Dear Confused

Sometimes our dreams are a way of processing the stuff we/life has been inputted into our minds often in the last 24hrs. therefore the more you think about her/situation the greater the chance a part of that will play out in your dream scape.
Sometimes I dream that my ex-husband survived his boat sinking & I wake up happy other times I dream of his death & I wake up with the physical feeling of grief in my heart even though the accident was 25 years ago.
Lucid dreaming & dream yoga are quite interesting topics to mull over.
Kind regards & sweet dreams
Roberta

Hey Confused:

As I was looking at your Dec 19, 2025 posts, I came across “In my case too, the relationship with my mother was very chaotic, violence and arguing constantly, throwing some awkward affection here and there, then rinse and repeat. I can’t remember if I was dissociating when I was a kid, definitely trying to escape in imaginary worlds and games though”-

And it occurred to me how much we do have in common. I too escaped into imaginary worlds, daydreaming for hours every day, every chance I got. There were no computers back then, so my escape was strictly mental, imaginary.

A member here in the forums (Robi1992), only 3 years older than you, also grew up in a chaotic home with an unpredictable, sometimes violent mother, and like you, he escaped into imaginary worlds and games: (Robi, Feb 18, 2024: “When I was about 11, my parents bought my first computer. I was hooked from the early beginning. I would spend an entire day and sometimes night playing games and watching films. The internet has become my playground. Finally, there was a place where I could hide, explore and fit in… For many years, as an adult, I would spend my days in front of the computer.”

Children who grow up in chaotic homes like you, me and Robi, need an escape. But we can’t escape the consequences of growing up in chaotic homes. Neither the suffering nor the consequences end just because we become adults and live away from home. As adults, we have to take on the difficult but necessary healing process if we want to put an end to the negative consequences of growing up in chaos.

🤍 Anita

@Roberta

I am sorry for your loss. I thought of that and i know it plays a big role, its just that i can’t get her out of my mind and i don’t know why. The only way seems to just tell her to cut contact indefinitely but i know i’ll be still thinking about her constantly. I’ve done it with others in the past, didn’t work. So i am trying to find out what’s going on with me perhaps, idk.

@anita
Psychiatrist said he doesn’t think i’m depressed or something. He said im afraid to let go and surrender and he sees some OCD in me, not depression. But i don’t feel like it. I feel depressed with strong OCD tendencies that focus around this girl.

What you’re trying to say is that i was using her as an escape?

I saw it clearer because of how much different my life feels now, without the intense feelings for her, but now it’s at 0, i can’t find the inbetween, it’s always 100 or 0 with me, i think that’s the hard thing to learn, how to live in the middle and still enjoy it. I wouldn’t say i used her as an escape, rather she added joy/love/belonging, things that i crave.
Yes we’ve had many meaningful exchanges and i refuse to believe that what i was feeling/doing were “fake” or something. I was feeling great while doing, legitimately caring and supporting her. I even felt it now at times but its like my brain says “no no, we dont do that here” and shuts it off.

Hey Confused:

I wasn’t thinking that you used her as an escape. I was thinking that the fact that it was a LDR was an escape from the stress a close physical proximity relationship would have caused.

Coming to think 🤔 about it.. is the shutdown an escape in itself?

Escape from feelings?

I have no doubt the two of you had genuinely loving exchanges.

🤔 (I love this emoji, lol) Anita

Not wanting to escape the feelings that you liked so much, I am thinking, but wanting (subconsciously) to escape feelings you wouldn’t like AT ALL, like what shows up on the other side of love (what you experienced as a child, the arguing, the violence)?

Remember you said that you don’t remember if you dissociated as a child ((I think you said it early on, Dec 19)?

Well, my guess is that you did like any child would, and you “forgot” how badly it felt when love (your mother’s affection) turned into arguing and violence.

And what you’re trying to escape is not love and affection but what followed it, in your early, real-life experience.

🤔 Anita

“When she confessed her feelings, (you thought) “Now I have to be extra careful not to hurt her”-

So, when she expressed love for you, you didn’t expand, as in, Let’s Love Each Other. Instead yo u contracted, as in, I Have 2 B Careful.

Love= Hurt.

That’s the kind of “love” you grew up with, the kind that hurts.. so, you connect the two?

🤔 👀 😢 Anita

Damn,not really 🙁 . I still can’t connect the two. My exact thoughts when i read her poem were “Oh, what a wonderful, deep and affectionate move, she is lovely”, but then it followed “Why don’t i feel more? I SHOULD be feeling more, why am i not crazy/elated right now? Isn’t that what i wanted? I feel so bad if i don’t feel more about it right now, i am such a bad person, but now i have to be extra careful not to hurt her, damn she really IS into me?!” I think my train of thoughts was kinda like this. But then again, i have never felt excitement about receiving gifts/love since i was maybe 12? For example my friends surprised me with a pair of shoes on my birthday and i faked my excitement because i didn’t wanna seem like an asshole, but really i felt nothing, just appreciation and that’s all.

I think i can’t receive love and i have to be okay with faking it at this point, i dont know. I don’t “believe” in unconditional love towards me, i’ve always learned to earn it.