Age 12 I readily drank to become anybody but who I was. It worked as long as I could be different. Eventually, around age 15 it began to become more difficult to be different ie even though drinking, the new me was becoming the status quo. By 18 it was over for me. No matter what I drank or drug I took, all I could do was get more surreal and insane, but I still felt like me. And the me that I felt was not authentic to me, even though it was on some important levels.
The 12 year old who wanted to escape, and successfully did was my baseline for being authentic. It gets complicated now though. The new me with alcohol became the old me again but now totally addicted and crazy to boot. I became surreal to myself. So, was I now authentically myself again, but just more deranged? I dunno.
Nowadays, I'm in a battle with myself questioning my own authenticity. This is a direct result of my amputation in 2012 which allows me physical freedom of movement and sensations that I last felt when I was 12. So for the last two years, my feelings have changed to a new kind of freedom. Between 1969 and 2012, I was physically unable to feel what I'm now feeling. Thee new feelings are in fact though causing me to reflect on some emotions and headspaces that I also haven't been with from 1969 to 2012.
Its a very surreal trip I'm going thru now, because for 43 years I've been unable to feel, think, and belief in what I'm now experiencing as authentic.
In a lot of ways, I'm lost to myself. For me, this is unendurable. I mean unendurable. My face is full with tears as I write these words.