Anyone there to help? I feel I'm drowning

[mosp]

I don't know how much I'm allowed to say about this, but if I don't express my emotions I will explode.
I recently made a new friend. Long distance. He is doomed. The friendship is doomed. I can't cope. I didn't anticipate feeling so close. :(

I'm so sorry that my posts have suggested that I'm excusing him and minimalizing the crime. In my heart I am not doing either of those. I suppose it comes across that way because I have tried to defend him when any poster has taken the 'he doesn't deserve it' position.

I think I might have to call this thread a day because I feel so hurt that someone who knows nothing about me can label me as egotistical. I have considered long and hard after reading that, whether it is true. But I honestly believe that my motives were right.

I do disagree with the DP and I promise I do take murder seriously. But I still feel for him. As would anyone who decides to support HW.

Who did he kill? Why can't you even talk about them?

1. I don't want to dwell on it. I know he did it. He knows he did it. I chose not to focus on it. I don't have the right to forgive him, but I choose not to judge him.

2. I am purposefully not posting details because I don't want to say anything here that could come close to identifying him.

Whatever my subconscious motives, I can say for certain that 'excitement' or 'ego' are not factors that I am aware of.

I don't know you and I wouldn't make a sweeping judgement on you. Your opinion is different from mine. We've lived different lives and experienced different things and responded in different ways.

Some of the compassionate posters on this thread are responding with certain knowledge of me personally at the backs of their minds.

Sorry, but I hate confrontation and strife. I can't cope with it. :(

But you're corresponding with a murderer? Are you serious?

How much more confrontational can you think of than an act like that? It seems more like you're attracted to extreme violence and aggression. Being disagreed with on the internet isn't actually in the same class as a crime like that.

I think you're not dwelling on the person he murdered and the people that were left behind to deal with the destruction he caused because if you thought about it for more than a second, you wouldn't be able to justify what you're doing.

I am compassionate, I'm compassionate for his victim, and I'm compassionate for you. You need to be thinking about this stuff instead of burying your head in the sand and indulging in romantic fantasies about him, because this will hurt you very badly at some point. It already is - you've said you're drowning because of it.

Nyac. back off a little love. I mean this with respect and kindness, as I know you are writing from a position of concern too, but perhaps there is another method that would communicate it better. IMVHO mosp has enough to deal with. Your extremely well-intentioned thoughts are liable in this case to be counter-productive.

We are not hear to judge mosp, we are here to help her. The man she has been writing to has also been judged and sentenced. He will pay the ultimate price for the most ultimate of crimes.

She needs to understand that while her compassion is perhaps unorthodox, it is compassion none the less.

yes I agree that there are reasons for her to have chosen to do this, but I don't think that she is subconsciously totally aware of the entirety of her need to communicate with this man.

Mosp, you need to get support. THEN we can see what your options are. give them a ring tomorrow and come back and let us know what they say,we'lls ee what's what then?

nyac is right about something though, you are hurting in all of this, and that has to stop.

It's not compassion though that mosp is displaying, it's something else, and it isn't good. It's certainly not good for mosp.

True compassion would involve take into account his victim - it's the absolute starting point with something like this - and the true enormity of his crime, which she isn't doing. She's jumped straight to minimising and excusing, which isn't the same as forgiveness or non-judgement either. It's good in a way that she's had to do this, because only the superhuman could look fully at a crime like murder and not judge, so mosp is avoiding her own judgement by trying to pretend the crime isn't as important as it actually is. There isn't anything wrong with judging murder, it's actually important, otherwise we'd all be amoral, immoral monsters.

But I take your point that mosp isn't able to hear this so there isn't any point in me continuing Hissy. So I'll properly bow out this time.

I don't think Mosp is going to like what I'm about to say and I will entirely understand if she wants to report it to get rid of it - or if any of the other posters on this thread report it to prevent her from seeing it in the first place.

I think that Mosp is doing something very common and understandable for someone who's been badly hurt by someone else, namely, trying to make a perpetrator seem harmless - trying to morph a "bad" person into a "good" one. If you can render a proven murderer harmless, maybe the world can seem a bit less horrifying. If you can find evidence that a man who is universally recognised as BAD is actually GOOD, then maybe the darkness can lift a little. I don't know. I'm being horribly inarticulate. I think a lot of people who have been hurt spend time trying to rewrite history, placing third parties in the shoes of the person who hurt them and trying to make them behave differently this time.
Basically I think there is a possibility that Mosp is projecting someone who hurt her in the past onto the person she's writing to, and either trying to win his approval or prove to herself that he's "not that bad"; if she accepts that there were "extenuating circumstances" that make HIS crime less straightforwardly horrendous, maybe the same can be said of the person who hurt her, which in turn might make the whole thing slightly easier to understand. I don't know.

hopkin, that is a good insightful post

it doesn't merit deleting and I think mosp should read it very, very carefully indeed

as well as all the rest of the posts on her thread, which come from a place of concern for a vulnerable woman

I was just coming to say, hopkin, that your post was not at all worthy of deletion. I agree with AF, what you said definitely rings true. It may not be the entire picture, but it does explain a lot.

