An explanation
A lot of you haven't heard from me in a while, and I want to kind of explain this now instead of the next time I talk to you. I'm usually very open about things, but for some reason this is hard for me to get out.
Signs of affection have been really making me uncomfortable. Anything more than a hug and I'd become incredibly uneasy. It was getting so intense that I had become obsessed with avoiding certain situations. Needless to say this makes for a tricky relationship.
I actually started to think that maybe something had happened to me as a kid, which just made everything worse. I started having night terrors like I did when I was little. Back then, I didn't remember anything. The three times it happened recently, I remember very clearly. I would wake up to find a man in the room, a different guy in a different place, each time. Then I would scream my lungs out and slowly the predator would fade away. My eyes would be open while I was sleeping and the screaming is what would wake me up. My mom is the one that said it sounded like night terrors. Since realizing what it was, it has stopped.
Shortly afterwards I was looking for a book on amazon when I came across one on something called 'sexual anorexia.' I looked into it and realized that it described, almost exactly, what I was experiencing. After a little more reading and watching a little "TLC",I figured out what my real problem was.
This girl on tv was talking about how unsupportive her parents were when she had been raped. Until that moment, I had always thought that my mom had been supportive when I told her about when this happened to me. I think that at the time I was just so relieved to have told her, that maybe it didn't matter. I know now that it definitely does matter. My mom has always compared herself to others and is too busy competing that she doesn't even live her life for herself. It's always about being right, being better, or having something that they don't. The day I told her about what happened to me was no different. All I wanted was a hug and an "it's okay", but instead she said two things: 1 - "I never could have told my mother." 2 - "I was worried that ****** (an ex-boyfriend) would try something like that."
Growing up, the people closest to me were not always the most supportive, and this continues to be the case with my mom. All my life I've wanted to act, but I was always very shy. When I was about eleven they were doing auditions locally and I decided I would balls it up and give it a go. When I told my mom about it all she said was, "you're probably too tall" and that was the end of it.
Recently I asked her to please not tell me that I am going to be "dissapointed and regret" the decisions that I make. She broke down. Dad told me that she couldn't help it because she never received much support growing up. She apologized and said that she felt like a failure. A few weeks later we were talking about someting when she said, "I'm afraid you'd be dissapointed, that you'd regret it."
Acknowledging that this has always been the way she's interacted with me, I realized how much it has and continues to affect my life. My whole childhood I'd been critized and argued with which has made me very defensive and insecure.
Mitch is the first person in my life that I have been this close to, who is there for me, regardless. He doesn't always agree with me, but he never makes a point to tell me I'm wrong. Having been starved for this, it's all I wanted from him. I realized I wanted to keep love and intimacy separate. If he never wanted to have sex again, I would have been relieved. This is not the makings of a healthy relationship.
Figuring out where this has stemmed from has made a world of difference. Knowing that the way I feel comes from somewhere else has made the relationship that we have so much stronger, and we're both happier than we've ever been.
Interactions with my mom still aren't much fun, but it's easier now because I realize how little what she does has to do with me. The hard part about it is she always means the best. I don't know anybody that wants to please as much as she does. If she was conscious of being hurtful it would be easy for me to say something, but that's not the case. She has a lot of her own issues to work out and it's important that I've realized this, as it makes it easier to sluff off some of what she might say and do.
It's like Dr. K. said, "95% of the world's harm is through ignorance. Only 5% is malice."
--
So there ya go. What I've been dealing with and what I'm afraid to tell people when they ask where I've been.
Expect a phone call, soon.
Signs of affection have been really making me uncomfortable. Anything more than a hug and I'd become incredibly uneasy. It was getting so intense that I had become obsessed with avoiding certain situations. Needless to say this makes for a tricky relationship.
I actually started to think that maybe something had happened to me as a kid, which just made everything worse. I started having night terrors like I did when I was little. Back then, I didn't remember anything. The three times it happened recently, I remember very clearly. I would wake up to find a man in the room, a different guy in a different place, each time. Then I would scream my lungs out and slowly the predator would fade away. My eyes would be open while I was sleeping and the screaming is what would wake me up. My mom is the one that said it sounded like night terrors. Since realizing what it was, it has stopped.
Shortly afterwards I was looking for a book on amazon when I came across one on something called 'sexual anorexia.' I looked into it and realized that it described, almost exactly, what I was experiencing. After a little more reading and watching a little "TLC",I figured out what my real problem was.
This girl on tv was talking about how unsupportive her parents were when she had been raped. Until that moment, I had always thought that my mom had been supportive when I told her about when this happened to me. I think that at the time I was just so relieved to have told her, that maybe it didn't matter. I know now that it definitely does matter. My mom has always compared herself to others and is too busy competing that she doesn't even live her life for herself. It's always about being right, being better, or having something that they don't. The day I told her about what happened to me was no different. All I wanted was a hug and an "it's okay", but instead she said two things: 1 - "I never could have told my mother." 2 - "I was worried that ****** (an ex-boyfriend) would try something like that."
Growing up, the people closest to me were not always the most supportive, and this continues to be the case with my mom. All my life I've wanted to act, but I was always very shy. When I was about eleven they were doing auditions locally and I decided I would balls it up and give it a go. When I told my mom about it all she said was, "you're probably too tall" and that was the end of it.
Recently I asked her to please not tell me that I am going to be "dissapointed and regret" the decisions that I make. She broke down. Dad told me that she couldn't help it because she never received much support growing up. She apologized and said that she felt like a failure. A few weeks later we were talking about someting when she said, "I'm afraid you'd be dissapointed, that you'd regret it."
Acknowledging that this has always been the way she's interacted with me, I realized how much it has and continues to affect my life. My whole childhood I'd been critized and argued with which has made me very defensive and insecure.
Mitch is the first person in my life that I have been this close to, who is there for me, regardless. He doesn't always agree with me, but he never makes a point to tell me I'm wrong. Having been starved for this, it's all I wanted from him. I realized I wanted to keep love and intimacy separate. If he never wanted to have sex again, I would have been relieved. This is not the makings of a healthy relationship.
Figuring out where this has stemmed from has made a world of difference. Knowing that the way I feel comes from somewhere else has made the relationship that we have so much stronger, and we're both happier than we've ever been.
Interactions with my mom still aren't much fun, but it's easier now because I realize how little what she does has to do with me. The hard part about it is she always means the best. I don't know anybody that wants to please as much as she does. If she was conscious of being hurtful it would be easy for me to say something, but that's not the case. She has a lot of her own issues to work out and it's important that I've realized this, as it makes it easier to sluff off some of what she might say and do.
It's like Dr. K. said, "95% of the world's harm is through ignorance. Only 5% is malice."
--
So there ya go. What I've been dealing with and what I'm afraid to tell people when they ask where I've been.
Expect a phone call, soon.