Health And General Life Care: [loveshy_drgilmartin] Re: I am in a world of hurt.

It's easy to say that love-shyness is invisible. But, really now,
don't you think that never having a girlfriend is completely
devastatingly? Jeez, there's enough peer pressure just to get laid in
high school.

Having all that talent makes things all the more frustrating, because
he should be on top of the world, but instead he's at the bottom for
some unknown reason he can't fathom. No matter his victory he always
walks home alone.

So how did you come upon love-shyness, Ruth?

--- In loveshy_drgilmartin@yahoogroups.com, "Ruth Ahlgren"
<ruth.ahlgren@...> wrote:
>
> All parents pretty well blame themselves for whatever happens to
their children, but most as in my case, have their child's best
interests at heart even if we get it wrong. My partner and I will
never forgive ourselves for what happened to our son. In my case I
try to understand it as best I can, but there are limits to my
understanding of my son and myself. Sometimes the emotional pain is
too much. It is easy to blame other people for what goes wrong and it
takes strength to face up to your own part. Of course I struggle with
this. I do have an ego and now that ego is deflated to nothing as I
try to live with what happened. Shall I die, or should I try to
continue and why? Unlike most of you, you look forward to having sex
and relationships. I don't have that, but of course my life has been
blessed with some fine moments, and some of the finer moments I can
attribute to the pleasure I received from seeing my son laugh and all
the wonderful interactions we had.
>
> I thought my son was doing well. I thought he was doing better at
everything than most young men I observed. I thought he had grace,
charm wit, intelligence, good looks. He didn't talk a lot but my
father did not talk a lot so I thought this was acceptable. Teachers
told me he was shy in speaking up, and I guess now I should have
realized this was problematic, but as my father seemed to be a
wonderful man who didn't readily share his thoughts, I just accepted
that this was a hereditary trait that was ok. My son could write
beautifully and draw beautifully so I thought he has creative outlets
for expression. I had no brothers and no male models in my life other
than my father so I thought my son was living up to what I thought was
a fine model of maleness. My father despite being shy and introverted
was respected by everyone who knew him, males and females. He was
exceedingly stoical and although there are absolute drawbacks to how
he operated in the world he gave respect and it was returned.
>
> My son didn't have Aspergers as far as I know. I have limited
understanding of Aspergers, and that experience seems to suggest that
people with Aspergers have great difficulty interacting smoothly with
others. Of course this is a matter of degree. All people have
difficulty at times interacting smoothly with others. I am not an
expert on Aspergers, but I have known parents who have tried to help
their children with Aspergers in all sorts of ways. If you go to a
website about Aspergers you find that it is attributed to a problem in
a part of the brain, and is evidenced by certain behaviour. That
behaviour suggests the person with Aspergers has difficulty
reading/understanding certain non-verbal cues of others. I am not an
expert so I'll leave it at that. If you have Aspergers, you should
tell me what it means to you, and perhaps I will have a better
understanding.
>
> My son didn't engage in conflicts with other people and perhaps that
was evidence of some underlying problem. He avoided conflict, and
that is not always a good thing, but of course teachers and adults
like that quality in children, because dealing with conflict in
schools is problematic and time consuming.
>
> Some of you have been kind and some not so much. To those who wish
to villify me - go right ahead. You can't hurt me any more than I
have been. If you want to believe women are evil horrid creatures,
well you will certainly find evidence but that view won't bring you
much peace love or happiness, and you sure are going to miss out on
seeing anything but what you have convinced yourself is the reality.
Gilmartin's work is becoming your bible and some of you sound like
fundamentalists. I would encourage you to sometimes look at life
beyond your problem and don't limit your vision.
>
> I am beginning to bore myself, and undoubtedly you as well. Take
care. I need a break from the pain.
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Talmer Shockley
> To: loveshy_drgilmartin@yahoogroups.com
> Sent: Friday, February 08, 2008 1:01 AM
> Subject: [loveshy_drgilmartin] Re: I am in a world of hurt.
>
>
> One slight mistake love-shys often make when reading Gilmartin is that
> when they don't fit his love-shy profile 100%, they can seriously
