A blog by Elena Overfield, Formerly Pepetoe

I have spent an embarrassing amount of my life worrying about whether people like me. Not in the casual, normal, I hope I made a good impression kind of way. I mean really worrying. Are they annoyed with me? Was that message different? Have I done something? Why haven’t they replied? Are we okay? Do they still like me?Are they going to leave? Beneath all of those questions, there has always been the same, much scarier one: What does it say about me if they do?

The thing is, I don’t think I’ve ever experienced rejection as simply rejection; I’ve experienced it as evidence. Evidence that I wasn’t enough, that somebody else was easier to love, that they’d finally figured me out, that I was too complicated, too emotional, too needy, too much, that somewhere along the way I’d failed whatever invisible test you apparently have to pass to make somebody stay. When you spend your life being terrified that people might leave you, you become incredibly focused on keeping them. Even the ones you probably shouldn’t.

I think I’ve always been scared of being the one left behind

I can’t pinpoint one enormous event that made me scared of abandonment. There wasn’t one dramatic childhood moment where everybody disappeared and suddenly I became this way. It was smaller than that. Little experiences. Comparisons. People leaving. Feeling different. Feeling like other people found belonging more naturally than I did. I’ve wondered recently whether part of that was because not trying felt safer than discovering I wasn’t good enough.

Then friendships ended. People who felt permanent stopped being permanent, and every time someone left, I think my brain quietly added it to the file marked: See? People eventually leave you. So, I learnt to cling a little harder. To overanalyse, to fix, to smooth things over, to forgive, to keep doors slightly open, to desperately want everyone to be okay with me. Why? Well, somebody disliking me never felt like: “Oh well. We don’t get on.” It felt like: “What did I do wrong?”

I’ve spent so much time wondering whether people want me that I forgot to ask whether I want them

This has been one of the biggest revelations of my year, and it sounds so ridiculously simple now. I get a fucking vote too! I have spent years entering relationships and friendships thinking: Do they like me? Do they want me around? Do they think I’m annoying? Will they stay?

Do they think I’m annoying?Will they invite me?

Somewhere in all of that anxiety, I forgot some fairly important questions: Do I like them? Do I like how I feel around them? Do I trust them? Do they make me feel safe? Do they respect me? Can I be myself around them? Do they take accountability when they hurt me? Am I maintaining this relationship because I genuinely value it, or because losing somebody feels like failure?

That’s a very uncomfortable question, because sometimes the answer has been the latter.

I don’t need everybody to like me anymore

I think school teaches us a bizarre social rule that takes years to unlearn. You exist inside this tiny ecosystem of the same people. The same corridors, same friendship groups, same parties, same gossip, same people every Monday morning whether you like them or not. So, falling out with somebody feels enormous, as it feels like you can’t really escape them. Then, there becomes this pressure to maintain appearances – to “get on,” to keep things “civil,” to avoid being disliked, to make sure everybody’s okay with everybody.

Except… I’m not in school anymore. Hell, it’s been 5 years! I don’t have to be friends with someone simply because we exist in vaguely adjacent social circles. I don’t have to desperately repair every friendship that breaks. I don’t need everybody I meet to think I’m lovely, and I am allowed to meet somebody and simply think: You’re not my person. No villain required. No enormous betrayal. No exposé. No dramatic argument.

Sometimes two people simply aren’t meant to occupy significant space in each other’s lives, and that’s okay. We don’t need to force it, we don’t need to ask for closure. We can simply learn to just move away from it.

Not everybody deserves permanent access to me

This has probably been one of my biggest mindset changes recently. History is not a contract. Wow, that’s a powerful statement. Somebody being important to me once does not guarantee them permanent access to me. Knowing somebody for ten years doesn’t automatically earn them year eleven. Having incredible memories with somebody doesn’t mean I have to tolerate the person they’ve become. Loving somebody doesn’t mean I have to like how they treat me. I think understanding why somebody behaves badly doesn’t mean I have to accept the behaviour.

I think I’ve previously confused empathy with obligation. I can understand that someone is struggling. I can understand their trauma. I can understand why they react the way they do. I can understand that they probably didn’t intend to hurt me, and still say: I don’t want this in my life anymore.

Those two things can coexist.

Sometimes “enough” really is enough

I’ve also learnt that I don’t need a courtroom-standard case against somebody before I’m allowed to distance myself. I don’t need twelve screenshots. Three witnesses. A PowerPoint presentation. A million comments on a TikTok post. A unanimous jury verdict.

