Dear Robi:

What you wrote in the last paragraph is so sweet. It feels special reading it. Yes, the grandiose dreams did have a purpose: to protect me from completely drowning in the ‘You’re a Nobody” maternal message. Daydreaming of being an international movie star gave me hope of being a Somebody one bright day.

It makes sense that you need to rest and distract yourself after returning to your parents’ home, on top of having a cold.

Do you think it’s a good idea to promise yourself that once you move out from their home, this time, you will never again return to living with them?

I wonder if such a promise will make it easier for you to survive however long you will still be living there.

I didn’t know that your parents regularly put you through Blaming Sessions (BS 🙂)

You and I have a lot in common: my mother had regularly put me through BS.

No wonder that at times, when your girlfriend gets emotional, your 🧠 expects BS. I suppose your parents got emotional (upset, hurt, whatever), and next.. a BS.

I understand feeling guilty about not feeling empathy when your gf got emotional. But it’s not that you’re not an empathetic person, it’s that understandably you Freeze, and empathy gets frozen.

It’s like PTSD-BS type..?

Using my phone, I’ll continue a bit later.

Hello The Meditator:

What CT did well for me was that before therapy I was stuck in how I felt. I didn’t know what he felt. What the therapist did well was to ask each one of us the right questions, and made him- in my mind- a 3-dimensional person, so to speak, when before he was 2-D.

Before, I didn’t ask: “What is he experiencing?” I asked: “What does this his experience mean for me? (marriage ending)

This makes me think of your case. Your wife said: “I’m not feeling it.” You seem to hear: “The marriage may be ending.” Which is understandable. But there may be a missing middle step:

‘What does ‘not feeling it’ actually feel like for her?’- that’s the third dimension I’m talking about.

You clearly know what this situation feels like for you. Do you feel you understand what it feels like for your wife?

🤔 Anita

Continued:

ChatGPT, this time (still using my phone) tells me that I learned to respond to other people’s emotional intensity (irl) with hyperarousal and a desire to escape the situation.

Maybe your reaction is a shutdown, as in feeling nothing at all?

Hyperarousal (Fght or Flight) and shutdown (hypoarousal, Freeze) are 2 different reactions (to hearing another’s person expressing upset, etc.), and one person can experience either one at different times.

About autism, Chat GPT says that your shutdown (feeling nothing when girlfriend is upset?), may be a trauma-related response (a reaction to the parenting you received for so long); it maybe a result of autism (which has nothing to do with the quality of parenting, and is substantially genetic,

Or it can be both.

Thing is, there’s not even one trait or subjective experience that ALL diagnosed autistic people experience.

In any case, even if you were born on the autistic spectrum, no way that your parenting experience did not affect you.

Actually, I used to suffer from sensory overload (an Autistic trait, yet not experienced by all who are diagnosed on the spectrum): being overwhelmed by noise, tight clothing, heat and humidity, and at one time I clearly remember, a cooking smell nearly killed me, LOL.

I think sensory overload is a common autistic trait. Did you experience that, and if you did, did it happen during stressful periods of time only (indicating trauma response..), or did you experience it in stressful and non stressful circumstances alike (indicating perhaps autism)?

Another common autistic trait is in attachment to routine and difficulty with changes to routine. I think you did very well with changes when in Spain/ away from home, didn’t you?

Anyway, I may have gotten carried away while I didn’t even read the 2nd part of your post yet…

Working on your friend’s (future) flat in Sibiu sounds like an excellent idea, yes!

As far as me these days, the days have gotten shorter and colder and I should be out and about by now, at 1:20 pm, only 4-5 hours of some light left and it’s been sunny for the last hour. I need to adjust to shorter days.. My neighbor and her 2 beagles should be back from Hawaii (well, the beagles have been in a boarding place in the state here), so it’s exciting.

Please tell me what you think about autism vs trauma response, how you understand autism. I am curious.

And how did the visit end with your girlfriend, how did the conversation in regard to your empathy end?

🤔 Anita

Dear Nea 🙂

Thinking about you this Sunday night, hoping that you, baby and husband are okay.

I understand if you’re too busy to post here again, or if you prefer not to. It’s totally acceptable. Just wanted to let you know I didn’t forget you and hope you’re well.

🤍 Anita

Dear VDF (Very Dear Friend) 🙂: So good to read from you this Sunday afternoon!

I will very soon need to leave to the big city up north, so I’ll reply further this evening.

Your VDF, Anita

Hey Olive 🙂

The original plan was that you and Sam would travel together to Europe. You structured your life around that goal:

You left your independent city life, placed your belongings in storage, worked multiple jobs and saved money. Then the plan stalled because Sam got nervous and wanted to save more money.

You made concrete sacrifices. Now, you are unemployed, living with his parents, using up your savings, and watching time pass while the dream that motivated your sacrifices remains uncertain.

You wanted movement, adventure, Europe and a future with Sam while he seems to be currently attached to the familarity of his old, teenage/early 20s life. His old life seems to be his priority, not his new life with you.

I think that what you need most at this time is clarity: clarity about the future travel plans, about Sam’s actual timelines, and whether his priorities and yours still align.

The behaviors between Jane and Sam would disturb, I’m guessing, 90-95% of girlfriends in your place, even though, seems to me, the behaviors you’re aware of are all that there is between them. Still, it’d be unpleasant, to say the least, for almost every girlfriend.

I have more thoughts, but please tell me what you think/ feel about what I wrote so far..?

🤔 Anita

Good Sat afternoon (for both of us, being 3 hours apart), Olive 🙂

I just spent a few hours reading through your recent posts and I’m not even close to being done with processing all that you shared in this thread.

I am experiencing your level of self-reflection, emotional honesty and willingness to look at the role of your own past emotional wounds as the cause of your disatisfaction (rather than projecting full blame unto others) as exceptional and extraordinary, admirable, really. My hat is off to you!

I need more time to process, and would like to get back to you this evening. But for now (and please let me know what you think of my current understanding at any time and correct me where I may be wrong):

Both of you, living in the city, decided to go on an adventure travel to Europe. You worked 3 jobs in the city, saved as much money for the trip, placed your belongings in storage, and moved with him temporarily to the small town of his youth because he didn’t save enough money in the city and wanted to work and save more money working in his small town.

You moved there with him but the focus seemed to have shifted from the two of you saving for a trip to Europe => to him re-living his adolescense and Jane is a big part of it.

It’s as if suddenly he’s not only 3 years younger than you (27/30), but 13 years younger, a 17 year-old teenager having fun with his teenage friend (Jane).

From what you shared, it doesn’t seem to me that Sam and Jane are having a romantic adult relationship, seems more like a re-enactment of a teenage relationship where physical and even sexual elements may be part of simply because of immaturity and a lack of adult discernment.

So, now.. having emotionally a 17-year-old boyfriend, you are in a strange position.. ?

🤔 Anita

You are very welcome, Young. Anytime you want to talk about anything, please do. I’m here.

🙂 Anita