Hypersensitivity & Social Skills (or lack thereof)

Dear public online diary,

today I became very nervous about my interaction with an acquaintance of mine. I met him about a year ago and we got along easily. Over the course of that year we would stop and greet each other, exchange niceties, and part on good terms. Now, I feel insecure after sending him two emails. The first email was to greet him and ask him how he was. The second email was a reply to his reply, along with some follow up questions about something. He replied to this, but I started to think he was just being nice and that I was annoying him.

He gave no indication of being annoyed, but I feel like he must be wondering why I am contacting him. To be honest, I am lonely, bored, and attracted to him. I tend to seek out the company of males whenever I have free time. I respect him and I find him intelligent and attractive. I don't want to make him irritated with me. I also don't want to drop all communication with him. Still, I get paranoid, and whenever I get hypersensitive about social skills I back off until that person seeks me out.

I can never tell when someone is secretly wishing I would leave them alone. Sometimes, I bluntly tell them that I can never tell when I am being annoying and to just let me know when they want to stop chatting. I find that that only works half the time because the really kind people don't want you to know that you are annoying them. Ah, dilemma.

So, for now, I must be content to desire this man from afar. I hate rejection. I also hate being annoying. I also hate being lonely. Life, meh. 

Depressed and Needy

Dear public, online diary,

I am totally miserable. I am depressed, lethargic, behind in 2 of my elective classes, and I have become infatuated with two men out of my reach.

I am experiencing a nasty chemical imbalance that makes me feel sleepy 24/7. I sleep 10 hours or longer. I sleep through my classes. I make it to a few classes, come home, and fall asleep again. I have no drive to leave bed. Bed is warm, bed is comforting, bed is not the hostile outside world.

I am leaving my current out-patient treatment and going back to the County out-patient center; the same one that turned me away so many times despite my florid psychosis. I am very agitated about being moved back there. It makes me sad. It makes me fearful. It makes me utterly pissed off that I have to play nice with a system that sent me to the brink of suicide.

I  hate my depression. At least when I am manic I can get a doctor's note excusing me from class. Depressed, I cannot even get to the doctor because I sleep through all the appointments.

When I am depressed, unlike some people, I tend to seek out other people for sexual comfort. I use contraceptives and I get myself tested before and after each new romance, but I really wish I could not feel this urgent need to possess another person's body.

I go on sprees. Shopping sprees, food binge sprees, sex sprees...I think I am just seeking a little extra serotonin through self-gratification.

Now, here I am again, depressed and needy. I try to stay away from men but it's so hard. I tend to seek egoist males who try to dominate me.

For instance, I have developed feelings for a professor of mine. I've had him as a professor for 4 classes already. During his office hours he has this way of correcting me that is a little different than the way he corrects others. With the other students he smiles and says that their ideas are a possibility but....[here he gently tells them to consider another idea]. With me he just sternly says don't do that, no. I wanted to do a paper on topic 'y' and he told me to do it on topic 'x'. End of discussion, he said topic 'x' and his tone was final.

This is not just my imagination. As part of my therapy for my paranoid symptoms, I learned to look for evidence that a concern of mine is valid. So, I looked for evidence. I have listened to how he interacts with the other 15 students in my grad class and compared it to his manner of discourse with me. I have observed his politeness, his gentleness, his openness to the ideas of the other students. With me, he sternly tells me no, don't do that, don't believe that theory, don't listen to the author of the textbook; listen to me. As an undergraduate he singled me out during class to ask how I was doing on my in-class assignment. I smiled and nodded, shuffled my papers, but he saw through me and told me that the material only got more difficult and to come to office hours for help. I knew he was doing me a favor, but I felt like I was getting preferential treatment. I feel like he doubts my intelligence and that he feels the need to act like a father and tell me what to do. I actually like it. I like his controlling behavior. It makes me feel like he sees me as a distinct person, even if he thinks I am a lesser person than my peers. I crave his attention. I like being chastised for my outlandish and improbable ideas. I like that he has a PhD and that he is smarter than I am. It makes me feel like I should obey him, like I should play the role of an intellectual submissive.

Lately, he has been ignoring my emails and this forces me to seek him out in person after class. He then tells me to see him during office hours instead because he has someplace to be (perfectly understandable, but because of my attachment to him I would much rather he just reply to my emails with an email). Just last week I sent him an email about my paper (now about topic 'x' and not my chosen topic). He didn't respond. I let it go for 5 days. Then, I just decided to go in and see him during office hours. I was nervous and uncomfortable because I am so infatuated with him. I did not sit down in the chair in his office and instead started to ramble on about my paper while standing up. I really wanted to leave. "Sit," he said. "Sit, sit." I felt like a pet dog. I sat. We talked. He loaned me a book. I thanked him and left. I think I just nailed what has been bugging me about this student-teacher dynamic. I am his pet dog and that is what I want to be.

On Summer Romance

I have not been blogging as much as I would like because I have been sitting by the phone like a puppy-eyed virgin waiting for this new guy to text me.

I went into this new romance knowing it was going to be a very temporary situation. Next month I enter the graduate program and all my classes are scheduled for the evenings. Evenings are the only time he is free from work.

He is not particularly serious about me either. I can respect that he was honest to me about the fact that he does not want a commitment. We are both setting boundaries that state we have to be honest if we are dating somebody else, but there is no rule that says we cannot date somebody else; we just have to admit to it. I would honestly prefer a monogamous relationship that lasts one month and then we go our separate ways. He would prefer a casual dating scenario that lasts indefinitely.

I guess we will see what happens. I am the clingy type. Yes, I know it is not healthy. I never had a father so my model for male-female attachment is screwy. I am always afraid of being abandoned. I place too much emphasis on monogamous sex being the center piece of a serious relationship. I am a little obsessed with the sex. I feel empty and anxious if I have not had sex with my significant other in a day. I need constant re-affirmation of his desire for me. I do not particularly care if he likes me as a person, but it is vital that he physically yearns for my body, and only my body.

I have taken great care to work on the part of me that grew up in a dysfunctional extended family situation. Still, I have attachment anxiety from early loss in my childhood. I have never even had a relationship that lasted more than a year. Either I pick a guy who is a total jerk or else I wind up running away because I made a mountain out of a mole-hill.

Alas, I, as a human, am doomed to this vicious cycle of love and heart break. This guy does not want a relationship so I must not bond too deeply with him. I must keep him in the periphery of my life so that he does not hurt me too deeply. Maybe one day I will meet a man or woman who will see every part of my soul and body and will still want to be with me every day for a long time.

I have put out to the world that I am bisexual. I would honestly prefer to have a female because I am so attracted to their bodies and their attitudes about life and love. I have not yet been asked out by a woman. Sometimes I see a woman with another woman and I wonder how they ever opened up to each other about wanting a lesbian relationship.

This guy does not know I am bi. I have decided not to tell, ever since the last guy decided because I am attracted to women that I would consent to a threesome with him and some random woman. I do not like having my sexuality manipulated. It is there, but it is not something that can be folded like origami in somebody else's hands. Maybe one day, I will meet an open-minded lady who is open and extroverted.

I still want to know how women know other women are available. I am either totally unattractive to only one gender (women) or I miss all the signs. :(  For the record, I get told a lot that I am "pretty" and "cute" and have "big boobs" by people who see my profile picture on myspace, so it is likely not a physical deformity but rather an attitude issue I have or something, I dunno. Okay, I am done psycho-analyzing myself. Feel free to psycho-analyze me in the comments! Just please be tactful! :)