Suicidal

I can relate to what has been said here. My mother used to say over and over again: "James you will embarris me." What other people thought was so much more important than my feelings.

I still at times am affected by what my parents and teachers told me--even after many years. However, I just move on with life.

It takes a long time to regain trust in people. I found a lot of trust in 12-step meetings. They always say, "Whatever is said here, stays here." The people in AA gave me unconditional love. It is important to verbalize our feelings. This forum is one place. What you say can stay totally unknown to everyone else but you.

Good Luck,
Jim S

Hi Angel

It's good to know your counsellor let you write things down. I've never seen anyone who would let me do that. In fact every professional I've seen has strictly banned any kind of written communication and then wondered why they weren't getting anything from me. They seemed to think that if they made talking the only form of communication they'd allow, that I'd suddenly be able to talk to them. I can't stand the thought of more sessions sat in silence and panicking because I can't talk or answer their questions.

I have to say that when I first started searching the internet for help with my depression I looked up email counselling. There are some sites that offer this but unfortunately it comes down to cost again, plus the fact that they all seem to be men. It's a shame because it would be ideal for me to get some counselling this way.

I've still not had any replies on the gay forum. I don't know, it's kind of put me off the whole thing. I get the impression I'm not adult enough for them. All the websites I've seen seem to be the same. I feel uncomfortable with a lot of the content on them. There seem to be a lot of questions/comments about sex issues on there. I don't feel I'm in that league at all. I feel more like a naive teenager when it comes to starting out on making contact with other gay women. It's a bit pathetic at my age. Maybe I'm just destined to remain alone and fantasize about my tutor.

Maybe I could give the happiness goals a go. I'm not really sure what makes me feel happy at the moment. I seem to have lost enjoyment of most things. While the weather is nice, going to the beach could certainly be one thing. The only others things I seem to enjoy at the moment are listening to Barry Manilow records and watching my tapes of Cagney and Lacey.

Guest, please read about covert incest. It sounds like your father has an excessive entanglement with you.

http://covertincest.org/why.html

http://tinyurl.com/637pv

http://alwaysyourchoice.com/ayc/emotion ... covert.php

Hi Taran,

Can you help? ....I'm just not understanding what this means. Please know I'm not disagreeing w/ you! I just don't understand "covert incest". I did go to the site you mentioned, but I still didn't understand. And I would like to. Because I find it interesting.

See; I'm getting from Guest that her father is domineering and controlling and distant. And that he and her mother expect her to hide her feelings as far as feeling anything that is not "socially normal". If she feels anything close to depressed then they feel she is just looking for attention and they shun her and they won't accept that she could truly be hurting. They treat her coldly and if someone calls her pain to their attention they laugh it off, create stories of how she is just looking for attention and so forth.

And ok, I admit I don't understand what you mean by the "excessive entanglement" you say her father might have w/ Guest; I'm just curious as to why you suggest that maybe the covert incest is a possiblity. Did I not understand "covert incest" correctly? Did I miss some things in Guest's posts that would help me understand better why this was what you were thinking of?!!


Thank you Taran!

-Angel

Angel, covert incest is the same as emotional incest. It does not involve physical sexual abuse, but is an excessive emotional entanglement. It's when fathers treat daughters as their partners, or when mothers treat sons as their partners. If Guest's father thought of her and treated her as his partner, meaning his wife, then that would be covert incest.

I'm still a bit confused about this concept Taran. I haven't ever felt I've had a close relationship with my dad and certainly was never thought of as 'daddy''s little princess' like the links you posted suggest.

I agree that maybe I have a couple of the symptoms suggested in the third link:

'Guilt about having legitimate needs or continually putting them behind those of the opposite-sex parent;
Feelings that one is never enough or truly lovable -- expectations to succeed in life that are unrealistic and have been set by the opposite-sex parent;
Inability to directly express anger towards the opposite-sex parent whose demands seem overwhelming;
Difficulty in maintaining relationships, often seeking a "perfect" person for a partner, or an idealized partner that can never live up to one's expectations;
A direct link to sexual shutdown. '

but is this enough to suggest that this is what is going on here? I have never heard of this before.

