Hi all,

Thank you for your responses – you guys are all so helpful, its so very appreciated.

Anita – Thank you for taking so much time to learn about my scenario. I agree with you. Logically, when I look at the entire picture, I do feel that I did not conduct myself correctly. I was afraid to ask questions, I think I was afraid of the reality. I think 2 years ago I NEEDED him to be a good person, and that made me dodge asking the questions because the reality is not what I needed, I needed someone to believe in. At the time, I just wanted to enjoy my time with his positive traits. I still wasn’t afraid to voice my concerns with him, but I was able to take a lot of undesirable behavior before I reached my end point. As I grew as a person and transformed myself over the past 2 years, I realized that I was excited to discover him and was hoping for him to contact me. Unfortunately, by this time, the situation was complex, no longer freeing. He had already kept facts from me for so long, far before I grew into the person I now am. In agreeing with you, I can see that I am a bit confused whether he really deceived me? I also don’t know if there is space for healing in between us in the future if the opportunity arises. I feel like we both took things too far; I took my unrealistic perception of “us” too far and he misrepresented himself for too long. At what point is there too much damage between two people?

Matty – you sound right. I am not really honing that I have now learned about him, I’m isolating my experience with him; separating his good as “him” and his bad as “this can’t be him”. I still believe in him, maybe its because I am a dreamer…but if I consider all that I know now, I don’t think there’s much space remaining for me to believe in him, unfortunately. Emotionally its much easier said then done.

Inky- Thank you. you are so very correct. I keep myself in line for the most part and any of my darkness hurts me, not others. So I have a hard time coping with when others allow themselves to hurt others.

Hi Anita –

I was a child of a abusive father and grandfather (verbally, emotionally, several times physically). I never felt safe, in fact I had anxiety starting at age 5 until my father was legally kicked out of the house for hitting my mom in front of me at age 11. From age 5-11 I thought my dad was going to kill me because of his rage. In fact, this is embarrassing, but until the age of 11, when my dad was kicked out, I had to sleep in my mom’s room, otherwise I would have anxiety attacks about dying and wouldn’t be able to sleep all night. At 13, during a nasty divorce, my mom’s health declined and she almost died from her heart stopping. I had to pick up a lot of the responsibilities while my mom was ill, because she couldn’t remember anything, all while my dad was taking and hiding money from us. At one point we couldn’t pay utilities and were getting close to not being able to eat while my dad was floating around on his yacht. As a kid I grew really talented at crying and being scared out of my mind to poof, 5 seconds later, in public I was smiling, happy, and silly in front of everyone. Hiding behind happiness was my defense mechanism. I have stayed out of relationships for many many years and spent so much time by myself relearning myself and healing my thoughts. And what you described is something I still do, when something intimidating comes up (a call for a job, a guy I like..etc.) I won’t even look at it. Even if its a good thing, I feel unsafe because I can be hurt by the outcome, so I stuff it away for hours or days until I can deal with it.
But I have worked on all that, and sure…I am definitely no master of myself, but I am realistic, compassionate, and I try. I know I fumble…but I try to learn or minimize it. I really just want to be normal, but even when I read what I wrote above it makes me sad and I don’t know if I could really

I had a moment of realization tonight – I realized that I had a huge part in this situation with this guy (duh, but a larger part than I initially thought). I was excited to find someone I felt this way about. I have been focusing on my work and myself for so long and I haven’t found someone that I felt excited about this him. I pushed it. I didn’t let things unfold effortlessly. I don’t know where to go now. I don’t have the line to communicate with him. I caused it by the way I confronted him. And if history repeats itself, he will contact me in 5 months, and I can’t do that again.

I realized it was primarily lack of communication. There are still things that were deceptive, however I don’t know enough facts to really give much detail without me rambling on. All my facts consist of what the other girl told me and contorted long stories, so I guess a lot of the content would be speculation.

As far as “too much damage in between two people” – I don’t even know where to go from here. I think its time I grow out of this one….maybe the way he treated me is a degree to close to my past. Maybe thats why it feels right, is because its just the kind of stuff I am used to.

What do you think Anita?
Again, thank you for all your help, its so incredibly nice of you. I really want to learn so I have the tool to create the life I want to live with people whom are healthy for myself to have in my life.

