Meursault 2.0

[sanmagic7]

why not love yourself?  what has not loving yourself gotten you thus far?  maybe it's time to change tactics for yourself, see if it works out any differently.  what could it hurt?  could it make things worse to love yourself?  and, maybe you need to start simply liking yourself.  the love will come later.  i don't see you even liking yourself which, i would guess, would make it more difficult for others to like you.

i think that's an interesting observation your friend made, that as soon as you find someone who is attractive to you, you become frozen.   have you ever thought about that phenomenon?  what does that mean to you?  what does it mean for you?  what, exactly, is freezing within you? 

people sense these vibes coming off others, maybe not at the time, but a day or two later.  i just came back from visiting my daughter, and was introduced to a friend of hers.  we spent some time together having breakfast, she was intelligent, funny, nice, upbeat, and we had a lovely time.  back in the motel room with my daughter, i told her that her friend was really nice, but i sensed something 'off' about her and wouldn't care to spend too much time around her.  my daughter and i discussed it and figured it out, but only after we'd all said that we'd get together again sometime.   it wouldn't really bother me if i didn't see her again.

it was nothing she said or did, but a vibe that didn't fit with mine.  an innate attitude (nothing harsh or overt) that i had known and didn't really like at a visceral level.  could i ever explain this to her?  no.  it wouldn't be understood on a logical level, and very possibly it would be taken personally and hurt her feelings.  i would never want to do that. 

so, maybe you want to try something different within yourself, since all your 'monster' beliefs haven't really helped you so far.  i'm not saying it would be easy, but it would be do-able, step by step.  different mind messages to yourself, positive self-talk, speaking to yourself in the mirror by saying only positive things about yourself - not about what you do but about who you are as a person, as a man.  your energy input into yourself in a positive way.  there may only be small things to start - i like you, you're kind (to your mirror image) - but they add up and they all count.

best too you with all this, meursault.  you deserve to have love in your life, including from yourself.

[meursault]

It's so confusing to me, because without getting that message, that I am unlovable to women, I generally DO like myself.  I think I'm pretty entertaining, and I've helped a lot of people, and I have a lot of skills and experiences that I am proud of.  I am usually pretty giving and helpful and even though I'm really afraid, I think I'm pretty brave.  I'm pretty intelligent and creative.  But then I get that message (whether I am misreading or not I guess I sometimes might be), and everything crumbles.  It's like this volcano of terror and a disintegration of any coherent sense of self.   I spent pretty much the whole of my 20s trying that CBT stuff.  I made lists and lists of positive things about myself.  Had sticky notes all over te place.  Went through a 3 month intensive social phobia group program a couple of times, and then saw the guy privately for a year after, as I worked on all that step by step stuff.  Making smaller goals, and practising them until I could function without too much panic and incompetence, and then building up to bigger goals.   It certainly had some usefulness, but it never addressed this core of things.  Positive affirmations haven't worked for me the way they seem to have for other people.  I don't know.  I diligently did that stuff daily for years.  It got me to a functional place, but there was no healing which had occurred.  That only came when I lost my virginity.  I still do some of the skills I got out of that on a daily basis.   I have spent years at a time plugging along, holding the faith that there is nothing wrong with me, and it's just faulty thinking, and trying to say positive things.  Then it eventually wears me down, and the messages have piled up from being unwanted that I am forced back to accepting it:  there is something fundamentally unlovable about me.

Sometimes, I regain my footing within a few days, and sometimes it has taken years.   I really think I have been unable to contain any of this reaction to rejection in the last two years.  I  opened up about growing up and started dealing with that in therapy, and it's like I'm permanently activated and horribly fragile.  All the legal stresses certainly made things worse.  My therapist seems to think this is all how this stuff heals, and I am going to have to go through all this stuff.  She says going through all this and processing it with her is how she can help.  She also encourages me to keep trying to meet women.  She has said something like "Relational trauma, especially developmental trauam, can only really be healed in a relationship with someone."  I THINK with this attachment based stuff, that maybe she just sits with me and lets me be vulnerable and open talking about it, as I learn that I am accepted until I actually feel like it is safe to be me around women and I won't be attacked.  I kind of think she has greater faith in my ability to handle it than I do, though.

I'm kind of thinking the confusion of what seemed to be going well, and then having that turn into some incomprehensible rejection, really triggered a lot of that traumatic stuff from when I was little.  Just terror and worthlessness and unpredictability and rejection.  And then in a panic, I was answering those messages.

