Quote: The stuff your H's counsellor keeps coming back to me. There ARE people with borderline versions of personality disorders who really ARE wired to be loners!
I'm not saying Wolfie's one, but it sure would explain some of his ambivalence...he WANTS love and closeness...but feels confined by it at the same time.
This truly WOULD make it HIS problem, and thus his responsibility to make a choice and stick with it. The pathway of growth and joy, IMHO is the path forward with you...the pathway of withdrawal, comfort, solitude and later despair, lays in the other direction.
Yeah, Shiney there is more going on than the average challenges of a relationship or the average challenges of piecing.
In regard to what you said about "feeling confined", I think there is some of that going on, but...
The main problem seems to be something like a faulty filter for blocking out stimulus. I understand because I'm like that too--although nowhere near to the extreme he is.
It's like, at the end of the day, all we want to do is hole up in our room and decompress from the stress of dealing with people and little stresses all day long. It's like the tolerance level for any stimulus has been reached and there is no more room for it.
We rarely even socialize--we don't go out and do things with friends like you and CJ, or have friends over. We both jealously gaurd our alone time (together or separately) and decompression time. If I lived in the city and had to try to deal with the stimulus overload that would cause, I think I would go mad.
My maternal grandmother is like this too, even more extreme than Wolfie is. She lives in a very remote place (you have to take a boat to get to her place). No roads, no running water, no electricity. She comes over to visit family once or twice a year, but not for long. She often says that she loves her family, but can hardly stand being around people for very long. My mother is wired the same way, but less so (like me).
I know it isn't a popular notion, but I have often wondered why this particular trait seems much more common and pronounced in Native people. I know there are some real genetic differences--not to be explained away by environment and culture.
So..anyway I don't think Wolfie's problem is as extreme as my grandma's, but could get there as it seems to get stronger with age.
That definatly makes the whole thing a bit more challenging--that and the bonehead thing.
It's easy to forget the bonehead thing, as he's so intelligent and is very insightful in many ways. When it comes to our interpersonal communication, he can sometimes be nearly, um well, retarded..and that always shocks me.
Oh well...I am mathmatically retarded, so I guess we all have our areas of deficiency .
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