Intimacy issues and building relationships is the hardest obstacle I am facing right now. At first I felt betrayed by friends/girlfriends who seemed to walk out on me. I thought that everyone was afraid of me or despised me for having "issues." It hurt. I started boxing people out and keeping a safe enough distance from friends and even family. I was worried about their perception of me.

So I stayed relatively alone for a long time, except with some friends who I would hang out with, but not get close to. Once I started getting better and wanted to establish relationships again, I had the habit of keeping people at bay and I am unsure how to break through that at this point. One thing I am starting to believe is that it wasn't really other peoples' perception of me that was hard to deal with, it was my own perception of myself. I notice now that even when I meet a girl who I had no previous connection to, I still do something that pushes her away (It is not that I am saying something out of line, they are just sensing something and I can't figure out what it is). It is like people try to get close to me, but something I do pushes them back. I think it is an internal thing that I have to figure out.

It is interesting. Looking at several pictures of myself over the past few years, I notice that my arms are often crossed, in group photos there is generally more space between me and the others than anyone else, and I sometimes look like I am leaning back. It makes me think I am still on a major defensive and afraid of something. Weird.

In the past, I sometimes wondered if things are staged. Meaning, when a girl comes and talks with me (I have trouble with the approach too) sometimes I wonder if a friend set it up, that she is doing it out of sympathy. I have even thought that a girl was a psychology student trying to get some info on a "crazy' guy. Well, I don't believe this to be true, but this is how my mind works sometimes. Still part of that defense I guess - doing anything to keep people at bay even though it is the last thing I want. This is supposedly a symptom of bioplar too. Anyone else ever feel like this?

I think it comes down to reworking the way I think; retrain the brain.

I just saw my psychiatrist today and we are planning on addressing it in the next session. For now he recommended an author named "David Burns" who wrote a couple books on cognitive therapy. There is actually a chapter on love and relationships in the book "Feeling Good" (great title, I know...) and it looks promising. I'll try to post something from it if I find anything good.

I don't know if this helps, but it felt good to read/respond.