My friends are all very different people. I don’t have a “friend mode” I can sink into the way I have a “teacher mode”. Some of my friends are perverts of the most extreme stripe. Some of my friends are conservative Evangelicals. Some of my friends are immigrants and they find my behavior to be absolutely unpredictable and odd.

All of these people like me for me. Not for what I do for them. There are periods of time where I do jack shit for people. I don’t provide food. I don’t go help move furniture. I don’t babysit.

I still have friends.

Some of my friends I can talk to nearly daily. Some of them it needs to be a few hours in a year and that’s ok.

There is no one way to be my friend. I would be sad if all of my relationships tried for some kind of “equality”.

My relationships are healthy and strong when I like myself and I like my friends and they like themselves and they like me. Things fall down when I hate myself. I create problems that don’t need to be there. I’m tense and argumentative. I’m prone to bait people just to be a shit.

If I want to continue these beautiful friendships, if I want to keep the chosen family I have created for myself… that is complicated. I can’t blow things up when I’m pissy. I have to proactively talk about problems and find solutions.

I wish that didn’t require 99% of my mental capacity. Some days I feel like I only have about 7% going spare.

But parenting has taught me that there is never again going to be an easier stage. “I want the solution to be easier” will probably never happen again. My life is hard and it could totally get harder. I need to be stronger. I need to have more patience. The problems are not going to get easier for me so that I can stop growing.

And that’s ok. I accept that deal. I even embrace it.

I will find a way to create the healthy boundaries that will allow my beautiful friendships to continue. I will figure out how to move the slider from 4 hours a day to 4 hours a year without being upset about it. No one is being nasty by having their own needs and boundaries. No one.

We are loving each other by saying, “Hey this doesn’t work for me” and giving the other person a chance to adjust. Even though on some days my boundaries are not perfectly observed… all of the people who truly sucked at that have been ejected. I don’t put up with shit. Ok, I put up with a little shit. Because human beings will always give a little bit of shit.

Even Sarah gets on my nerves and she’s the least irritating person I’ve ever fucking met.

Me getting frustrated is about me. And the only person in this entire world that I have the power to change:

Me.

Do you know what I want to say to every single person I know right now? I love you. We’ll find a way. Because I need to know you are in the world. Even if the way is, “Krissy I’m sick of talking to you. You can follow me on social media but shut up about it.”

That is an option.