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Hey all, it's been a while since I posted. My life has been...uummm...interesting since my last post.

I've been working really hard on my issues, but have gotten stuck. It's probably not surprising that everything seems to come down to abandonment which is really just a lack of self-love and self-esteem. I know that it will take time to build those.

What I'm trying to figure out is how to deal with the loneliness, pain, and anxiety that I feel in the meantime. I've been sitting with the emotions for several days now. They seem to be getting worse rather than better.

I know that in "normal" situations, the suggests are things like "go out and meet new people," "go for a walk," or "keep yourself busy." Meeting new people when I feel like this is hard, well harder than normal. Because I feel abandoned (even though I created my situation in my last relationship), I feel lower than normal. It's hard to see any good in myself. If I try to focus on the other person rather than myself, all that goes through my head are things like "I'm annoying them." "They don't actually want to talk to me." etc.

I've been making some huge changes in my life, perhaps too many at once. I've cut out my most toxic relationship, which was part of the demise of my romantic one. I have stopped self-medicating. I have started working on my issues. My former romantic partner said that she might be interested in reconciling, but needs time to decide. Of course, I take this as abandonment.

Well, that was quite a ramble. My emotions are all over the place right now. If anyone has any suggestions for quick, temporary relief when I get like this, I would truly appreciate them.

OK, I'm tired of not knowing what is real and what is simply a figment of my imagination that has been perverted by decades of abuse and distrust.

I feel sorry for those who have been involved with me who have been subjected to my accusations that stem from my belief that everyone is going to hurt me because I'm not good enough.

I've found myself contemplating repeating past mistakes just so that I don't have to feel the pain of not having the attention that I crave ignored. All the while knowing that the end result will be that I'll still feel alone and ignored, but in a far worse situation than I am.

This is all so crazy.

I keep myself in relationships that are less than satisfying just so that I can have the crumbs of attention. Geez, I was ready to propose to a woman who claims that she loves me when it suits her needs just so that I don't have to face the reality of the situation. Just so that I don't have to deal with the thoughts that plague my mind.

I've done that once actually. I married a woman that I didn't love just because she claimed to love me. That marriage was 5 years of horror. She ended up leaving me for some guy that she met online.

I'm so tired of being suspicious of others. I'm tired of worrying. And, I'm tired of feeling guilty about all of it when I learn that my suspicions, accusations, and worrying were unfounded.

All of this is new to me. I'm just beginning to learn mechanics of it all, and I haven't even begun to delve into the emotions behind it; but I'm tired of feeling these things.

I'm trying to figure out what to do about distrust and jealousy in romantic relationships. My fears have left me not trusting anyone. This trust extends to my romantic partners and anytime that I experience an EF and I don't know with any level of certainty what my SO is doing, I assume that she's out with another guy.

I know that it isn't fair to my SO. I know that usually it's all in my head. It destroyed my marriage.

I am overcome with fear when it happens. I get nauseated. I become obsessed with the idea. Normally, I just stuff the entire notion deep inside and ignore it until it goes away. Sometimes I'm not as strong and I lash out. It's hurtful to me, to her, and to the relationship.

I can't expect my SO to account for, and be able to prove, every moment that we are apart. I don't know how to stifle the inner and outer critics though. When it happens, it is so troublesome that I want to end the relationship just so that I don't have to feel that way anymore. A preemptive strike to protect myself kinda thing.

How do others deal with this?

The background that I posted on the sister site (Out of the Storm):

I suspect that my story is not too different from many others here. My mother is/was a very self-centered, alcoholic whose idea of child rearing was to keep me shut, alone, in a bedroom all day before I was old enough to go to school. Once I reached that age, she decided that her job was done as far as "nurturing" me goes. I was still expected to do whatever she thought was best, in fact at 45 that still holds true. I still get to hear how disappointing I am because I did not choose the profession that she thought that I should, and if I disagree with her I had better be prepared for a fight. I just don't talk to her anymore unless I have to do so.

