Dear miaim,

is there a particular reason you’ve started questioning your choice of art as a career path? You said you’ve never questioned it much before, you simply knew it was a good choice for you and you went with the flow. But now, during the pandemic, I suppose you had more time on your hands and you started thinking about it more? What do you think is making you doubt yourself at this point?

Dear Ryan,

I am sorry that things with your coworker didn’t work out. You did give your best and was very supportive for her, you cooked meals for her and held her in her arms without pushing for anything more. She could feel safe and cared for with you. However, she wasn’t ready for that, and it is, at least partially, because she’s battling her own demons and trying to numb her pain with drugs and alcohol. You saw this very well:

“I’d get bits and pieces of the stressors and traumas that were her life when she was younger, but she always keeps those walls up or uses alcohol to lean on.”

Although your meetings with her were often light and carefree, as you say, she’s carrying a lot of pain inside, which she’s trying to numb with those addictions. She is working with a counselor, so she might be free some day, but not just yet. Perhaps that’s one of the reasons why she doesn’t want to get more deeply involved with you – because she knows she isn’t able to give you the love you deserve. Or, she is afraid of another intimate relationship. Or both.

Whatever it is, at least she was honest about her unwillingness to get romantically involved with you. She never gave you false hopes, although it appears she did enjoy your company. But for her, it wasn’t going to happen. It doesn’t make you a less worthy or desirable person, it’s just that this concrete girl refused you. It has nothing to do with you, but with her.

What I am noticing is that you are (at least until this last post where you’re a little bit disillusioned) still showing some of the savior complex, which you talked about before. You said:

“I thought that I could be a good influence in her life, and maybe I was/am?”

“It is my hope that she will continue to distance herself from the “unsavory characters” and the drugs.”

“I feel that I am a positive and calming influence in her life and I would like to continue to be.”

“I’d like to see her live a cleaner life and live up to the potential I see in her”.

You also said she’s an old soul, intrigues you as a person and would like to know her better:

“I would like to know her better than just a work friend that I hang out with. Not in a romantic sense, but I’d hope she’d drop her walls a bit so I can know her better.”

“I’m just not comfortable doing without knowing her better.”

These are all signs that you’re trying to save her. You’d like to know her better, understand her traumas, and be the person who helps her climb out of it. Even if she’s refused a romantic relationship, you still hoped to have an intimate relationship with her, to be a friend who she can confide in and talk about her problems.

But unfortunately, saving others never works. She is the only one who can save herself. She’s probably already working on it, but since she’s still suffering with addiction, it means the wound is deep and she doesn’t know how to cope otherwise.

It’s not your task to help her, moreover she isn’t asking for your help either. She wants to keep things light and playful with you, and now she’s even made inappropriate comments about the repair man, which to me signals she’s putting up a protective shield and wants to distance herself from any intimacy with you. It appears to me that she wants to be left alone with her pain (and her addictions), she doesn’t want you to interfere. It’s not the healthiest choice but it’s her choice, and you can’t do much about it but to respect it and to spare yourself from further pain.

The question I would ask myself if I were you is why you have the need to save her. Usually when we want to save someone, we’re avoiding to look at something in our own psychology that needs to be solved. We’re working hard on changing them instead of looking at what needs to be changed in us.

Dear Neverdyed,

I am glad you’re trying to get to the bottom of the problem, that’s the only way to resolve it.

“The last video chat ended after he said I’d made him responsible (I couldn’t hold my tears because I missed him even without addressing it).”

Could you explain this? In his view, what have you made him responsible for?

“Somehow I think only marriage empowers the couple to demand/request what he or she wants/expects, maybe it’s because it’s formal? As for my idea about marriage, I believe it’s related to my parents’ terrible divorce, but I’ve stopped claiming that it’s all their fault. I don’t mind having a partner for life, just “getting married” is totally unnecessary for me, the most important thing is being faithful/loyal. Now it seems weird to me for how infidelity scares me off as it has nothing to do with my parents’ divorce!”

So your parents had a difficult divorce, and it probably affects your idea of marriage. That’s why you don’t want to get married. You only want loyalty, however, here is one big problem: you said you can only request things (I guess this includes loyalty) if you’re married. So how do you request loyalty if you’re not married? Do you see your internal contradiction?

