Dear Jisoo,

Yes, I misunderstood you regarding your father’s behavior, because I assumed that he was the one guilty for sexually harassing you when you were a young girl. I made the wrong assumption because of a few things you said: you said you feel safer with any man than you do with your father, and also that you were in a situation where you were helpless, and that it’s difficult to fight own family members.

Based on all that, I assumed it was your father who is responsible for sexual harassment, and not other men. But true, you never said he was the one who harassed you when you were a young girl. You only said he would gaze at you with sexual undertones and made some comments, when you were staying at their place after the death of your husband. I apologize for making a wrong assumption.

As for the man having the need to disappear – I thought that you might have been too much for him at times, and that’s why he had the need to reduce contact and “disappear” on you during the weekends, for example. Like, he had a need to check out and take a rest from you. But that was again just an assumption, which might not be true, because you say his mother wasn’t a demanding person. I mean, you don’t know much about her, just that she was feminine and motherly. Perhaps you do remind him of her?

I really don’t want to speculate, it’s hard to understand his intentions. But for this or that reason, he probably has a fear of commitment… I was trying to understand his hot and cold behavior, and came up with one possible explanation – that you remind him of his mother – which might not be true.

Hi Murtaza,

When i cared about anita, i still thought life is meaninglessness, but she isn’t, it doesn’t go hand in hand,

Relationships are a big part of life. So if the person you care about isn’t meaningless to you, then this part of life – your relationship with this person – isn’t meaningless either. Then how come life as a whole is meaningless, if a big and important part of it isn’t?

i can provide anything besides changing my life, care, attention, understanding, respect, love.

And if your loved one is sick and needs money for a life-saving surgery, would you still refuse to earn the money? Would you say – I care about you otherwise, but don’t ask me to save your life, it’s too much of you to ask?

You mentioned once that a girl friend of yours put an ice pack on your foot when you hurt it. Well, even to have an ice pack around, you need to have a fridge, you need to have a place to stay and access to electricity… and someone needs to earn the money for it. In order to provide some basic care for our loved ones, we need to have the physical/material resources to do it. Without it, we can just say nice words, but that’s sometimes not enough to help the person we love. That’s how love and willingness to work for example go hand in hand.

• This reply was modified 3 years, 10 months ago by Tee.

Hi Murtaza,

You over and over suggest therapy, like its the ultimate cure, therapy only works for people who want to change, want to be helped, i don’t.

I understand that. But you also want connection, at least in theory. With your current attitude, with your apathy, with your belief that life is not worth living, it will be very difficult to find someone who’d want to have a deep, meaningful relationship with you.

You say you don’t want superficial relationships. That’s fine. But how do you imagine to have a meaningful relationship with anyone, if you say there is no meaning and purpose in life? Following your own logic, there is no meaning in relationships either. And yet, a true loving relationship – which you haven’t experienced yet – can be incredibly meaningful and deep. It exists, and I believe you are capable of it – but you’d need to give up some of your stubbornness.

I perfer to choose my own suffering

Yes, when we love, we are vulnerable, and we depend to an extent on other people. Even in a healthy relationship it is so. I understand that you don’t want to adapt to “brainwashed” people to be loved on their terms. I understand you don’t want to betray yourself for a drop of someone else’s distorted love. I get that. But what if there are people capable of true, healthy love, and if you would make yourself capable of such love too, you could have a deep, loving relationship?

You over and over suggest therapy, like its the ultimate cure, therapy only works for people who want to change, want to be helped, i don’t.

Because you don’t think it would be worth it. And that’s where you are wrong, in my opinion.

• This reply was modified 3 years, 10 months ago by Tee.

Dear Dave,

you are so welcome and thank you for your kind words. I was thinking of how you were doing… I am sorry to hear there are complications regarding your moving into the new apartment. And I do hope you won’t end up homeless at the end of the month – do you have a backup plan in case it doesn’t get solved by then?

The slight feeling of sadness and depression is normal, since you say you’ve never really lived on your own before. So you probably miss the familiarity of someone being by your side, perhaps sharing your worries with… now you’re on your own, and your father is also sick, plus there are unexpected problems with you new flat, so it all makes it harder for you…

I am sorry that you have to experience those hurdles 🙁 But try to hold on, it will be better once you move to your new place, and can take a breath and relax finally… now you’re still in a stressful state, and you will be until the problem with your flat is solved. I hope it ends well, and soon, before the end of the month!

Dear Candice88,

how are you? Any progress with the moving out and couple’s therapy?

Dear Jisoo,

Teak, he never showed signs of withdrawing

I mentioned that because you said he would be calling and chatting with you all the time during the week, and then practically disappear on the weekends:

He would text non stop , call multiple times, share pics whole of the week and it suddenly reduces on the weekend. One or 2 msgs , calls very rarely. So this type of hot cold treatment drove me nuts and my mental state was bad…resulting in either crying or shouting.

