Hi all

Thank you. I went to my first therapy session yesterday.

The therapist tried to explore the pattern with our childhood.

For me, I grew up with some insecurity issues, wanted to get protection as I mentioned earlier(I think that’s how i wanted closeness), while my father was very explosive(emotionally) He would force me to go eat breakfast with him but there are times when I didn’t want to, to a point i cried really hard thinking why was he forcing me to do something I didn’t want to. He had problem when people get emotional or cry and i still remembered he scolded me for crying. He couldn’t tolerate people having vulnerable emotions, he would go head to head and gets very confrontational, or explosive. This happened to me, to his colleagues(which usually result in things falling apart), to my mom and elder brother, basically anyone who is against him(even the slightest). He was also very judgmental, in a heated argument I had with him before(I learned stand against him when i got older) , he called me useless and loser because I didn’t get married. It was so hurtful for me, I almost ran away from home that time

So from young I have learned to hide my emotions, and just dealt with it myself. I feel this is what happened when i swallowed my emotions, and not let her know that I was sad. I didn’t have the appropriate tools to express my emotions(while I think i am naturally born very sentimental). Similar thing might have happened when she came home late, I don’t often text or call he during the time, because I didn’t want to upset her. Once she gets home, she realized i was upset and she was caught by surprise.

We touched on her upbringing as well, her parents were very strict and she didn’t have much autonomy when she was a kid. So now, if asked for closeness and assurance, she might feel bounded and wants to escape. So the way my therapist saw it was, we are the classical pursuer distancer dynamic. It is to what extend we can live with it.

My therapist was saying: may be you unconsciously reminded her of how her parents treated her, while you want assurance and closeness. If this is the case, of course our love feeling dies down.

I didn’t make my second appointment, I feel I have cleared a lot on my side. The interaction pattern, my childhood insecurity, the way to regulate my insecurity when I feel it(meditate/ exercise/ breath/ distract). I also think in our relationship we got lazy and we didn’t celebrate much or go on a date etc.

All I have to do, is to stay calm and collected. It is hard to imagine we are breaking up(we might be heading that direction though), but I will clear the reasons why so that we have properly closure.

When asked whether I leaned towards the possibility of break up vs she just needs time to restart, I answered I really didn’t have a concrete direction(with her reactions i really feel very ambivalent, unsure how much is my projection though, she might think she was very clear i really dunno). I guess that probably should be my stance when i meet her. Be open-minded and see what comes up.

The therapist did encourage me to write letter/ email to her, for important insight like this. She can choose to read or not. But she mentioned she is one of those who compartmentize things, the emotions do not get in her, it’s all in the head, not in the heart. I am still pondering on this. But she encouraged me to lead the discussion when it comes to emotions, I am obviously a lot more introspective and have gone to a deeper level when it comes to emotions.

Thanks all, best wishes to you

Hi Anita

Thank you.

I think you made a good point, that she might be afraid of making me overreact, and that may be she did not want to trigger me. May be throughout the years, my reaction makes her feel she was at fault all the time, she did mention she didn’t know how to deal with my reaction sometimes.

This morning, it did come across to me that may be it is better if we are apart. Given she has lost the feelings as a partner towards me. She cares, but probably there is something more that is needed to continue as partner. May be she has been suffering for a while and honestly I do not want her to be scared and suffer anymore. Together or not.

Anyhow, i will continue to see the issue that is happening on my side, will go to therapy tomorrow. Will see what comes up

Clara

Hello Anita and  Helcat,

Thanks you. I will try to remember to act out of love. I guess the whole thing is a bit out of my comprehension. I can’t figure out if she wants to break up, or if she wants to salvage the relationship(or any other motive).  The actions do not add up.

If she wants to break up then she has all the opportunities(including yesterday, I kind of prepared for the worst yesterday), or,  we can definitely set an earlier date to end this rather than make it the end of the month, if it’s exactly one month it will be 20th, but not 27th. I even mentioned this was very challenging in practice to wait for a month( i assume if you do want to break up then you don’t want to wait also?and no need to deliberately prolong the suffering of someone else if you don’t think the benefit of the longer separation prevails?)But she said she was slow and she needed time to think things through. Plus she said she and I are not dating any other person during this period, so we are still partner in her mind. she even texted me afterwards for giving her this space.

if she wants to continue, why is she not sharing anything at all yesterday. She did not seem to really want to share much, and this is also weird given we haven’t talked for a whole week(and we lived together before that). I did ask if anything came up but she said she would share at the end of month.

