Accomplishment. Supporter Unhappy.

[Tinyflame]

I think if a person cares about someone else it only follows that they want them to be happy, and their life full. Which would include him wanting you to heal and feel better about yourself, and you not being jealous about other people in his life.

That being said, you have placed this under accomplishments, meaning you feel it is progress for you. If he understands that, he will be happy for you too (if his character is as you have described).

I think the funny thing about (in)/dependence, we are all inclined in one way or another, and it seems to me eventually at some point we'll be faced with the opposite. But the healthiest stance is flexibility, using wisdom. It is like emotional detachment to me, as an analogy: to be able to detach from what is negative, but not the person, or even their pain. Similarly, there is a large difference between emotional dependence, and trust: the first is feeling a need you must fill only yourself, from inside; the second is awareness of what you cannot fill from inside by yourself.

 

[Upside Down Eagle]

Thanks Junebug,

Your logic helped me feel better, because yes it´s an accomplishment to me. I would love it if he could see that too, but then again maybe ten months are not enough to understand the stuff in my head.

I can imagine it seeming contradictory to him. I said I really wanted to be his friend, and I do. I just don´t want to be his friend as long as being his friend means that my own dependency is going to mess with my head.

And I think he can´t understand that because I am not being overtly dependent, for example I have never bugged him about him being closer to his other friends. I feel the dependency but I don´t put it in action.

He´s told me before that he doesn´t understand why I worry about these things - he thinks I only worry about them just in case they upset him. But I worry about it anyway regardless of him. Urgh O.o

Anyway I told him again that I really appreciate him but I just need to sort these things out first. Hopefully in time he´ll understand and maybe I can overcome that dependency and be a good friend to him.

 

[Mytime]

I’m hoping it’s ok to add to the conversation, being a supporter myself. One of the hardest things for supporter is not to take thing personally. It takes time and work on our part to get to that place.
You said in the beginning of the friendship you fell back into a behaviour you wanted to change.
You acknowledged, that you were falling back and took the steps you needed to do, to work towards your goal. That is a great accomplishment ?
It can be confusing, when a relationship starts off one way and then it starts to change. I feel that happens in any relationship. When one person pulls away, the other person insecurity come out also.
Communication is your biggest friend. But I don’t feel it should just be about your feelings. He needs to also communicate his own. It would help the friendship if he took some time to understand PTSD and also look at himself to see if he has his own hang ups to work out.
I can only share my experience as a supporter. It can be hard when someone needs space. For me it was hard to understand, because I wasn’t fighting or seeing my relationship was in trouble. When you feel the friendship is a good one, but the person is wanting space. It can be confusing and hurts because you can’t truly understand why the person wants space away from you. I’m not sure if this helps or make sense, lol.

 

[Mach123]

I'm sorry but scanning through the what's new section and looking at the thread title my mind changed the meaning and I LOL even though I was sure you couldn't have meant "I just accomplished making my supporter unhappy."