hope you love her, cause you're stuck with her now

[MichelleLT]

My reply:

I don't LIKE to take time to reply to you. I don't LIKE to have time to formulate an answer. I NEED time.

Something happens in my brain when things get beyond a certain stress level. It's like my brain shuts down in some survival mode where emotions don't matter, no, don't exist. Blame my Dad, blame Neal, blame whomever you want, but this is the reality I live with. I literally have to sit there and pry it out of myself. I start by asking myself how I feel about what you just said. Good or bad emotion? Bad. Okay then, what emotion exactly, hurt? No, that doesn't sound right. Betrayed, no not that either. Angry? Maybe. What about it makes me angry? By the time I've gotten here you've long moved on and now I'm trying to follow my own train of thought as well as deal with the new stuff you are bringing up. I don't do it on purpose. I don't do it to infuriate you or dodge issues. In fact, I hate it when you raise issues, assume my silence means I'm not going to respond, and either move on to another topic or drop the conversation because then I am not only left trying to sort through the morass of thoughts in my head but trying to figure out a time to bring it up with you and no time ever seems good.