My long drawn-out crushes

[philsau]

I could really use the perspective of a friend right now. I keep butting into these stupid patterns of behaviour when it comes to women: the long drawn-out crush that dominates the imagination and goes nowhere in reality. Its such a cliche but I seem particularly prone to it. It's happened to me about 5 times in my life so far and at the age of 24 it's really causing me heartache and getting in the way of finding a fulfilling relationship. Here are the vital statistics:

 

Kate: I grew up around her for five years in one of my earliest foster families. Wanted to marry her when I was 13.

 

Christiana: An American girl from Boston who I penpalled with for two years from 16-17. She came over to Ireland and it transpired that she already had a boyfriend.

 

Kyrie: This was when I lived in Scotland for the first year at age 19, also American (from Hawaii). She was a Mormon missionary.

 

Maeve: without doubt the worst. This literally lasted for 3 years. She was a psychology student in Cork when I was studying there. She moved to Edinburgh and my self knowledge was so confused at the time I somehow found a reason to move to Edinburgh to be around her.

 

Chloe: A weird non-starter which I was sure would go all the way. Met her when I was volunteering at a soup kitchen in college and we've been messaging sort of half flirtatiously and half platonically for the past year. She recently blocked me. (this morning in fact).

 

I've had ENOUGH. I need to sort this out before I fall apart.

 

I keep falling for these women and instead of initiating some form of relationship directly I get drawn into that familiar pattern of love sickness and faux friendship. My fear is that I don't want to mess it up, yet by being controlled by fear I invariably do.

 

My best explanation that comes from both therapy and journalling is that I had no stable bonds with my parents growing up. My mother was a schizophrenic who was basically unstable and useless and my dad was away at sea most of the time, but extremely cruel and violent to me and my siblings growing up. I was taken into the foster care system when I was 4 and have had 5 different placements growing up, 2 of which were in the state residential system. I was actually spanked and given cold showers by my first foster mother (frying pan into the fire) and my second foster family at age 10 -15 were loving and stable but I was at that age so messed up I fought them tooth and nail.

 

From an early age I had to develop an emotional hide to protect myself, and this has left me as a man quite independent and strong in many areas but also disconnected from my heart and from others and uncomfortable with being intimate and open, preferring to intellectualize and fantasize instead of reaching for the core of what I want. I keep thinking what if any women out there found out about my past, why would she want me? She would want someone stable and undamaged (and indeed these long drawn out crushes tend to be of women who are of the stable, warm, intelligent variety).

 

And those fears constrict me with women and many other areas of my life. I'm a novelist, which is code for "since I can't enjoy life in reality, I'm going to invent fictional characters and situations and play them out for other people's stimulation and enjoyment, while continuing to wallow in my own pain and grandiosity."

 

I realize these habits with women are destructive but I also recognise that the issue is deep and goes back to how unstable and untrustworthy those early attachments were. Has anyone here had experience of healing from that and finding a fulfilling relationship with a quality woman?

[ribuck]

What an interesting topic!

 

My own experience is similar to yours in some ways but not others. In my teens and early twenties I developed long-term crushes, which sometimes lasted for years. I could not let go of the idea that I wanted to get together with that person (even though I usually got friendzoned before long).

 

These were women who attained my highest ideals, and I think I clung onto the crushes because I had high self-esteem and would not settle for less than these unattainable people. But the "perfect" is the enemy of the "good", so I spent these years without a girlfriend.

 

Eventually I reached 30 and realised that I needed to lower my standards. Ironically, it didn't take long after that before I met (and eventually married) the girl of my dreams.

 

Sorry, but I don't have any worthwhile comments to offer other than describing my own experience. The only observation I made to myself afterwards was that I think the crushes would have faded quickly if I'd understood the real nature of friendzoning.

[RyanT]

These were women who attained my highest ideals, and I think I clung onto the crushes because I had high self-esteem and would not settle for less than these unattainable people. But the "perfect" is the enemy of the "good", so I spent these years without a girlfriend.

