So this is gonna be a wild ride... Years ago I had someone who had offered to be a father figure for me when my own father was tw abusive, he was always there to listen and help me and let me vent whenever I wanted. Girlfriend steps in, says she isn't comfortable with our dynamic, he disappears and refuses to speak to me by her request, years later, we're talking again and I finally get her to understand it's not a kink and merely a sort of emotional support thing in which I consider him my father figure. She reveals to me that, contrary to what he had told me years before when I asked if I was being clingy (he had said he just wanted to do better for me as a parent) that now, he felt uncomfortable with me and thought I was clingy.

I ask my friend if I'm clingy, she mentions boundaries, and suddenly my world turns upside down. What? It's like a new concept to me. I always felt I could vent to my friends when I needed some help, to hug and have some comfort and always be ready to give it back and be as supportive I could to them in return. I always thought it was mutual. I would always respect if they're busy, but I would also be very what I considered to be very emotionally open to them (which what I'm learning may have just been dumping) even though I'd always ask if it was ok...

I'm slowly learning. Of course I won't wanna take up their time, but the one thing bothering me is the whole "Sometimes people don't want you to talk to them about certain things. They have every right not to want to talk or listen to you talk about tw: self harm, suicide, trauma. One thing was that in venting, it's important not to repeat things over and over again. Just my luck that my OCD and way of coping is to repeat things over and over again when talking about something. As well as the feeling "People don't want someone who's negative all the time."

My mom, whenever I would tell her I feel sad or when I'd start crying or even told her I was upset by something, wouldn't listen. She'd roll her eyes or look annoyed at me or tell me to "take my negative vibes somewhere else", that kind of thing. So with my friends, it'd always make me feel good when I was allowed to feel sad or angry or anything by their side, leaning on them when I needed and feeling welcome. I especially hated wanting to talk to her about something and her getting mad at me for it, so I just felt like I had to be extra careful with what I brought up and how.

Now that I'm learning about boundaries, I feel like that idyllic comfortability in all my relationships are being threatened by the following thoughts.

"I won't be able to feel as emotionally free with them anymore."
"But I like to feel comfortable and safe with my friends."
"I thought I was doing okay by doing as much as I could to return their help."
"So they won't want me when I'm sad...?"
"They'll just push away my feelings?"
"Am I not allowed to lean on them?"
"I can't talk to them as openly anymore?"
"Am I gonna have to be careful with everything I say?"

I know this is supposed to be healthy. I know this is what relationships are supposed to be like. But for some reason it's just starting to upset me thinking what I thought was alright and what made me feel happiest and most comfortable is all wrong and that I'll have to feel restricted and unsafe, essentially the same walking on eggshells feeling with my mom.

All this starts to spiral into a thought of "If I can't be happy the way I am, if my disorder makes me so toxic and unbearable to other people, then why am I still here? Doesn't this mean I'm not meant to be here if I can't feel or act like others?" And it all just starts to feel awful.