From: anon-1348@twwells.com
Newsgroups: alt.sexual.abuse.recovery
Subject: self-defacing
Date: 23 Nov 92 00:25:10 GMT
Organization: Anonymous Posting Service at twwells.com

ANON:-Mail:  Yes
ANON:-Announce:  YES

Hi,
  It's been a while since I've posted anything, but I've been
reading quite a bit.  Something happened to me that I need to talk
about.  It's been about a year since the breakup with my ex-SO.  To
give you some background info, we dated for close to 5 years.  He and
I are in the same dept as graduate students, we work at the same
office on campus, so we run into each other quite a bit.  Both he and
I said that we wanted to try and be friends, but that hasn't
happened, probably because of the dynamics of the relationship.  
  To try and make a long story short, it turns out that even though
we haven't really talked to each other, or see each other very much,
I am still quite affected by my ex.  If he says hello to other people
in the same room as me, and doesn't say hi to me, I go nuts.  I feel
as if I'm not worth talking to, that there must be something wrong
with me, that I'm a terrible person because he doesn't want to
associate with me.  On top of this, I am extremely envious and
jealous of him... he has a new relationship with a woman he met about
6 months after the breakup; their relationship seems to be quite
serious and he seems to be very happy with it.
  I see them together, and I go crazy.  Talk about feelings of
abandonment and loneliness, jealousy, you name it - it gets
triggered.  Now when I rationally sit down and think about this
stuff, I realize that my reactions are way out of proportion, but
somehow I just can't control these very strong feelings.  It seems
like I can't get closure on the whole thing.  I think I'm going crazy
because I keep wanting to relate to him but everytime I try, I end up
feeling bad and feeling sorry for myself.  I also frustrate him
because he also ends up feeling bad - not because he did anything,
but because our interaction is so bad.
  I don't know why I keep wanting to be friends with this man.  It's
become almost an obsession.  All I can think about is how we aren't
talking to each other.  It's almost like there's a child inside who
is afraid of being left; like she wants to try and make things right.
 I feel so powerless when I interact with my ex; no matter what I do,
the outcome is always the same - I end up in tears, he ends up saying
he can't talk to me.  I also had a realization a few weeks ago that
my ex reminds me of my father...  Now, I have no memories of being
abused yet, but I know that I was afraid of my father, at the same
time I "loved" him.  He was a violent, volatile man who physically
abused my brother for such things as getting an unsatisfactory
rating on his report card, stuff like that.  My ex is similar to my
father in that I felt as if the only emotion I could really detect in
both of them was anger... I realize now that toward the end of our
relationship my ex and I weren't really close emotionally.  We had a
great physical relationship but we really weren't intimate in the
sense of talking with each other about feelings.  Somehow I feel as
if I've wasted my life in relationships where I've never been
intimate.. like I've never really been able to connect on that level
with another human being.  I guess I have friendships, but more than
anything in the world I want to have a close relationship with a man.
 Maybe I can be faulted for being too male-centered, but I feel as if
I'm nothing without a man.  Funny, but sometimes I feel as if I make
the relationship that way.  What's gotten me so upset is my ex told
me earlier today that the reason he can't interact with me in a
'normal' way is that I make myself feel inferior to him; that we
never interact as equals. 


Does this make sense to anybody out there?  Whenever I'm in a
relationship with a man - I feel like I turn into a little girl who
just wants to be taken care of.. it doesn't happen right away, but it
eventually happens.  Then the man leaves because he feels as if he is
interacting with a child instead of an adult... This little girl is
really crying now because she wants somebody to love her and take
care of her, while the adult is telling her that the prince will
never come...  I feel like I'm really stuck and I don't know how to
get out of this rut... I can intellectually understand what's
happening in my relationships but I feel like I can't control these
emotions...

Phoenix



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