This is the problem, the subconcious (especially when the mind is in a mess) is so hard to understand.

I really appreciate you posting, hopkin. There was nothing insulting in what you said.

I intend to call HW this morning (just looked at the time...this afternoon then!) but I can't get my head round what I might say. My head is spinning. I don't want to cry on the phone. I definitely don't want to get close to disclosing any of my history.

I suppose I could ask what kind of feelings are 'normal' when at first one gets a penpal? I will also ask if their members are commonly accused of egocentric motives or revelling in violence and bloodshed.

I do know that strong emotions at the time of the killing of the inmate is common, and they provide counselling for that.

mosp, I think you should tell them what you initially told us

you don't need to disclose anything more

tell them you are feeling overwhelmed by your reactions, you feel you are in too deep and you are wondering whether this is common and ask what they recommend

I reckon this will have cropped up lots of times before, I doubt you are unique in this, lovey

I am also convinced it has cropped up before. I just hope they don't suggest I stop writing. I'm kind of scared to call.

Don't run away from it

If they suggest you taper off the letters, they will have a very good reason for that. They are the experts, you do not know better than them (none of us do)

mosp, I am 100% certian you won't be the first, and you won't be the last. Don't be a cliche, take some power back. Concentrate on yourself, you still have much to fix before you can consider helping lost causes. It's more heartache you simply cannot take on.

I'm sitting here with the phone in my hand. I can't do it. I'm useless at the best of times but right now I can't speak. :(

Then email them

mosp.

My love. I read the front page on their website about becoming a penpal and it says up front that volunteers/members need to commit to communication with an inmate, and unless there is a valid reason to stop, that communication ought to continue.

I'm saying this to remind you that it's in their best interests that you continue, so if there is a way that they can support you in continuing commuicating with this inmate they will do. If THEY decide that you need to have a break/pause/cessation then it's because you really need to stop, for your own good and for that of the inmate.

Call them. Talk it over.

Your tone about yourself love is still so searingly negative, I am utterly convinced that you need to pause this care for another and focus on your own care.

This could be a very 'blonde' question ....

could he find out your address ?( I'm presuming the letters are sent through a agency / PO Box or something ? )

I would be terrified if he could find out the address . What if he somehow got free at some point , and came to find you ? Or scare he could somehow send a friend round ( in my mind all is friends would obviously be murderers too ! )

Not scare - somehow .

oh bless... I don't think many DR prisoners would (a) get released or (b) find the $$$$ to get on a plane and come find mosp. Why would he come and murder anyone here?

but nonetheless...

It doesn't worry me that he has my address.

I managed to call my coordinator. She was lovely. Chatted for ages. She said that it is rarely recommended that penpals stop writing. Usually if the prisoner is getting abusive in his letters, or demanding marriage or something. It is normal to feel strongly.

I feel better about it now. Just from talking about it.

OK then, but then YOU need to be responsible for yourself more then... Can you do that?

Can you write to him and explain to him that you are feeling a little overwhelmed? Could you set yourself days of the week where you take time out from writing?

Can you please involve your RL friends, and let them support you when you are feeling lost, consumed and drowning? Please keep calling your HW coordinator too, if you are feeling anxious.

Yes I will, hissy. Thank you.

mosp, take care of yourself, won't you ?

You know where to find me too mosp... Is Fan back yet? I know there are others in your circle that will keep an eye on you too, so open up and lean on your support network?

So you know what I mean by support network...

I have no family to rely on, they've made that sickeningly obvious... What I have however constructed in that void is the following, in no particular order:

Mumsnet - Hundreds of people that although i don't know them have been immensely supportive, without whom etc etc....

A MN FB spin off - all from the Emotional Abuse support thread - all in all about 24

My RL friends, non local, all in different countries, although there if I need to text/tweet an argh or a grrr

My domestic violence support group

My therapist.

In the past I have done the Freedom Programme too so can call on WA or the FP and go back to if if I need to.

All this in a year.

Only the Therapy is paid for... £40/week. The rest is all free... So yes you have to get yourself out there, you have to put it all together, but I kind of have wraparound care one way or another.

Oh and it looks like I now have a boyfriend too, so in time he'll be some kind of support too...

Put the effort in to getting yourself supported, in a variety of ways, use the email group you have, your RL support, MN, and any other local resource that is pertinent to your situation.

OK?

he he, at the least it'll give you more stuff to write about....

Thanks AF. I will. But sometimes I need to offload and I feel that mn is a risky place to do it because my friendship with this man is met with hostility and misunderstanding from a minority. Those of you who see HW as a good organisation, and are only thinking about the impact on me have helped me. Thank you.

This thread has opened my eyes in many respects. To myself and also attitudes that have shocked me.

Hopefully, if it brings even one person to join HW, it'll be worth it.

Sorry, I'm rambling now. Feeling quite passionate about it after my phone call! :)

:) hissy. I do have many lovely rl friends. I have told some of them about my friend in DR, and they are great. Just that sometimes I get a need to offload at a time when I'm alone.

I just wish I could get therapy.

I haven't been on mn for months, but I only ever received understanding and support in the past.

Thank you for taking time to be so kind to me.