I have no idea about what signals I send off, I suppose.  I have asked several female friends, and they laugh when I ask if I have a creep vibe.  Apparently I don't at all.   I have been told that I can come across as too eager.  But also told I am too aloof.  And my best friend has told me she thinks I seem easy to hurt, so maybe women don't want to get involved because they know they would feel like they're kicking a puppy (I'm guessing there).  She has been in my presence a few times when I've asked women out.  She said I come across as hopeful, a bit nervous, but fairly open and like I am fairly confident.

About the freezing around attractive women.  That's something that I try to figure out all the time.  It is very urgent and acute.  I've tried to work my way through understanding what's happening with this with both my therapist, and the EMDR therapist I saw last year.  They both see it like this:  I am frightened, as I normally am, but then arousal signals due to being attracted get all caught up in a terror response, and escalate.  I'm triggered by the very fact that they are women, and then there is also a fear of rejection, judgement and humiliation.  When I was younger, I shook like crazy, but now I just freeze right up so I don't show how afraid I am and risk ridicule.  Inside, my thoughts are just incoherent streaks of lightning, and my body feels like exploding as I keep myself from just running screaming.  Then I start to feel all distant and stunned and foggy.  My brain is gone.  I was telling the EMDR therapist about falling to pieces in a coffee shop, where a couple of girls were being all boisterous and laughing, and how every time they burst out laughing it hit me like a shovel to the face.  I actually jumped out of my seat at one point.  She said: "Do you see how attractive women are a trigger to you for your trauma history in exactly the same way a car backfiring is to a Vietnam vet?"  (Or close to that.)  That makes quite a bit of sense to me, especially how it's worse when the women are laughing.  As my Mom would be going off on me in a world filling rage, saying how I should be killed or sodomized or castrated or whatever, my sisters often danced around laughing at me and teasing me.  What did I do then?  I didn't back down, but I remained completely still, so it wouldn't escalate.  I see the parallel there....

I've known women who have had similar experiences with kind of specific things like that, like falling to pieces hearing guys horsing around and making sports cheer sounds.  I don't really understand what is happening yet with that stuff, it is still too incoherent for me to really remain present when it is happening, but I can sort of see how my therapist's interpretation makes some sense.  Both she, and my friend who is a therapist have pointed out how those bodily signals of arousal often get mixed up in panic.  Now I think it has happened so much, I have a terrible conditioned response.

Meursault

[sanmagic7]

well, meursault, it makes sense to me.  i'd never really heard it explained that way, but i can see how that dynamic would occur without any conscious thought or recognition.  like the backfiring example.  the vet is immediately back in the war zone.  attractive women immediately send you back to that house full of malevolence and ridicule.  and, so you freeze so as not to have all those bricks of pain thrown at you again.  the same coping mechanism you relied on with your mom and sisters.

all in all, it sounds just like what your therapist says - this is part of the process, painful as it may be.  as you continue to work with her, you'll find the healthy coping strategies you need now as an adult man, of that i have no doubt.    it does take time, tho, and patience, including with yourself.  you'll get there, meursault.  the rough stuff will be rough, and it's probably exacerbated by all the trauma and stress you've been going thru for the past 6 yrs. as well. 

that's a lot to deal with, a lot to manage, a lot to sort through.  it'll happen.  i have faith.   big hug!

[meursault]

Thanks for being supportive.  I have definitely lost it.  I knew it would be tough after the trial ended.  I knew that losing 6-7 years of my life would hit me hard.  I am having a hard time making any sense of this all.  There is a hurricane going through my head and body.

I wrote the following yesterday.  There are a few swears, and a suicide attempt description, so I thought I better just link.  It actually has helped me to make things a bit more coherent.  I think it's fairly insightful, or maybe thought-provoking.  Don't know, it's very personal, and I tried to write it as fairly entertaining prose.  I sent it to a friend who was briefly a therapist of mine (several years ago), and he asked if he could send it on to a few friends, since he thought it articulated something kind of important.  It's my thoughts on the idea of having to love oneself before being lovable.  I wrote it out in very short time, and barely any editing has occurred, except correcting some punctuation, and getting a quote right.  I started writing it as a fictional character doing exposition, but that didn't last long....  I don't know, I think it sums up what I've tried to articulate for most of my life better than I ever have before.

https://wps999.blogspot.ca/2017/03/love-yourself.html

Meursault

[sanmagic7]

just keep taking care of you as best you can, whichever way works best for you.  i've found writing to be extremely helpful myself.  keep going, meursault.  you'll get there.  big hug.

