Dear anita,

I think you are right. What happens in our childhood, shapes who you become. I was given the feeling that I am disgusting.

But that is the past. I understand that my problems come from an unhappy childhood. But the thing is, in the present I am behaving in disgusting ways. It was never my intention, I only wanted to do the right things. I just wanted to be kind and do what is right.

I think I need to listen more to my gut feelings and ask myself more what I truly want. I was not feeling good about seeing K. last year. Even when I first met him, I didn’t want to go on a walk with him just after I had met him. It was too quick for me. But somehow I couldn’t say no! Out of politeness I think. Somehow I’m always disregarding my own feelings when I’m with others.I try to notice my own feelings more now. When a friend asked me yesterday if we want to meet today and go to a gallery, I declined. Because I was not feeling well. She accepted it without questioning me and all was o.K. This is just a little thing, maybe even meaningless, but maybe it’s a start.

Maybe when my parents told me that crying was blackmailing and other things, I learned that I cannot trust in myself. Now I don’t trust my feelings and look for what others want.

At the moment I feel so disgusted with myself. I try to stay positive… but my problems are very severe. I think if I don’t attempt to be in a relationship, things can’t go too wrong. But I don’t know how to fix myself and I feel pretty hopeless and am filled with self-hate these days. I’m also very unproductive at the moment. Thankfully, next week my classes start again.

Dear anita,

when it comes to K. I feel confused. I feel like I hurt him, because I let him use me. But I said it’s o.K. when he asked if I wanted this. He said he can wait. I still said yes. Out of fear of disappointing him, I think. I also had the feeling that I had nothing else to offer to him. That we got along better in bed, contrary to when talking. When I talked to him I most of the time had the feeling like I’m not interesting enough, don’t talk enough, am not hardworking enough and don’t have anything interesting to say. He said: say something (I think it is hard to start a conversation with just this request). So I said you can ask me something. He replied: “No”. So I started to talk to him about my current art project, but it seemed to me like he found it ridiculous or couldn’t understand that I spend my time doing this.

Did he know I didn’t want this? Did he know I wanted more? He didn’t seem like a bad person to me.  I realized that I was not part of his life. That I was only getting scraps of his time. Stupidly I thought it could change, if I was just patient enough.

It is definitely for the best that this is over. It made me feel bad about myself. I also started to spend less time in the community rooms of our dormitory, out of fear of meeting his sister or others. Most of my distress in the past half year was caused by this. I posted about it on this thread.

I don’t remember anything particular in my childhood where I felt I was hurting a family member…. Some things come to my mind though…

1: As a child I cried a lot. My father said (I think to my mother, thinking I was not listening) that I was blackmailing him by crying. He also was angry or irritated, his voice sounded emotional. Since then I started crying only in my room and without making noises and without anyone seeing me.

2: My sister told me this Christmas that she somehow felt responsible or guilty for our home being messy. So she also felt guilty and responsible for things that should have been the adults job. I too remember my mother complaining that she was left alone with the housework. They came from a farmer’s family. There it was usual for the children to help out. We were made to feel guilty about not helping enough. Don’t get me wrong, I think giving children chores is good. Just the guilt tripping is unnecessary. And I also think that it is normal for children to not feel enthusiastic about it. Doesn’t mean they are bad children!

3: I often felt like a bother too my parents. For example, when I was in my last year of high school, I was talking to my father about future plans. I wanted to go abroad and work as an Au Pair. My father exclaimed “Au Pair, Au Pair, why don’t you go study?” It seemed like I was getting on his nerves is what I mean.

4: I had a Gym Ball and my sister was sitting on it. I pulled it away from under my sister. My father hit me on my head and also said something devaluing to me. I too, hit my sister often. I made a point to not let her read my books etc. Now I think that I was very jealous of her. My father always was on her side. On the other hand she wanted to do all the things that I did, which bothered me. She also was better in school.

I was probably also mean to my brother. But he also didn’t play such a big role for me, as he was 5 years younger. I remember him smashing the glass door at home out of anger. I don’t know what it was about, I don’t think it was because of me. That reminds me, once I broke new glasses out of anger and my mother said “It is just because of your anger!” or something like that. Anger seemed to be something bad for her, but she didn’t make me understand it better.

Hm, I don’t remember so much. My family was strange. My parents made me feel bad, I think. Like I was not a good daughter? Once a doctor said to my mother “You have such a nice daughter” and my mother said something like: “You don’t know what she is really like”. They also often jokingly said “Those bad children”.

