am i different?

I’m not different, am I?

I’ve been asking myself this question ever since I was as young as six years old. “You’re too sensitive”, “you’re too much”, “you talk too much” “you’re weird”. I know, corny right? You see, I still had friends and all. Afterall, I learned quite early on what parts of myself I needed to slightly alter to fit in. But even my own friends bullied me, or eventually distanced themselves from me. I was always trying to Find new ways to reinvent myself. There was lots of trial and error. Sometimes I altered myself completely, other times slightly, but the older I grew and the more mature I became, the more I rebelled against society’s demands and remained true to my core. Yet in spite of it all, very rarely did I drop my guard in front of someone completely. This included the parts of me that were vulnerable, that were considered ‘chaotic’ or ‘annoying’. It is only when I am serious and melancholic that I feel like I am accepted. I’ve spent my whole life being convinced that the rest of the world are just denying themselves of their inner child, of their playfulness, of their light and that I am one of the few who have maintained that inner child. But what if that’s just a story I like to tell myself to cover up the fact that I am too neurodivergent to ever be fully accepted by the people around me? What if all of the quirks and childishness and authenticity are nothing more but symptoms of being too different for this world to ever be considered ‘normal’? This sounds like a silly teenager questioning their identity, labeling themselves different. Yeah, I know. But it’s actually quite triggering for me. Because you see, I have spent my entire life questioning my identity and why I have such a hard time finding people who accept me entirely for me. People who love me as deeply as I love them. People who care as deeply as I do. I did question myself to be autistic at one point, but with autism, there is the whole idea of being antisocial, which I would disagree with, because I quite crave human connection. I was also a very calm baby as my mother told me, which means I wasn’t really exhibiting any signs back then of being abnormal. I then question if it’s the trauma that has made me this way. But there wasn’t much trauma I could recollect at six years old, which is when I first began to get excluded from my peers. I have always yearned for true connection, whether it’s through friends or romance. My mommy always told me it’s because everyone I met didn’t have as big of a heart as me. She has tried her best to assure me that there is nothing wrong with me. That I just haven’t met my people. But sometimes, all it takes is for someone to point out how energetic I am, or how much I can talk, and suddenly I am six years old again asking myself why I always feel like I have to chase the acceptance of my peers. Why it doesn’t just come naturally. Why I have to restrict so much of my most authentic self so that others can accept me. Why I have to have such strong emotions in the first place. I have been trying to convince myself that it’s a blessing I can feel so strongly, but in the back of my head resides a little voice that whispers to me that I will never be normal enough to be loved and accepted to the same extent that other ‘normal’ or ‘neurotypical’ people get loved and accepted. I have fully accepted myself, but sometimes, I sit back and wonder how much less alone I’d feel if I didn’t have a constant nagging feeling that something is inherently different about me.