Hi,

thanks again for your reply. I think you’re right about what you said in the first paragraph. When it comes to people and what they think of me, I always tend to think the worst. I have a lot of fear when I see that guy or his friends, and you are also right about the embarrassment. I read through the link you gave me and the exercises there are also very useful. I read through the part about facing fears, and it made me realize how afraid I am of being rejected by him, and the fact that he rejected me as a romantic partner is what makes me so embarrassed to see his friends, because I feel like they all know I was rejected and they’re all laughing at me (although they might not be at all). I also just realized that I obsess over this fear and the fear makes me avoid places where he or his friends could be – that’s why when I accidently run into them, I get so scared and anxious. I guess if you keep avoiding your fears they get worse…and this fear is something obsessive for me; I think about him constantly like I’ve said. Maybe the movie-like thoughts in my head occur because of that obsessive fear. They’re a way to control my surroundings; I can pretend that what’s in my head is real and that makes me feel in control of the situation and it’s comforting.

I really miss that guy and want to just talk to him… I don’t know if that’ll be good for me, but it was really awkward the way I ended things with him. I was really hostile when he was trying to be nice and let me down gently, and I deleted him from Facebook and was cold to him and of course he stopped trying to talk to me because of the way I acted. I feel really ashamed about that because doing that only hurt me, and he’s probably glad he doesn’t have to deal with me anymore after seeing that side of me. Anyway I’ve been obsessing over this the whole day now and I finally wrote him a short message on facebook, because I thought that’d be a way to face my fear and hopefully that’ll help me move on. I’m terrified now that I’ve made the wrong decision, and now I’m obsessively checking my FB to see if he’s replied and getting anxious that he hasn’t. I don’t know how I’ll deal with it if he just ignores my message…maybe it wasn’t a smart thing to do to try to get rid of my fear of rejection by putting myself in a situation where I could get rejected…I was just hoping that if I actually do something and get rejected I’ll regret it less than doing nothing at all and continuing to obsess over it forever.

To answer your questions about what I do to pull myself out of the movie scenes…I guess it’s easier when I feel like I’m in control of the situation or when other people are paying attention to me and I don’t feel like I’m being judged. The movie scenes will start playing in my head whenever I’m confronted by a situation that makes me feel anxious or awkward, or if the situation is generally unpleasant. The problem is that I get used to that and eventually I lose the control to stop what’s going on in my head. I feel more “present and grounded” when I’m doing things that require intense concentration – like cleaning, writing, drawing, or something like that. When it gets really terrible sometimes I go to a church and meditate and that works really well. I was traveling the last few days and that was exciting, so it distracted me from the movies. I can’t travel much though, because of the lack of money and time, so that’s not something I can do more often to feel more grounded.

One of the worst things about my situation now is that I didn’t realize how hard it can be to get mental help in a different country. I’ve been trying so long to find a therapist and am still getting nowhere. Someone here had mentioned to me that her boyfriend had been depressed and had been trying to get help, but he wasn’t able to find a therapist either. Then he attempted suicide and finally he got the help he needed – so basically you need to actually hurt yourself before you can be heard here, and that is very discouraging. I’d put myself on a waitlist with a therapist in October, and when the appointment finally came I was so relieved but she kicked me out within five minutes saying that she wasn’t trained for dealing with abuse victims and that I’d have to find someone else. So when I thought I was finally going to get some help, I just got let down and that was very disappointing. But it’s been really helpful posting here, it’s great to be able to tell someone everything without having them judge me. So I will probably keep posting here until I’m back in Canada, where I’m hoping it’ll be easier to find a therapist.

As to your last question, I think having a father figure is just a basic need for anybody. I’ve never had any reliable, trust-worthy males in my life and when I see that just about everyone has a father and a boyfriend that makes me feel inadequate because I’ve never even been in a relationship before. When people talk about sex that makes me feel very alienated due to the abuse in my past. So I feel like I need to have those things too to be a “whole” person. When I was with that guy I felt so safe and happy and I’d never have any running thoughts in my head; my mind just always felt clear. And the thing I enjoyed most was just being in his arms and being touched by him in a non-sexual, comforting way. I miss that a lot and it’s what I think of the most when I think about him.

I’ve checked my Facebook about 10 times while writing this message and he hasn’t answered. I hope this anxiety goes away and that I haven’t made a stupid mistake by trying to talk to him again. I’m really interested in hearing what you might have to say about all this and am eagerly waiting your response.

Thanks for listening,
Luciana