Dear Anita:

Thank you for your reply.

I would certainly like to think that the closeness she and I shared was indeed real, and that she had at least some genuine affection for me. But, of course, I can’t see the world through her eyes. Without a doubt it was all real on my part. When we discussed our relationship, closeness, challenges, etc., she was at times more inclined to talk about those things in terms of the superficial rather than the substantive. I don’t doubt that she felt vulnerable, though.

After several months of getting to know each other, she began confiding her past experiences to me, and the subsequent mental issues with which she had been diagnosed because of those experiences. I chose to allow her a certain amount of latitude in her behavior in the belief that her struggles with her supposed issues deserved some leeway. (I say “supposed” because in my research into her behavior, I found that the behaviors she manifested where far less indicative of the things with which she told me that she had been diagnosed, and much, much more indicative of another disorder about which she never told me. I also learned that folks with that particular disorder frequently misrepresent their past, claiming most of the experiences she claimed, as a means of gaining sympathy from others and exploiting their compassion, and also to excuse their own poor behavior. I honestly don’t know what to believe.)

I am not one to court abuse, but I see in hindsight that I should not have allowed her such leeway, in spite of her issues—which reminds me of the joke about the little boy who asked his mother why one dog was mounted on the rear of another dog. His mother told him that the dog on the other dog’s back had a hurt paw, and the dog in front was helping the hurt dog home. The little boy shook his head and said, “Isn’t that typical? You try to be kind to someone and they [insert coitus verb here] you.”)

CMI