Up to this point, you’ve guided me toward a simple yet pivotal realization about myself: I may not have some fundamental genetic flaw that makes me incapable of having appropriate feelings and managing my life. There may be a logical explanation for why I feel the way that I do. My first reaction to that was joy and relief.

My second reaction is, What do I do now? My stress and fear are still here, as are all of my oddities and inhibitions. I used to blame those things on a broken brain. Lacking that excuse, it’s just me out here, a grown man who doesn’t know how to manage his feelings.

It’s hard to pin down exactly what I’m searching for. I know that there’s more in my past that can explain my present. But explaining it and actually fixing it are two different things. I’m having an anxious morning today, and it has brought with it a strong dose of “nothing can fix you”.

I should pause until this mood passes. I have to make a phone call this morning to cancel an appointment, and it’s a call I could have made two weeks ago. But I didn’t, and now we’re approaching short-notice territory and I’m afraid that they’ll be mad. I do this kind of thing all the time. I’d say that I feel an inappropriate level of anxiety because of it and a thousand other tiny things just like it.

Off to work.

This forum has already helped me in a very significant way- I want you guys to know that. You listen and you ask questions, and the questions are opening doors that I didn’t realize I had locked and boarded up. I signed up with an online therapist yesterday. You inspired me to do that. I want more of this.

Anita, thank you for complementing my writing. It is by far my most comfortable form of communication. I’ve had relationship troubles in the past because of this: when there are words I can’t say, I’ll simply write them. I don’t understand why, but some people have considered this to be less honest or less forthright than verbal communication. I just like having some time to think about what I’m saying, having the ability to refine it, and not having to listen to my own emotion-filled voice searching for words to say.

In answer to both of you, my relationship with my parents is/was confusing. The word “confusing” doesn’t actually cover all that I feel and don’t feel about them, but it’s the best I can do. I’m going to try and describe them and our relationships, but I don’t know if I can make sense of it yet. I’m 42 years old and I still don’t understand them.

My dad lived with us until I was 14. I don’t know what he did for a living- something for the local government. He wasn’t a spy or anything, I don’t think- he just never talked about anything of substance, including his job. He drank a lot of beer and fell asleep in his chair most nights. Mom would do mean things to him to make him stop storing while we watched TV.

Dad and I lost touch pretty quickly after he moved away, after the divorce. Years later, about 7 years ago now, he got sick from his alcoholism and died. Neither of us tried to contact the other. I didn’t attend his funeral. I never hated him- I just didn’t know him. What I did know what that he looked like a bum to me. He was missing teeth, was small and unhealthy. Bald on top with a fringe of long hair. I guess I was ashamed of him.

My mother is a religious fundamentalist. I don’t talk to her either, unless she reaches out first, which she does on occasion. I wouldn’t mind just disappearing from her life, but I think that it  would hurt her feelings and I don’t want to do that. But she wants me to share her religion and I don’t. It hurts to be seen as “sinful”. She’s a nice enough lady but she lives in a reality that is different from mine. I’m afraid to introduce her to people- she’s likely to ask them about their souls. Maybe I’m ashamed of her, too.

Dad was present but absent. Mom is passive-aggressive and weird. The first time I saw them fight, it resulted in divorce. I don’t know what to make of any of this.

I don’t know how to tell whether it is them or my perception of them that is broken. That’s the scary part. That’s where I start to question what’s real and to doubt myself.

Thank you again, TeaK and Anita and anyone else taking the time to read this stuff.

Ben