Blaming it on hormones...

This is a little rant. It means little to nothing but I wanted to get it off and send it out into the nether to quit plaguing me. 

I remember a time, before puberty, when I was absolutely sure of everything. I was in sync with my body and my decisions. I knew what I wanted to eat, what I wanted to wear, and how to feel about any person or thing. I slept when I wanted to sleep. I knew what I knew. And then puberty changed all that.

I remember thinking that trope where the girl goes through several different outfits because none of them feel right was so stupid. I'll never be that girl. And of course, I was wrong. I had opinions but I was constantly wrong or had to rethink them to adapt. Suddenly nothing tasted correct and I couldn't keep friendships to save my life. I was "too much" all the time. And it took at least an hour for me to fall asleep every night.

And because I was so young, I had no knowledge, no intuition to back up what I knew or felt. So I had to keep telling myself "don't say that because you probably don't actually mean it". And it made me so quiet. And so frustrated. And even now, decades later, I don't feel like anyone *knows me* because I don't convey who I am enough.

Don't get me wrong, I can speak out now. But I always cut myself short before I reveal too much because I rely so heavily on that prompting. I've been "too much" and then "too little". Does anyone actually care? No- of course they don't.

And it's friggin' cruel. It feels like I was cut in half. One side of my brain resisting the other. And what the *** are hormones for otherwise? And this is supposed to be natural?

Where is that bold little girl who got on her bike and rode through hay fields, bugbites and wheat-whips be damned, she was going to buy candy with the allowance from the grocery store and then eat it under a magnolia tree? Now she's frustrated and exasperated all the time...and if she has to go to the grocery store at all, it's going to ruin the day. Not because anything happened...but my own brain is going to put me in a funk of hormonal indecision and misery.