> question whether they are LS or not. My feeling is that Gilmartin
> studied the most serious and obvious cases to make sure he achieved
> definitive statistical results. For example, if a shy man happened to
> have any kind of sex, including only with a prostitute, he was
> discounted from the study.
>
> Judging by the facts that you state, I would assume your son was LS.
> You seem like someone knowledgeable about Asperger's. (Which made
> assume certain things about you.) Did your son have Asperger's? AS,
> your husband being shy, and your son being slight and bright all point
> to love-shy. Niles I would consider gay, and having slightly feminine
> (or non-masculine) characteristics yet being hetero is also a
> suggestion of love-shyness. Being an actor is not unheard of in
> love-shyland, just not typical.
>
> How old was he?
>
> Sorry about the continued negativity against women expressed on this
> board. Love-shyness is usually passed down from generation to
> generation. While it is something to be overcome, you can't blame
> yourself for raising your son as best you can. Congrats on finding
> this forum. It may help bring closure to your situation.
>
> You could not have know exactly how he was doing romantically anyway.
> If he was an actor he could probably hide his pain better than
> almost anyone on the planet. Love-shys usually keep it secret
> especially from their parents.
>
> Yes, it is stupid to think that the girl thing will come after
> scholastic or career success. But everyone thinks that. I even
> remember telling family and relatives when I was in high school
> discussing college options that I would worry about women after I
> graduated and had a good job (so who cared about the M/F ratio of the
> student body.)
>
> You haven't given us full details, but I doubt you could have stopped
> him. It sounds like he was an extra sensitive human.
> Once a male is out of high school, his mother should stay out of his
> romantic life because there is nothing she can do about it. THE
> LOVE-SHY'S MOTHER IS THE LAST PERSON WHO CAN GIVE HIM ADVICE AND HELP
> HIM ONCE HE IS AN ADULT.
>
> Ruth, unless he said to you, "I'm going to kill myself tomorrow,"
> THERE IS NOTHING YOU COULD HAVE DONE. nothing.
>
> --- In loveshy_drgilmartin@yahoogroups.com, "Ruth Ahlgren"
> <ruth.ahlgren@> wrote:
> >
> > Thank you for your kindness.
> >
> > I'm sorry if I offended you..
> >
> > Love-shyness according Dr Gilmartin seems to be carefully defined,
> but my son does seem to match some of the profile I have read so far.
> (I haven't read it all) He was definitely regarded as shy or
> described himself that way, and yet he was an actor who loved to
> perform for everyone so I wasn't sure about his shyness. He was
> smallest guy in grade school, not so small later but still slight. He
> was sort of a Niles Crane type - you know on Frasier - the tv show. He
> was good looking and had a sweet sense of humour. His peers saw him
> as quite bright even brilliant.
> > Part of my problem in seeing he had problems was that he was in a
> lot of ways like my father, a sweet gentle quiet man who I adored. He
> was not physically matured and my partner and I had warned him that
> this of course was hereditary. If he had chosen to live he would have
> turned into a gorgeous man.
> >
> > I am at fault in that I thought he was doing very well. I thought
> he was smart and was going to mature just fine. Some things went on
> with friends that I still don't know and they aren't going to tell me.
> He had fallen in love with a girl who initially expressed interest
> and who raised his hopes but who rejected him. He seemed to be
> telling me he had moved on although I know the pain lingered. He was
> brave enough to ask another girl out but I suspect she did not see him
> as more than a friend. When he first asked her out, he wanted a male
> friend to be with them, so he was playing it safe.
> >
> > I knew he would experience rough patches in the dating game, but I
> always thought he was going to end up wowing everyone. This by the
> way wasn't just my view as a lot of people seemed to think he was
> confident and bright. I think he was being labelled gay by a lot of
> people which hurt him deeply. I think he took abuse from both the
> neanderthal's and the gays. He was very serious and probably romantic
> about girls.
> >
> > As a lot of parents I was concerned more that he get a good
> education and I thought the girl thing would happen more in the
> future. Obviously that was stupid on my part. He and I talked and I
> thought the bond between us was strong, but he downplayed his feelings
> to such a degree and he seemed so sophisticated, I failed to grasp the
> degree of pain he was enduring. I will never be able to forgive
> myself for not stopping him. The pain is unrelenting.
>
>
>
>
>
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