u/Nastasyarose

I hosted a party once where I had a banana bar. Banana Snapple, banana milk, banana lollipops, soda, runts, every single banana flavored item I could personally find. Spent over $300 on it. At the party people gave me such a hard time about
"why the heck did you do this?" that I just put it all away and kept it all for myself instead.
Banana is the best of all flavors. My go to smoothie is banana mango. Two bananas, SIx pieces of chopped mango, turbinado liquid sugar, and pre-crushed ice. Yogurt does not belong in a smoothie btw. And if you put a banana in something and actually taste it, that is a blessing from God because it's the best taste in the world and I have to fight so hard to even notice it.
Side note: circus peanuts claim to be banana flavored as well. I don't agree, but they sure are delicious.

I grew up in an abusive home, yada yada, it was bad. I did the work (or so I thought) and in my early twenties I thought I had “healed” myself because I had a healthy relationship (or so I thought) and some friends. I thought it was stable. But Im pretty sure I was just masking everything with drugs and alcohol. I’m not sure if I healed anything. I’m in a relationship right now that I find extremely triggering. I’m noticing a lot of old patterns coming up. Here are my observations:

I have social anxiety so bad I dread almost all human interaction. I can’t relax around most people, I need to be “on”, funny, deflective, etc. Not performing well in a social interaction makes me want to claw my skin off. I relied heavily on drugs and alcohol in the past to relieve that pressure on myself. I thought I had normal relationships, but now I see that the fear of being seen is still there, now that I’m sober.

I find comfort in long-term partners, and I believe I am co-dependent on them. Because I only feel comfortable around a select few, I ease my loneliness by being around partners 24/7, even if I know it’s unhealthy or that they’re not a good match for me.

I used sexual attention to validate myself. I think the only way I can be “worthy” of love is by being the most attractive, the funniest, the coolest, the smartest, whatever-est. Although I don’t want to value these things, I feel that my worth is tied to finances and beauty. I want a simple, stable life, but I feel immense pressure to “succeed” and prove myself. If I feel insecure, I find ways to validate those feelings, usually with people other than my partner.

I’m a perfectionist, so I’m afraid of failure. I have lost opportunities by being too scared to try.

I’m scared of people, so I’m scared to even seek opportunities.

I feel incredibly lonely/incredibly afraid of people at all times. I feel like this is hindering my quality of life and preventing me from finding peace.

I feel the urge to self hrrm because of all of this.

When I am angry, I want to inflict this pain on other people. I often go nuclear and try to prove how little I care about the people who I supposedly love. The after effects of this further the spiral. I had thought I had overcome this urge but my current partner brings it out of me heavily.

I don’t know if I love people, or if I’m just afraid to be alone.

Idk, I’m 32, I’m in therapy, I’m on meds. I don’t know how to proceed from here. How can I make myself comfortable around people? How can I stop viewing everything as a threat? How do I actually let go of this anger? Are these problems possible to overcome?

I have a five week old & I’m a first time mom. I literally have never been around babies before. I know he’s little and developing but is it normal for him not to respond to affection? Like he doesn’t calm down to my voice or touch, only my breast. Is this normal? Second, he hates diaper changes and will wail the entire time. I know I gotta get through it, but like, that’s not going to psychologically scar him right? Is there something else I *should* be doing? I know these questions probably sound super basic and dumb but I just need reassurance that everything’s normal and he’s developmentally on track. I know they’re “crying hungry potatoes”, but im having trouble wrapping my head around it being “okay”.

Adalbertus
Wladuslau
Wojciech
Magdelena
Leokadia
Bronislawa
Katarzyna

And my personal favorite,

Ignacy