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What, If Anything, Have I Done Wrong

Submitted by Anonymous on Sun, 11/26/2006 - 8:00pm
in
November 26, 2006

Question

I have been spending time with a young lady for 7 months now. We dated for 2-3 months before she called telling me she needed to slow down that her emotions were out of control.

She has always been hurt/let down in past relationships. She told me she was worried that she was out of control. I was surprised things had been going well.

Well after our talk we continued, she continued to call. We see each other once a week. She has told me her family and friends adore me. Recently she has started seeing someone else.

I allowed my feelings to grow as she became more interested. She had pursued me. I enjoy receiving her calls each night to say goodnight and speak about our days. But I am worried that I am allowing myself to ultimately be hurt.

I truly believe she has deeper feelings based on her actions, but I have to take her word for it. I do nothing but care for her, and she has told me she thinks I'm treating her like a kid. But if I don't call back she gets mad. 90% of her thinks she is in love, has never been treated so well, and it scares her that I may be true, but she isn't ready.

Almost as if I put pressure without even noticing it. We had a deep conversation the night before she went out with this guy and I thought she was about to tell me she does have deeper feelings and is scared but our phones died.

I have been racking my brain wondering what if anything I have done wrong, and trying to figure out why if she has no feelings does she call me so often.


Answer

You haven't done anything wrong. This girl sounds very frightened and conflicted about becoming involved.

She cares for you and is terrified that she does. She's like a deer caught in the headlights of your love. She's frozen stiff but can't run away and can't come towards you.

I would ask her to talk about what frightens her so much. I suspect she's afraid to love and to lose through rejection, abandonment or death. This fear, I have come to realize, is the deepest and most universal fear of all.

I also suspect that she is so afraid because she is no stranger to loss. Once burned, twice learned. She's been traumatized and one of the symptoms of trauma is that the person expects lightning to strike again.

In other words, if you've been struck by lightning, you're terrified to be struck again. If you've been abandoned, you're scared that this will happen again. Of course, the fear can actually make our worst nightmares happen again and again.

Let's see if we can help this poor girl begin to heal. What we want to do is get her talking about the problem.

Start by telling her that she seems scared to you. Ask her if she knows what she's afraid of. If she's clueless, suggest what I said above. Then tell her that if she can figure out where the fear began, that is who abandoned her when she was young, and then talk her pain out, she will begin to heal the wound and free herself to love.

Let me know how you do.

- Doctor Love

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