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November 30, 2017 at 3:56 pm #180163
ScottParticipantDear Anita,
It has been awhile since I’ve posted on here about my relationship and some of the anxiety stemming from it. I am doing much better now with handling anxiety and projecting my focus onto the important things in life like school, hobbies, working out, friends and etc. There’s just one thing that seems to bug me from time to time and I need some insurance on whether this is an insecurity or something I have the right to be upset about at times.
My girlfriend and I have been dating for 10 months or so and things are good for the most part. However, I get caught up on her past sexual relations sometimes (my mind sometimes wanders onto these topics) and it begins to put negative thoughts towards her in my head. What has been bugging me recently is thinking about the guy I know that she hooked up with one night before we were dating. It bothers me that this one “hookup” means she has him on snapchat and they follow each other on instagram and I’ve seen her like some of his pictures too. I guess it just gets to me because if she claims it was just a drunken mistake, then why are these connections there? I don’t understand why there needs to be the instagram and everything involved still. And when we are together and run into this guy she hooked up with at certain events, I feel really weird about it. I feel weird because 1) I know they had a casual hookup 2) they acknowledge each other and say hi (which is somewhat understandable). Now when I say they acknowledge each other, I suppose that is okay but it bothers me that like at a party he like offered her a drink and she tried it and blah blah blah. I clearly just don’t like there to be any sort of connection there because it wasn’t like they “talked” or dated. And I’ve mentioned in the past that I received some crap from somebody as a joke about how my girlfriend gives good “head” (oral sex). I know this stuff is pretty superficial and doesn’t really matter, but it does seem to bug me and it’s the first thing I think about if I know we are going to encounter him.
Sincerely,
Scott
December 1, 2017 at 4:39 am #180191
AnonymousGuestDear Scott:
Welcome back, good to read from you again.
I re-read some of our communication from July this year. July 22 I wrote to you: “you often think and visualize your girlfriend’s sexual past… At times you see her as ‘the one I love and care about and the one that loves me’ and at other times, you see her as ‘a slut (or some other sexual being)’…. Ar0und puberty you asked your mother if she had sex with her new husband, your step father. She said yes. That set you ‘into a spiral of sadness and sickness’. You ‘then wanted to have control over her and would always have her promise (you) she wouldn’t do anything with (your) step dad.”… The problem you have with your girlfriend is the same problem you had with your mother, continued… That ‘spiral of sadness and sickness’ that came about then, is the same spiral you are experiencing now, plus added to it the details relevant now”
The “added… details relevant now are what you described in this new thread and same old same old “spiral of sadness and sickness” got reactivated.
It might be reasonable for you to ask your girlfriend to no longer have any communication with that man and with any man she had any kind of sexual contact. If I was in her position I would agree to it willingly.
It will not solve the problem for you, will not make that spiral-of-sadness-and-sickness go away, but it can help. At least it will show you that she cares about your distress and is willing now to do what she can do to help.
So you may consider asking her to end all contact so to help you. I think it is reasonable to ask because she doesn’t have a child with any of these men, and therefore a realistic reason to keep contact.
Other than that, there is no solution other than you re-experiencing that spiral-of-sadness-and-sickness with more awareness, possible in quality psychotherapy.
It is a very difficult thing to do. That spiral was so unpleasant, involving such fear, that you don’t want to be more aware of it, to feel it more. You don’t want to feel it at all!
Problem is it doesn’t go away, it keeps popping up, keeps reminding you of it. So better feel it, better feel it with awareness. Experiencing this spiral with awareness is different than experiencing it the way you have from one point on, from the point of repressing it.
When your mother told you that you have to stop the controlling behavior regarding her having sex with your step father, you repressed the emotion, that spiral best you could, pushed it down. Experiencing it now with awareness would mean to let it come up and stay in your awareness for a longer time, relaxing into it.
Possible in quality psychotherapy because doing what I mentioned goes against our instinct to avoid pain. Yet, I see no other solution.
anita
December 8, 2017 at 6:45 pm #181141ScottParticipantDear Anita,
I apologize for how long it has taken to get back to you as I’ve been very busy with school and what not. I feel like what I described above is a mindset or pattern of thoughts that comes on when negatively thinking of my girlfriend. What I mean by this is that when things are good and she is being positive and supportive, the thoughts aren’t there. But when I feel mistreated or like I’m being used for what’s convenient as in taking her out dinner, giving her rides to and from class and making her feel better or reassure her when she is saying I don’t like her or love her and want to be with other girls, this is when I get annoyed and upset and have these thoughts almost as if I’m doubting the relationship. I mean I really do like her and the negative thoughts I have come sometimes, but typically I can overcome them and that’s what I have been doing. I don’t know why, but I feel like these thoughts come into play when she is drinking and I see her on display on social media, like she’s out doing stuff with other people and I take it as a threat. I don’t know why this is, but I am angered when she is having fun it seems like, but other time I am not. I guess I just get annoyed with her being needy and wanting reassure and then at other times is out having a good time with her friends and it’s like I have to deal with the negativity and then all of a sudden she is fine.
I guess what I am saying is that I have resentment towards her sometimes and it can build in certain scenarios I feel she is taking advantage of me or is lying or manipulative of my emotions. Sometimes I do wonder if she has a narcissistic personality dissorder because of how much everything is oriented around her. Let me know what you think and what I should do, I know this kind of changed directions in terms of topic, but it all goes back to the basis of this relationship and it leaves me wondering.
