Love Is Dangerous.

[Deleted member 1860]

This one's gonna be all over the place, and probably long, so I apologize in advance.

I'm VERY vulnerable right now, so saying something along the lines of "suck it up, buttercup" is NOT going to get me anywhere. I am looking for SUPPORT that is compassionate yet honest. Thank you.

Everyone knows how damn blunt I am, right? *heads nod*

Everyone also knows how I don't think I have any friends here on the forum (save maybe one), right? *more heads nod*

Well I sort of had a breakthrough. "LOVE" is dangerous to me. I CAN NOT have people liking me as it sends off alarm bells in my head and I majorly freak out. Yes, MAJORLY. Once those alarm bells go off, I tend to destroy whatever it is that was good. I was raised in a house where "LOVE" was never safe. My mother used love as a manipulation tool. It was a way that she could get what she wanted. Need to feel love? Play the damn game. But, you were still at risk for having it used against you in the future. THIS is why I don't think anyone will ever have pure feelings of LOVE (or even LIKE) toward me that aren't simply a selfish means to an end. I wasn't loved as a child, not like I should have been loved, and now that I am an adult, I still don't think I am worthy of being loved for ME and not for what I do for someone. Letting someone in means that they have power over me and can manipulate me as they see fit. (More alarm bells!)

I am struggling with the basic human need to be social and be loved (and love others), but love is dangerous, it is not safe. My mind cannot reconcile the two. I think that's why I turn to pissing everyone off. Damn, now THAT feels safe! Safe in that they're never getting in.....Safe in that there is some FEELING there but it is NOT a dangerous feeling. If I can piss someone off, that means that they care, but it still keeps me safe. I don't get caught up in lovey-dovey feelings where my guard is down and I am open to manipulation.

I want to be close to people but it is NOT safe. I don't want to be like this anymore! Somehow I think I couldn't have this sort of breakthrough until after my mother was out of my life. And maybe not until after I entered my most current episode which just HEARING her voice sent me over the edge, down into the abyss. (That started last Tuesday and I've been non-functional since, for a week and two days now.)

I don't want to make people hate me because that is the SAFE emotion! I want to be able to accept that people can like me for me. I want to be able to accept the "loving" emotions (ie like and love) without freaking out every time someone gets too close to me. I'm sick of keeping everyone at arm's length!

I don't know what to do. All I know is that I can't go on like this! At least I did the right thing by kicking my mother out of my life. At least now I have a prayer of discovering what love really is.

Thank You.

Oh and please ask if you have any questions. I am coming out of a flashback so my mind is pure mush right now. It was next to impossible to even proofread this, so my apologies if its a bit jumbled.

 

[moonbeam]

I think that is incredibly insightful.

I won't lie, being open to love with others comes with the ability for betrayal. Its all about trust and learning to let the right people in. But it can be very rewarding. If this is something you are genuinely wanting to change it will take time and energy but might be beneficial.

If it makes any difference my feelings towards you are on the positive side but I don't want anything from you. I like blunt people, being coddled makes me feel like they want something.

 

[Casey_03]

First of all, congrats on the breakthrough -- realizing that is a big deal. No, a huge deal. I think many of us on the forum can relate to the aspect of "love" triggering alarm bells; I know I can. And I think you're right that pissing people off is just a safe way of getting emotion out of someone. It keeps them at a distance but you still get to feel some sort of connection, even if it isn't a good one. But if you've had this breakthrough and realized why you behave the way that you do, you obviously aren't completely satisfied with that sort of connection. And at the end of the day, is a life without any real connection really worth living? I know how silly it sounds to ask that on a PTSD forum -- all of us have been hardwired to opt for safety over genuine emotion. But I don't think it's enough. I know for me it isn't. I've recently had a realization very similar to yours, after years of having only meaningless or negative connections with people, I want to feel a genuine connection with another human being on a warm, loving level. But that requires vulnerability, and being vulnerable is a risk. I think it's worth it though, and I think the fact that you've had this realization means you probably do too.

 

[TXbandit]

I know this was probably difficult for you to put this out there but that took GUTS! I'm right there with you feeling like love is dangerous. For me it is. I do not trust anyone with my heart. I push people away when they show even the slightest of love interest in me. I think it will take me a very long time to let someone back in after enduring six years of manipulation and abuse from a man I "loved".

Know that you are not alone in this, hun and you do have friends here. I second what @moonbeam said about learning to let the right people in. Do guard your heart but you NEED to allow yourself to be liked and loved sometimes. Every one deserves that. You don't have to jump in it head first but take it one step at a time and in a way you are comfortable.

