I've Diagnosed My Soul as Claustrophobic

On love, freedom, and the low-key panic of maybe wanting more than one kind of life

I recently contemplated spending $400 to be alone for three nights in a neighboring city. Not because I needed rest or because I was sad - just because I have grown bored of myself in this zip code. Maybe I’ve been reading too much Anais Nin and I’ve grown moody. Or maybe it’s because I am so routine that I start to feel the confinement of the box I live in.

I’m familiar with the contradiction: craving both stability and wildness. I notice this rebellious spirit surface in the same predictable forms. “Maybe we should go out and have a beer tonight.” “Maybe we should download a dating app”. Sometimes I think what I want is romance, but really I just want to be surprised by something. Anything. A new face, a new street, a reason to get dressed up. The unknown.

But every time I follow that feeling, it ends in disappointment. I know the outcome so it’s called insanity to repeat, right? So now I ask myself how I can meet that craving for connection in a way that doesn’t lead to the same anticlimactic Thursday. Tonight, I’m writing to you- all of the stuff I could never tell a barstool, or Brad, who’s most brilliant question is “sup?”

Lately, I’ve been noticing how fucking weird age feels. Today, I went to my nephews eighth grade graduation. Aside from holidays, I could count on my fingers the minutes we’ve spent together. And yet, there I was- probably the only person in the cafeteria who wasn’t 14 or a parent- and definitely the one trying hardest to hold back tears. I imagined what it must be like to see your little world expand and grow until it becomes a universe of it’s own - how beautiful and terrifying that must be.

In the last year, I’ve started wanting things I once couldn’t imagine myself caring about. Things I didn’t understand when others desired them. I’m not even sure I want them now. Maybe the part of me that clings to structure wants this future. And the wildness that whispers run…doesn’t.

Truth is, the desire is there. But the readiness isn’t.

I think what scares me most isn’t love or commitment - it’s what might happen to me inside of it. Because even if the box is bigger, a shared life, a partner, maybe even a family - it’s still a box. Even if it’s lined with affection, self awareness, and keeps Celcius in the fridge for me. Even if it’s the kind of box people post about with sepia-toned joy and matching pajamas.

I worry I’ll outgrow it. Or worse- I won’t, I’ll shrink to fit.

And I’ve recently been diagnosed with claustrophobia of the soul.

I’ve always needed space. Not just physical space, but the kind that leaves room for reinvention. I don’t want to live a life where awe shrinks, where adventure fades, where the parts of me I love quietly dissolve. I don’t want to become someone who stops seeking the unknown. I like the ache of maybe, the tease of not yet. I like wrestling with the questions more than the answers which halts all the play. And I’m not sure the box - any box - has room for all of that.

So for now, I’m just making room - for the part of me that longs, resists, and still believes something expansive is possible - even if that expansiveness just keeps looking like me torn between a brewery and a dating app.

Thanks for keeping me in this tonight,

Bre