I can’t remember anything big about feeling like hurting my parents. But I was feeling like I was difficult and a problem, I think. It feels a little blurry thinking back. It’s already long ago. I know I was unhappy. Even as a child of not older than 13 years I had thoughts of jumping out of the window and suicide. I was hoping to finally grow up and leave my home…

Dear anita,

I couldn’t sleep well. I felt so worried about him.This is why I truly am toxic! Something is very wrong with me and my problems are much bigger than I thought. It was wrong to call him, bother him, right? My intention was just to finally clear things up, but I think I hurt him. It sounded like he started crying and then he was online on facebook until now, the whole time.

He said on the phone that he didn’t want to continue hurting me, that it was all his fault. It was never my intention to make him feel guilty. Just to finally change things for the better. End this thing or improve it for the better.

Why was I unable to see that I needed to stop this much earlier? I saw signs that this was not going anywhere and that he is not interested. But somehow we continued the exchange, out of politeness? Because none of us was able to say “stop”? I even asked him: “It feels like you are not interested anymore. It would help me very much if you let me know if you still want to stay in contact with me”, after he hadn’t responded in a while. He just said, that he had been sick. But it was probably also the wrong way of asking him. It confused me, that he still wrote back to me, said on a phone call that he wanted me to visit him, that he was just busy and wasn’t not responding to me on purpose. He also said that everyone was mad at him, because he wasn’t responding to them quickly. He also was the one who initiated sex all the time. These things confused me, made me believe he still was interested. I should have seen that he was not.

I am a very sick person. Did I abuse him? I think I did. I was not able to say no, I was not able to protect myself. I let this happen and I hurt him in the process. Now he feels guilty, maybe he feels ashamed. Is what I did to him a form of sexual abuse? It is not what I wanted. He is such a good person, a person that I truly liked. I only want good things for him. I feel like I severely hurt him. I hope he is o.K. That he takes care of himself and heals.

I better don’t try to be in a relationship with someone ever again. I don’t want to hurt people! There is no way for me to live a normal life like others, be in a relationship. I am too sick.

My only hope is that he will be o.K.

Dear anita,

no, I don’t want to make the same mistake again. I don’t want to sleep with men I barely know.

Being a child in a women’s body is not what I want to be. Maybe it is the truth. Even though I wish it wasn’t. I don’t know how to change it. Is it just about valuing myself more? I don’t know if I can learn to grow up. If I can heal.

I knew this was not a true relationship. I’m not that stupid. I knew there was something wrong. I know there is something wrong with me.

Dear anita,

no, sex didn’t feel comfortable, I didn’t enjoy it. Enjoyed it when he held me during the night or took my hands or kissed my forehead. But I wasn’t so comfortable with the sex. It was more about pleasing him. I worried even that if I didn’t seem like I enjoyed it, he would be displeased and so I felt stressed. The last time we only had oral sex (only for him though) and I was thinking: I hope it’s over soon, I feel like a whore and I hope he comes quickly. After I returned home, I felt bad and confused. And I told him it was nice seeing him, to make him feel good I guess. But I think he didn’t buy it.

It’s better it’s over, I think. Only the call confused me. I wanted to finally have a more open and honest conversation, but I felt guilty afterwards, but is it only because I always feel guilty? He acted like it was a serious relationship and said he was sorry, that he didn’t want to hurt me, that it was his fault. I ended up writing him messages that he should not blame himself, that he shouldn’t say he’s guilty and that it was only the circumstances. Now I kind of wonder, if he only wanted to present himself as the good guy? Also acting like I had unreasonable expectations (when my expectations were very low)? His actions tell a different story than his words, I think… He almost never messages me, but when I’m with him, he takes phone calls or texts with other people. I think his argument that he doesn’t have time doesn’t make much sense. It’s not like expect lengthy phonecalls every day. I don’t know am I too wary? Or does he think I’m stupid? Maybe I’m stupid for taking this seriously, for ignoring the warning signs and my own feelings.

Dear anita,

I think K. and I just broke up. Yesterday I sent him a message, asking if we could talk. Because we rarely see each other. Because we almost never text each other. When I text him, he only replies with “how are you” and doesn’t respond much to my questions or doesn’t tell much about his life.Yesterday I looked at his facebook profile and saw that he has marked himself as “single”. I don’t know if this had been there all the time and maybe I only realized yesterday?

To me it seemed like he was not interested in me. Also when we met a few weeks ago… We watched a movie together, we started kissing and moved to the bed, but he turned the PC around so he could see the movie. Even after we finished he went straight back to watching the movie. Then when it was over, he asked if we should turn off the light. We were sleeping hugging closely and I felt close to him that night. But in the morning I felt insecure again.

We just talked on the phone. I barely could hear him, because my phone is old. Maybe I should have gotten a smartphone, to communicate better? I don’t want a smartphone because it is a big distraction… I asked him if he found it weird that we barely communicated with each other. He said that he has a lot to do and that he thought I would understand. He said he doesn’t want to hurt me anymore and asked what I suggested. I wanted to ask, if he could just write sometimes and tell me more about his life. But I don’t know if he heard me correctly, I think he just told me that he doesn’t have the time. He suggested that we break up, because he doesn’t want to continue to hurt me anymore. He said he didn’t think it would be so difficult. He also said that a relationship should be more fun and not so stressful. Apparently this call was too stressful?

