Can I Help Her?

[JohnDoeTheGreat]

Hello Everyone,

I've been watching this board for a while and I’m hoping to get some help here or at least be pointed in the right direction.

I have been dating a beautiful little thing for a little over a year now, for the sake of this post let’s call her Jane. For a long time I thought that Jane was my perfect dream come true. She is usually very sweet and caring, not at all bitchy and she is completely true to me. She enjoys the same music as me, and she likes the same kind of parties as I do. We were even delivered by the same doctor and knew some of the same people growing up, though we didn’t meet until last summer by random chance. It seemed from the beginning that we were meant to be together and I immediately fell head over heels in love with her. It wasn’t until recently that some of her problems started becoming almost unbearable.

This is Jane’s story according to her. Growing up Jane’s mom always thought there was something wrong with her. From what I’ve gathered, Jane’s mom had her tested for several conditions including Asperger's Syndrome and sent her to counseling at a young age. I personally think that being treated like this has been part of her problem. Jane had virtually no friends in school growing up and says that she hated school (I agree), yet she graduated from High School at the top of her class. She said that she would become extremely agitated in school when there was something she couldn’t figure out and was often sent to the councilor. From my experience, if she does not understand something almost immediately, she gives up, breaks down in tears and tells herself that she is a looser. She’s also suffered from anorexia to different degrees. She tells me that she has always had something inside her head (not a voice like schizophrenia) telling her that she is a looser. She tells me that she knows there is something broken in her head and that she is always struggling to fix it but she hates counselors and says that she cannot talk about her problems with anyone but me.

Everywhere we go I have to be careful of setting her off somehow. If she thinks I’m irritated with her or even angry at someone else she starts getting agitated and before long she is crying. If she hears something that she doesn’t like or agree with she has to plug her ears and look away from whoever is talking. If I try to politely confront a patron for being mistreated or taken advantage of somehow she tries to interrupt me and act’s very embarrassed because she can’t stand confrontation. She can’t handle being alone; if she has a day off when I’m at work she’ll often call me in tears, verbally beating herself up the entire time on the phone. She can never make choices without tears being shed. Even if it’s something very small, she agonizes over all of her options, and when I try to talk through the problem with her she has an argument for why each and every option is bad. She is very smart, thin, beautiful and capable, and yet she is CONSTANTLY complaining about how stupid, fat, ugly and incapable she is. She can’t tell a lie to someone else yet she constantly lies to herself about her potential. She has no self confidence and no drive because she is scared that she will mess up somehow.

Now, I am a very optimistic person by nature and I have tried and tried to support her through the times when it’s the worst but it’s literally every day that she goes off about something or other… or nothing. Sometimes she just starts crying and can’t tell me why, or starts her usual litany of how she is stupid or ugly or fat for no reason. She is extremely beautiful and yet when I tell her this she stops for only a second before starting it up again. I have tried everything I know to help her and yet all that’s happening is that I feel like I’m going crazy myself. I have started going numb when she starts crying because nothing I do helps her. I try to break through that numbness so I can be more comforting but that only lasts a little while and then I find myself just wanting to get away. Thoughts of leaving her are starting to crop up even though I still love her and want to be with her more than anything. If I did leave her she would probably go completely crazy and kill herself or something. I so badly want to help her and if anyone can give me some advice on what to do I would be extremely grateful.

Thank you in advance from the bottom of my heart,

John

[vashti]

From what I’ve gathered, Jane’s mom had her tested for several conditions including Asperger's Syndrome and sent her to counseling at a young age. I personally think that being treated like this has been part of her problem. John

It sounds like her mother is right. There is something very wrong with this girl, and perhaps you are having a hard time admitiing this to yourself because of how "beautiful" you find her. It is very hard to accept that something in beautiful packaging can be so damaged.

I don't think you can fix a girl who has serious mental health issues. The only thing you can do is decide whether or not you will tolerate them (and of course, consider whether or not you can accept children you may eventually make with her having this defect passed on to them).

Personally, i don't get why people settle for "fixer-uppers". They usually don't improve, and in fact, only get worse. There are lots of emotionally healthy people in the world. I would find one of them.

[nuevo]

yeah, I don't think you can fix her all by yourself. You need help from a doctor or some professional on that matter to help her. I understand that you love her and everything, but you can't be her "doctor" and be dealing with this your forever; eventually,you will get sick too .

If she refuses to get some help you will have to leave her. I don't think is biological, is some kind of trauma from childhood.

good luck