Hi anita,

She seems calm to me.

The bedrooms system is the same. Not having my aunt here is great. She never felt like family, was always selfish and treated us as less than.

didn’t know that your figurative tail often wags outside of the context of daydreaming. In what circumstances does your tail wag? How does your excitement looks/ sounds like?  – I seem to be desperate for connection. I open up to people when I first meet them, easily joking, having fun conversations and readily discussing problems. This is what I mean by tail wagging. Although I seem to trust some people and not others whem I first meet them. It will take more observation to figure out why that might be. My excitement to me used to feel genuine and open. Now, I feel it is chaotic. Just desperate and needy.

I can imagine lots of people figuratively wagging their tails because of being around you. I bet that you imagined it many times, while daydreaming, imagining that this or that person, a boyfriend perhaps, was as happy to see you as you are happy to see him. Did you? – My daydreams are complicated. I am never able to imagine the long term of the relationship. It seems off. But in the beginning, I would feel loved but it would not help me see what that relationship grows to be. Like what is happily ever after for a married couple. I just know how I wanted to be talked to or treated but not how the long term would be. And it makes me sad. And who I am in those daydreams often changes. And it is strange but I’ve realized I mimic other people, even in real life. Someone else’s confidence – how they behave that I think is confident. Someone else’s kindness and so on. I do know I am a kind person. But if another person’s behaviour seems more expressive, I mimic that. And I think my daydreams are confusing because of that. I don’t know that I am that person.

Can you describe to me a situation/ circumstance in which you were excitedly anticipating a real-life interaction with another person: how did your excitement show, and what was the other person’s behavior during the anticipated interaction?  – My colleagues. We would joke together, discuss our lives. I used to feel the excitement, which I wonder now might have been needy, wanting to joke and laugh. But they would be rude, out of nowhere. It feels like a punch to the stomach. I still go through this with them. Even when I see evidence that this is not where the connection is at, I still go through that cycle.

Imagine that you are assigned with writing an academic essay, a one-page (or shorter) essay, describing this “self” that you are referring to. You are welcome to post such an essay here. – ( I am going to use “she”). She seems disturbed to me. Always ready to go into a frenzy. Not sure she has ever felt true peace. She believes that bad things will happen to her, so she is always looking out for it. She is also super scared so she is constantly seeking out to be protected. No amount of life experience seems to build her strength. She just gets through one thing at a time and it does not contribute to long lasting good qualities. She is very weak. Every negative possibility bothers her. She has to ruminate over it, worry about how to deal with it, know she is not cut out to deal with it, desperate for it to not happen. She does this with everything. She morphs into what she believes will keep her safe but it just comes off as desperate and she is always left alone. She knows she will not have anyone but still tries. Everybody is above her. She has never been in a situation where she felt right, in the few situations that she started feeling good, other people have torn her down, whether it was their intention or not. Everybody’s tone matters, expressions matter, opinions matter. She has never gone a day where she had to face something and she knew what she was doing. She doesn’t trust anyone including herself. So she is putting herself in situations she doesn’t want to be in. I don’t think she wants to be in any of this. She wants peace but won’t find it. So she is letting life whiz past her. Never feeling like she has finally arrived.

Can you share specific details about some of the features of your looks that you consider “ugly by societal standards”? – I have a giant forehead, nose, lazy eye, thinning hair, crooked teeth and I am fat.

Dear anita,

Yes, my mother is c- free! I don’t want to jinx it. She has check ups every 6 months. The next is coming up. I am very nervous. I will keep praying for everything to be fine.

Thank you for taking the time to read the other thread again. I will be 27 this year. My grandmother is staying with my aunt, she went a couple of weeks back. She will stay there for a couple of months. There was no helper since the pandemic started.

You are right, my childhood has affected my brain. But I am afraid I won’t find people for the healthy supportive social interactions. You are right, my “tail” wags often but I quickly realize the other person does not care. I don’t think I will meet a dog with it’s tail wagging. I am not saying I’m special but people don’t function like me. It’s mostly just superficial fun or give-and-take. I find myself more drained after social interactions. With even some wonderful people I met at work who I still keep in touch with and we go for walks often. All my new interactions and experiences are built on top of my underlying (I don’t know how to describe it) “self”. I hate that self now. I’ve had enough of always being anxious and scared and unfulfilled. I want to wipe it out and start fresh. I feel exhausted.

I am not fishing for sympathy but I am ugly by societal standards and I won’t easily find love. Most people are not looking to love or find love. They have other standards I won’t meet. In this reality, where I will not find love and most relationships are superficial, I’m afraid I can’t rely on others for healing. But at the same time, I don’t know how to heal which is why I am asking for a miracle that someone comes along and wipes everything out and loves me.

Coming back to this thread, I am feeling really slow and dysfunctional. I am never able to reach the “finish line” and I know I’ve clearly answered that question for myself in my previous replies for why it happened. But I want to know how to fix this. How to be normal. Every new thing I do sucks because of how abnormal my brain is. I want to change that.

• This reply was modified 4 years, 8 months ago by samy.

Hi anita!

It’s so good to talk to you again. You probably won’t remember me but I gave you my name back then so I will use it. This is Girija. I hope you are doing well. The threads are still there, I found them. I show up as Anonymous, inactive. I used the same email to create both the accounts, I don’t see an option to reactivate my old account. Would you know where to get that option? Or maybe I could reply on that with the new account?

I am ashamed of that thread for how it ended. I disappeared without saying anything, but you were so helpful there and I am grateful for that. My conclusion that my problems are beyond the external came from my interactions with you and my own introspections after I left tinybuddha. I couldn’t handle exploring my problems then and simply quit. I am very sorry for doing that. I couldn’t handle it. I left without saying bye or a thanks, I’m very sorry about that. I read that thread now and see how resistant I was to look at the source of my problems. I feel terrible about it.

You are right I don’t want to take the pain anymore. Honestly, I am not sure if I can either, I am worried I’ll get a heart attack or stroke.

I’ll bring back the thread with the new account, if you are ok with that, it’s called “Advice for the lost and weary”.  When I do, I am worried you will see who I am and not reply and I can understand that. I am sorry again. I will reply on it with this account. I will own up to my mistake. And I know, I can’t expect you to forgive me, so I won’t but please know I am sorry. Thank you for helping a stranger. You were there on the thread to talk to even through my mother’s surgery. Thank you!

I’ve been to counselling but it did not work out. I needed a space where I did not want somebody saying everyone has good and bad. I already know that and acknowledge it but knowing someone is also good does not help with this pain, it makes me feel guilty or wrong for feeling this way.

Girija