There is such a thing. And I have it. Wiki defines it as avoidance of intimacy because of emotional brittleness. Okay. I'm risk averse. I know where that comes from. I had an alcoholic mom and an alcoholic grandmom whose major intramural sport was getting drunk, fighting with each other and waking me up in the middle of the night to answer the question "which one of us do you love more?"
I was 6 years old.
So I shut down and swore that no one would ever hurt me again. Not like that. I knew that I could be physically hurt -- there was nothing I could do about that (and I lived in fear of that, too) -- but I'd be damned if anyone was ever going to get close enough to me to emotionally scar me like that again.
And no one ever did. Not even when people moved away. Not even when they died.
The last time I actually cried over the death of someone I was 19. It was the same grandmother I mentioned above.
I drank because I was a drunk. Deep down, though, I also drank because it made it easy to have sex with people -- and why was that, you ask? Because when you're drunk you are not intimate. Not really. Physical, yes. Intimate, no.
Get it? I do. Now.
In a couple of weeks I'll have been sober for 12 years. And only now is this becoming clear to me.
Next up? How do I fix it?
Stay posted. More will probably be revealed and, as usual, it won't be good.
Growing up is hard work.
2 comments:
{{ hugs }}
Thanks, Sis.
I opened up about this this morning at my home group here in Manhattan. I was surprised by the number of people who came up to me, after the meeting, to confide their similar situations.
Apparently (and as usual) I'm not the only one...
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