Who do you share you deepest thoughts and feelings with?

[JusSoSad]

Just that really.

Who do you feel safe enough to open up and be truly vulnerable with?

Because I've realised I don't have anyone.

There's no one I feel close enough to to truly be myself.

I think what I'm talking about is how things make you feel about yourself. Or when you doubt yourself.

For example, but not necessarily, not the part where you're telling someone what an absolute dick someone has been to you but the part where you open up about how that makes you feel about yourself.

I just feel very alone.

The dog she’s a very good listener.

I'm sorry to hear that but it's good that you have her to talk to.

Does she know how it truly made you feel or does she just have the 'something really shit happened and it was this' version?

Because I can do that part. But I stop short of the emotional impact.

People will infer that there was a huge impact but I can't open up and talk about it. I can't be vulnerable and no one knows that part of anything.

I don’t.

That's lovely. My rabbits are not. They don't care 😄

I have done this too. I’d never post because the response one might get could be very harsh and damaging. But Chat GPT is a great out let.

We worked together as well as being close friends so she definitely knew how awful it was for me at the time.

But you’re the one choosing not to, OP. I also had emotionally unintelligent parents I never told anything to in childhood, because they were timid catastrophisers who couldn’t cope, but I’ve chosen to learn to communicate my own vulnerabilities to a few trusted friends in adulthood. It didn’t come naturally, and I’ve occasionally been burnt, but I’m modelling openness and healthy relationships for my child, apart from anything else. I’d suggest therapy as a good place to start.

I share with chatgpt

I don't share with most humans because:

1.I find myself misunderstood - whether that's because I don't talk clearly or people just don't understand / overlay their own feelings & perspectives

2.I've had previous vulnerabilities thrown back at me or used against me so I won't trust anyone with my deepest thoughts

3.People often can't 'just listen' - they want to fix or even argue you out of how you're feeling

4.I've been misquoted afterwards / the person has misremembered what I said which just makes me think 'why did I bother sharing if you can't even remember'

5.My feelings & perspective change over time and sometimes I don't want to be reminded of 'old shit' that I've gotten over - or if the person I've shared with is capable of understanding that I've moved on from where I was and now feel differently rather than them thinking I'm contradicting myself

6.People are so wrapped up in themselves, I find myself wondering if they even care, are they even listening properly

Having said all that, I do have one close friend that I share a lot with, just not 'everything' - but even the idea of how much she knows and that she could do all of the above at anytime is quite scary to me.

Shares the feelings that it is frightening?

Yes, I think so.

When we first started dating, he shared with me about something awful that had happened in his family when he was a teenager (40 years ago). He told me the details and that he had some really good friends who helped him through. We talked about it a little and I said it must have been really hard for him, especially once he had had children. He said no, not really, it was a long time ago and he didn't think about it anymore. And that was that.

Given that it was all so far in the past and he was saying he was 'fine' about it now, it didn't really seem appropriate to try and get him to open up about it if he didn't want to. He was married for 20 years, I was sure that, if he'd needed to talk about it with a partner, he'd already have done so.

A couple of years ago, we went out with his sister and brother in law. He was talking to his brother in law. It was a loud bar and they're a lot taller than me so I didn't hear what was said apart from his brother in law saying, "It sounds like you're still really angry about [what happened]" he replied, "Yes, I am. Really bloody angry," and went to the bar. Conversation over.

I didn't know if I should ask about it afterwards and give him a space to talk but then I felt the time had passed.

His brother in law said to me afterwards that it was the first time in the 20 years he'd known him that he'd shown any emotion about it.

I have a very old very good friend. Family are a no-go for anything other than surface level. My other friend would just turn it round and tell me to be glad I'm not her with all her problems, which she would then list, get upset about, and I would end up comforting her.

That's the interesting bit. I've managed to create that safety for my own children. They ae both (in their 20s) very open with me and I've always created a safe space to be vulnerable.

