I'm a Girl, and I'm Allowed to Have Butterflies.

The Girly Man had no excuse for the "butterflies in my tummy" comment, but I would argue that it's a totally different story when the little bastards are flitting around in mine. I'm a girl. I overthink stuff, especially when it comes to dating, but about other things too.

When I have a crush (to use 7th grade language), I simultaneously love and hate the way it makes me feel (Nervous AND excited. Eeks.) And then I go into massive overthinking mode, where I think I said something a little bit wrong via text message, or I forgot to emoticon it so my tone didn't come off exactly right, and he's probably mad at me now. ("He" is the universal he...Not a particular one, I'm guilty of this type of overthinking pretty much any time I let myself get even the slightest bit emotionally involved.)

So I literally run myself ragged (in my head) until it gets cleared up, which it almost always does, and then I feel stupid for a second, then happy that it's all fine. That is, happy and fine until the next time it takes 3 hours to return a message, even though I KNOW he's busy with whatever task is happening that particular day, and maybe, oh just maybe, my stupid little text message isn't as important as the task. At least not right that second.

Sigh.

I'd like to say that one of these days, I'm going to learn how to not let the emotions creep in, at least not right away. But I think as women, we're hard-wired such that our emotions define are who we are at that particular moment in time. I know that I'm a totally different personality when I'm calm, cool, and relaxed, but there's another girl that comes out of the woodwork when I'm stressed and anxious. It's like a light switch--fine one second, then freaking out (internally, anyway), the next.

This is the thing that's really interesting about me. Most people who know me think I'm pretty collected the majority of the time. Those who know me well can probably see glimmers of the other me from time to time, but on the surface, I think I usually look pretty much fine. It's a tough battle to wage when the world expects that level-headed person most of the time...especially on the days when I don't really feel like I have my act together, and guess what, I might not have it together tomorrow either.

I get anxious about new relationships. I get anxious about money (mostly because I never have that much). I get anxious about work. (See "anxious about money" as a reference here. Ha.)

There are effing nervous butterflies in my stomach all the time, and it sucks. Calm | Cool | Collected?? Not always.

Are you following me yet? I know for a fact that more than 15 people read this! If not for me, do it for the poor butterflies. :)

PS: Not totally related, but this happens to be one of my favorite songs. Seemed appropriate, given the post's title.