Dear Tiny Butterfly:
It seems to me that no matter what you choose to do about this relationship and in it, it is not going to be EASY for you. You are, I believe, going to have a difficult time no matter what. My next thought to myself, placing myself in your spot as I see it: since i am going to have a difficult time no matter what i do, why don’t I see to it that my GOAL in this is the right goal for me, so that the difficult time in front of me is going to take me someplace better in my life, so that my chances at mental and physical well being long term are maximized?

You wrote that you have changed and grown for the better since your party days. You mentioned being true to yourself, it being something you value. You mentioned how you were very happy with your boyfriend for six months. From all that you mentioned I see your motivation to LOVE and be loved. How good it felt. That is the draw to him. You are also motivated to GROW.

Conflict: when the price of love is shrinking, not only not growing, but shrinking, fearing, cowering, apologizing.

Is it still love then? Does love SHRINK you? Does love work against you?

Side note: I had a similar relationship with my mother in that she attacked me relentlessly, blaming me for her attacks, claiming I was thinking things i was not thinking, that i was trying to hurt her when i was not, ‘reading my mind” in all the wrong ways. Those physical and verbal attacks were horribly HARMFUL to me, terribly so. My anxiety was intense and ongoing, the physical toll incredible lifetime. How fortunate you are, I am thinking, for being an adult when such attacks- verbal attacks (more painful to me than the physical). How fortunate, I am thinking, that you have the physical, circumstantial power and opportunity to terminate this abuse.

Back to you: i would suggest at this time that you reflect on your GOALS as they relate to this relationship- verbalize/ write them down. Growth- sticking to your goals (with flexibility: to evaluate, re-evaluate, examine, re-state over time and experience). Like I wrote: you will have a difficult time ANYWAY, staying (abuse) or leaving (loneliness, doubt…)

About him: i have no doubt that sometimes he is very loving, very sweet, even vulnerable and that you feel such closeness to him at times, that you have such memories… possibly you see him at times as the vulnerable child that he is inside and you feel compassion for him… A person can get lost in such feelings. It is true he is a good kid inside, that he attacks because he is hurting… he deserves empathy. My input: he deserves somebody else’s empathy. Once he attacks you, repeatedly (a pattern) – it is no longer the job of the attacked to feel empathy for the attacker. In this predator-prey relationship empathy by prey means keeping the prey position, being hurt more and more.

Will he change? Grow? The fact that he so inaccurately reads your mind means he practices distorted thinking severe enough to be a problem. The fact that he may do that “only when distressed” is very discouraging because future distress is inevitable. it means that you can realistically expect to be attacked ON TOP of future distresses. You can expect to be attacked when you are down (as in family struggles). He will need to be distressed by his own dysfunction and desire a better way. He will need to choose the more difficult way- to grow (and experience growing pains) and not go with the path of least resistance, temporary, immediate relief in the existing patterns.

You may think it should be easy for him… to choose what works, what will obviously make his life better on the long run?

Not so, if it was easy, you wouldn’t have the difficult time you are having in making your life better on the long run.

What do you think? Back to writing goals…?
Take care:
anita