I don’t know, he acted like my request to communicate more was somehow unreasonable? But I don’t think I want too much! I just want him to tell me more about his life, want to be at least a little bit of a part of his life? Just that he writes me a few sentences about his day a few times a week. Not even every day, not a whole essay or something. How long can that take? Five or ten minutes? Maybe sometimes a call and sometimes seeing him.

It doesn’t seem to me like I asked for too much! More like I asked for too little.

It appeared that he was truly upset. But over the phone, who can tell? I felt worse after the call. Asked myself: “Did I want too much?” “Did I ruin everything?” I felt more guilty. But I can’t see how this would have possibly progressed. without talking to each other, why even be in a relationship? It’s probably better to end it.

Sorry, I know you already told me that it wouldn’t work out. But I guess I didn’t want to give up. I guess I will get over it. i already didn’t have high expectations.

I also will reply to your previous post another time.

Dear anita,

your day sounds very nice. Good to hear that you are doing well.

Usually I don’t feel crazy when communicting with you. I also thought that all was o.K. with my therapist, but I got confused after the last session. Maybe it’s different, because I meet her in person, while I write to you. I think writing is easier for me, I can express myself better through writing. I don’t like to talk. Most of the time I feel like I don’t know what to say and people expect me to talk more, not be shy, say something interesting. But often I feel like the things I say are stupid, not interesting or that I share too much personal things.

I told my therapist a lot of personal things, like I told you here. But appearantly I didn’t tell her how I feel. I didn’t tell her that I wanted to talk about that topic. But I don’t think it wasn’t because I wasn’t open. The same thing happened, that happens with me in real life. I didn’t trust in my own feeling, my own needs and thought that she must know better.

Or maybe it was because I didn’t tell her in the next session, how depressed I got after that session. I only told her later, when she was asking me questions about therapy (I don’t remember what she asked specifically).

Once we also had made  a plan for me to document my work progress. But I didn’t really document it, I made a plan in my head and it also went quite well. I just documented it a few days later. But I didn’t tell her that I didn’t stick to our original plan. I wasn’t open and honest there.

In therapy somehow I got very nervous a few times. My voice got high pitched, I started to play with my pen. It also happens in real life, with K. it was especially bad. I felt so uncomfortable when I met him last week! With him I feel so inadequate. I just can’t imagine that someone could like me or love me or want to be with me. But in his case, I don’t think he is interested (anymore?).

I don’t want to do things just to please others anymore! I want to think more about what I want… People will not respect me and I will not respect myself, if I do anything that they supposedly want. I will only feel ashamed of myself, like I felt after my visit with K. I hope I can finally change that, but I wanted to change it before…

For the new year hope that I can value myself more and not let others take advantage of me or disrespect me. I rather want to take better care of myself…

You are right, my own self doubt will make it difficult for others to talk to me. I feel so unhappy with myself and am not relaxed when talking to people. I wish I could feel more o.K. with myself – but lately it feels like I get more and more insecure or that I’m doubting myself more.

Hopefully I can make progress in the new year. Sometimes I wonder if I should still post in this thread – the title seems so negative – not like a growth mindset at all…

Hope you have a good day today! Take care!

Hello,

I’m sorry to write again… I think you already gave a lot of advice to me and won’t know what else to say.

At the moment I just feel overwhelmed… I try to focus on the present, but I feel very hopeless… Will it ever get better? It seems my problems are even bigger than I thought.

My therapist told me that “she can’t feel me”. Appearantly I’m not expressing what I feel, but only express thoughts. After the last session I felt so confused… She said also that I can ask her how she feels and that she will tell me her honest opinion, without going easy on me. I only said “yes, o.K.” to that, because I already was so overwhelmed at that point. She had asked me a lot of questios, like “On a scale, how open are you with  me?”. And I didn’t know what to answer. I got nervous, but I only realized that, when she asked. She asked how does therapy make me feel? Do I like to go to therapy? I said that I felt neutral, but later realized, that I was very uncomfortable.

Now I’m wondering how I made her feel, what she wanted to tell me. Am I too unattainable? Do I tell things that put a strain on her? Am I egoistical? Do I make others feel bad?

I also visited K. last week and I didn’t feel comfortable. And probably made him uncomfortable as well. I felt not so good after that visit. I don’t know if a normal relationship will ever be possible for me. I don’t know if I will ever be o.K.

At the moment, I try to focus on other things, I try to work on my art projects, but it’s hard. I’m feeling agitated and hopeless.

I will work some more now, do yoga later. Hope it helps.