Hang in there Solara and hugs if you accept.

 

[WhisperingUnicorn]

@Solara

Thank you for this post! .. I have a lot I want to say on this, but I'll try to message you privately (I haven't tried that feature yet :) ) ..

Stay tuned :)

 

[Eleanor]

Solara, you have been something of a puzzle to me/for me. On the one hand you are SO incredibly insightful and compassionate in your understanding of others, particularly others in pain and struggling... and on the other hand you say things in such an abrasive way. Now I get it a little.

And I am so incredibly ... grief stricken that this is a survival skill that was necessary for you.

This is up for me right now because my daughter (8) ... well, it is strange. She's gotten kind of mixed up about love and like - and I think in her case it is just conceptual (she has friends and loves us and her sisters etc. and has loving relationships with us) but she will not say "I love you" although she will write it, and draw stuff... but.. when I pressed her, she told me it "makes me feel weird to say it." She can't say why or how exactly, but she clearly LOOKS super uncomfortable even talking about it.

Granted, love in our family is not unproblematic. :(:wtf::sour: Her dad has PTSD and was verbally and emotionally abusive (mostly to me, but some came her way too, before I could stop it, I kept her away from most of it, but there was no way I could keep her away from all) for YEARS of her life. Her grandmother is emotionally abusive to her grandfather. I could go on. Dysfunction R Us. My mom once went out of her way to tell my daughter (I think she was ... 5 or 6?) that she (my mom) loves my dad, and then kissed him on the lips and explained that we do that with people we love. At the time I thought the whole thing was low level... icky. Awkard for sure. But now... I wonder if it wasn't just one more REALLY confusing thing...

Anyway,

love is dangerous, it is not safe. My mind cannot reconcile the two. I think that's why I turn to pissing everyone off.

You are quite right. Love is dangerous. It just is. If you love, you are going to get hurt at some point. You just are. Love makes us vulnerable. Even if our loved ones don't mean to hurt us, or in any way want to do so, it is gonna happen.

That said, others having power OVER us, and manipulation are two different beasts. There is hurt and hurt. People who love us back with compassion and respect don't manipulate, (although sometimes it is hard to see the difference between respectful requests and manipulations if all we've ever known is manipulation - the difference is in how refusal or agreement plays out over time..) Power OVER bespeaks a willingness to harm us against our will and better interests. When we enter relationships as full agents we can know that we can always walk away. Pick up our marbles and go play someplace else. And we can pick better people to trust and love next time. People who can actually do the work of love. Love, after all, is not in this sense, something we FEEL but something we DO that is accompanied by particular feelings.

There is a book that @Pencil pointed me toward - "Transforming the Difficult Child" that is not about your childhood, but seems like it might speak to some of the place that you are at with respect to other people appreciating you. I always got that "negative attention is better than no attention" but it helped me see how ... threatening and painful positive attention can become.

 

[desiderata310]

@Solara you are a difficult personality for me but I still like you.
Not a lot I can say except that I completely understand where you are coming from- probably more than you know.
Go easy on you.
Flashbacks suck.

I wish I had more I could add but I can't at the moment. It's been a really difficult night.

 

[Whitebird]

I think most people are afraid of LOVE. Even people who didn't have any experiences of unhealthy relationships in their past.
This link might be helpful:
Link Removed

 

[WhisperingUnicorn]

Well, I may not be able to send what I had hoped. I can't find a way to private message you, and what I was going to share is something I know my man wouldn't want me to broadcast in a public setting ..

Suffice it to say, "Love" is a concept that can be SO severely damaged. In my world, I'm idealist enough to believe it IS the strongest and most blessed force imaginable (how we best "image" GOD), but in my man's world, REAL love is perhaps the most prized, but also the most fragile of all, so he fears losing it, and he has PLENTY of reason to EXPECT to be hurt by others if they get too close .. cuz his story is a string of just such attacks. He loves me, now (8 years down the road), and lets me close (in fact insisted on showing me everything he could about himself - to inform me, and I think to also test me to see if I would have real staying power), but he still can't TELL me he loves me without almost physical pain for many of the reasons you listed above. Our journey took YEARS to move from a threatening relationship (he believed I was hired to replace him at our job) to close friends (FORCED to work together in the same office for 8 hours a day every day for months on end) to what we are now .. lovingly and perseveringly committed to each other's happiness, health and wholeness ...

