Hi Anita,

I am not entirely sure what happened as I was a child with my relationship with my parents, I was my parents only girl so they tended to favor me more, but was also the middle child and may not have always had all the attention, or I got too much and just wanted more time alone. My dad tended to be absent in stages of my life due to work but I would still see him at night. I was described as a happy baby and child, rarely cried always smiled and I guess that was true until I was about 5, and I think that was when my relationship with people changed when I started school and peers my age tended to bully me from then on. I cannot remember a year I didn’t have problems with kids in my class. I think I have always been a bit reserved, I tended to have one or two friends at a time but I had the same friends throughout elementary school. Then when I got into middle school I struggled a bit more in hanging out with the same people until by the time I reached high school my friend expiration date was about 9 months. Well, it was more of a rotational thing, that I would go back to friends from 2 or so years ago.

I think the seal of the deal may have been when I was in high school, I was forming a really strong bond with two people. At the time, the three of us were all going through depression stages (teenage year, ya know) and the two of them would always be talking about how hard their life was and I kept all my difficulties to myself because I didn’t want to be their burden. I would try so hard to be something that they could be happy about and they didn’t see it that way, they only wanted to be sad. Well around the same time one of my friends started doing drugs (and lied to me that she wasn’t), I opened up to my other friend about who I was and tried to move onto more deeper conversations. Two weeks later he straight up refused to talk to me and started to ignore me. Worst was the fact that I knew he was suicidal, he said that when he would graduate and after all his friends would finally leave him he would kill himself. He purposely tried to push me away so he had that excuse. And I had to live with the fear that if I didn’t do something that I would have been that person that let him die. I always had that battle on sending his parents or a teacher a letter explaining his situation or keeping his secrets. But when time passed and I called his bluff, I knew he caused me enough pain I let him go. He is fine now, I think, its been 6 years or so since then,
But I think he is the reason I cannot trust people. Even though I may have always had something that made it difficult to connect to people, he reinforced that with fear. I don’t want to be put through that pain again, I don’t want to trust someone enough to open up and then feel rejected.

And then 2 years ago, I thought I found someone else I could open up to, and I feel that even though I wanted to be ready to be a good friend and finally start meaningful relationships, I couldn’t do it. I was most likely rejected because of it.

I don’t know Anita, that is just my thoughts on my poor connections, I have always been a bit bad with connecting with people for what ever reason and my experience as a teen sure didn’t help. I am not entirely sure the roots of it but I can tell you where the trunk is.

What are your thoughts?

Laure