That’s what I meant by withdrawing – that he would withdraw his care and attention at times. But you’re right, it would be more accurate to say that he was hot and cold: sometimes very close, sometimes disappearing on you. So he sent you mixed signals.

lost my husband suddenly few years ago, right in front of my eyes.

i witnessed my life collapsing in a matter of seconds and now not really invested in any relationship completely. i am scared it may end suddenly , same thoughts w.r.t my family members too.

Losing your husband so suddenly, in front of your eyes, is a huge trauma. No wonder you are now anxious about suddenly losing those you care about. You are anxious about losing them, but at the same time are trying to be detached, to protect yourself from a potential horrible loss in the future.

Its only me who is there/not there, talk good one day/cry one day, put boundaries/remove them ..lot of such stuff.

Well, it was also him who was there and not there. As far as I understood, you were always there for him, you always sought contact, and even a deeper bond, but he was the one who was rejecting it. He did it either by physically disappearing on you, e.g. not being available on the weekends, or by rejecting a romantic relationship in spite of showing care and affection for you otherwise. He was playing you, that’s for sure.

You were probably trying to protect yourself by putting some boundaries, by trying to set some rules of behavior (e.g. you made him show you his home), perhaps by rejecting his advances sometimes. But you didn’t really succeed to stay away, because it felt so good when he would talk to you. When he was available and giving you attention, it was wonderful, it felt like home. But when he would withdraw, it felt horrible and you felt abandoned.

I wonder if you experienced this same hot-cold dynamic in your childhood, with your parents, or it’s something that only got triggered now, after your husband’s death?

Hi Murtaza,

you were hurt and suffering as a child. Here you described it:

i got a mother who knows nothing about life, a father who lived in his room the whole time i was alive, a brother that used to bully me, my childhood friend almost molested me, a teenage years where i did some horrible things, things i don’t even like to think about, i spent my whole childhood and teenage with shame, i don’t even wanna say for what, because its too unpleasant and no one wants to hear it, i failed at school and i blamed myself so hard, no one cared, my mother blamed me, shamed me, a god that tells you to be greatful for your awful parents, to be greatful for being alive, thankful, i had so much shame when i sinned, so much that i hated myself so much,

Here is you trauma and your wound (described in simplified terms, but nevertheless): lack of love, compassion and understanding for you, inflicted upon you by your parents, your older siblings, your relatives (you mentioned your uncle), your friends, and the entire society. You were blamed, shamed, bullied and mistreated by people who were supposed to love you, and their mistreatment was condoned and encouraged by the society, because in your society, you need to respect the elders no matter what they do to you. And you need to become what they expect you to become, otherwise you are seen as weak and a loser.

That’s a severe trauma and very hard conditions to live in for a young child and a teen. No wonder you broke down and developed extreme shame and anxiety. No wonder you felt trapped and helpless, because there was no one to turn for help, or the help you were getting was inadequate.

You couldn’t bear the shame, you couldn’t live with it any more, it was killing you. And you also couldn’t bear the loneliness, the lack of love, affection and bonding – all natural human needs that weren’t met in your childhood. That too was killing you. So you found a way to help yourself:

i did something for myself, developed my own philosophy, developed my own way of living, everyone tells me its wrong, everyone tells me its bad, and i should do this and that, fuck them all, i live my way, or not live at all, i don’t care what you or teak or anyone think, you think im victim, sure, go ahead, it doesn’t change anything.

So you found a philosophy that helped you not to feel the intense shame and guilt, that helped you love and accept yourself as worthy, rather than worthless. In this philosophy, you’re not blaming yourself, unlike everyone else blamed you, but you are blaming your genes and the environment. And with this, you are actually loving yourself in a way, because at least you are not blaming yourself. You did find a way to protect your sanity.

And so, I want to acknowledge here that what you did – inventing a philosophy and a worldview which enables you not to feel intense shame and guilt in an extremely shaming and judgmental environment – is something you did out of love for yourself. So yes, this was love, because it protected your sanity and protected you from the judgments of the cruel external world in which you were living.

However, the problem is that your philosophy only dealt with your shame and guilt. You don’t feel shame and guilt any more. But it didn’t help you with your second biggest problem, which is having a loving relationship. It is counter-productive for developing a deeper bond with people, and it shows on this forum as well.

So you would need to understand that what protected you from shame and guilt won’t get you the love you crave (you are trying to reduce your craving and numb yourself, but the desire for connection is still there, and it’s a natural desire, so don’t suppress it).

Your “cure” has its limitations and its very bad side-effects. I and everybody here are suggesting a different cure. A proper cure for your problems, that will eventually help you have satisfying relationships as well. Because with your current approach, you won’t be able to have them.