 

 

Just curious mate, are we talking looks or personality here? 

 

Only I also formed a series of overpowering and drawn out crushes in my mid to late teens

all the girls involved were pretty enough, but not the 'top 10 girls in the class list' material.

Indeed most were seen as 'plain', but for me there was just 'something about them'.

 

Which I later came to realize was they were all very disturbed,

.......just like me at the time.

 

Seriously back then you could bet your life savings any girl I was strongly drawn to, 

would turn out to have a series of self harm scars and an horrendous life story,

and we're talking everything from wholesome looking, straight A 'good girls'

to plugs in her ears, bright red hair, DM boots and smoking weed daily.

 

[Edit: Had a think about this, here's what I've got.]

 

but that only became obvious when I actually started dating some of these 'special girls'

(in 2 cases the very same girls I'd actually had crushes on in my teens)

 

........and that's when the real trouble started.

 

Now we all know statism has hidden cost for every visible benefit,

well with people it's often said to be visible costs, hidden benefits.

 

So with my crushes It could be said I was purposely avoiding 'taking it further'

(like I said twice I later 'got the girl' so can't be they were 'out of my league'?)

 

How was I benefiting there? 

 

Well like the moth circling the light bulb when I actually 'touched it' I got burned pretty bad,

mind-games, manipulation....getting drawn into feuds with other unstable young men.

While ever I kept them safely in fantasy land I was sheltering myself from all that.

 

More importantly though,

 

Subconsciously the 'Malcolm Gladwell Blink effect' already told me they were messed up,

yet until I'd actually got close to them I had 'plausible denial', you can ignore gut feelings,

but when it's right there smacking you in the face?

 

So I was able to continually avoid asking myself the question;

'why am I a huge powerful magnet for dysfunctional girls?'  

 

.....That's the sort of rabbit hole who's 'entrance fees' make celibacy and solitude seem a fair price.  

 

(Obviously just my personal experience and armature ramblings but I hope it helps.)

[Wuzzums]

Contrary to the first post, I'm gonna propose the theory that you're still having crushes because of your low self-esteem. You're not sure of who you are, or what your worth is, so you're living in a narrative where your past doesn't exist or at the very least trying to hide it. You said it yourself you're a novelist, so could it be that you're picturing a future of an idealized version of yourself together with an idealized version of some female, but neither of those having any past?

 

You said you're afraid of your past because it might be a turnoff for women. I think this is a bit superficial, why do you want to attract women that do not like something that is you? Why would a woman that refuses to date you because of the color of your eyes be desirable in the first place? It's no different with your past. You do not want to be with someone that holds you at fault for something you had no say in, nor can't possibly change.

 

I am very sorry that you had to go through the childhood you had. Self-esteem development is linked with a strong bond between child and parent. Changing homes so frequently can have a toll on how you perceive yourself. You have to let yourself seen and have others around you see you in order to develop a strong sense of self. Each time your caregiver changed it meant you had to start opening up to a stranger all over again, and because some parents have no idea what they're doing they probably had their own ideas on who you were or supposed to be. You mentioned receiving harsh punishment from one of the foster mothers, this implies you weren't acting the way she wanted you to act. Strike one against the self. This is why I think you're now feeling ashamed, perhaps, to talk about your past with women. Like it's something you're responsible for, maybe.

 

Now I'll go back to my first point. If you can't connect to your own past then you're probably not connecting those women with their past. You're attracted to them because they're sort of blank slates, you're just adding your desired traits on top: stable, warm, intelligent. Who wouldn't be attracted to a Mary Sue we conjured up in real life?

