Learning to Dance with Myself Again

I’ve considered what to write here. I’ve had ideas for a million articles. For a while, even, my creativity and output was fecund. I had started a schedule, had the creative energy most of the time to write and produce.

You’ve found me, Reader, at a point of silence for the past few months. I could not fathom writing for Substack during this chaos engulfing me. And so I kept my pen tethered to the desk and took to my bed for far longer than I should have.

For a little over a year, I was enchanted by a kind man who was very loving and sweet. He was the first man who seemed to love me for me, silly goth and weirdo I am.

It was my first relationship, as I found tethering myself to people offline to be too frightening, so I never took more than a brief foray into online dating, swiping through profile after profile. I was too shy to even query a person I knew about dating or the like. And I had just come out as asexual, which I still identify as.

In December of 2024, I never would have thought I would have entered a lovely relationship that made me feel more alive than I ever had in my 40 years. I was truly happy for the first time in my life, though my PTSD and bipolar issues often got in the way of that happiness. By the end of 2025, I thought I would spend a long time with this man, a sizable portion of the rest of my life.

But January has a way of freezing the heart, perhaps, of bringing a sad clarity the holidays obscure with their cheer and merriment. It started to slip for sure, then. It started to slip, but I wanted to hold firm even though I knew in my heart it wasn’t something that could continue.

I wanted to go to graduate school, as has been my dream for so long. I applied to two universities, and meant to apply to three, but remembered his pushback. How he hated grad school and snarked on my plans to get a philosophy PhD. When I mentioned it, he would frown and go silent. I didn’t tell him I didn’t apply out of state because I wanted to still be with him.

And other things started falling apart. I was trying to take care of myself, as I had spent a year in therapy tailored to my responses in the relationship, so that I could get better in the relationship, and so that we could maybe have better communication. I had begun to worry every day if I had made him upset or if I made him happy and I began to feel more and more of myself vanish, and to feel unhappy, myself.

He stopped being demonstrative. I watched as certain things I loved about him began to change. And I am sure things about me began to change as well. I was not as affectionate and the panic attacks came back and increased. I was trapped, even as I was hoping to work on myself. It was my goal of the new year as the relationship began to crumble.

I became so unhappy living a solitary existence with someone I was convinced no longer cared for me. By March, the relationship was dissolved.

While I am older, I am still incredibly naive. I had never experienced a breakup with someone I might see again. I had never been in a situation where I couldn’t leave, even though it was over. Finances and a lack of stable employment have kept me there, and even though he remains kind, I still feel the discomfort and the sadness for what once was.

So, I have been unable to pick up the pen. Honestly, I’ve been unable to get out of bed many days. I am slowly starting to pick myself up from the floor and to sew myself back together, like Sally from The Nightmare Before Christmas. And while I no longer have a Jack in my life, I still have myself, and I have always been good at figuring a way out.

On World Goth Day, I am sad that I do not have anyone with whom to dance. It brings tears to my eyes to consider it, because I loved dancing with him. But I will have to find the heart again to dance with myself. And I will, soon.

Thank you for reading this and any other pieces I’ve written. I try to keep everything free to the public, but invite you to tip me at Ko-Fi, whose button you can find below. Thank you.

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