Dear grounded/Anna:

I figured I will look for the answers to my questions in your own words so I re-read your posts in the 2017 thread and the current one. My purpose is to attempt to be a bit helpful to you. You didn’t share anything about your childhood but I can tell some things about your childhood by reading about your experience in romantic relationships with men.

This is my understanding: as a child you were very much alone a lot of the time, not connected to your parents. Sometimes they were there for you and you felt happy, safe, content. But most often they were not there for you and you were sad alone, scared alone, feeling strong emotions, alone. There were your parents perhaps feeding you, taking care of you physically, but they didn’t know how you felt, didn’t notice, didn’t ask you: Anna, you look so sad, ell me… Or Anna, it hurts when a friend doesn’t want to  play with you, doesn’t it. .Stuff like that, paying attention to how you feel. Without their attention and help you were scared by the intensity of your feelings, confused, not understanding why you feel the way you did, and you were so very sad to be so alone.

As a child you adjusted best you can to this emotional/ social isolation at home, played on your own and did a good job at being on your own: “I can be happy on my own… I am not afraid of being alone, actually I am very good at it.. I’m good at being in my own company and doing things on my own”.

As an adult, a woman, you are still okay being alone until you start dating a man you are interested in and who is interested in you. Then the old need to connect, to be together, to be seen and heard and understood, awakens with intensity: “when I let people in I let them in 100%”, a 100% because the unsatisfied need of childhood is so strong still.

When you experience a breakup, the feelings of isolation as a child awaken: “I was in a really deep low for a very long time, all I could do was cry… I am still waiting for him to come back… I am waiting for the happiness that he made me feel… I feel afraid to leave him behind and I’m not sure where to conquer those fears… I’m afraid to be without him… I’m afraid to lose him… living with this hope that he might come back is hard.. I’m afraid… How do I give up and let go of the idea of being together with him?.. it’s me wanting to hear from him, seeing him.. tell me that he wants to be with me”.

Taking out the sexual element of romantic relationships, your feelings within a relationship and following a breakup are the same as you had as a child. The intensity of your need for the man, the intensity of your fear of being separated from the man are the same intensity you felt then for your parent/s. Basically, like all of us, we keep re-living our childhood experiences in the context of our adult lives.

For you to be less anxious in the context of relationships and otherwise, to be able to choose better, to develop a healthy, loving relationship with a man, you will need to examine and process some of your childhood experience, to understand it, to.. sort of take the hand of the child that you were and tell her that she is no longer alone. Take her hand and ask her questions, gently, explain feelings to her, so that feelings make sense to her, teach her. This will lessen the intensity of her need for another and the intensity of her fear and despair regarding this breakup.

anita

Dear grounded/Anna:

I hope you feel better soon, and that you will soon enough be in the love relationship where you feel content.

anita

Dear grounded:

Earlier in the month you wrote: “I don’t feel strong enough to see him and know that he doesn’t want me/ can’t be with me so I have not been attending  group events”.

Last communication with him, if I remember correctly,  you expressed to him that you want an exclusive relationship with him. He was on dating sites at the time. Later he told you that he deleted the dating sites but didn’t explain further, didn’t tell you so far that he is no longer dating or that he is interested in resuming an exclusive relationship with you.

I think it is reasonable to  assume that nothing has changed, he is still not interested in what you are interested. Because you already accepted his birthday party invitation, what I would do if I was you, is to not spend any alone time with him before or after the birthday party (last time this happened was around new year, I think).

It will hurt you if you once again become physically intimate with him not in the context of an acknowledged and established exclusive relationship with him.

So let’s say you attend the party and everyone gives him a hug or a kiss on the cheek (whatever the custom)- do the same in front of the group of friends, but no physical contact with him outside the group, no alone time, is my suggestion.

Regarding  wishing him a happy birthday Thursday via text, I wouldn’t attach any question to the text, just wish him happy birthday, that is all.

I hope to read from you again, any updates or if you need to express more of your thoughts and feelings.

anita

Dear grounded:

You are welcome.

Geographic/physical distance is an advantage when it comes to creating an emotional distance from a person.

“I also won’t make the same mistakes I made in the past. do still want to be with him so  I’m not sure”-

not sure about what specifically?

* I will be away from the computer for about 16 hours.

anita

Dear grounded:

He said: “I can commit to just seeing you for now and be exclusive, get off dating sites and what not but I don’t want a relationship with anyone right now, not while things are on the right track for me”-

So he wants an exclusive sexual arrangement with you, for now, no time length specification, correct?

– and what did he mean by “things are on the right track for me”?

anita

Dear grounded:

So he offered you an exclusive sexual arrangement until thing are no longer on the right track for him. He may then consider a relationship with you if things are on the wrong track for him…?

– better ask him if this is so, and what he means by things being on the right track for him on one hand, and things being on the wrong track for him on the other hand.

anita