Dear anita and La Brava,

thank you for your responses. I will address both separately.

anita,

I spent sometime since reading your reply thinking about childhood memories. What I noticed is that in a lot of them, my parents aren’t  actively part of my memories. When I think back on playing around the house/backyard and vacations, these are very much happy memories. However, in these memories I know that my parents are around (also in the house or also on vacation), but I can’t see them or have an interaction with them. I was pampered in the sense that I had everything material & I know they wanted me to succeed and would always be there for me. It almost like La Brava might have hit the nail on its head by saying they drove me everywhere, attended practices, gave me all opportunities, which I understood as love. I always just “knew” they loved me without it being said. It was shown by actions, not words.

So in terms of vocalisation, feelings were not talked about much as far as I remember. We never said “I love you” to each other and I have a hard time recalling when I heard my parents say they were proud of me. Feelings were not really discussed in our house. So when I used the term “admit my new relationship”, because to me that would be revealing emotion and committing long-term. And of course, I feel very uneasy about showing/admitting emotion. I also fear failure of the relationship and how I would be looked upon if we broke up. I don’t want to broadcast a relationship unless I “know” this relationship will work out. Obviously you will never know if a relationship will go the long haul, but I don’t want to introduce anyone that I don’t see a clear future with yet myself. I almost have this feeling that if I commit it has to work out, otherwise my parents would look down on me and my feelings. One interesting thing I would like to note, I always just anticipate their disappointment or think they would disapprove. Which is weird, because I don’t remember my parents disapproving many of my actions. They also didn’t yell much growing up. It was a strict household and I didn’t usually break rules. But there is a thing I now just call “the look”…it’s the way I am looked at that I think means they do not approve, but they never say anything. I’ve been told I use “the look” myself these days.

I appreciate your post once again, it’s allowed me to start digging into the right direction. Talking about it now almost makes me feel silly for not seeing all this earlier.

La Brava,

thank you for your thoughts. I have previously taken the love languages test and it always is a tie between acts of service – gifts – words of affirmation. The result almost looks like I don’t really understand my own love languages. However, I also considered that maybe acts of service and gifts is how I was shown love, so I see it as a love language, while words of affirmation could be my true one.

I actually have recently started keeping a journal, and I will use your recommendations when writing in it. Is it surprising that I even feel uncomfortable writing my emotions into my journal? Like I write it, but am afraid to open up 100% as someone could read it someday. No one will as I am living by myself, but I have this worry and always have to push myself a little bit to write down my feelings.

Thank you again.