I need some help please. I am desperately infatuated with a woman who I met two years ago and haven’t seen since then. I tried to keep this post short, but I found that it was somewhat hard to do without putting a lot of the situation into perspective.

I was in my mid 20s and was a very optimistic thinker. I even considered myself a bit of a hero, laughing at challenges and facing them head on. I had fooled around in some casual relationships before but was starting to realize that relationships weren’t really for me. That all changed when I was in college and met her, Mary. We’re alike in so many ways… all of our interests, our hobbies, our beliefs, even our stubborn, headstrong arrogance/confidence. One thing that truly inspires me about her is how she keeps on with a positive attitude in spite of the fact that she has several serious health problems and does not anticipate living past 40. As soon as we met I was almost immediately convinced that if anyone in this world was for me, it had to be her.

Not long after Mary and I met though, some very traumatic events occurred in my life. I’d rather not go into specifics but I was coming out of a long-distance relationship and what should have been a simple break up went horribly wrong. Only a few months later, my grandmother who I had always been very close to my whole life passed away. The last straw was a friend who turned against me after I had long been supportive of her but declined to help one day. It was all overwhelming and completely changed my view of the world. I shut down emotionally and cut nearly everyone out of my life, including Mary, as I tried to figure out how everything went so wrong.

It wasn’t until a year later that I started to get back in touch with myself and realized just how badly I missed Mary. I managed to get in touch with her via email and was pleasantly surprised when she responded! I didn’t disclose any specific details about the traumatic events that had occurred, but rather tried to pick things up where they left off.

Here’s the catch…

Right now she’s staying at home due to her health issues. Despite us both being in our 20s, she lives with her parents who, from what I’ve gathered, are protective of her to a point of paranoia. She has told me repeatedly that they won’t let anyone (guys especially) to come visit her and is rarely allowed to go out on her own. She also does not like to talk on the phone much since there’s always someone else at home with her. I’m not sure what pains me more… the fact that her parents keep such a tight grasp on her or that I cannot see her because of it.

Some days I can get by without thinking about her, but other days my thoughts latch on to her and I can’t think about anything else. What’s worse I get angry at myself because I missed several great opportunities to spend time with her while I was having my emotional shutdown, and all of the traumatic events from the previous years come flooding back, making me question and doubt myself all over again.

I constantly worry about her due to her health, or that she doesn’t share my feelings, or that maybe she’s avoiding me. It kills me that I can’t visit with her like we’re normal adults, not knowing how she feels about me or if or when we’ll get to see each other again. We still text each other casually but not about anything serious. Rather than texting though, I want to talk to her again, or talk a walk with her somewhere and just give her a hug. Really I just want to spill out all of my feelings to her face-to-face just to hear her response, even if I don’t like the answer… Am I worrying too much that I can’t be open with her about my feelings? Why must my heart be so selfish and seemingly incapable of letting her go? What should I do?

Thank you for taking the time to read. These feelings have been on my mind for a long time, wanting to be let out. Please ask if there’s anything that’s vague or unclear, my thoughts have been all jumbled up with this for close to two years.