[Wife#2]

Oh, Meursault, I wish I had answers for you. I really, really do. You sincerely seem like a genuinely good and loveable man. To have such a visceral response as you go through is completely understandable. And also completely challenging in social situations. And on first dates (when women are likely to be chatty and giggly - especially if they like you).

To my uneducated, unprofessional view on this, you are sincerely lovable and worthy of love! It's difficult for a woman to get to know you, because much of what they would do during the 'getting to know you' phase would be triggering in the extreme. They would act in ways common to early friendship and dating - wanting to dance, laughing at anything even if you didn't MEAN to be funny. Add the confusing part of being attracted, then immediately repelled, and you've got one understandably confused man! Because it isn't the man being repelled, it's the cPTSD dragging your mind away while YOU are still attracted to the source of the trigger!

Imagine it like this - the backfire wasn't from a random car out on the street - it was from the motorcycle you used to love riding. Now, every time you crank the bike, BANG and you're triggered. You know you can just avoid the bike, but that's not what you want out of life. So, you think - maybe if I just switch bikes. Sell the old one, get a new one and crank it up. Bang. Not as big as before, but you're now hyper-sensitive to that sound, and you're still triggered. You LOVE riding motorcycles, so it's hard to give up. One rides past with loud pipes and even THAT triggers you - because you're longing, wanting AND feeling completely denied something you love. The more you feel denied, the worse you feel when you ARE denied by being triggered.

This may seem really strange, but it's a possible way to build the relationship part WITHOUT the triggering part while getting to know a lady and allowing her to get to know you.... internet dating. Don't laugh too hard. I met my husband through internet dating. It worked for us because I could get to know him some (I'd been pretty burned before and was very cautious- ditto for him) before committing to a face-to-face meeting.

When we felt safe enough after chatting via text, we exchanged phone numbers. When we felt safe enough after talking on the phone, we met face-to-face. THEN we started dating. That may give you a chance to explain that hearing laughter CAN make you nervous - to call you back if she notices you drift off - that it isn't personal at ALL. Without getting into the details, still giving her a heads-up that these things can happen, so she won't be off-put by it.

I do know hubby revealed that he doesn't drive and why pretty early on, because he'd learned that many women ran away or just disappeared when that was revealed. He figured, better to let her run early than to invest in caring about her, only to lose her with that fact. I revealed why I'm pretty stand-offish when first meeting people - because I figured better to let him know now than him think I'm a cold fish later, when I really DO care.

Given the challenges you face, that may be an option. Which you may have already tried. I don't know. What I do know is that all your posts point to you being a very considerate, caring, fun-loving fellow whose cPTSD is damaging your quality of life now. I do wish cyber-hugs could help you feel the respect and caring I feel for you!  Even more, I wish I could give you an answer that would work.

[meursault]

Wife #2:
I cried a bit reading that.  I'm so utterly demoralized.   It's strange, though, how my feeling of safety and willingness to be vulnerable becomes so much stronger after a woman has sex with me.  I sort of have a "Well, if she had sex with me, she must accept and like me.  She must want ME"  I am luckily not so deluded I rationally believe that, but emotionally it's there.  Same with female friends.  Once I know they are for sure lesbians, or in committed relationships or whatever, I am able to feel safe around them, and then, in either of those cases, I really LOVE those same things that trigger me.  It is a spike of excitement and enjoyment of their femininity rather than terror when I hear them laugh.  I don't really understand it,  but in a way, since they won't want me sexually, they aren't going to do something that hurts me.

To strain the motorcycle analogy:  once I realize the sound is coming from a motorcycle that is on a road I can't reach, or is on the road of ME where it has shown it won't wreck the pavement, or lose control, I can enjoy the sound. 

I have met a couple of women via chatting online, and tend to do pretty well conversationally, but the first meeting is still full of terror.  I met a woman who posted she wanted to meet new people in my city last October (IIRC) and we chatted for a couple of weeks (a lot) before we tried to meet.  She cancelled on me three times, and then finally showed up.  I felt no rejection there.  When we finally mt, we hit it off pretty good.  Neither of us are interested in each other romantically, though.  She's the one I posted quite a while ago that I had a date (we both knew it was a get to know you sort of date and not necessarily a date date) with, and at the end, she got on the bus, and five minutes later texted me "Thank you for restoring my faith in humanity."  She and I are still friends.  We text several times a week.  I had her over and cooked her supper last week.  But it wasn't a date with necessarily romantic intentions, and when neither of us seemed interested, we just became friends.

