@ Anita: thanks for coming back.

yes its true, its much cheaper for her living here. I guess i’m not so easy going sometimes when it comes to things like consumption and food shopping. i’ve noticed that i’m quite controlling with money, particularly food shopping. i often request that we go half on all the food items, but she says that i’m quite stingy and calculating when it comes to money, and that because i’m earning more i should cut her some slack.

i guess you’re right. i lack self acceptance to some extent and sometimes look externally for a model of how i should feel and what i should do. I see a lot of my peers in seemingly functional relationships and think that should be available for me. i guess i’m trying to fit myself into something that part of me doesnt want enough. i guess all my motivations for staying in this relationship right now are based on how i’m scared that this might be the way for me in every relationship and so i might as well stay in this one.  i also fear not being able to meet someone in the future. Additionally i fear the rigmarole of having to break up while living together, and the disorientation and likely self loathing that seems to emerge for me after each break up ive been through. it’s a very fearful process but i guess i need to do it.

I’ve noticed a dynamic in my relationships where if my partner expresses a lot of warmth, closeness, dependency, or makes grand proclamations for our future together i recoil a bit. however, if they show signs that they are distancing themselves, i step up the effort and fear abandonment.

in terms of my family, i dont remember much affection. i guess my family aren’t really expressive in that sense, and don’t really talk too much of emotions. I’m not particularly close with them and keep them at a slight distance. i show up enough in their lives to maintain a relationship i suppose.

@ peter

thank you for you input. i guess i wasnt really shown much of a model of love growing up. i have never, however, thought of defining love for myself. i always thought it would be something organic that i would be overcome with as a relationship progressed. love to me is vulnerability, is throwing everything into this other person knowing it may be unrequited. i guess thats never appealed.

Hi gunter,
Thanks for writing back about your process. I have done similar internal work in the past but I often find I don’t come to any deeper truths. The feelings are often fear of judgement from others. That I’ll be disapproved of and left alone and therefore this will confirm my unworthiness. I struggle to go deeper than this sometimes.

I know in an earlier post you said a recent relationship has led you to confront these shadow energies of unworthiness. How is that going for you at the moment? I hope you’re doing well.

Thanks

@ inky
Thanks for the response. It sounds like you found the balance that you need.

@anita
Have you improved your relationship with yourself over time? How did therapy aid this?

Hi Anita
Thanks for the response. Yes the self loathing and social anxiety is what I fear when I’m around others. This is what drives me to seek solitude.

I believe this stems from bullying in school and my parents. My mum is anxiety ridden and not very relational. She deals only with the practicalities. For her life is a series of endless dangers. The implicit message I got was that life was not a series of possibilities, but a series of potenrial pitfalls to be navigated. My dad has never talked about any feelings or anything of an emotional nature with me. We talk about sports and practicalities. Honestly, I’ve never felt close to either of them. I suppose this is a pattern I’m repeating by opting out of intimacy.

I have attended therapy in the past and have explored in depth this self loathing. It has been present from my late teens until now, and has pushed me into very low moods many times. I have been able to manage it better these past few years, but perhaps this is as a result of finding solitude to be a good remedy.

I never thought of the admonishing myself for cheating as an extension of this self loathing but this is a good insight. Internally I have punished myself for so long for it. Perhaps longer than the act itself warrants.

I hear what you’re saying and it does ring true. Do you believe then this impulse to protect myself from increased fear and self loathing, by leaving the relationship is an act of self deception? That the only thing it serves is protecting myself more. Can the impulse to a voice fear and self loathing really drive me to feel that someone isnt attractive any more?