I'm still feeling very distressed and suicidal. I now have, what feels to me like another major problem. You'll probably think I'm overreacting but I can't help it. I stayed with my friend last night and I wasn't tired when she went to bed so she said I could use her computer. I went onto another forum I've been posting on but I couldn't log in under my name because I've just discovered my friend has registered on the forum and had set the computer to log her straight on. I had no idea she had been reading what I've been writing and I'm really not sure how to handle this.

I discovered she is registered as someone who posted some replies on my thread a couple of weeks ago. This person was talking about a friend who suffers from depression and was asking me if I'd felt the forum had helped. I posted a couple of replies and she told me she had persuaded her friend to look at the forum. Now I know none of it is true. I didn't know she was looking at the site or reading my posts. I had told her about the site but didn't expect her to visit it. Anyway, now I feel really bad and can't understand why she posted the messages. I really thought maybe I had helped someone else in some small way but none of it was true. It feels like the whole thing was a mockery.

While I was trying to log in I also discovered personal messages she had written about me and about our friendship. She said she'd asked me about thoughts of suicide and I'd denied them but from reading what I'd written she'd discovered it wasn't true. I feel devastated by the whole thing. I know I haven't always been honest with her about how bad I've been feeling but that's only because I didn't want her to worry about me. She sounded betrayed by me and I feel I've really hurt her and I don't know how to deal with this situation.

She also repeated things I'd said to her and I feel a bit betrayed by that. I'm sure she was motivated by concern for me but if I'd wanted to talk about those things myself I would have done. She told the woman I've been talking to how I feel really down if she doesn't reply to me and that I have been worried I was becoming too attached to her. Now I feel really embarrassed and scared that this woman will not want to have contact with me anymore. I did talk to my friend about feeling this way but I did not know she would tell this woman about my feelings. It is all such a mess.

I feel unable to cope with the despair I'm feeling right now. I made another excuse to pop home because I'm feeling really suicidal at the moment. I'm such a crap person to know, I don't think I can even call myself her friend. I didn't realise how she was feeling all this time and she hasn't mentioned any of it to me. I've come home and started battering myself because I need to block these feelings out. I really don't know what to do.

I know it must be difficult for her coping with me and that's why I try to put on a bit of an act when I'm with her and I don't tell her the details of everything that is happening. I realise now, she feels she has to try to cheer me up but when she read some of the things I've said she thinks she failed and I feel so bad about that. I can't find the words to say how much. It's not that I don't like spending time with her or appreciate what she tries to do. It's just that the slightest thing makes me feel really low and I find it difficult to enjoy any of the things I used to like doing. It's not anything she does or doesn't do.

I felt the forum was a really safe place to talk about things that were on my mind. Things that I can't talk to ANYONE I know about. But now I'm not sure I can feel like that anymore and I don't know how to cope with feeling like this. I feel like I can't go back to that site because I might say something to hurt her again. I really hope she doesn't find this forum in case I've said the wrong thing. All I do is hurt everyone around me and make everyone else's life a misery. I just can't cope with all of this.

You'll probably think I'm overreacting when I say I feel a bit betrayed and feel uncomfortable knowing she couldn't tell me about this. I'm not a very nice person or a very good friend if she can't trust me. I feel like I've let her down and I hate the fact that I've let this situation drive me so low again. I don't know what to do.

I really wanted to talk to her about it but she had asked the woman I was talking to not to tell me that she had been in touch and even though the woman suggested she talk to me about the way she was feeling, she hasn't mentioned anything. In some ways I think it would be better to just try and forget about it but I don't know if I can now. And if this woman stops replying to me I don't think I'll cope.

I feel doubly bad after also giving in to the temptation to write to my tutor. I don't know how she's going to feel now. I expect she was just beginning to think that she'd got her life back without me pestering her. I hate myself for doing it.

Everything is such a mess.

