Originally Posted by Lilly2
But, and a big BUT here, once I get to know a person, I don't mind helping and supporting or hearing about struggles the person is facing. I don't want to come off standoff-ish either. It's just when I barely meet someone (like engaged in only one post with a new member), and that someone shares their deepest secrets with me, I don't know yet how to handle that. Maybe I lack empathy in that regard because I'm too worried about my own safety, or because I'm worried about the safety of others when I'm limited to what I, myself, can offer. That said, it doesn't mean I don't care. I genuinely do care. I just want to figure out a healthy way to engage with others, like taking relationships slowly, which feels safer for me.
When someone gets upset because I haven't met their expectations, I feel bad. I question what I said was wrong. I want to repair the situation, but I also want to distance myself from a potentially unhealthy relationship, too.
There's a balance to these things, and each person has their own level of safety boundaries. For me and my system, we have a lot of safety boundaries, but it doesn't mean I don't want to be friends. It does mean that our friendship might have some frictions because of our different boundaries.
And herein lies the problem: My relationships with my own alters have frictions when it comes to levels of safety and their boundaries. There are some things that some of my alters have not processed in therapy yet, and that means there are some things that I, as a person/host, have not processed in therapy yet. I don't mind discussing those things when I feel safe to do so, but I also need a safe place to go to when I need to debrief, pace, and contain those overwhelming intrusions, flashbacks, nightmares, thoughts, and emotions.
I don't know how to explain this at all without coming off as standoffish. I don't want to lose any of the friends I've made on PC for explaining this. All of the friends I've engaged with are great, and I enjoy all of their PMs to me.
The only thing I ask for those whom I've just met, who are brand new to PC, or who I've engaged with only once or twice online, is that I need time to get to know you, and I really need to have my boundaries understood in a way that they don't take personally. I'm not mad or blaming anyone; everyone has their own levels of engagement and issues to deal with. I'm just afraid of men, in general, and of outing who I am IRL. I'd prefer to be addressed by a pseudonym, except for the few people whom I've engaged with IRL via email (I'm okay with you guys, so no worries, and if I feel triggered by something, I will let you know). I'm also okay with the many people I've PM'd over the past few days and/or weeks. No worries there. It's just a couple of new PMs that I had to state my boundaries to them, and I feel bad, but it's because they announced that they were male and had shared some things that I wasn't ready for, and didn't know that I wasn't ready for until they had shared it. I don't know them, and I want to be a support for them, but I feel safer doing so on the forums with men.
But, once I get to know a safe person, no matter their gender, or once I get to know a safe person whose gender I'm not privy to until later on, then I'm okay, since we've already had established a rapport without the gender announcement in the past, and so I'm totally okay with that.
Oh gosh, I hope I'm making some sense.
I'm sorry. I have to be apologetic here because I don't know how else to explain all this.
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