My Redeeming Moment on Facebook

As I am sure you are aware from previous posts, alot of my anxiety deals with feelings of rejection. I worry about people rejecting me and so I try to avoid it. I think the times in my life where someone has rejected me really scarred me and left deep wounds which later manifested as panic attacks and severe anxiety.

However, I had a really great experience with Facebook yesterday. Here's a little story about when I was just a girl. I have always been a bit boy crazy and when I was in elementary school, I had a huge mega crush on this one particular boy. Only problem, he wanted nothing to do with me. He was in love with this little girl that all the boys were in love with. She was French and had recently moved into the area. This boy even paid another boy to "ask me out" (at that age it was just a title of boyfriend/girlfriend but you didn't actually do anything) just so I would leave him alone. Oh the drama of 9 year olds. It's not like I was a stalker or anything. I don't remember even telling him that I liked him, but I must have been staring at him or something to give him the creeps. Also, being the youngest of 9 I was a bit neglected as a child so I never matched, always wore 10 year old hand-me-downs and my hair was probably a bit unkempt as well. Anyway, eventually the boy moved away and I went on to have other crushes and life moved on.


Yesterday I got a friend request on Facebook from this boy-now-man. I have no idea how he found me. I don't use my maiden name, and we have no mutual friends on facebook. It took me awhile to even figure out who he was. Here is the best part. He left me this message with the friend request:


"Am i wrong, or did we go to elementary school together? lol god, you look great:).".

What?!? Is this for real? It was such a good feeling of finally being accepted by someone who rejected me for so long. It felt like one of those wounds finally healed and disappeared.


The thing about Facebook or any social networking website is that its a place to say "This is who I am" and you have control over what pictures are listed and any other information you want to share. So of course me being the way I am, I am very picky to post only the best pictures and most of those pictures I have photoshopped (I do photography on the side) and let me tell you, photoshop can do wonders. I would never post a picture of the way I am right this minute- no shower, no makeup, in my pajamas. Everyone tries to show their best face on Facebook. It's your way of saying "I have arrived."

His comment really made me feel good about myself. What felt even better? I wasn't asking for it. I didn't look him up. He found me. My sister once told me the best revenge is not giving that person another thought. And I really hadn't in this scenario.

Although it felt really nice, the reality of life is that not everyone that rejects you will someday think you are great. And unfortunately there are a lot of people from my past that rejected me that I can't help but think about. I have dreams almost every night about being rejected over and over again by these people, never feeling good enough. And I will never heal if I continue to wait for that acceptance day that will never come.

I need to learn how to heal without their acceptance. To love myself even if others don't. To feel that I am good enough just the way that I am. And that is the hardest battle I struggle with everyday.

Has anyone else had similar experiences with Facebook or any other social networking site?

If you enjoyed this post Get the Reality of Anxiety via RSS or Email