Decisions

Dear Aber,

I really don't know what to do right now. I'm so confused. I'm dating such a great guy that deserves someone special. Someone who will be there for him and someone he can be there for. I don't know if I can be that guy right now. We've only been dating a few months, but it's been good. I've been hurting him and I didn't even realized it when I've been pushing him away. I'm just so afraid to getting close and intimate with guys right now. Sometimes I feel so dead inside.

Things would probably be different if I didn't have extra stress due to my mom getting breast cancer and my step dad being hospitalized twice in 4 days. I'm still reeling from guilt about my father's passing. He was taken from this world so suddenly that I didn't have time to tell him how I feel and that I'm sorry that I took him for granted. To make up for all the time I didn't get to spend with him. My father was such an amazing guy. Even though he wasn't the time of person to tell someone that he loved them all the time, the few times he said it to me was straight from his heart. My father died of cancer, but he didn't really suffer.

My mother has breast cancer now and I don't want to make the same mistake. The last couple of years have been so rocky in our relationship. If anything happens to her, I want to make sure that she knows that I love and will always be there for her. I've only known my step father for a short time, but I know that I love him like a father already.

With what's going on with my family, I don't know if I can give the attention needed to build a relationship with my boyfriend. I want him to be happy and I don't want to ever hurt him. I just don't feel like I'm the same place as him...emotionally right now. There are so many things going through my head right now and I'm so scared of making the wrong decision.

I know the right decision is to make my family priority. That's the one thing I know to be the right choice. I just don't know if that choice can include R. I have to spend a lot of my time with my mom and step dad, helping to take care of them as they are recovering. I don't know if I'll have time for a relationship, especially one so new. I'd like to work on the relationship and ideally that would work if I didn't have the other stresses on my life.

R finally got me to open up more and communicate with him more than anyone has in a while. I just don't know if I can fully open up more as my spare time will slowly dwindle. I don't want to rush in making a decision, but I don't want to keep him holding on. Especially if things don't work out.

Will I hurt him more if I end the relationship or will I be saving him from more heartache? I wish time could just stop right now, so that I can take my time in making a decision. Too bad that reality doesn't allow for that.

Thanks,

Scared Shitless

Mama's boy...not for a while.

Dear Aber,

I used to be called a mama's boy when I was younger, but the last few years or so my mother and I haven't been really close. I think I withdrew from my family after my father passed away in the summer of 2007 and when I moved away from home.

It was painful when my father passed away and being around my family made me feel really guilty about how I treated my father. I took him for granted when he was alive and when I'm with my family, it reminds me of that. You'd think I'd act differently toward them and that my father's death would've brought me closer to them. Instead, I drifted away.

Now I feel guilty for drifting away from them. Yesterday I found out from my sister that my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer. My father died of cancer and now my mother has cancer. I'm terrified now and been on the verge of crying for the past 24 hours. I feel so helpless. It makes me think about all the fights my mother and I have had the last couple of years and it hurts my heart to think about. I feel like I haven't been a very good son to her. I feel bad for how terrible I've been. I separated myself from my mom and my family, so that I can go off on my own and live me life. I just realized that having my own life doesn't mean that I have to disappear from them.

I've already lost one parent. I don't want to lose another one so soon. I don't know what I would do if I end up losing my mother too. I'm screaming inside and I don't even know how to let out all this stress, pain, and fear. I want to eat like crazy or bake a ton of things or even run to the ends of the world, but I don't even have the energy to do that. All I could think about is hiding out in the corner of a dark room and just lay down in the fetal position and pass out.

I miss being a mama's boy! I'm afraid! I'm hurting!

Why does this have to happen?

xoxo,

ex mama's boy