My man's first response is still to "piss you off" first, push you away, and bluster and threaten if necessary to keep his world safe. He has had to do this just to survive .. :inlove: My heart goes out to you, @Solara .. TRULY. Because I see in your words a portrait very like someone I have come to love very DEARLY, and I want for you to FEEL safe, to be CONVINCED of it, to love in the right kinds of relationships, and to be surrounded by people who WON'T just TAKE from you all the time ..

My man used to say to me, "I'll hitch my wagon to your faith." So if you can imagine being able to say the same, might I share with you that I have faith that YOU will be able to love and be loved, as you were MADE to, because there ARE "trustworthy" people who will love you self-sacrificingly (even if imperfectly) .. And when you find it, it may be a very bumpy road to get there, but when you do, the fact of LOVE, a gift from Him who MADE us, will take your breath away!

My comments might not be practical, yet .. I can imagine my man might even read them and bluster and say "Don't try to tell me that sh*t!" .. yet here we are, finding love along a broken road. So for whatever this is worth .. it is not about "just trusting people" .. it's about finding the RIGHT kinds of people to trust. This might mean they have to walk farther with you to "prove" their trustworthiness, but the right kind of people will be willing and able to go the distance ...

I don't know if any of this helps or encourages, but that is wholly my intent! :inlove: and :hug: 's if you accept them!

~S2B

 

[The Albatross]

[1.] "If I can piss someone off, that means that they care, but it still keeps me safe." [2] "I don't get caught up in lovey-dovey feelings where my guard is down and I am open to manipulation." ... [3] "I don't want to make people hate me because that is the SAFE emotion! I want to be able to accept that people can like me for me. I want to be able to accept the "loving" emotions (ie like and love) without freaking out every time someone gets too close to me."

The first is an observation about the unwanted behavior and the dynamic - that safety is your priority and that you interpret caring negatively to fill the need and because it's safe. The second is likely a combination of risk awareness when "in love" and an expression of wanting love without the risk of manipulation... which I wanted to at one point and decided to label it as "dreaming the impossible dream" (I can hear that song in my head right now even just having said that). The third bit is the goal. So Solara, it's not as jumbled up as all that.

When do you want change? NOW. So all that remains is trying to frame up a plan or getting assistance with how to go about it. (added in edit... and meeting a person you could love who in turn also could love you as you are and who will endeavor to continue to love you as you change together)

About the only thing I have to add (not likely very helpful) was way before therapy... after husband number one and when I was trying to drive out/run off husband number two. I had to recognize and admit for myself (which I finally was able to do around the 4 1/2 year mark) that risk of being in love and vulnerable, and perhaps even destroyed by any number of awful things that can happen in a relationship was less than and not equal to the pain of staying the same.

I brought still (even though I tried not to) a whole lot of baggage... so did my partner and it hasn't been easy. At times both of us have seemed to reassess if it was worth it. But in the end, we both agree it has been. Mutually. Odds were against me and oh man I knew it... so no "suck it up butter cup" from me cuz I was petrified. So much so I was muttering incoherently walking down the aisle on my wedding day... straight up out of my mind scared.

But even though living alone was safer (and that was my own mothers choice by the way)... I took my best shot and so did he, me figuring I had less than a one in three chance of being successful... him thinking like a 50/50. I think I was bound and determined not to be like my mother, and when I self examined... I really wanted someone to love who loved me back.

 

[darrenS]

i can certainly relate , but over many years and a near lifetime of pushing it away , i came to realize that i missed so much from not allowing myself to feel love, it didnt have to be relationship type love , i learnt i could enjoy meaningful friendships and still feel safe, i tend to look at it as a risk most certainly and i could get hurt, rejected , feel betrayed , manipulated, but i can survive that , its not like it hasnt happened before and ive had to deal with it. But all in all it has been worth the risk.

I would much rather take the risk or flight from safety , its hard at first and there will be hurt, but its better than the loneliness otherwise.

you have a lot to offer , your smart , funny and honest , and have a gift with words. i hope you can work through this , as it would be sad to see you withdraw for no reason other than fear. be well

 

[Ronin]

Is there a way to persuade yourself it's something else than what sets you off? I mean, converting the feeling into another feeling or a shade of feeling that doesn't get the same alarm bells up? You're pretty factual in quite a lot; could you see responses not for the emotion (since obvsly emotions = danger zone and old schemes you can't juust overlay) but just for what they convey as information, for starters? (the omg they don't love me, chill panic. They don't hate me, chill, protective vest also can come down. They just find this and this and that about me seriously cool. Doable.)