Letting people live their lives and GALing...

[ericmsant2]

I'm dealing with constant anxiety because I can't get used to being alone.

Is dating someone going to help you deal with the anxiety of being alone?

I wonder if I will EVER be a normal healthy person emotionally. I really do.

What is a normal healthy emotionally person looks like? Personally, I think it is a matter of perception and ACCEPTANCE. I think I am normal emotional person even though I prance around in a pink tutu (just kidding). My point though is….don’t you define normal? Don’t’ you define what emotional health looks like. Each of us are different Antonia and so I would ask…is your definition based on what SOMEONE ELSE thinks or says is emotionally healthy?

It's that I know that I've had "issues" emotionally my entire life.

AND KNOWING is really half the battle. IMO (and according to my therapist, sometime all you can do is ACKNOWLEDGE and ACCEPT what and who you are. For example, I have and to some extent still have abandonment issues – I know this, so I work hard to TRY and make sure that my choices are not driven by this. Am I perfect? No. Will I ever be? No. It is a part of who I am so I have made peace with it. Any partner that I am with would hopefully understand it. So instead of wasting a ton of energy trying to “rip it out”, “change it”, etc…I focus on accepting it and not allowing (as best I can) to have it drive me.

I want to be connected to people, and I want a relationship with someone.

Then connect!

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?

How do we learn? How do we grow? IMO, we learn by doing, by taking chances, by learning (AS BEST WE CAN) from our mistakes. No one Antonia is perfect. You ain’t, I ain’t…your next partner isn’t.

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.

1) Stop saying you are damaged.
2) Stop trying to forecast the future, LIVE FOR JUST TODAY! Enjoy what you have today.
3) Maybe stop trying to FIX it and ACCEPT it. Accept that you, I, your mom, my mom, your dad, Cadet, AJM, CAT,….hell everybody has issues. The issues though should NOT hold us back. DO NOT get fixed overnight and in some case not for a verrrryyyy long time. You cannot undo the past – you can though change how you view/approach and deal with the future.

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.

Maybe you don’t have to “fix” you. Maybe you can just be YOU.

I don't want to hurt someone who seems so together.

If they are “so together” they will make a choice that is good for them. You really do not need to HELP them.

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.

I think you are smart enough to LEARN how to deal with someone like this guy. Hell you will never learn unless you try. Oh…and you will make mistakes along the way…just like he will, I will and everyone else.