Reader’s Question

I have been seeing someone for five months that I care for a great deal. We were very drawn to each other from the very beginning. Now he is preferring to only have a friendship because of emotional issues that he is dealing with. He has come out of a relationship six months prior to our first meeting each other face to face (we were communicating through e-mails for roughly a month). This lady broke the relationship off because she found out that she had cancer and did not want him to go through the trauma of her treatment and the treatment possibly not being successful. She has since been told that she is currently all clear. He has said that he would never go back to her because he would be in constant fear of going through the same pain again, and after him dealing with that pain he cannot reopen himself to a relationship with her. He does realise however that he still has emotional issues as a result of the hurt he endured (which is perfectly understandable).

He does care for me and it would seem that whenever he starts to feel deep emotion towards me then he pushes it away. He talks of being completely confused and does not know how to deal with it. I can see (and feel) that he is going through intense emotions and I think he is so terrified of re-living that pain that he is trying to find any excuse not to accept his emotions towards me. He has gone as far as to “invent” issues on my side, or possibly noticing even small issues and exaggerating them to such proportions that he feels comfortable to push me away, though he refuses to understand the true dimensions and actual facts of the issues (but then he says he understands them and is sorry for the way he feels, but still does not want to lose me as a friend). He is grappling with his emotions and in the process pushes me away — but not so far that I am not available to him. He seems to want to hold me at arms length, obviously because he cannot bear to have me too close but also could not bear to lose me neither.

We have had many deep emotional discussions and we have a deep emotional connection between us, we trust each other to open up and talk of our feelings and our past hurts and issues, and to show our vulnerability.

My worry is that even though I know and understand the deep emotional issues he is dealing with, and I am willing to give him the time to sort them out, and even just be there as a friend until he does — will he ever actually emerge from this emotionally confused state? It is not as if their break-up was due to relationship problems or adultery or something that could help him move on. He has said that they did have their issues but that they were “usual acceptable relationship problems” and that they cared for each other a great deal — but he has emphasised to me many times that he will never even consider going back to her.

I need to know how to help him untangle these emotions, but without it seeming that I am pushing for my own benefit (which, though I really cannot stand to see him hurting, but I suppose there is a selfish element in that I want him to be able to feel for me freely). Is it even possible for me to help him, or should I just bow out of the emotional dealings and just be there as a friend until he is willing to accept the emotions? How can I deal with my own emotions that seem to grow every day and feel as if they are threatening to consume me? Is there even hope of this developing into the loving, caring and deep relationship that I am hoping for, or will he always be mourning for his “lost” love and I will just be a consolation prize? I do not want to hurt him and I do not want to hurt myself. I am just so confused at what to do and really need some kind of guidelines on how to deal with this. I find that I cannot concentrate on anything else at the moment because this is consuming all my thoughts.

I have tried to remove myself emotionally and physically from the picture, but it only lasted two weeks before he contacted me and wanted to see me for visits again (which I could not possibly say no to). The visits, as friends, have yet again developed into some deeply intimate moments (which I could also not possibly say no to, and I’m really just not sure whether it is the right or wrong thing to do by accepting them), which he is now deeply regretting because he says he is still so confused and says he “does not want to lead me up the garden path”. I queried this with him and said that the only way he could say that is if he has made up his mind that nothing can ever come of this, to which he answered that he does not know, but that he is not at all ruling out a future between us.

What do I need to do? Do I back off and let him deal with these emotions? Or do I stay right there in the middle of it all and just hope that the tangle of his emotions towards me grows to an extent that his emotions towards his ex-girlfriend lose some of their “power” over him? Or am I fighting a lost cause because he cannot accept closure on that part of his life?

I really do not know what to do and am only getting deeper and deeper into a situation where I could already get deeply hurt. (I know it sounds rather soon, but we connected very early on to a level that would normally take a lot longer.)

Our Clinical Psychologist’s Reply

Time will hold the answer to this situation. From your description, we know several things such as:

1. He is confused,
2. He is willing to stay confused as he’s not taking any action to stabilize the situation one way or another,
3. He is willing to keep you confused — keeping you at arms length while encouraging intimate moments, and
4. He’s not making decisions that protect you so you must make them.

In these situations, I recommend that you place the romance on probation. Develop a time frame, perhaps 3 or 4 months, during which time you will try to fix and clarify the situation. If after that time the situation is unchanged, then you must assume he is unable or unwilling to change and you must move on. We like to think that people who say the care for us also take care to protect our feelings. Sometimes this is not the case. He is willing to let you linger in a half-on, half-off relationship while he pleads confusion. If he’s not willing after a probation time to make a decision — you must consider that as a decision and protect yourself by moving on.