BellaOnline Forums Beauty and Self Self Development Going away from pain or pleasure?

Ah, dear Holly, I don't know where to begin!

What do I want?

Well,I'd like to be able to react in an adult way, emotionally,to stress, grief and the fears that often plague me.

Often, my reactions are those of a much younger child than 16. I've never talked about this before - to anyone! - so it is rather difficult to put into words.

For example, last night one of my dogs was in pain (I took him to the vet this morning and he has sprained his cruciate ligament in his leg.) I went into an anxiety attack and all the fears which might have been found in a 5yr old child were there - as they always are when I am stressed, worried or fear loss. I was beside myself because I didn't know what was causing him to be in so much pain. I desperately wanted to talk to someone - for comfort, but there is no one.

I lose friends because I am clingy and dependant and I really do behave like a small, frightened child who fears loss or abandonment. I seem to have no control over this.

In intimate relationships, I am idealistic, like a teenager. I am not adult and it is very obvious to those concerned. I have been told that I don't want a lover. I want a mother!

Mentally, I react in a mature manner when there is trauma or strife, such as attending the injured at the scene of an accident, or taking the initiative to put out a fire if it starts. (always the one with a clear head who does what is necessary) - but in personal matters, my emotions take over from my mind and I am a mess. What is personal always brings a terribly immature response, tears, panic, fear of what the future holds, like a child orphaned and alone and terrified.
I was always afraid to be away from my parents, up until I was 18. I could not relate to males, and still fear men I do not know well. I was afraid of people my own age and became a loner very early in the piece. I never had a best friend until I was over 40, and even then she was someone 14 years my senior and I did not let her get to know me well. She only saw what I wanted her to see. She was the only close friend I ever had, and she died in 1996.

I never had a boyfriend. Never went out with a boy, and never knew what it was to have school friends.

Because as a child I spent a great deal of time 'splitting off' I had a lot of blank spots in my memory. This often drove people up the wall.

So I did not go through the normal 'mile stones' of childhood which are necessary for a child to experience in their develoment, not as a child, and not as a teen, so I did not have these as an adult. One cannot go back and experience them. If you didn't go through those stages, you miss them. No one can run before they have first learned to stand up, balance, and walk.

I have always been aware of this, but it is now that I feel the full impact of it. When I was younger, I just kept on hoping that things would get better, which of course they did not. So mentally, intellectually, I matured normally, but emotionally I was arrested in my development and none of my experiences changed that. Perhaps if I'd received help when I was still pre-adolescent, it might have changed everything. But there was no help. By the time I was 18, I was suffering the consequences of retarded emotional develoment to such an extent that it only compounded the damage, and I suspect I arrested again. It was like the rolling stone effect - it kept on going and got worse with the on going years.

How do you go back and relive your childhood and adolescence? How to experience all the things that just weren't there! That's what I'd have to do! How do I now experience being a normal child and teen? I wish, oh I wish I could! All those experiences I never knew and cannot know now because the time for them is passed and gone.

I have often looked at others who were badly abused and who are DID/MPD and see them married with children, and I wonder why it didn't happen for me. My life was not worse than theirs. But now that I have this information, I think I understand why.

I developed other areas of my brain to compensate, and that is good, but my emotional develoment remains an embarrassment and a great impediment in my interpersonal relationships, so that in truth, I don't have any! None have lasted. So of course, now, I protect myself from further grief, and I don't get close to people.

That is about the best way I can explain it. And it is a relief to be able to finally admit, at least on the forum, what my major problem is. It is a load off my chest, so to speak.

All I want from life now, is to be able to love without being rejected, and to remain in reasonable health so I can give my dogs a full and happy life. (My dogs are all I have) I have never really asked for more than to love and be loved. Then it became just to love, with no expectations of being loved and accepted as I am, because I've found that people don't seem to be able to do this. (love me as I am) It is so painful to see those you love turn from you in disgust, and tell you that they want an adult for a friend, not a child.

I wish I could be an adult in my emotions. I wish I could lose my insecurity and terror at the thought of pain and loss. I wish I didn't feel like a frightened child who is all alone in a cruel world. (Imagine how a small child would feel to be lost, alone, and having to face life and its responsibilities!)

Anyway, that is some of my story. There are things that a mature mind cannot do for you. You also need emotional maturity. That is at the centre of your being.

Please forgive this long epistle?

Kerryanne.