Dear laeithia:

You are welcome to answer the above questions, or not. I don’t think it matters if you contact him or not, I mean, the relationship is over and has been over for some time, unlikely to resume, so if you contact him it will not damage a relationship because such doesn’t exist, and is highly unlikely to result in resuming a relationship, and even if it does, such a relationship is … highly unlikely to last.

Realistically, it doesn’t matter for your life and not only that, but your obsession with him is not likely to end as a result. But you are welcome to try (if you do decide to contact him, the questions I asked will be helpful for you to answer).

The nature of your obsession with this man, let’s look at it, yesterday’s post: “I know no matter what he will never apologize”- replace him with your mother and it is: I know no matter what, my mother will never apologize.

“and I will never get acknowledgement on his part of the pain he caused me”- replace, again: and I will never get acknowledgement of her part of the pain she caused me.

“I feel I have done a disservice to myself to have never spoken up for myself to him”, again, replace and adjusted: I feel I have done a disservice to myself to have never spoken up loud-and-clear for myself to her, and instead, pretending everything was fine.

“it has been almost a year now, and although I believe I have finally put the relationship behind me”- replaced and adjusted, again: it has been almost thirty years (or so) now and a few days since I talked to her some, and although I believe I put the relationship with my mother behind me, I really didn’t.

In summary: the conflict with your mother, that doesn’t feel “alive” for you, you don’t feel distressed by it, as if the matter is closed and doesn’t bother you anymore. But what happened in the reality of the neuropathways of your brain, is that she is replaced by this man and the conflict with her has been transferred and projected into him.

So you feel very much that the problem is about him, convinced it is, but it is not.

anita