It’s totally understandable that infidelity scares you, in the sense that you don’t want to have an unfaithful partner. But you need to be able to demand that from him – even if you’re not married. That’s called a committed relationship.

So what would happen if you’d demand faithfulness from your partner? We already know that the man you’ve been involved with refused to be faithful. Not only that, but he suggested that you too should have more than one lovers (“he suggested me have more than 1 lover to avoid being stuck”). That’s when you started withdrawing and have been trying to forget about him, but it was very hard and it made you suffer a lot.

But also notice that him suggesting infidelity was the line you didn’t want to cross. You could tolerate his long silence, his not answering your messages for days on end and other stuff, but you couldn’t tolerate him being unfaithful. And that’s fine, that’s a healthy instinct. That’s a minimum in a healthy and loving relationship.

Do you think you could demand that from a future partner? Or there’s something standing in the way?

“Finally, I’d like to bring up a question since I’m quite afraid of being a third party without knowing it in the future… How to tell if a man’s single?”

Well, if he’s available to chat during the day (or if he’s busy working during the day, then in the evening), he’s available to meet during the weekends, he isn’t secretive about where he goes and how he spends his time, you‘re allowed to call him, you’re invited to meet his friends or his family… Also, he doesn’t promote open relationships, he doesn’t talk about having more than one partners, he isn’t avoiding you, he is eager to spend time with you…

Dear Felix,

In your posts you’ve mentioned several times that you’re hoping to get some positive feedback from the universe, but nothing is coming your way:

“I do send out love into the universe. I don’t do it as a favor so I can get back something from it, but I hear silence in return. In fact, it often happens that I get adversity and hardship in return.”

“It’s just been so stale lately that I don’t remember what it feels like when something cool or interesting comes my way because of a coincidence. I am trying to send out positive thoughts into the Universe and I really hope to get some feed back.”

“I am not giving up, but I haven’t had any good or positive news in a very long time. … I am just so tired of it all that I would do anything for something good, fun, exiting to happen.”

So it’s like you’re trying so hard, you’re giving your best, but no good news in return.  You only hear crickets, or even worse, you experience more adversity. It’s like you’re saying: “please, I am doing my best, I am trying so hard to be a good person. Why don’t you show me some love in return, why don’t you show me that you care at least a little??”

It seems to me it’s how a child would talk to a parent. “I am trying to be a good boy, I am doing everything to please you. Why can’t you show me some love already??”

Does that ring a bell for you? Because what could be happening is that you’re subconsciously trying to please your parents (and now an external authority like God or the universe), but you feel you’re not good enough. You’re judging yourself harshly:

“I am trying to forgive myself, to be more precise, I am talking to myself about moving on, but like a sadomasochist I am continuing to punish myself.”

“I am trying to be patient, accepting, and loving of myself. I realize how important it is to love myself and be fair (from learning about Buddhism), but this alter-ego inside of me continues to punish me for effing up.”

One part of you knows – the rational part – that the key is to love and accept yourself. But the other is still judging you for being imperfect. That’s the inner critic, which is most likely the internalized voice of your parent(s). So there’s an inner child within you, which is being tormented by the voice of the harsh inner critic. What it needs is that you become a good, loving parent to that little boy. To stop judging him and pushing him to be better, but to love him and accept him just as he is, with no conditions. This will change the entire “constellation”, so to speak, and things will almost certainly start changing in your outer life too…

Dear Neverdyed,

“I simply stayed silent when he said he didn’t even want a girlfriend in the beginning”

So if I am getting this right, your relationship started as a very casual one. In the beginning he didn’t even want a girlfriend but saw you as his “lover”, which to you sounded more like a mistress, i.e. for sexual encounters. You agreed to it and it didn’t bother you at first, because for one, you didn’t fall for him much back then, and also, you spent quite a lot of time together.

So it seems that in the beginning, neither of you saw it as a serious relationship. But then, what happened? You started falling for him and wanting more out of the relationship, and he started withdrawing? Was there ever a period where the two of you could share deeper thoughts and feelings with each other, or he (or you) resisted that?

“I discussed with him once and I said something like “only in a marriage can you ask for something”, and I’ve no interests in getting married.”

So it was you who said “only in a marriage can you ask for something”? Where do you think this attitude comes from?

“I’ve no interests in getting married.”