Hi Anita –

For sure, get some good rest! 🙂

I do not speak with my grandmother anymore due to her behavior. (I didn’t mention her earlier, but she did some things tha forced me to have to drop out of college.) I have not spoken (being my choice) to my grandfather since I was 11 (I’m 26 now). I speak with my father and he visits me about every 6-8 months (he lives across the country, I moved away with my mom). We don’t have an abusive relationship anymore, however, I mostly tolerate him in my life to be completely honest. I have worked hard to show him how I will accept being treated and knows I gladly will not speak with him if he shows any sign of abusive tendencies; as long as I keep my distance and set firm boundaries, he is okay. Sometimes what he says will have an undertone to it, but I just ignore him or don’t respond to him depending on the severity of the comment.

My mother and I have a great relationship….she’s my best friend and we pretty much are a team as we have been my whole life. She is working on building up her life again (still) so we have a major partnership in trying to do so.

Embarrassing?

After 11 from all the stress my heart health declined and my heart started failing…I dealt with this until I was 20. So after 20 my life has slowly started to become calm. The past 6 years have actually been the hardest for me, because the calmness is confusing to me. But over the years I have been learning how to live like this.

Hi Anita –

I apologize for the slow reaponse.

It is silly that I am embarrassed about that – my mother has always raised me to be strong, so when I in a weak position I tend to feel embarrassed.

Yes, my heart has been recovering and for about the past 3 years I am been symptom free! Yay!

Exactly, I totally understand what you are talking about. For awhile there I created chaos in my own mind just because functioning in a calm environment was something I was not used to. I have slowly embraced the calmness.

That makes sense. I tend to see the world through excessively sympathetic eyes. My thought process is that everyone has there own experience and trials in this life…so is my pain really pain, or is it a different way we are experiencing the same situation. After all, I do believe deeply rooted in people is goodness, it’s just the effects that life has had and their own perception that vastly differs. Additionally, I go back to that strength thing I said above – I almost feel that my pain is not valid, that I am seeing things wrong.

What now? I don’t know. I usually just go on working on myself and expanding my horizons. However, I can stand the thought of him coming back around in 6 months. I want peace, I want to move on. But knowing there’s a possiblity that there’s a guy I still miss who will come lurking out of the shadows…it doesn’t allow me to focus on my life without him in a clear conscious. Nothing he’s done was unforgivable, but the way he handles it, makes it to where I’m left with the question “how could I forgive you, you don’t give me the opportunity to?”

Hi Anita –

Ah, thanks! Yes, always working to incorporate more healthy habits to keep my heart healthy and become a better person as well!

In reguards to my relationship with my mother – yes, we have always had a good relationship. However, the older I have grown and the more clarity I have of the past, I realize our relationship was more of teamwork/survival oriented relationship. I think if I didn’t have her and vice verse to bounce emotions off and and to give more confidence in each other’s perception of what was going on in our lives with my dad and grandfather, we wouldn’t have bounced back or freed ourselves of the situations. It kept us sane at times. She held out of divorcing my father till I was 11 on purpose, because she did research and spoke to attorneys years prior to make sure my voice counted when visitation rights were to be scheduled. I opted to never stay with him.

Our relationship now has changed slightly. We still are pretty much a team, however, as we get more settled into our lives, I see us being less of a single working unit, and a little more developed in our own lives.

That’s true. I guess adulthood changes people. I don’t know if I am young at heart or if I just have had that whole process stunted in me, but i don’t even comprehend ill intentions or unsympathetic behaviors. This kind of makes me sad and angry a lot of times – it’s so easy and wonderful to come from a place of kindness, so why not?

I guess I just know the pattern now. He makes a mistake, he goes away for months, he contacts me and apologizes. And I don’t want him to go away, never did. I just want there to be openness, whatever that might bring. And now, because I know this is a pattern, I don’t want to experience the next cycle….it’s too long of a cycle to allow for any spiritual growth in him or growth in the relationship. The thing is, what he does and the way he reacts stems from personal insecurities…not out of meanness, at least that’s what I truly believe.

I never sought after him, I just reacted to whatever he gave me. It’s just sad, because I don’t want to lose faith in him…but I think I’m realizing I’m slim on other options. I guess I am keeping who he is when we are in our” on” mode an aantonym for what happens between us. Are they the same thing?

Again Anita, your so kind, thank you for everything