Needless/Wantless

All living things have needs. (Primarily food, the irony of which will be addressed shortly.) It doesn't matter if you're a houseplant, a toucan, or a chemical engineer, you require certain things to live and thrive. This isn't just a human thing, it's a universal one.

I happen to hate having needs. At some point in my formative years I learned to equate need with weakness. Weakness was unacceptable to me, therefore my needs were unacceptable. My child-self didn't understand the universality of need. She just saw a sucking void of childishness, selfishness, and dependence. Stop needing, she told herself. So she did.

Little did she know that some of those critical needs are community, compassion, and support, and those are not weak, they're wonderful. Look at any sitcom on television since the dawn of technology. Characters and their friends. Lucy had Ethel. DJ had Kimmy. Rachel had Monica and the gang. Even Walter White had Jesse, dysfunctional as their relationship was. People need people. We need another presence to acknowledge our existence, our joy, our pain. The needless me refuted this as utter nonsense. She still does on most days.

I want to do it all on my own. I want to take care of business. I want to be an Independent Woman, damnit, who can make it after all. Mary Tyler Moore with tattoos. ("But Mary had Rhoda!" Shut it.) But here's the thing. I can't.

I can't do life on my own. It pains me to admit it. It pokes at the very core of my identity - a lone survivor, a self-made girl, a paragon of Teflon and grit. But admit it I must. Remember those basic needs, like food? Yeah, I can't really do that. I don't know how to feed myself. Twenty years of anorexia have obliterated my ability to meet my most basic biological demands. And emotions! PLEASE! What are those?

I've finally reached a point where it's abundantly clear - even to me - that I need my TRIBE. I need people. Being needless may seem cool in a James Dean, The Outsiders, aviator-glasses-and-unfiltered-cigarette way, but it's not sustainable. All those sitcoms touched people because they reflected the value of community. Of togetherness. I need that. I need to look in someone's eyes and say, "I'm a disaster today," and have that person say, "Girl, you're a disaster every day, but I love you anyway and I'm right here beside you."

I need. You need. We need each other. If you've ever been ashamed of your needs, please know that you're not alone. If you're lonely, please know that there are people like me all over the planet praying for you and sending you love. If you're struggling, like me, to figure out how to eat, you need only reach out your hand. Someone will take it. If you're grappling with something else - perfectionism, addiction, despair, whatever - please know that you're just like that houseplant and that toucan and that chemical engineer. You're ALIVE. And there is love out there just waiting to wrap you up and bring you home.