My father, although married to my mother, was mostly absent in my life because of his job. When he was at home, he had a quick temper that would cause things to get physical very quickly. At a very young age, I learned that it was far easier to just accept responsibility for whatever he was mad about, regardless of whether I did it, the dog did it, or my older siblings did it, because the physical pain was far easier to endure than the terror of waiting.

One of my older brothers and my older sister apparently thought it was fun to use me for sexual experimentation. In the second grade my brother would have me "perform" sexual acts on a second grade girl while he watched. At the age of 10, my sister would use me to satisfy her urges. And at 14 the same older brother and his friends would have me do sexual things with the neighborhood girls for whatever reason.

I had/have physical limitations that caused me to become the butt of the jokes of many of my peers. I was also a skinny, malnutritioned child, so that was just more ammunition. My father even asked me one day why I couldn't just be normal like the other kids.
I sought to escape all of this as quickly as possible. I started acting out in school and went from an honor student to failing all of my classes over a six-week period in 6th grade. I started destroying property and engaged in arson between 6th and 7th grades. By high school, I was drinking, stealing cars, fighting, and getting into all sorts of trouble. I was arrested a few times with only one misdemeanor conviction. I finally quit school my senior year. I got married for the first time a few months later.

That marriage resulted in my becoming a father and my life changed. I was bound and determined to be different from my father. I realized that by working hard I was able to achieve some of the respect and attention that I craved.

My marriage failed. My ex remarried and took our daughter to Germany to live. I had a string of unsatisfying relationships. Then I met my second wife. She seemed so different from everything I had experienced before. Well, that's because she was. Once we were married, she would stay on computer all night and sleep all do. She refused to work, and refused to take care of the house. Eventually, the arguments escalated into fights and two of those resulted in her being physically violent. It was with her that I discovered just how much my childhood had affected me. When she would yell, throw things, and hit me, I felt just as I did around my father. I quickly found myself sleeping at the other end of the house so as to not incur her wrath.

When she finally left me for some guy that she met online who didn't cause her as much stress and anger as I did, I met the person that I would spend the next seven years of my life with. She was great for the most part. She didn't yell, scream, break things, nothing was flung through the air, or any of the histrionics that I had with my second wife. She would just quietly tell me what to do and make all of my decisions for me when she had the time for me. She promised me that if I helped her get through college that she would do the same for me. So, I worked and she and her adult son lived with me. After a while I grew tired of doing all of the work and while she and her son just did whatever. I told her that her son had to go. He did, and so did she. A few months later, she called me and asked me to come and see her. She wanted to reconcile and tell me how angry she was that I allowed her to move out of my house and into the country when she didn't have a car and couldn't even get to the grocery store without her mother's help.

We finally got back together. We moved into "our house" together so that I couldn't kick her son out again. She eventually did though. Again, I grew tired of doing all of the work while she did nothing and told her that I was done. Since she couldn't afford to keep the house without me, her mother bought her a house. The gf convinced me to move in with her and help her pay the bills. This arrangement lasted for about a year. She had decided to go back to school to get her master's degree. I, once again, grew tired of being broke and going to work every day while she did nothing to earn any money or take care of the house. We eventually split up for good.

Then I met my latest gf. After our first date, she spent every day after work at my house. She would stay there until 1 or 2 in the morning without any thought to whether or not I wanted to do something like sleep. This went on for three months before I got really mad and told her that I was done. This resulted in her showing up at my house in the middle of the night, uninvited, and yelling at me until I caved. And, so progressed our relationship. One of the times that I told her that I wanted out of the relationship, she threated to call the police and tell them that I assaulted her if I didn't agree to listen to reason and try to work things out with her. I eventually caved again, but this time I told her that there were boundaries that she needed to not cross. She complied for a while. Then the ranting and raving that would last for hours or days began again. Her telling me how horrible I was and how badly I treated her all came back. So, last week, I ended things again with her. She showed up at my office the other day and threatened to follow me to my house to talk to me if I refused to talk to her there. I complied, just like I always have, and listened to her for the next four hours.

I don't tell any of that for sympathy, as I said I'm sure that my story isn't that different from many here, but rather to give background.