Letting people live their lives and GALing...

[AntoniaB]

Ok so, couple of issues creeping up, but I want feedback on one thing in particular.

Because I want to meet new people, and it's very hard to do so in my area (small town) who are my age (because all the new people I meet tend to be 18-21), I joined an online dating service. I made it clear that I want to seek out new friends and then if it goes something further, great. I weed out nearly everyone I come across. I'm very picky I guess. But one guy out of 100 caught my eye from his profile description.

So I contacted him and we have been emailing. The longer we email, (just a few days really but he's very responsive), the more I feel like this guy is really "together" and emotionally healthy. He just seems in a really good place. And the more I see this, the more damaged I feel about myself.

I think that I've only ever been attracted to "damaged" men. Men with emotional problems that I could try to fix. Men who couldn't connect who, through the sheer magnitude of my efforts, would either reach me on some level or be trying to. My friend told me it's because I'm a perfectionist, that I need a project. That a "normal" healthy guy isn't enough for me. There is no challenge. I agree with this.

So as our first meeting gets closer (it's Thursday) I just feel like a deer in headlights and feel like I want to bolt. I feel like I'm only going to HURT someone who is healthy because I'm messed up. Sure on the outside I'm successful and have overcome a lot. But on the inside? I'm not just dealing with betrayal from years ago. I'm dealing with constant anxiety because I can't get used to being alone. I'm trying really hard to overcome it but I wonder if I will EVER be a normal healthy person emotionally. I really do.

It's not that I have a timeline and am trying to be over the past traumas in too short a time span. It's that I know that I've had "issues" emotionally my entire life. That I don't know if I even know what love really is. I've said it but only as a codependent. And it's like a tidal wave that I'm trying to hold back, this stuff that makes up who I am.

I feel very stuck. I want to be connected to people, and I want a relationship with someone. And I'm tired of watching my life go by year after year alone for the most part while I'm not sharing companionship with someone else. I could die tomorrow, you know?

But I also feel like I'm this very damaged person inside. And the tough part is that I feel that another year or two alone isn't going to fix the damage. NOTHING WILL. I'm a perfectionist and I'm too hard on myself and I'm anxious and my anxiety can cause me real problems, and I've tried for 3 years now of therapy to fix it all, and I just can't. All I've done is develop better coping skills. But I can't get rid of the root cause, which is that this is who I am.

Now can you see why I want to run from this first meeting with someone? I don't want to hurt someone who seems so together. I don't understand how to deal with someone who is as kind as this guy is. I really don't. I'm used to having to work to entice someone to me, to open up. I don't have to do ANYTHING of the kind with this guy. And it's positively freaking me out.

So....help. I know this is not a "dating" forum, but this issue is really part of a larger issue in terms of trying to come to terms with feeling like a damaged person and trying to navigate any relationship after recognizing how messed up we can become post-betrayal, post-all this introspection...