I’m starting to realise how much of my life I’ve spent wearing a mask — not out of malice or manipulation, but as a way to be liked. To be safe. To be accepted.

At college, I notice I still do it.
I soften myself for certain people who I get a weird vibe from — over-extending to prove I’m okay. But underneath, I think I know they’ve already made their minds up about me. Maybe I trigger something in them. Maybe I remind them of something they’re not ready to face.

And then I catch myself — trying too hard to be light, to be liked.
Trying to make myself palatable.
It’s familiar.
Too familiar.

I used to do this all the time at university.
People used to say “You’re only real when you’re drunk.”
And they were probably right.

I drank to feel free.
To feel uninhibited.
To say and do what I couldn’t in the daylight.
But then I tipped too far.
I drank too much.
Got into fights.
Got kicked out of clubs.
Played the protector. Played the wildcard. Played the one people talked about the next day.

But none of it felt like me.
It was just the role I had taken on — because the people around me didn’t know how to love the real me.
And maybe I didn’t either.

I’d finally escaped my parents. But I didn’t know how to be free.
So I recreated the chaos I grew up in.
I found people who felt familiar.
Assertive, aggressive personalities that made me feel small — just like home.
And I played my part again. Quiet. Attuned. Hyper-vigilant.
Trying to stay safe in the system I already knew how to survive.

It’s only in the last few years I’ve learned to say:

“Nah. Fuck off. Get out of my life.”

Not from rage — but from clarity.
From finally understanding that I don’t owe anyone my compliance.
That I’ve only kept some people around because, unconsciously, they made me feel at home.
And home wasn’t safe.

It’s been an eight-year process. And I’m still unwinding it.
Still catching myself falling into roles that aren’t mine.
Still shedding the shame of being “fake” — because I wasn’t fake. I was just surviving.

Freud called it the repetition compulsion — reenacting our early dynamics because it feels familiar, even if it’s harmful.

And he was right.
But what Freud didn’t tell us is that we can stop.
We can wake up.
We can choose something different.

I’m doing that now.
Piece by piece.
Boundary by boundary.
Not perfectly, but with more awareness than ever before.

And if this is what real freedom feels like —
Then maybe, finally, I’m on my way home.