I had also tried a dating site.  I was only able to meet one woman that way, and when we had our date, she was very confrontational and hostile, and I could tell she could read my nervousness and it annoyed her.  What I thought was humorous sarcastic banter from her when we were messaging, was genuine disdain for the world.  It was a very clunky date.  I also felt like there was no reprieve from being rejected, since my profile was putting me "out there" 24 hours a day, seven days a week.  IRL, at least I can somewhat feel I'm not actually being rejected when I stay at home and hide.  I've asked a couple of female friends help me write my profile, since I wasn't getting the responses I expected.  I'm definitely willing to try that again, though.  I just closed that account in the fall.

I do think there is some fine line with letting the women somehow know it is not them, but just my own weird reactions when I get too nervous or dissociative, while somehow also not coming across as completely damaged, too.

I'm feeling so damaged.  I saw my therapist today, and she, as always, was very supportive and accepting of me.  I had sent her an email over the weekend asking her to let the police know I was dead in my house though.  And later rescinded it.  I feel like such garbage.

Telling her about what happened with that woman, I recounted the details, and was bawling hysterically.  I had this wild, shaking, high pitched desperate voice, and was saying over and over "I don't understand anything!  I can't make sense of anything!!!  What is happening?  What happened?  Why did she change so much?  I'm crazy and nothing makes any sense!  HElp, I don't understand what is happening!"

Tears were actually shooting from my eyes.  Wow, was I shaking.  When I told her all the details, she helped me understand a little, I think.  The woman is in an intensive daily mental health program, and has BPD, which doesn't mean anything in and of itself, but my therapist made me see that maybe she just got scared of getting closer, or was just herself overwhelmed by the idea of dating.  She reassured me that all the things the woman said were "extremely strong" messages that she liked me and wanted to see more of me, and then, to save face or feel justified in retreating, blamed me by telling me she didn't think of it as a date, even though that was explicitly said.  My therapist reassured me how all the things I was told actually meant what I thought, and I wasn't just so crazy I didn't understand anything and the world hadn't stopped making sense.  I had shown the texting exchange the date and I had after the date to my best friend, and she said:  "You come across as pretty eager, but there's nothing in there that's weird or anything.  And she seems to be enjoying the conversation."  My therapist suggested maybe she felt too exposed by the fact that I was interested in her, and pushed me away so she didn't have to risk closeness.  Who knows, I guess.

I was holding my face and bawling and choked out "Do you see me as so bad I deserve this?!?"  and my therapist looked really gentle and sad and caring.

God, do I feel fragile how easily I was hurt by that woman.  And wow, was I interested. I don't think I've dated a woman in ten years to whom I felt such a strong sense of attraction and comfort with.  I lived with a girlfriend for a year a couple of years ago, and I was never as excited to hear what she had to say as this woman.  Then my therapist and I talked how I need to add some other therapist or group or something, since she is unable to give more than she does.  So, she is going to look around and talk to colleagues.  Part of me is scared that she is just sick of me and this is how she is getting rid of me, and of course I would be too powerless to do anything so she would stay.  But I think she means what she said.  I am almost positive. 

I asked her if she has seen problems like mine before.  And if I was the most damaged client she has ever had.  She said she has seen this sort of thing before, but never to this degree.  She said the people who have gone through all that I've gone through are usually heavily medicated, and institutionalized regularly.  She said she's never seen a client who works as hard as I do, or who goes as deeply into this stuff as I do.  It was an extremely heavy session.  I was bawling a lot.

She gave me a big long hug at the end and kind of rubbed my head and told me I was a good man, and one of the strongest and most loving people she has met.

I am exhausted.  I feel like I can start to return to the world from this Jacob's Ladder nightmare I've been in for a week.  She liked what I wrote that I linked above.

Anyways:
Downsideup:  I don't think that way.  I don't want to be rescued or saved or coddled.  I want to be strong and find and earn someone's love.  I don't want a prize, I want a shared giving.  If it is saving, I ant it to be mutual.  Anything else is me being powerless, and that isn't what I want.  I want love very badly, and I think a lot of this developmental trauma makes me feel that need very acutely.  And I know no-one here can or will give me the love I want.  I'm not here for that reason.  I'm here because I feel so alone with all this, and people here seem nice, and a lot of you have gone through similar hells, and have some understanding of your own with this stuff that when I speak I don't feel so completely alien and alone and broken.  That I am understood.  And that maybe other people can see some bits in my stuff that they can use or apply or find insight into their own stuff with.

Arg.  I'm crying. Lol.

Meursault

[Three Roses]

A cyber "hold you while you cry" hug.

