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Tee
ParticipantDear Ava,
you’re welcome.
In case you know more about the topic, would you mind elaborating more on the topic of people changing personality during sex?
Unfortunately I don’t know much more, just that sex involves (or should involve) intimacy. If we’ve experienced wounding and abuse in our closest relationships, i.e. with our parents, the related hurt and the need to revenge and punish the perpetrators may come up during sex. Your girlfriend might have experienced some sort of abuse, possibly sexual, and her abusive behavior towards you is the result.
Since she wants to have (abusive) sex practically all the time, it means her personality is almost completely consumed by her shadow self. Even though you might have compassion for her, and seek to understand her better, try to remove yourself from the situation in which you are exploited, as Anita also suggested.
Tee
ParticipantDear lk09,
I do drink quite a bit when I feel like speaking my mind out but it is only then. It is occasional.
And when you need to get drunk in order to speak your mind, that’s also when you aren’t loving and respecting yourself enough…
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This reply was modified 4 years, 2 months ago by
Tee.
Tee
ParticipantDear lk09,
They know I have always wanted to choose my own partner but the delay that happened in my sister’s marriage has scared them and they are not understanding my current mental state.
Your sister had the right to make a mistake, didn’t she? She was engaged back in 2018, and then the wedding was cancelled (not sure whose fault it was though?). And she is about 33 now, right? So she received that grace and understanding from your parents. You have the right to get the same treatment…
I have tried moving on many times in the last 2.5 years, it did not work. I have consciously tried to move on, to like other people but I am unable to. That scares me a lot.
As I said before, I believe the reason is a childhood wound… there was a dynamic with him where you were his savior, his helper, he valued you and looked up to you, you helped him in his decisions, and the two of you were similar in many aspects. You could even tell him your darkest secrets, you could be completely honest with him. You thought he was “your person”, the other half you were waiting for while watching the skies…
The truth is that you were valued and appreciated and seen by him – some of the time. But you were also unappreciated and rejected by him at other times, lots of other times. Now it occurs to me that it almost reflects your childhood experience – you were loved and appreciated by your granny in your early childhood, but then you were rejected and unappreciated by your parents and sister later.
He was the promise of perfect love, where you would be loved, appreciated and valued at all times. The childhood dynamic was there: you were doing your best to get his love (you were doing that with your parents too), you were trying to help him heal so he can finally love you. You craved for love from someone who couldn’t fully love you… the same as in your childhood. That’s why you were so hooked, and why it’s so hard to get unhooked now.
I believe the way to heal is to learn to love, appreciate and value yourself at all times. You thought you love yourself, but when you’re accepting lesser treatment, when you need to beg for someone’s love, when you’re afraid to tell your parents not to arrange marriage for you – all those are examples when you’re not loving and respecting yourself enough. When you feel awkward during a group setting, probably feeling judged by others (you didn’t answer why you feel awkward?), you also don’t love yourself enough. If you work on loving yourself completely, your magnetic attraction to people who can’t love you completely will lessen.
April 15, 2021 at 3:05 am in reply to: trying to live with unrelenting shame (maybe I should kill myself) #377758Tee
ParticipantDear ninibee,
if my salad was an achievement, I not only did not want to share the news of my great achievement with her, I wanted to avoid the possibility of her seeing it or commenting on it. For a moment, I wished I had not made a salad at all.
As we talked about earlier, it might be that you felt so thoroughly rejected by her in your early childhood (which you don’t consciously remember), that you later decided to reject her thoroughly too – you felt repulsed by her (this is what you know and feel consciously). All this time you’re probably angry at her for not giving you what you needed, and on an even deeper level you’re hurt and in pain because she never gave you what you needed.
However you don’t want to show it. You show neither anger or pain, but what you do show is that you don’t care. You don’t need her attention, and if she gives you any attention, e.g. asks you about your lunch, you’re doing your best to show how completely indifferent you are, how you couldn’t care less (“I said it as boring as possible”), perhaps you even show a slight hostility and impatience that she even asked you. It’s a defense mechanism – your indifference actually hides your deeper anger at her, and beneath the anger is pain…
I believe your anger at her manifests indirectly, by you sabotaging your own life. But it’s not expressed at her directly. During healing, we first need to get in touch with our anger (in a safe, therapeutic setting), and then with our pain.
Tee
ParticipantDear lk09,
regarding your drunk incident, I think you should forgive yourself you kissed that guy back because you weren’t aware of what’s going on around you. At the same time, drinking to the point of passing out isn’t really helpful, so I think you’d need to look at that tendency – if it’s a tendency and not an isolated event? Do you feel more relaxed and funny at a party, if you drink?
