A
female
 ,
anonymous
writes:I met this guy I really like at the gym. I add him on facebook and he messages me his number. We text for a couple of days and he said that he was out in town on saturday night and if i was out to go and meet him for a drink. I didnt contact him sat night because I was with my friends and we got too drunk. But the next day I text him and he didnt reply. I saw photos of his night out on facebook that he added. He has not liked any of my photos or statuses that I have put up since Saturday - and before this he liked them all the time. Im so worried he has gone off me.......but worst of all Im worried that he has heard something negative about me which has turned him off......I not so long ago had a mental breakdown and did things that I would not dream of ever doing. I live in a small town so word got round. Im totally better now but Im scared that if he has heard anything than he has backed off. I dont want to keep pestering him but I feel like I want to delete him from my facebook because I dont like to be blatantly ignored. I have low self esteem and this rejection would make me feel worse. I dont know what to do. I am 30 years old.
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female
reader, anonymous, writes (9 April 2014): I can relate to what you feel. Although I've never had a 'breakdown' there have been many times in the past where my behaviour must have seemed very close to that because of prolonged stressful events that I had no choice but to deal with alone. I live in a massive city but the field that I work in is very close knit, very incestuous with everyone knowing everyone else's business. There's no anonymity whatsoever.Did you get counselling to help you to deal with what happened to you? My feeling about anyone having a breakdown is that things became too overwhelming and there was not enough support of the right kind around at the time.If you've been in that position of, on the one hand, overwhelm and, on the other, not the right kind of support, then your counselling should have been helping you to understand how to run your life so that you don't become overwhelmed again and so that you slowly and steadily build support into your life. THese could be your main goals as it's likely that this pattern of overwhelm/lack of support will need time and effort to change.With this guy and what's happened, you've understandably reacted. His brief presence has triggered a lot of your fears about yourself - your reputation, your ability to be a 'well' person with good self esteem. Recognise, please, that the guy in question hasn't actually done much at all except quickly make an appearance in your life and that it is your reactions to that which are now threatening you and starting to make you feel overwhelmed. It sounds like you very quickly needed his acceptance and 'approval' in order to feel better about yourself and, now that the possibility of that seems withdrawn, your reacting and going into panic mode.This is something that will keep happening in many different ways, until you yourself learn to change how you respond to it.Recognise that there is a massive and healthy difference between an emotional based REACTION and a measured and logical, though not entirely unemotional RESPONSE. Reaction in this case would be something like "Oh no, he's going to find out about my past and people will be talking about me behind my back and he's going to never speak to me again and I liked him and now I won't ever find anyone this will always keep happening in this small town and it will never change I'll always be alone I feel so ashamed I'm useless etc etc".A response would be: "okay, I am obviously reacting in a panicky way. I've let this man who I don't know affect my emotions far too soon by putting a lot at stake in how he treats me. I obviously still feel great shame about what happened to me, and the fact that he's not now responding is triggering myshame. Rather than investing all my hopes in him that he will somehow not find out about my past, allowing me to avoid confronting my shame, I now need to work on my sense of inner shame. Until I do that it will keep happening. It might make more sense for me to get involved in a group activity like volunteering where any men involved are going to be more understanding about what happened to me and I can take my time to trust and know them. Meanwhile, I can build up my self esteem by valuing ALL of my emotions, even the difficult ones and keep building in things that are healthy for me like exercise, meditation and pleasurable activities. This won't be the same as having a loving partner, but until I sort myself out more I'm not ready to receive or give into a healthy and loving relationship. Doesn't mean I never will be ready, just means I need more time. I also need to work on gaining a support system, one person at a time and slowly and steadily, so that I feel less 'alone' when this kind of thing happens. I need to get a balance right so that I'm not burdening new friends with my problems, but slowly opening up to them and offering bits of support in return. It's no-one else's responsibility to sort me out and it's not my responsibility to sort out others. But we can help one another."This would all work better if , for now, you can get counselling.Unless you are planning to move to a different area entirely - and small towns really do not suit everyone and can actually very negatively affect some people's mental health - then I'd suggest actively planning to turn around, as much as possible, people's opinions about you. This won't happen overnight and it will mean getting on board one person at a time as part of your support team. You don't have to become someone's full time supporter in return! Or take on other people's problems. Just make sure that people know you value their friendship by the way you talk to them and behave around them, that's all is needed.Good luck.
A
male
reader, Danielepew  +, writes (9 April 2014):
 If he likes you, he'll stay in touch. Just go on with your usual life.
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