Dear voicewriter:

No, I do not NOT wish to continue writing. I am fine communicating further. I thought I was not helpful to you and didn’t see a way for me to be helpful. But since you are interested in more, i am definitely willing to continue!

I am lost, really. This is not often the case with me reading posts here. I really am lost. Let’s see, what can I ask you so to maybe get an understanding myself… oh, of course: can you tell me a bit about your childhood, specifically about your relationship with your mother, your father? Past and present if they are around…? But mostly how it was, your relationship, your intimate experience with either parent or both?

I wonder if you are willing to go back there. Our relationships throughout adulthood are greatly influenced by the relationships in our FORMATIVE years. That may help me get an understanding… maybe you already do?

anita

Dear voicewriter:

To gain insight into your very last relationship I do need the relationship with your parents when you were a child. It is very relevant, do not kid yourself. Just because your childhood happened and is done with decades ago, it can very much be alive and well, still working in the present. We carry that child part of us throughout our lives. I want to process what you wrote here:

Your father was very verbally abusive to your mother who was a sweet woman. She did not express her anger toward her husband. She put up with his abuse. You thought she was weak. You as a kid made it a point to not be like your mother, to not be weak, so you were kind of a brat, you write.

When you were with your ex boyfriend (the last one), you abused him (nitpicking, negative criticism…) and you broke up with him again and again. You were disappointed with him for putting up with your abuse. You wrote these things on this thread, you can re read your posts. You thought your bf was weak for accepting your abuse and you lost your loving feelings for him.

Your ex bf was like your mother, accepting abuse and you were like your father, dishing out some abuse (I know, not as bad as your father did…) You lost your respect for your bf because he was like your mother, accepting abuse. Maybe you tested him to see if he takes it or stands against it.

As a child, living with your sweet, submissive mother and your … later abusive father, you LEARNED to be like them, a bit like your mother and some like your father. Be at times submissive and at other times aggressive.

You also mentioned the sexual things. I don’t want details as I am uncomfortable most often with too much details on sexual practices of others, but I wonder IF it is about you being aggressive sexually that you prefer.

I wonder how much you identified with the STRONG parent, your father and how much you detested your mother for being weak. I wonder how much these patterns have played in your relationships with men and with the last one.

What do you think, any bells?

anita

Dear voicewriter:

Still interesting and I am still lost… thought I had it for a moment.

Do you see any connection between having the parents you had, the childhood you had and the relationships with men?

This man?

Anything rang true in my last post, anything at all? Can you re-read it, maybe think about what I wrote and about your relationships with the first, most important people in your young life, your father and your mother, and how those affected the rest of your life?

With my life experience, I can not believe there is no connection.

I am soon going to bed, early I know, and I am in WA so that is three hours earlier than your time. Anyway, I will soon retire. So if I don’t answer tonight, I assure you I will answer you tomorrow morning, my time.

anita

i broke up 12 times in 9 months when i was 24. it was first time. intuition pushed me to. i was right.

Dear Arlene:

Welcome back to your thread. I re-read all your previous posts as well as the latest one. These are my thoughts at this point:

When you were a child your father was abusive to your mother. Your empathy was with your mother: when she hurt from your father’s abuse- you were hurt. She didn’t assert herself so you got angry for her. You got angry at your father for abusing your mother-yourself (there was no separation for you mentally, between your mother and yourself, not as a young child).

The intensity of your anger was proportional to her lack of anger, to how passive she was. Later on in life, you had relationships with strong-willed men, you wrote. This last man was not strong-willed like the other men in your life- he was softer, more needy of you, more loving.

That was what triggered your anger, as I understand it. It was like you were talking to your father and saying to him: “Now you are nice? Now? After all that you did? Too late now!”

At the beginning of your thread, you insisted that you are not angry but “frustrated”- I disagree.

You may very well be angry right this moment as you read this. Are you?

anita

Dear Arlene:

I am sorry you are distressed again, like you were in November, wondering the same thing, if you lost the best thing you ever had in your life. Do you think there is a value in examining my suggestion in my previous post to you today?

anita

Dear Arlene:

I see that indeed, you are very anxious and distressed. Can’t think clearly when that distressed. So please calm down, a hot bath will be a good start, a fast walk releases stress, anything but thinking about the problem at hand. Distress causes cognitive-fog, making clarity impossible.

So when you are calm, please come back to the thread for clear thinking.

You can also use this thread to vent, distressed and all, just keep writing, keep expressing.

anita

Dear Arlene:

Hope you feel better soon. Let me know if I can be of any help to you and how might I be able to help you.

anita