Feeling Attracted To Someone.

[Meadowsweet]

I'm in my forties, I've been single for over 10 years. And not long after I had split up from my partner, I had a silly mistake with a man, called it quits and remained friends for a few months, thinking everything was ok, but it wasn't and he tried to kill me because he wanted more from me. Prior to that, I had an abusive relationship, followed by another unhealthy relationship. I'm ill equipped and inexperienced in what is healthy and what's expected of me healthily, and naturally I am sensitive when it comes to relationships.

But, I'm doing ok managing PTSD, and I try to monitor and analyse myself in terms of my other issues, to keep on top of them, and also, I really really want to get through these difficulties and not be stopped by fear.

So to try and be more sociable, I started going to a class, and there's a man there who I can feel myself developing a thing for - nice butterflies in my stomach and feeling awkward around him, kind of thing.

Nothing might come of it, but if it doesn't, I don't want it to be because my issues have beaten me. I'm trying to wade through feelings of guilt for feeling this way, like somehow I am guilty for my abuse because I've been attracted to the men who have abused me at some point (dirty and deserving of it) No doubt there'll be loads more stupid issues coming up if this does go anywhere. I'm quite good at using logic to tell myself these things aren't true, but in this situation, I can't be completely logical because I need to allow myself to feel what I feel.

I'm too old for this. I just would like to hear from others who had been long tern single, and have succeeded in this area and how you managed dealing with stuff as it came up?

 

[stuff]

Your post sounds a lot like my romantic history. Wish I had some advice. I'm more and more guarded these days, but I'm also growing and opening up in other places.

 

[PitbullLOVE]

I am going through the same thing right now, or something quite similar... I am getting back into a relationship because I "ran away" from it previously. I want to try it again, because I am afraid I left the relationship because my issues beat me, as you were saying. I also battle feelings of guilt - that I am guilty for being attracted to men who abused me - I have been in multiple abusive relationships and blame myself for being attracted to those type of men. The man I am going back to now, is such a great man but I just can't seem to connect with him - and then it comes to what you said about allowing myself to feel what I feel - do I allow myself to feel what I feel, or is it really just my issues, and do I need to work through them and then will I connect with him? Or is he just not the one?

Ugh it's just too much. :( I get anxiety just thinking about it. You are not alone, I am right here with you.

 

[Ladyghosthunter]

I'm here for ALL of you!! Right now, you need to help YOU and unfortunately, being single is a blessing even if you don't look at it that way. I'm not ready for anything right now and it's best that I stay alone for a while until I can get up the "nerve" to be around people, be around myself, and to be around anything that is NOT dysfunctional. I attract the wrong kind of people and that isn't good. So being alone for a while and concentrating on myself, even though I'm alone or lonely is better than being with someone dysfunctional or not making the right decision again. Concentrate on YOU first, everything else comes last.

 

[Meadowsweet]

Of course we are all in different places. But when I look back on everything, maybe now i'm ready for this.

When I was just turned 15, like all teenagers, I tried to find out about boys, but I was a bit dysfunctional and didn't have the ability to cope with those kind of situations, which led me into trouble. By the end of my 15th year, I was in a proper relationship with an older (and tough) man, because I felt safe. At 17 I left him for another man. That relationship was very abusive. At 23, another man offered me a way out, and I left and went straight into a relationship with him. He was never physically abusive, but he was twice my age and acted like an authoritarian father, he would treat my like shit and constantly remind me that he had rescued me 'from the gutter' and tell people in public that I didn't understand life and stuff.

Then when I left him, I was 30 and alone for the first time since I was 15. I joined a spiritual group on the internet, met up with them offline, became better friends with a few of them, invited them to my house, and was probably like a naive teenager again, thinking I had found a substitute family. I related to this one guy probably because he had a lot of issues, and I felt safe to be a person with issues around him. I knew he had suffered with mental illness in his teenage years and early adulthood, but he spoke quite openly about it as if it was in the past. He had given up his medication and maybe, having kept my own issues hidden for so many years, I was interested and inspired by someone who had moved on and who could be so open. But looking back, he showed phases of self harm and self hatred, followed by phases of narcissism. he was very dangerous, and I was unable to understand it or recognise the signs, because of my own complex issues.

But, that was eight years ago. I developed PTSD from what happened with him, and that's led to me facing a lot of underlying issues, and the messed up thinking styles and dissociative responses that got me into that life threatening situation with him.

I'm not cured, but I'm aware. I'm more aware of my own responses, and of psychology in general, of other people's as well as my own. I know about the need to recognise where boundaries are needed and why, and that it is acceptable for me to set them. It's still a work in progress, but I think there comes a time when we have to experience real life situations to keep working on it.