As for confessing it immediately to your boyfriend – well, since you two were honest about everything and knew each other’s vices, then it makes sense. And I guess it didn’t harm your relationship. Sometimes though it’s not necessary to confess everything, specially if we know it will hurt the person and it was some foolishness we did once and never again.
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This reply was modified 4 years, 2 months ago by
Tee.
Tee
ParticipantDear Weiword,
I believe the best way for children to have a healthy attitude to life, where they feel empowered and able to go after their goals and dreams, is by proper upbringing. It starts from a very early age, where the child is loved, appreciated, seen, validated, encouraged… If so, the child will develop a healthy personality and won’t be prone to flawed beliefs and theories like pre-planned destiny and similar.
Tee
ParticipantDear lk09,
you left him a really loving message here, it shows you care a lot about him and his well-being. But at the same time, you’re right not to reach out again and repeat the same cycle… he needs to be willing to help himself first.
At home, nobody is asking for my consent anymore. They didn’t ask if my relationship with him ended or not, they are like since the choice was between my sister and this unknown man… Obviously our daughter will choose her sister and so they started telling me about different boys suitable for arrange marriage.
Have you told you parents you’re not interested in an arranged marriage but want to marry out of love? In one of the previous posts you said that you kept your relationship secret from your family:
we never did even have a chance to live how normal couples do, with love and without worries of what our families would do if they knew we are still dating.
I know you were on and off, so I guess that was one of the reasons you kept it a secret. But still, perhaps there’s a part of you that is afraid to claim the right to love whomever you want. I know it’s hard in the Indian society to love freely without being obliged to your family, but perhaps it’s time to stand up for yourself and claim your right to make mistakes on your path to finding true love. It’s very rare that we immediately find our companion for life, and we’ll trip over and experience heartbreak, but it doesn’t mean our parents know better and that arranged marriage is a better solution. It’s definitely not. So perhaps stand stronger in your determination that you don’t want arranged marriage and are capable of finding the right person for yourself, even if it takes more time and some trials and errors.
Regarding you being withdrawn and uncomfortable in a larger group:
I have difficulty enjoying myself with everyone as well. It is not just that I have difficulty sharing my mind with people, I have difficulty even enjoying myself in a group. I become awkward and I notice that people avoid my company as they feel I am too serious.
It’s possible that one feels awkward in a group, and can only truly open in 1-on-1 relationships, like you can. I am also like that, being much more comfortable in the company of one, max two people. This can be partly due to your personality, where you want to connect more deeply, better understand a person, listen to him/her, and create a deeper bond. And you’re not able to do that with many people at the same time, because you’re not the kind to like superficial chit-chat and just throwing around jokes.
However, if you feel truly uncomfortable and perhaps even judged by others while in a group situation, you should look at that, because there might be a self-esteem issue there and feeling not good enough.
Tee
ParticipantDear lk09,
I am sorry, I feel I might have contributed to his leaving by openly asking you if that was him. But I wouldn’t feel fine communicating with him, and at the same time keeping you in the dark about his crush, since I wasn’t sure if you knew about it. And I thought you should know, because it might have explained some of his behavior, like trying to get your sister’s approval. I thought you should be privy to this information. Well, later it turned out you already know all about it, which is good. It’s good you were honest and open with each other about those kinds of things.
I actually have a lot of compassion for him and know what it means to have low self-esteem, frequent crushes and addictive behaviors. Been there, done that. I am sorry he didn’t stay here… but at least he reached out, even for a short while. I do hope he seeks professional help, or re-joins the forum, because he’s suffering now, and there’s a way to stop his suffering. I hope he chooses to help himself…
Tee
ParticipantDear Kpd,
I started going on and off. I asked for breaks, break ups. I never could get sure into her, nor could I go away from her.
When i breakup with her, I see all the good things, I imagine and visualise good things, I value her and miss her. But when I start talking to her back, o get the stress and bad feelings about the bad part associated with, I get feeling less etc.
So when you’re close, something bothers you and you want to get away, and when you’re away, you miss her and want to get close again.
Can you explain a little about what bothers you when you’re close? What is the bad part, that causes you stress and bad feelings?
Tee
ParticipantDear noname,
I hear you – you feel that people are dismissing your problems and want to fix them, rather than hearing you compassionately and “sitting with you” in your pain. You say your therapist is good at doing that, but others, like your roommate, aren’t. It does seem to disturb you a lot, because it appears just having your therapist see you and validate you isn’t enough, but you’d need more people to do it. That’s why you need a support group too, which you’re afraid to attend to due to confidentiality issues.
Now, the practical side of me – the problem solver – would like to offer an advice to perhaps look at online support groups, rather than in-person ones, so not to compromise your anonymity in the city you live. It shouldn’t be a problem to find such a group, since I believe quite a few popped up since covid…
Perhaps you’re annoyed by this advice, and in general by people offering solutions, because there’s a part of you that doesn’t want to move on. Have you considered that? What would happen if you’d become successful in your career? Is there somewhere in you a fear of success, a fear of healing and moving beyond your past, which keeps you stuck in one place?