 

I'm also 24 and the last crush I had was in highschool. I remember having these crazy thoughts. Like if she rejected me in some way, no matter how trifle, then I was fully at fault. I was paranoid I messed up the whole interaction somehow and maybe if I said something different, or used a different tone of voice, then I could have gotten what I wanted. It wasn't about what her preferences were in the moment, or that she was busy, or maybe just sleeping. No, I was always 100% responsible. What I was doing was playing in my head both parts of the interaction, and when it didn't measure up to reality I had no idea what to do. When I stopped creating stories for her and just looked at her own story unfold was when she became an actual person in my mind. It was also when my crush for her just faded away. Never had a crush since.

[philsau]

Thank you guys for the feedback, much appreciated.

 

What is interesting is that I am able to have one night stands to satisfy my base sexual needs (again, the transient nature of those relationships translates into what my childhood experience was). But to me that feels repugnant yet stable long term relationships seem so unattainable at the present moment without further growth and healing.

 

Wuzzums I can relate to your comment about seeing women as a blank slate and playing out both sides of the interaction. My mistake in the crush mindset was not being honest, direct and respecting these women as human beings with a past and with issues of their own. Also the resolve to draw a line under it and move on if the relationship clearly isn't going anywhere.

[J-William]

My best explanation that comes from both therapy and journalling is that I had no stable bonds with my parents growing up. My mother was a schizophrenic who was basically unstable and useless and my dad was away at sea most of the time, but extremely cruel and violent to me and my siblings growing up. I was taken into the foster care system when I was 4 and have had 5 different placements growing up, 2 of which were in the state residential system. I was actually spanked and given cold showers by my first foster mother (frying pan into the fire) and my second foster family at age 10 -15 were loving and stable but I was at that age so messed up I fought them tooth and nail.From an early age I had to develop an emotional hide to protect myself, and this has left me as a man quite independent and strong in many areas but also disconnected from my heart and from others and uncomfortable with being intimate and open, preferring to intellectualize and fantasize instead of reaching for the core of what I want. I keep thinking what if any women out there found out about my past, why would she want me? She would want someone stable and undamaged (and indeed these long drawn out crushes tend to be of women who are of the stable, warm, intelligent variety). 

Holy shit man! I am sorry for your awful childhood, it's amazing you got out of that and are still able to function. That's quite an accomplishment!

 

I don't think you want to be having one night stands, it's not healthy or smart to reinforce habits of emotional distance and non-attachment with women who might accidentally get pregnant. You do not want to be stuck in an 18 year relationship with a girl you can't stand for more than one night.

 

I never found that pining over girls was a good thing to do, and looking back now I can see that the girls I was pining for were not as great as I made them out to be in my mind (for instance, one was an alcoholic who has now turned her vast intelligence towards cataloging 17th century English literature or some such academic bullshit)

[ribuck]

Just curious mate, are we talking looks or personality here?

 

I only got crushes on girls who I thought had great looks and great personality. It turned out that I was wrong about a couple of them, who were batshit crazy, but at the time I didn't see that.

 

Looking back, there were girls with wonderful personalities but below-average looks who would have willingly dated me, but I was not attracted to them at the time. My loss, for sure.

[PatrickC]

Looking back, there were girls with wonderful personalities but below-average looks who would have willingly dated me, but I was not attracted to them at the time. My loss, for sure.

 

Oh that resonates with me. It almost reminds me of Hamlet and Ophelia in part. Looking back there were certainly high quality women I completely overlooked for entirely shallow and utterly vain reasons often. Like you, definitely my loss sadly.

 

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To the OP Philip, I had a similar intensely religious upbringing. Which in my case incurred a rather incompetent father that just never gave me any useful advice about the ladies. I can only assume and can confidently say that he was repressed in this area. Young men (and women) need a lot of truthful guidance when it comes to navigating the opposite sex. Otherwise it can become deeply confusing for them. And in my case a sort of Lord of the Flies situation as I looked to my peers for advice.

 

I'd say look to therapy, but also mentoring from older men (Stefan being one) that know better. Most young men have simply been left to paddle aimlessly in the dark in this regard. You have my sympathies.