It seems the space and time itself, is doing something and she wants them.

Anyways, I should stop thinking the ‘why’. I will never get to know until the end of the month (given she has thought through and know it also) This is out of my comprehension given I do not have more information.

The family issue did impact me quite a bit, so I had been very insecure as a person for a majority part of my adulthood. I don’t think they deliberately peeped, it just happened my mom was oblivious. That uncle passed away and I don’t think he meant evil either. It kind of just happened, but then it made me feel very insecure.

Thanks all for listening, good morning on your side when you see this

Clara

Hi Anita,

Thank you, your words reminded me to think more clearly about the situation indeed. I really shouldn’t just ignore all my needs and push myself to this point where I stick to the one month at all cost. This may just create resentment at the end if not properly addressed ,  if I don’t have a clear-head I may just blame her for all of these and forget that each relationship has two sides. So yes, voice out clearly does help to make this all more workable. Even if she does not agree or does not respond, I have done my part.

The reading does resonate. Probably because my past relationships were not successful, and as a child, there was no personal space for myself(I shared flat with a big families). I still remember the window of my bathroom was broken, and I often am scared someone on the other side would be able to peep, my parents have no sense of privacy, my mom would walk in(the door often has no lock) while I was showering, I remember there was one time an uncle was outside and I think he saw me shower, and I remembered I tried to use a towel to cover myself. Thinking of these make me feel a bit insecure still.

I understand it is the lack of knowledge in my parents’ generation, and probably they grew up that way which caused them oblivious of how impactful these seemingly minor things can harm to a child.

I think these are some of the root causes of my insecurity. I reviewed them before but I think i never actually did anything to deal with them, just did the first step to acknowledge of these incidences that happened before. I think I struggled to forgive my parents for a quite a period of time, while they didn’t even know what i was angry or irritated about. I reconciled with my parents(primarily I decided on the reconciliation and forgive and let things go cause nth was talked about), and I have a good relationship with them now. Just that I don’t think they know what I have been through, and I don’t think they would understand what it was.

So yea, I think I am naturally very empathic and sentimental and wants to get close to some ppl, but yet I think somehow I know people can be a source of danger(with them and myself aware of it, conscious of it or not).

i will try to look at the books you recommend as well

Have a goodnight

hi all

she responded quite quickly. we had a phone call.

I told her two things

1) i told her about the incidence of my mom, and i refrained myself from contacting her. while i allowed her to text me if something major happened, i didnt allow myself to do the same. I said i wanted to compromise that we can contact each other if anything happens. in my mind we sre still together, and with such big thing i woild really want to talk to her, to which she agreed immediately

2) i asked for specific date when we will talk .about how we should move forward, we made a date in the end of jul

i confirmed that we are on a break but on broke up. and i confirmed the definition, which means we are still exclusive to each other and we are not dating anyone else.

i shared with her i did a lot of soul searching, inseurity did come up but i tried to treat it as my homework to prepare for the relationship.

overall, i think this has settled my mind better. to have a confirmation and direction of where she is heading to, instead of just imagining myself

thanks everyone

<p style=”text-align: left;”>i think i did not expect her to contacr me anytime, my source of suffering  is my ruminating thought of what would happen after this</p>
even so, by expecting myself not contating her whatever happeend and her able to do so to me, this is not a right expectation

I will initiate a talk with her to clarify

thanks all

hi all

i think you are right

i was a bit too cruel to myself and not contacted her, even something bad happened last thur

i think it is legit to reach out to her , to say that the expectation does not aligh( i cant contact her and i gave her the allowance verbally), evidented by my mom’s situation( and that hurts)

and if we were to continue with this break the logistic, i may need the agreememt to reach out if needed. or we just end things directly may be better

this seems less cruel to myself also

Clara