Tee
ParticipantDear Neverdyed,
alright, it’s a deal. You take care of yourself too!
Tee
ParticipantDear lk09,
I hear you and your concern about your sister’s aggressive, manipulative behavior all throughout your childhood and youth. It’s good that you’re aware of her abusive behavior and you don’t feel obliged to take it just because she’s your sister and you should “love each other”. It’s great that you’ve set some boundaries and aren’t allowing her to abuse you any longer.
It’s also very mature of you to try to talk to her about your ex and what exactly she holds against him. But she refused to detail, asking you to trust her, simply because she says so. Since she already informed your parents (and everybody else) about his crush on her, it’s probably true that she wasn’t trying to protect you, but she just behaved true to herself – telling you basically “just do as I say”. In fact, if she knew things about him (since they were in the same friends circle), it would have been only fair if she told you, specially since you asked her to be completely honest with you. So I see how she actually betrayed you here and didn’t act in your best interest.
In a recent post you wrote:
I don’t know how long we would have lasted if my sister didn’t interfere but I would have still dealt with it better than the mess she created with me, him, my family, and his family. I don’t think I can ever forgive her for that even if tomorrow someone else comes to my life, I know I can’t forgive her.
Well, regardless of how your sister behaved, she isn’t the only reason your relationship failed. She may have interfered and ratted him out, but it wasn’t what ruined your relationship. Rather, it was his insecurity, his addictions, his ambivalence. And his asking for her approval even if she was clear she would never grant it. If he were serious and dedicated to you, if he’d pulled his act together, she wouldn’t be able to stand in your way. But unfortunately, he wasn’t, and that’s why things ended the way they did…
Tee
ParticipantDear lk09,
good that you knew about his crush and could talk it through with him. I could see your sister’s reaction in a bit different light now, because she might have been concerned about you, to be in a relationship with someone who behaved rather foolishly with her, knowing that she was engaged. Perhaps she wasn’t motivated just by jealousy but also by real concern that you’re getting yourself into trouble with this volatile man. Has he apologized to her for his behavior? Has he done anything to mend the situation and assure her that he has serious intentions with you and something similar won’t happen again?
Tee
ParticipantDear lk09,
thank you for clarifying. If you have no problems him reading what you write, we can continue here, talking about your issues. And since he knows you’re posting here and might find his thread too, probably he’s okay with this setup. I would also like to hear Anita’s perspective on this.
I am glad you came to trust me and find my input, as well as Anita’s, valuable. I also think it’s great that you’ve started opening up more to your friends, in particular that one friend whom you trust and who told you she’d be there for you. That’s really important, and it’s a good plan.
You still seem to be seeking answers about your relationship and what it meant for him, and whether it was love or not:
I need to accept the fact that it wasn’t his confusion, I actually didn’t suit him or his situation.
Maybe It was all in my head…
It wasn’t all in your head, you definitely had a bond, but it was troubled. Don’t start thinking you didn’t mean anything to him, because you did, and here’s the proof:
I know he did love me and I know our situation wasn’t normal ever but he did try hard to work it out whenever I gave up.
Here you’re saying it was sometimes you who wanted to end it, but then he’d try to work it out still. Which means he was invested too, it wasn’t just you trying to keep him.
I think before we proceed, though, we should discuss the new element, which is that he had a crush on your sister. How much did you know about it? Have the two of you spoken about it openly? Because I think it would be important to talk it through so that it doesn’t burden the relationship additionally…
Tee
ParticipantDear noname,
I feel the need for another, not necessarily a partner just another person or people to hold space for my grief. The isolation is my biggest enemy. And I’m tired of being told it’s my fault I feel this way, i just need to change my perspective or do this or that.
When we’ve been so emotionally deprived as children, as you have been, we get stuck and identify completely with our wounded inner child, and it feels really difficult to get out of it. It’s like trying to pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps. The wounded child needs a compassionate adult to help it process its hurt and get unstuck. This compassionate adult is often a therapist, who can offer mirroring, compassion and understanding to the person, and help the person grieve their losses – everything they haven’t received from their parents and all the pain they had to live through.
With the help of a therapist, you’ll learn how to slowly disidentify from your wounded inner child and see also the adult side in you, the side which is capable of e.g. helping others compassionately, like you are capable of. So strengthening your adult self – which is present but weak – would be very important, and then bringing the adult self into interaction with your wounded inner child, to give it the missing experience of being loved and cared for. That I see as a plausible way to healing.
Do you have a therapist with whom you can do the inner child work?
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This reply was modified 4 years, 2 months ago by
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