Sincerely,
Scott
December 8, 2017 at 6:50 pm #181143ScottParticipantDear Anita,
I suppose I should add that I tend to think in terms of the past. So whatever it may be that I recall, I bring that past action or behavior into the now and associate it with her behavior. When I mention getting upset about her drinking, it’s because she has upset me many times whilst drinking and it tends to lead to horrible behavior and mistreatment from her. In a way, my predictions of the future are related to her past actions and I think that is what leads to my “ultimate” and basis of resentment towards her because I just expect the worst. She has been better about being nice to me and when we’re drinking because I nearly ended the relationship after a few times of her drinking and being verbally and slightly physically abusive towards me. Now it’s not that I’m some wimpy, soft guy that is afraid of her, but more so the fact that I can’t do anything back to her obviously because she is a girl. I’m strong and tall and confident in my ability to everything, but I am restricted in terms of what I can do when she acts up as in I can only give a verbal response which is hard at these intense moments. I’ve kind of been venting to you in this post so I will stop here and let you generate some thoughts on all of this.
Sincerely,
Scott
December 9, 2017 at 6:38 am #181179AnonymousGuestDear Scott:
I don’t think you mentioned any abusive behavior on the part of your girlfriend toward you in your original post. You wrote there about your trouble with her sexual past, before she met you and the fact that she has some contact (saying “hi” and such) with men from her past. In your last two posts you expressed that she is misusing you, mistreating you, at times being “verbally and slightly physically abusive” toward you.
Of course, you should not be in a relationship with a person who is abusive toward you.
anita
December 12, 2017 at 12:43 pm #181819ScottParticipantDear Anita,
I realize I haven’t mentioned anything about any sort of abusive behavior in previous posts and should inform you about what I mean by it. It is a combination of emotional bullying and not often at all, but physical abuse in a sense. I really do get the sense that she is a narcissist, because it’s truly about what she wants and when I cross the line with anything, I’m in “big” trouble. I’m not really sure how you would define a control freak, or someone that wants to manipulate a relationship and tweak it to be the way they want it to, but I do have a great sense of this in her. It feels as if without her being in control, or me crossing the line with her “certain” expectations, that this relationship will end. She has threatened to break up with me over such silly things and creates an ultimatum for a lot of what I do that is completely normal in other relationships. Instead of being upset about something like cheating or actually doing harm to someone, she is concerned with my actions and who I am and how I act and the list goes on and on. I know this relationship is likely not what it should be and that I need to run the other way, it’s just extremely hard to tell sometimes. I see a correlation between her and my old stepmother, because both claimed to and showed they loved so much, but had to do so by a means of control, so that it was played out through their own eyes. I guess I’ve kind of lost my true self in this relationship, bending over backwards for her and having to live a stealthy lifestyle in order to avoid conflict.
Sincerely,
Scott
December 13, 2017 at 9:41 am #181953AnonymousGuestDear Scott:
Love does not cause the loved one to lose his true self, to bend over backward and live a stealthy lifestyle in order to avoid conflict (your last sentence).
So you’ve been focusing on her sexual past with other men as the problem when the problem was all along her present relationship with you. Not unusual, to focus elsewhere.
Putting the above two paragraphs of this post to you together: it is not that she loved other men before she met you, it is that she doesn’t love you.
What do you think and feel about my statement, right above?
anita
December 13, 2017 at 3:34 pm #182041ScottParticipantDear Anita,
I feel like the things you mentioned above have a deeper meaning that I’m beginning to see. It does make sense in a way why I would reference her sexual past (or anything negative for that matter) to associate with her during times of distress or as a way to fault her for something when I myself am so much of an innocent man.
The troubling part for me is the amount of love she claims to have for everything, including myself, hence why she reacts with such strong emotions. She says she just cares so much about me that she gets really upset when things don’t appear right in her eyes. I can understand where she is coming from, because it happens to me to (sometimes out of insecurity), but I typically manage my emotions. It’s not to say that I haven’t ever tried to gain control over her for some things, but generally it is not me creating conflict or developing tension and expecting the other person to fix the problem.
It is very confusing for me as I feel so much love and care from her but at other times she is unpredictable and drives me crazy, stresses me out, and takes me away from my natural peace in life. It’s really hard to know what to do. Anything you’ve got in response to this helps me out greatly.
Sincerely,
Scott
December 14, 2017 at 5:44 am #182119AnonymousGuestDear Scott:
If a person is only abusive to you, no love, only aggression, things are clear, no confusion. It is similar to this scenario in nature: a lioness is approaching a deer. The lioness has never shown the deer love before and the deer expects nothing but aggression from it, so it knows what to do: run away and fast!
It is different in the case of your girlfriend (and stepmother you mentioned earlier): both claimed to love you and showed you love on one hand, and on the other, they were both aggressive toward you. Now, this is confusing- what to do? Reach out to that love or run away?
This is a complexity special to humans. Things are simpler in nature.
I used to be confused by this complexity but not anymore. I now understand that love and aggression do not go together. Part of you knows it too, this is why, I believe, you used the verb “claim” (“both claimed to and showed they loved so much… the amount of love she claims to have…”)
One definition of to claim is to assert the truth of something that is in doubt. So you, Scott, are doubting their statements of love.
It is possible to not be aggressive with another person, overtly/openly or covertly/in hidden ways. Where there is aggression, there is no love.
When a person is sometimes aggressive toward you, she doesn’t love you, not during her aggression and not in between the aggressions.
Unfortunately, love is rare and aggression is common.
anita
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