Dear noname,

I hear you – you feel that people are dismissing your problems and want to fix them, rather than hearing you compassionately and “sitting with you” in your pain. You say your therapist is good at doing that, but others, like your roommate, aren’t. It does seem to disturb you a lot, because it appears just having your therapist see you and validate you isn’t enough, but you’d need more people to do it. That’s why you need a support group too, which you’re afraid to attend to due to confidentiality issues.

Now, the practical side of me – the problem solver – would like to offer an advice to perhaps look at online support groups, rather than in-person ones, so not to compromise your anonymity in the city you live. It shouldn’t be a problem to find such a group, since I believe quite a few popped up since covid…

Perhaps you’re annoyed by this advice, and in general by people offering solutions, because there’s a part of you that doesn’t want to move on. Have you considered that? What would happen if you’d become successful in your career? Is there somewhere in you a fear of success, a fear of healing and moving beyond your past, which keeps you stuck in one place?