Do You Miss Me?

Recently, my nearly-15-year-old son informed me that he was dead – that is the old ‘he’ was dead anyway. Apparently, he seems to think that whoever it is he used to be no longer exists and he is now a totally new person with no traces left of who he used to be. Then he went on to ask me, "Do you miss me?" Now I didn’t know what it was he was really trying to say or what reaction he was looking to get from me, but it certainly got me to thinking.

How often do things happen in our lives that change who we are, perhaps even result in the death of a part of us?

When we are laughed at or made fun of, does it kill our self-confidence?
When we are injured after doing something risky, does the risk-taker in us become overly cautious?
When we are cheated on by a partner, does the trusting part of us become hard and untrusting?
When we are taken advantage of, do we lose our naivety?
When we enter into a physical relationship with another, is our innocence gone?

I think it's fair to say that events in our lives constantly change who we are. We are affected by the choices we make and the things that happen to us. We are not the same person today that we were ten years ago. And in ten years from now, we will be different still. But does that mean the who we once were is dead and gone?

I know that I have changed from the person I used to be. Sometimes it makes me a little sad to think that because of things that have happened in my life, I have become less trusting and that I am no longer surprised when someone lets me down. I admit to having become somewhat hardened, and that I am less likely to give all of myself for fear of setting myself up to be hurt. There are some parts of me that could probably be considered gone and replaced by something different.

But is it all bad? Perhaps parts of me needed to die in order for me to grow and become a better person. Maybe I needed to be a stronger person, and the events in my life have forced me to adapt and develop the tougher shell I needed. Perhaps being a little hardened and requiring someone to earn my trust isn’t all bad. Being cautious after experiencing an injury may have prevented me from being even more seriously injured. And maybe having been hurt by others has made me more compassionate and less likely to do the same.

Yeah, I’ve changed-in some ways for the better, and in some ways, not. There are some qualities about the old me that I miss, but there are other qualities that I am happy to see gone. And, there are things about the new me that I would not want to change, even if it meant I could go back and undo the negative experience in my life that resulted in that new part of my personality. I’m different, but is the old me truly gone? I don’t think so. At the core, I am who I am. I may grow and change as I experience life, but I believe that, even if it is buried deep within my memory, the old me still exists in some form. And I think that if my son were to look a little deeper, he would also find that the old ‘he’ is still there too.