Oh Guest,

my heart goes out to you. I'm very confused by your friend's actions though and so I'm not sure how to respond. How did she know about the forum you were on? Had you told her that you posted there? If so I really question her motives in why she did what she did. I'm not understanding why she simply did not talk directly to you about her feelings. And I really question her talking to this woman you have mentioned, behind your back. I feel that is very unfair to you. I'm not quite sure from your post what your feelings for this woman are. Are you to mean that you have feelings for this woman as just a friend and she is mistaking that or do you think you might feel something more for her? I am confused by your post as to where this woman comes into play in the situation. I'm sorry...I had a bit of a hard time following the flow of things in your post. Not your fault though, just having a hard time of things tonight is all! My thoughts are sort of racing here on me as they often do. But bear w/ me. I do want to try and understand this w/ you. I too get the feeling that she betrayed you. I'm just not understanding why. Or I don't know. Maybe she felt she couldn't talk directly too you for some reason and felt that she could talk too you through the forums?? Sort of some dramatic flare kind of thing where she'd create this scenario of getting her point across to you through the forum situation??? But again...why did she drag the woman you spoke of into things and talk about things w/ her that should have been left up to you to discuss w/ her? If she had concerns about you, she needed to talk to you and you alone on that. And not go talking to this woman about you behind your back. That bothers me about her...but again...not fully understanding that situation so maybe I'm reading it wrong too and not being a fair judge here.

I would say as long as you have not told her or anyone else that you post on this forum you can feel safe that she not find out you post here. And if you worry too much about it just be guarded in what you say that you feel is too personal for someone you know in your personal life to recognize. There are many stories people share here that can happen to anyone when you speak in general terms!! And if you want to talk w/ someone here on the board that you feel you have connected w/...be it one person or more then one...you can always register and send any of us a private message.

About all I can advise is to flat out confront your friend on why she did what she did and tell her flat out how you feel about it. Ask her about her reasons behind everything. Not sure how you feel about it doing that but it's about the only way to get any answers or resolution to the situation. That or simply making a decision about her friendship and letting it go. But you'll still always have questions for yourself about her reasons and motives and you may have doubts too.

One thing though. Don't let her speak for you w/ where this woman is concerned. Set things straight w/ her. Tell her that hey...I know so and so said some things to you and I want to set the record straight on that. You know...something like I'm not sure why she's been telling you the things she has but it's really not like that and I don't want you to be scared off. Can we talk about this? And then explain. Or again...maybe I'm not understanding the situation and I have it wrong. But again...whatever it is...it should be coming from you and not your friend so that the woman in the situation understands what is going on a little better and is not put off.

So ok. I'm going to stop here til we talk because I'm probably way off base on a lot of this and I don't want to be trying to advise on things I'm not clear on!! I want to try and help though!!


Please take care.
-Angel

I'd go to my friend and tell her everything, and beg for her forgiveness.

Hi Angel

Sorry if my post was a bit confusing. I just had all these thoughts going round in my head and was just writing them as they came to me.

I had told my friend about that particular forum and I had even shown her some of the more useful replies I had received. I guess she memorised the website from the print out.

I don't think she was trying to communicate with me through the forum. I only found out she was registered because I was using her computer. I was trying to get in to check my personal messages and when the computer logged into the site I saw the personal messages she had written to the woman I have been talking with. She had not posted them on the public board so I had no idea until now that she had been on the site.

As to my feelings for this woman I'm not surprised you did not understand what my feelings for her are because I am confused about how I'm feeling. When I joined that forum she did not reply to any of my posts for a while but I had noticed the nice replies she left for other people. Then one day she did leave a reply to something I had written and I have been writing to her on the board since. My emotions are so all over the place at the moment that I'm not sure I trust myself in how I feel. I know I get really disappointed and feel really upset if she doesn't reply to something I've written and I feel I have to keep writing until she responds. Maybe I am forming an attachment to her, I don't know. I think my feelings are all confused and mixed up with my feelings about my former tutor.

I do know I am now worried that she might back off and want to keep her distance from me. In a way I want to discuss it with her but I'm worried if I do she will tell me she feels it is better if she doesn't write to me anymore. Maybe it is a case of sticking my head in the sand but I don't feel I can cope with losing contact with anyone else that I care about at the moment.

My friend does not know about this forum so I don't think she'll come here. She thinks I only use the other one so hopefully it will be safe.

Then again maybe I'm just overreacting about this whole thing. I don't know anymore.