Sometimes there isn’t one enormous event. Sometimes it’s fifty small ones. Sometimes it’s the way somebody consistently makes you feel. Sometimes it’s noticing that you’re anxious every time their name appears on your phone. Sometimes it’s realising you’re constantly making excuses for them. Sometimes it’s realising you’ve had the same conversation repeatedly and nothing changes. And… sometimes you simply reach a point where something inside you says: Enough. I’m allowed to listen to that. We’re all allowed to listen to that, it doesn’t make you cruel.

This isn’t about cutting everyone off the second they fuck up

There’s an uncomfortable irony here. I have made mistakes. Big ones. I have hurt people, and I’ve spent a huge amount of time learning that the worst thing I’ve ever done does not necessarily define everything I am.

So, I cannot simultaneously demand infinite grace for myself and zero grace for everybody else. People fuck up. People say the wrong thing. People misunderstand us. People behave selfishly. People hurt us without intending to. People go through difficult periods and become versions of themselves they aren’t proud of.

I’ve been that person.

So, this isn’t “cross me once and you’re dead to me”, (although sometimes I wish that was a valid ploy here!) Doing this isn’t necessarily strength either. Sometimes that’s just fear wearing a leather jacket. The lesson I’m trying to learn is discernment. Was this a mistake or a pattern? Did they take responsibility? Did their behaviour change? Do I trust them? Do I believe the relationship can be repaired? Perhaps most importantly: Do I actually want to repair it? Because, sometimes the answer is yes, and sometimes, even when repair might theoretically be possible, the answer is simply “no, I don’t want this anymore.”

Walking away isn’t always cruel

This one has been difficult for me because I know what being left feels like. I know what it’s like to wonder why you weren’t enough. I know what it’s like to replay conversations searching for the exact moment everything changed. So, being the person who walks away can feel horrible. Though I am slowly learning that ending a relationship doesn’t automatically mean condemning the other person.

I can think somebody has good qualities and not want them in my life. I can remember somebody fondly and still know we’re better apart. I can care about somebody and maintain a boundary. I can even love somebody and leave. Maybe understanding that from this side has helped me understand something enormous about all the times I’ve been left too.

Because when I decide somebody isn’t right for my life anymore, I’m not necessarily saying “you are worthless.” I’m saying “this relationship isn’t right for me.” So, maybe every person who has walked away from me wasn’t issuing the devastating verdict I imagined either. Maybe rejection isn’t always that you’re not good enough. Maybe sometimes it’s simply that the two of you aren’t good together, and those are profoundly different things.

Someone leaving me doesn’t determine my worth

This might be the lesson hiding underneath the lesson. I’ve spent years believing that being chosen proves something. Someone wants me, therefore I’m desirable. Someone loves me, therefore I’m lovable. Someone stays, therefore I’m worth staying for.

However, there’s a problem with building your self-worth on other people’s decisions. If somebody else can give you your worth, they can also take it away. So, I’m trying to stop treating relationships like referendums on whether I’m a good enough person. Someone loving me doesn’t create my worth, which means somebody leaving cannot destroy it.

I get a vote too

Maybe this is what I want to carry forward most. I want to stop entering relationships auditioning – whether it’s for myself to finally be “good enough”, or for the other person, I’m not too sure. It’s probably the former.

I don’t want every friendship to become: please choose me. I don’t want every relationship to become: please don’t discover a reason to leave, or please don’t discover a reason to leave. I want to start asking things like “are we choosing each other?” Do we both make an effort? Do we both feel respected? Do we both feel safe? Do we both actually want to be here?

If the answer eventually becomes no, I want to trust myself enough to accept that, because I spent so many years learning how to survive being left that nobody ever told me another lesson would eventually become equally important: learning when to leave.

earning when to leave.

I don’t need to keep everyone. I don’t need universal approval. I don’t need to maintain relationships simply because ending them scares me. I don’t need to convince somebody to treat me properly. Most importantly, I don’t need to hate someone before I’m allowed to walk away from them.

People will leave my life, and I will leave other people’s lives. That’s not necessarily failure. Sometimes it’s simply what happens when human beings grow, change, fuck up, forgive, learn and finally become honest about what they want.

Ok, sure, I’m still scared of abandonment, but I don’t think that disappears because I’ve written a few revelations in a journal. Truthfully though, I do think something has changed. Now, when that family voice asks “what if they leave me?” I’m starting to answer with another question – “do I actually want them to stay?” Sometimes, wonderfully and terrigyingly, the answer is a big fat no.