[sanmagic7]

dear meursault,  i think your therapist has a good idea which has nothing to do with wanting to be rid of you or being frustrated by you.  i think she is looking at you beginning to attend a group as an adjunct to the therapy she is doing with you.  especially if it is a male/female group, you will be able to interact with others, get feedback, be supported, and show some vulnerability in a safe space.  such group work can be very helpful and healing, and might give you quality feedback for your questions and insecurities.  it would be a community, each helping the other, to promote healing.  that's my take on that suggestion.  on the other hand, she may have something different in mind that i'm not aware of.  but i do believe it's something she's thinking of to help you in a way that she's not able as one person.

you are wounded, meursault, nothing more, and the wounds are raw from all the stress you've recently gone through.  there is nothing intrinsically wrong with you from what i know of you.   women have their own issues, too, and sometimes those speak louder than words.

in the meantime, as much as we can be, we are here for you.  the earth mother in me is wrapping you up in her voluminous skirts, embracing the pain that is you right now.  be as kind to yourself as possible.  you are like a frightened baby bird, fragile but with that incredibly strong will to survive this.  you will make it.  eventually you will fly.

[meursault]

I woke this morning to your post and the following message from someone from elsewhere who read my "Love Yourself?" post...

My experience, love is a happy accident that happens to 2 people who have some things in common, especially values. You can't make it happen, just be open to it. It seems to start with friendship. It is rare, but is there such a thing as too many friends? When it happens, both see the best in each other, and bring it out. Loving yourself doesn't seem to matter, but giving and positivity does. There is mutual respect and space. You don't have to be perfect, and PTSD is O K, as long as you do your best to recover and try not to hurt the other person. Probably best not to have both seriously ill. Helps if other person wants to understand. Let whatever is good happen, and be patient

I just started bawling, but maybe in a good way, not sure, from both of them.  Your comment made me feel very fragile bu somewhat safe.  His evoked the thought:  "YEs!  Exactly!  Love isn't self-centred enough to require self-love.  It is GIVING!"  Then I thought about how when I was a little boy and trying to give my love to my mom, and how she never wanted it or had any for me.  ANd it's the same now.  I'm wanting to give my love, but no one wants it.  And it's the same now as then: I'm being told there is something intrinsic yet ineffable about me that needs to be different to be loved.  But it didn't make sense then, and it continues to overwhelm me with confusion.  Why?  Can't you see me?  I think I'm lovable?  Now I'm completely bawling....

Now I have to head out to my bi-annual teeth cleaning and sit in a chair while the extremely attractive dental tech pushes against me and talks in chipper enthusiasm.  I have been too scared to even call and re-schedule.  I hope this isn't a humiliating disaster!

Meursault

[Wife#2]

Add me into this hug! You really are such a beautiful soul, Meursault. I suspect that when you do find the love you deserve, and you DO deserve deep, mutual, complete love, it will be a love story for the ages.

And bring a magazine to the exam room - just in case. Something boring like Engineering Today. If all else fails, place it strategically and 'leave' it there. I'm literally thinking of what I would recommend to my son. We females DO have an easier time with covering.

[meursault]

Thanks for the idea, Wife #2!  It took me a few seconds to understand what you were meaning, but I just got it.  I am not worried about arousal,  but panic attacks.  I have a bit of a smile about that misunderstanding!!!  Turns out, I cancelled though.  My furnace just blew up.  I went to leave, and could hear weird sounds, so I have to deal with that....

Meursault

[Wife#2]

Glad I could make you smile!

Dang, drab-it about the furnace though. Hoping that is an easy fix.

[sanmagic7]

sucks about the furnace.  i, too, hope it's an easy fix. 

still earth-mother hugging!

[meursault]

Despite what a basket case I become with rejection and loneliness from women, I think I am otherwise pretty effective in life.  I traced the problem, took a bunch of stuff apart.  Called around for the parts I needed.  Discovered that places won't sell those parts to the general public.  Called HVAC guy I know from my small town and told him what was broken and what part I needed.  He called a supply place in the city and told them to bill him, and gave my name saying I'd be in to pick it up for him.  I have a furnace again.  I figure it would have cost me $500 if I had to get someone to come in and do it.  Instead, it was $80 and I'll have to buy that guy lunch sometime.

Phew. 

Just got settled into a warming house again.  That was potentially much worse!  Silver-lining?  I had a genuine reason for cancelling the teeth cleaning and potentially humiliating myself with crying or panic attacks.  I really don't think I could have handled that today.  Cute receptionist woman in the heating distributor place had me shaky and my brain was incapable of thought.

I think today will be a day of self care now.  Journaling and stuff.  Maybe go get chocolate or something and hide from the world.

Meursault