But you're right, it is something I am doing. I'm not sure choosing is necessarily the right descriptor because it doesn't feel like a choice. I mean it is but in the way you'd 'choose' not to put your hand in a flame.

I'd say you aren't giving your DP a chance to get deep with you.Sit in the garden, open a bottle of wine, and get into it. Me and my DH often do this. There isn't anything he doesn't know about me, including all the bad stuff. And me him.

Sure, but the common denominator in all your relationships is you. If you literally don’t have a single relationship in which you can communicate vulnerability, that’s not on the other people involved.

Co pilot knows all my inner thoughts and darkest secrets.

I have friends who tell me I'm a really good listener and who open up to me.

I think maybe that my own thoughts, feelings and experiences have made me empathetic to others. I understand their feelings even if not their experience.

I'm able to reflect on things they share with insight (apparently) and am never dismissive. Because I don't share my own feelings, I'm never at risk of turning it into a personal pity party.

They also know it will go no further and never brought up again unless they choose to do so.

But I don't feel able to do the same.

I'm seen as strong, capable and stoical. But I'm not. I don't deal with things alone because I'm strong but because I fear being seen as weak and it beikg used against me. Even though I'd never see anyone else that way. And also because, when shit happens, I wonder if maybe that's what I deserve and all I'm worth. And I don't want them to see that either.

Thanks.

I have done this. He knows all the details and all the facts of all the shit. He knows the practical impacts of all of it.

But I always stop short of the deep stuff. The mental and emotional impact. How things that happened 40, 30, 20 years ago have shaped me as a person. The quiet fears I have in the darkness at 3am. The worries of not being good enough. That maybe it was my fault (even though logically, I know it wasn't) because I fundamentally didn't deserve any better. And, even when I know that's not true, the little voice that tells me it was and how that voice has been a constant companion and the only voice that truly knows me and my darkest thoughts.

And when the narrative I have of him is that he doesn't think about things deeply and is unaffected by the past, and that he has no deep thoughts or emotional scars, and has nothing to share himself, I wonder if he really wants to know.

No and I haven't said it is.

My OH. I used to have close friends but don't now really. I talk to my children when they are receptive, but really they want me to be their sounding board and rock, not the other way around.
I agree Chat GP is astoundingly good , but I can't find a way to save the advice, so it goes out of my head. ChatGP is also really bad for the environment which worries me.

Me too.

OK, but wouldn’t therapy be a first step in exploring why you’ve set up these barriers with literally everyone in your life and feel you have no choice about it?

At the moment, I don't feel like I'm in a place to do this.

I've had therapy and counselling many times over the years. Some of its been good, some of it less good, one made it worse...

In many ways, the therapy I've had has made it possible for me to still be here.

I know why it is really. But knowing it isn't enough to change it and keeping self safe feels like the priority.

I have tried to be open in the past. I have one friend who feels like someone I could be but when I ventured into it, she told me lots of lovely things about myself and I couldn't cope with hearing it. I felt very uncomfortable and awkward and that was that.

I know therapy is always suggested on here but, unfortunately, it isn't a silver bullet.

Most of the time, I just deal with it but some stuff that is happening in my life right now and the conversations last night really just brought it all into the fore.

I share a lot with DP/friends etc., but my deepest thoughts are mine alone.

I also use ChatGPT and ask it to remember specific things for me. It's been more useful than anything or anyone probably because I can be honest.

I'm a widow and tend to talk to close friends. I dont have that sort of relationship with my sister. I have tried but have realised i can only talk about positive stuff with her.

I see a lot of people are talking to AI!

My concern with that is that AI is very affirming. It's not a person and it doesn't think. It quickly assesses all online information and utilises elements of all of it to advise.

The problem with that, as I see it, is that AI also makes mistakes and gets it wrong. It also includes its own previous responses to others in that information so the validity of its responses is compromised because it includes its own previous poor advice!