A blog post by Elena Overfield | Formerly Pepetoe

I have wasted an extraordinary amount of time wondering whether I’m asking for too much. In relationships, friendships, work, even from my own body. I seem to have this instinct to ask “am I being difficult?” before I ask “is this actually reasonable?”. I’m learning that there is a massive difference between these two questions, so let’s get into it.

I have spent years trying to be “easy”

So much time I have wasted trying to be everything I’m kinda really not:

Easygoing.

Understanding.

Flexible.

Fine with plans changing.

Fine with slow replies.

Fine with taking something else on.

Fine with doing a little more.

Fine.

Fine.

Fine.

Until suddenly I’m absolutely fucking not fine. Constantly trying to be low-maintenance doesn’t make your needs disappear. It just means they go underground until resentment, anxiety or exhaustion drags them back up.

Wanting consistency isn’t unreasonable

I’ve had to learn that there are things I genuinely need from close relationships, and these things I have also learnt are basically the bare minimum: communication, effort, consistency, affection, reassurance, knowing where I stand.

Those things don’t automatically make me needy. So, when I’ve been shut down (particularly in relationships), being called “too needy” when all I’m asking is for the fucking bare min? Believe me I’ve learnt to walk away from that – and this year I did, and I couldn’t be more proud of myself for doing that. Constantly trying to make yourself smaller for someone, especially a guy, is exhausting, and unfortunately, it does take that last guy to mess you around in the same way you’ve had before to realise “what the fuck am I doing?”

I’ve also had to learn the other half of this lesson this year, in that having a need doesn’t automatically obligate somebody else to meet it. Sometimes the other person simply can’t meet it, and you have to ask yourself if you are happy being around that person. Sometimes it’s sad, in the way that they are dealing with so much right now, and can’t be there for you (that’s when communication needs to step in, and believe me I’ve not even had that in certain relationships!).

When someone can’t meet that need, maybe it’s not that you need a compromise. Maybe it’s that you have to accept incompatibility. It hurts, it really fucking hurts. This way, though, is the way to learn who is right for you, in friendships and relationships, and the kind of people you want to hang around.

I am allowed to take up some fucking space

Maybe that’s what I’m actually learning. I don’t have to shrink my needs until nobody could possibly find them inconvenient. I don’t have to become endlessly accommodating to make myself easier to love. I can ask, and they can answer. Then I can decide what that answer means for me.

Sometimes my anxiety will make a reasonable need feel urgent. Sometimes I will need to regulate myself rather than ask somebody else to do it for me. I’m learning that distinction too. What I want you to also know is that having emotions isn’t a character defect. Having expectations doesn’t make me demanding. Having boundaries doesn’t make me difficult. I am allowed to “require” things from the relationships I choose to remain in.

And if that makes me incompatible with somebody? Maybe incompatibility isn’t the same thing as being too much.