Dear Elisa:

You are very welcome. You shared about your childhood: “I never felt an emotional connection when I grew up. I never knew what to do with my emotions, so I guess I learned to suppress them. I never really felt seen or heard… I internalised the feeling that (I) am not that important, as no one wants to see or hear (me)”, and about your sister: “she used to be quite jealous and blame me for things that had nothing to do with me”.

My thoughts: as your emotions were repressed, they were removed from your awareness. In your quest for Clarity, you need to become more aware of your emotions. A robot is a piece of machinery that operates on logic alone; a human is an animal that operates primarily on emotion, and partly on logic. Logic alone can not bring clarity to a human being on issues of relationships. In other words, for as long as you are cut off from your emotions, you are confused.

Also, in your childhood, two core beliefs originated in you: (1) that you are not important, and (2) that you are at fault. Both these core beliefs were not true then and are not true now, and they need to change. It is difficult to change core beliefs that were formed in childhood, but it is possible. I will be glad to share with you, over time, my process of changing my own core beliefs (that I was not important and that I was at fault, same as yours).

In my effort to understand you better, I re-read your previous thread of May 2016, 4.5 years ago. You were about 28 at that time. You wrote about your boyfriend at the time (I’ll refer to him as B2) and your confusion: “we have been together for over 3 years.. The more time went, the more confused I got… My boyfriend cried and went crazy and said it was all a lie. So confused again… he (B2) says I am hurting him.. he went hysteric and cried and cried and even trying to throw up several times. It ended up with me feeling sorry for him, although it felt wrong.. I am so confused that I do not know right from wrong.. everyone loves this guy and thinks he’s great- so I must be the bad one in it all. And who knows“.

You shared about a previous boyfriend (I’ll refer to him as B1): “he.. stalked me, forced me to have intercourse and so on.. not as ‘bad’ as (B2), But his (B2’s)  behaviour is definitely more confusing”.

Four and a half years later, you shared that you’ve been in a relationship with your current boyfriend (I will refer to him as B3). You shared about him: “Throughout the relationship he has given me the silent treatment often, saying that he wasn’t sure that he wanted a relationship at all… One moment he wanted to marry me and the next he thought I was the source of all his problems. One moment he was in love and then the other, he is angry… he made plans with me but they never followed through.. he says sometimes that we should either break up or get married… I guess that he has never said that directly, it was more what I was sensing… he feels that I am too much of a responsibility.. that I am just too much for him… he feels overwhelmed by life and just wants to hide away.. When he is in that state he just wants to cut me out.. (in the) span of a week.. he would be very loving.. then the other half of the week he would suddenly become distant… I feel confused when he changes his mind… He came into my room last night after he broke up with me and wanted to share intimacy, I knew that I should have said no, but I don’t want to hurt him.. It happened from a sense of compulsion.. He sounds so confused.. It’s been the same patterns for 3 years… I can’t help to have a part of me that thinks it’s my fault and that I am the problem”.

More of my thoughts: seems to me that B1, B2 and B3 were/ are all wrong for you, and that the words and behaviors of B2 and B3 were indeed confusing. It is impossible for you to gain clarity when in a relationship with an unstable, unpredictable person. In your quest for clarity, you need to be either single (not in a relationship), or in a relationship with a stable, predictable person who is clear, not confusing!

You wrote about you and B3: “We live in a commune together… We have different rooms so he just spends his time there.. we are both practising spiritual teachings”-

– can you tell  me what kind of a commune you are referring to, and whether the residents of this commune suffer from disabilities… and/ or whether powerful drugs are used in the commune?

anita