Dear Pandanator:

You are welcome and thank you for being here!

“It has been extremely stressful with one thing after another, a potential cancer“- has cancer been ruled out?

“I tend to try to believe that everyone deep down is a good person“- everyone deep down is a good person, but in too many people (and 1 is too many), that good-person deep inside is trapped, mute and powerless, deep inside a bad person. (am not saying that he is a bad person)

I am the one adding the boldface feature selectively in the following quote: “Based on the conversation, he seemed to be confused.. The whole relationship he was just very confused and was a hot/cold person. He would be super happy to see me one day and then a week later seemed like he wanted nothing to do with me and was always judging me”-

– seems to me that he had a parent who unexpectedly changed from good (affectionate, supportive) to bad (hostile, abusive) and he projected that parent into you, shifting from seeing you as good (and responding to his perception of you as good by being super happy to see you, acting hot), and seeing you as bad (and responding to his perception of you as bad by acting like he wanted nothing to do with you, acting cold).

His confusion may very well be about who you are, good or bad, friendly or hostile; a confusion that’s a result of his projection of a parent into you, and therefore not being able to clearly see who you are. It is very common for a person to project a parent into a romantic partner.

“I do feel very guilty over blocking him as I do believe he is a good person…  he was super friendly the week before when I snapped and told him to stop playing games…  All I can think is I am probably not as good as the other girl he ended up with”-

– think, if you will, that he was possibly projecting an abusive parent into you, and his behavior was not .. about you. If I am correct, then he will do a similar kind of projection into his new girlfriend.

“I do tend to be a chronic overthinker and an anxious-attachment person. It is something I want to work on. I am really trying not to think about the whole thing but it is quite an enigma“- an enigma that can be solved if you knew about his childhood. You know how your childhood is powerful in your current, adult life (causing your chronic overthinking and anxious attachment style), do you..?  Same about  his childhood.

What do you think?

anita