Dear Javairia:

I wish you didn’t delete your account here, so that I could review our previous conversations (at what month/ date approximately did we communicate last?)

“wouldn’t listening to someone vent out everyday be harmless”?-

-No, it is harmful because when you have a person in your life who “would vent out at any hour.. talk about his whole day.. tell anything and everything…overshared a lot and lot of information about him.. talking about (his) every single thing, every single day”, when you are his vent diary (“He even himself said.. ‘You’re my vent diary”), and his promise is to “not stop telling you everything”-  you are misused as a dumping ground for a never ending flow of information that is of no use for you.

Just like you wrote, it “means getting my space and values invaded”- your space is used as a dumping ground, so it is invaded by his dump.

“I start to live in the person.. lose myself.. constantly living (his) thoughts.. issues and problems”- you live in his dumping ground, with his things/life is everywhere, no space for your things/ your life.

I suggest that you tell him what you shared here on your thread, incorporate some of what I wrote in my reply to you. If he tells you in response that you are welcome to use him as your dumping ground too, maybe have equal time using each other that way, tell him you don’t want to, that you don’t have that need.

And hear/ read what he has to say, how he responds to what you tell him (and let me know, and if you need advice regarding his response, we’ll take it from there.

anita

Dear Javaira:

We communicated last in Feb, but that was a short communication. Most of our communication was way earlier. I think you started a few threads. Why did you feel the urge to delete it all: did you not value our communication?

Regarding the current topic: just because you invited him to dump (“I invited him..”), doesn’t mean you have to be his dumping ground yet  one more day, or .. for the rest of your life. We make poor choices, and when we realize that we did, it is okay to  make new choices.

Just because you agreed with his views before (“I shouldn’t have agreed with.. his views.. even to his smoking habits), doesn’t mean you have a duty to continue to agree with him yet another day, or for the rest of your life. It is okay for us people to change our minds, to abandon poor choices and make better choices.

“Is there an indirect way to tell him that?.. making an excuse of not getting to use my cell phone a lot by my parents.. gradually pull away from our texting time?”-

– not a good idea. Instead, tell him directly. Tell him that you let him vent out, say anything he wanted to day, nodded to a lot of what he said even though you didn’t agree to what he said.. If you tell him this, he will have the opportunity to learn that venting out at length to another person, burdening others with the massive flow of anything and everything that goes through his brain (so to make himself feel better, to lighten his burden) is the wrong thing to do to another person.

Plus, telling him directly, no matter how scary it is for you, will build some courage in you. And that courage will make it easier for to assert yourself then next time, with someone else.

Look for excuses and you’ll run out of excuses; look for the truth and share it, and you will do good to yourself and to others.

anita

Dear Javairia:

Yes, back in May of last year, you were 16 at the time. You shared that you saw your parents fight a lot, shouting and arguing. When you were 6, your mother attempted (or seemed to attempt) to commit suicide right in front of you; you were alone with her, when that happened.

Your father (who was never married to your mother) left the home when you were 9. He lives with another family now, and is not part of your life at all, other than talking to you on the phone strictly on financial matters; it has been your role to call your father on the phone every month regarding him paying for what you and your two older siblings need. You hate this role, it distresses you a whole lot, but your mother wouldn’t do it and your siblings won’t, so you are the one who ended up doing it. (One of your sibling does drugs and the other, you think poorly of.

You shared at the time that you took on another role, one of being a funny friend, always making jokes, the happy-go-lucky, kind of optimistic person, that you do enjoy your friends’ company and being the optimistic one, and that you don’t want to burden them with your troubles.

Ten months later, today, you shared that being courageous is something you “never really did.. never really bold, and don’t voice my points or needs”-

-time to change that, Javairia. If this guy does call you again to vent, tell him that you will not be his dumping ground again, that you want a conversation= a meaningful 2 way exchange of thoughts, a win-win exchange, one that works for both of you, not just .. for him.

Thank you for your apology. I accept it. Take good care of yourself!

anita

Dear Javairia:

Thank you for the correction. Most recently, this guy didn’t misuse you, that is, use you to vent endlessly so to  unburden himself at your expense. Any ideas why??? Maybe he found someone else to vent..? Or has he been venting to you on and off, so this is one of his breaks?

anita

Dear Javairia:

You are welcome. It makes sense that the reason he hasn’t burdened you recently with his need to vent is that “his way to reach  out to interact (with you) has gotten limited”- keep it limited then!

“I feel like a bad person to even admit I’ve been misused… why am I making this so hard and tiring for myself?”- I am guessing because you feel responsible for him, as if (and it is not!) it is your job to be there for him in any way he needs you to be. So if you are not there for him the way he needs you, you feel like a bad person.

As you know, you erased our previous communications, so I can’t go back and read about your childhood, but remembering that your mother attempted or seemed to attempt suicide in front of you, that’s a very, very distressing experience for a child. I imagine that you felt responsible for her suicide attempt/ the misery she experienced. I imagine that because children automatically feel responsible, aka guilty, for a parent’s expressed misery.

Fast forward, this guy expressed to you his misery, tells you that he needs you to relieve his misery, so you feel that it’s your job, and if you don’t perform this job, you are a bad person.

Makes sense?

anita

Dear Javairia:

That “‘bad person’ complex” that you mentioned, I suffered from it terribly myself for decades! I hope you don’t suffer from it for as long as I have. I will give you a current example for how bad..my bad person complex is (I like these three word term that you came up with): when I say to myself that I did not cause the current pandemic and its economical consequences- I feel  better. I feel better because it is my habit to automatically blame myself for negative events, small and big, that I do not cause!

Back to  you, you are not responsible for this man’s distress, for his suffering, you didn’t cause any of it. Therefore, it’s not your job to take away his suffering, or to provide a venting opportunity for him, so that he feels better at your expense!

“I will keep the interaction limited, and let’s see what happens in the starved interaction”- good plan. If he starts venting, interrupt him!

Regarding your offer to answer any questions I have regarding what you shared and erased, thank you. I appreciate it. I suggest that you share with me anything about your childhood and your current home life, if and as it feels relevant to you, regarding your current life situations. If I have questions in the future, I will ask you.

anita

Dear Javairia:

The process of not feeling guilty for what I am not guilty is  about telling myself the truth, that I am not responsible for what I am not responsible for, and believing it, believing what is true.. to be true.

In your case, it would be you telling yourself:

1. I was not responsible for having been sexually assaulted when you were 6 or 7, the man who assaulted me was responsible, not me!- and believing it to be true.

2. I did not have any kind of sexual activity with my elder brother. My mother was wrong when she accused me of that!- and believing it to be true.

You wrote: “since  I’ve been talking with that guy regularly, I’ve been self-harming more than ever before”- I didn’t know that. But you have to stop talking to him immediately!

Do you want to tell me more about the connection between talking to him and self harming (and how do you self harm?)

anita