Dear Gaia:

You can relate. This means that it is not your fault, this cringiness is not your fault. You know you’d never choose- no one would choose- something as terribly uncomfortable as this.

It is as if your mother took a syringe and injected cringiness into your arm,  same as my mother did to me.

She injected cringiness into you, and unaware of what she did, she wants you to get close to the original source of your cringiness- an impossible request!

Your guilt is not valid. You are not guilty at all for feeling cringy and for not wanting to be close to your mother.

It doesn’t sound corny to me at all, that you “crave most physical contact” with your crush.. I figure you don’t feel cringy when you fantasize about physical contact with him because the cringe doesn’t get attached to fantasy, only to real- life physical contact.

I understand better now: you naturally desire physical contact with a young man, but you feel cringy when you are in physical contact with a guy.. what a dilemma, what a conflict, needing something so much, naturally, and being cringed/ repelled by the very thing you need so much.

I think we understand each other well at this point, do we?

anita