Can you explain why? What do you associate with marriage that makes you reluctant to get married?

Sorry for bombarding you with questions, but I think it’s worth digging a bit deeper to understand the dynamic in the background…

Dear Nar,

I’ve been catching up with this topic and enjoyed the depth of discussion and the great insights provided by Anita.

Your mother seems similar to mine in the sense that my mother was also strict, criticizing me all the time and I was afraid of her as a child. You mentioned that neither you or your sister confide in your mother, and it’s the same with me. I’ve felt that when I was honest with her, she would later use it against me to put me down.

My mother too believed she was a “martyr” who would “do anything for me” (I am the only child). Like your parents, she and my father provided financially for me. We were middle class and they afforded me everything that serves my education and professional development (they paid for language schools, summer courses abroad, internships abroad, etc).

Regardless of that, my mother wasn’t very supportive of me. She had an idea of who I should become, and “what’s best for me”. In spite of her providing for me materially and affording me all those things, she actually hasn’t provided me with emotional nurturance and support – which is even more important than the material one.  Because of her constant criticism and complaining about life (and blaming everyone but herself), I thought it was my fault and that if I could only be perfect, she would finally be happy. Little did I know that her unhappiness was deeply rooted in her own emotional wounds and had nothing to do with me. Even if I’d become perfect, she still wouldn’t be happy. But I’ve realized that only much later in life.

So I grew up with a very deep shame, lack of self-esteem, lack of self-worth. I had every material need met, but none of the emotional ones. My father was better, much less judgmental and strict, with much more understanding for me, but he did nothing to stop my mother from tormenting me. He was a silent accomplice, so to speak.

Anita made some excellent remarks about how we as children depend on our parents for safety and support, and if they turn against us, attacking and criticizing us, it’s devastating because we have nowhere to run. They are our entire world. We look to them for protection, but at the same time, we fear them, because their love is very conditional. So we try to be a “good girl” or a “good boy”, to please them, so they wouldn’t abandon us.

I had a love-hate relationship with my mother, because I needed her, both physically and emotionally, and she did meet some of my needs, but not that what I truly needed emotionally. And I hated her for that.

I guess something similar may be happening inside of you too, where a part of you loves your mother and appreciates the support she provided, but the other part is rebelling, because your true emotional needs weren’t met. But what seems to also have happened is that you’re judging the rebellious part as bad. You talked about being cruel towards your granny and not helping her when she needed it. This you take as a proof that you were “a bad girl”.

But the reality is, most likely, that it was your mother who planted this idea that you were “bad” much earlier than you treated your granny like that. And you started believing her. When a child believes they’re bad, they will sooner or later start behaving in ways that “prove” how bad they are. Our mother’s critical voice becomes our owner inner critic, which torments us the same way our mother did.

As adults, our lives start falling apart and we think our mother was right – that we’re a failure and good for nothing. But the truth is the opposite: our life fell apart because we were raised with shame and criticism and were told we’re good for nothing.

Until we realize that – until we see how the wounding happened – we cannot truly heal.

I stop here, but there’s much more to be said on this topic.

Dear Javairia,

I haven’t heard of exactly the phrase maladaptive daydreaming, but it seems like a way to escape a difficult reality. Children who’ve experienced trauma and don’t feel physically safe in their environment (e.g. growing up in a war zone, or in a violent household, or physically abandoned or neglected by their caretakers for this or that reason), tend to disassociate from their body, to less feel the pain of living in a hostile environment. They tend to stay in their head, in their own imagined world, and daydream. As you said, it’s a coping mechanism, but it’s standing more and more in the way of normal functioning.

I didn’t have the time to read your other thread, but I’ve seen you mentioned the problem of self-harming. That’s usually a way to return to the body, after we’ve disassociated too much. It’s like one disassociates a lot via daydreaming, and then cut themselves to return to the body, to the physical reality.  Both behaviors are related to childhood trauma of living in a precarious, unsafe environment.

Do you relate to that? Also, is there a school counselor or someone you can talk to? It would be important that you create an experience of safety for yourself, e.g. by participating in a school group (a drama group maybe?) or participating in a community project. Walking in the grass, spending time in nature, hugging trees etc are all ways to “ground” yourself, to feel that connection with mother earth that feels too scary at the moment.