Hi smiley and welcome to the forum Be good to get to know you.

Would agree to being bad at eye contact too. Fine with the day to day conversational stuff but go anywhere difficult and I can't do it. Several things happen: I'm so embarrassed or ashamed of what I'm saying that I can't bear to look at her; that if I feel sad, then looking at her face that is compassionate and kind might make me cry; or I am trying to distance myself from everything and not really there at all.

Sometimes I make a real effort to, but it ususally quickly becomes uncomfortable.

starfish

Hi Smiley! Love the name!! <-- that's how I picture you!! lol! Sorry to hear that you are in the same poor-eye contact boat... but I'm glad you are finding this thread helpful!

I gave my t my letter about eye contact today... about how I'm scared of it and I avoid it and how I'm afraid she's going to be affected by it, etc, etc,etc.

She said that she doesn't want me to try and make myself look at her... that it's not something she wants me to force myself to do. She said she will always be looking at me- whether or not I'm looking back, because I am what she is fully focused on, and she was trained to be attuned to me verbally and nonverbally. She mentioned that lack of eye contact (universally) means that a person is ashamed or embarrassed on some level, so she already knew that I was feeling those things, even if sometimes she doesn't know why necessarily. She then went on to say, about the whole flirting thing, that that comes down to me trusting her not to exploit any connection we have via eye contact- trusting that she won't put her needs before mine. She said that I will make eye contact with her when I'm ready, whatever that means for me psychologically, and that she looks forward to that day. She also said that she will take it as a sign that I've reached a new place of healing.

We then talked about that previous relationship I had that I've been talking about on here (because she said my writing "got heavier" when I started talking about that). I'll spare you all the gory details, but she asked how I see the breakdown of responsibility in that relationship (i.e. who's more responsible for what happened). I told her I thought it was 60/40 (I'm the 40) and I then asked her what she thought... she said 90/10 (I'm the 10). We "negotiated" and she got me down to a 65/35... Then she brought up the dream I'd had not long ago that really irked me, and she talked about how the breakdown of power in that dream- that I believed represented this past relationship- was more along the lines of 90/10 like she thought... and then I asked her why she HAD to point out these inconsistencies (lol!). She said because she thinks I have a very accurate unconscious.

Then, it was getting close to the end and she gave me some analogy that was "supposed" to lead me in the direction of seeing her point, but i saw it coming and turned it around on her to illustrate MY point... I did it so seamlessley, she just started laughing! It was freaking awesome. Then she told me (in her stern mom voice) to get my BUTT to class (one that I've only attended about 50% this semester)!! You know, she's damn near the only person in my life who REALLY wants me to be in school, but i love that she cares so much. It actually makes me WANT to go to class.

Thanks for reading.

-CT