arielle21

This is something that has been slowly eating away at me, and I need some positive reinforcement, because I don't see the point anymore. I feel like someone made a mistake somewhere and put me in the wrong place or something. Growing up, my parents were really strict, I didn't really lead a stereotypical 'american girl' lifestyle. My parents immigrated here and so there is this terrible gap between our generations and they don't understand that things work differently here, to say the least, considering they've been in the U.S for 20 years now. My mom had an arranged marriage, and to her, dating is a sin, and as much as I've tried to ignore her views on american culture, seeing as how I'm living it and she's not, its still had an effect on me. She's very religious and that has also influenced me, but I'm grateful for that because religion has done alot for me. But I can't help but feel thats its impossible to live the lifestyle thats expected of me. I used to think that it was just my strict mother that wanted to make sure that I didn't drink/smoke, sleep around, stay in school, and get good grades. But after three years of college I've realized that its not just her, its me. Its important to me that I uphold certain values and live a certain lifestyle and maintain my original culture.....or atleast I thought I did. It seems that everyone else around me has explored themselves and tried different things and seem to have fun doing it, and nothing seems wrong with it on the surface. It makes me think whats the point anymore? Why should I stay "pure", why should I not drink, why should I not experiment with drugs, why should I not have a boyfriend?? Even as I type the answer seems to come on its own, just writing the possibility of doing it is already making me feel like I would be a bad person. Its been pounded it my mind that I would be 'bad person' if I did any of those things and I can't help but carry those feelings over to my friends. I feel really, really, uncomfortable if they're all drinking, or if they're talking about what happened in bed the night before. I can't handle it. It seems childish, but I don't want to experiment for the sake of experimenting, because I'm not all that curious. It just seems if I did live a more 'modern' lifestyle then I wouldn't feel so out of place right now, and maybe my friends wouldn't act like I was 5 years younger than them. It seems a shame that just because I have certain religious views that people see me as an immature person or younger, and also that I'm having to contemplate my values and belief system for the sake of 'fitting in.' Maybe fitting in isn't so important, maybe I should just keep doing what I'm doing. But i think some things are definitely wrong though, like needing to overcome the feeling that someone is 'bad' because they're drinking. I feel like I should just throw everything away and do what everyone else is doing, but I shouldn't have to do that.

There are so many 'what if's' running through my mind. Like what if he never loved me for me, but for the attention I was giving him. I entered his life in a time that he felt really alone and was craving for attention, he basically advertised it. I had figured then it was better to give in to it, rather than to have something happen to him because I ignored it. It almost felt like he was taking advantage of the fact that I was such a caring person. No matter what stupid thing he did or what kind of a mess he was in, I would always be there for him. Sometimes I think he liked me so much because he knew I cared about what happened to him, not because of me as a person. I dont know, I'm at a loss. I'm sure alot of my insecurities could be answered if I just sat down and talked to him and figured this out. But for me that is the hardest thing in the world. For some reason he's the one that is so exceptionally good at expressing his feelings, and I sit there unable to open up. I'm so afraid to be in a vulnerable position around him, I've always been the strong one. I don't know why its so hard for me, I avoid confrontation of difficult issues at all costs. I guess I break the stereotype of women being the ones able to express themselves better than men, because I suck at it. I keep everything inside me, or just maybe away from him, until I get to the point where I don't know what to do because I don't know how to communicate to him my distress and how I feel. I'm a great listener and enjoy helping people with their problems, but I can't seem to help myself.

I definitely waited too long to get help on this, and I'm at a point now where I don't know where the road will go next, what direction I need to take, if any at all. I just need to get this out. I have a guy friend who is bipolar and ADD. He had alot of problems in the beginning of last semester dealing with a long distance relationship he had with his girlfriend and a drinking problem among other things. He came to me for help and I couldn't deny him. He became very depressed and was contemplating suicide, so I did everything in my power to help him through it, I couldn't stand to see him hurting. Somehow my helping him caused him to start liking me more than just as a friend. He was very expressive about his feelings, telling me how much I meant to him. It was very flattering to say the least because I've never had anyone make me feel the way he did. In the beginning I would try to ignore him, pretend that he didn't have an affect on me, because I knew that he was in a 'serious' relationship with his girlfriend and was probably just missing her. I knew how much he loved her, and I knew that it was tearing him up that he couldn't be with her. But then their problems got worse and they eventually broke up. It was the weirdest thing ever to be consoling him about something that I was secretly happy about. On the one hand I hated that the break up was causing him pain, and on the other I was relieved that he was breaking up with his girlfriend because then I felt it might morally be ok for me to respond to his actions. I was going to say finish by saying 'to make a long story short' but i think this may be long no matter how I try to shorten it. Basically we became very close and spent alot of time together after that and went out on 'dates' although neither of us called it that. But then I realized that our 'relationship' couldn't go anywhere. Or at least I strongly believed that it wouldn't. This is because we have many different moral beliefs, things I consider the core of my being, are things that he will unknowningly completely disregard. Also there were some racial issues mostly on my part. He was ok with us being different races and religions, but it was something I was really uncomfortable with, because we wouldn't see eye to eye on alot of things because of it. I was absolutely confused as to what to do. He hooked up recently with this other girl he met. I guess he was tired of waiting for me, I really don't know. In a way I'm relieved because this might help me get over him, and concentrate on other things. This will leave open the opportunity to find someone that I can be truly compatible with and not just be brought together because it felt right at the time. But I still care very deeply for him. I regret not ever telling him that I loved him. I never confessed any of my feelings to him because I was afraid of where it would lead to. I don't know if I made the right decisions, I don't know if I should go to him now and tell him how I felt. I think I should leave it alone, because he does have a girlfriend now, and I don't want to mess that up for him. It would make sense if I expected that he leave her and us be together, but I don't want that either. Well my heart wants it, but everything else tells me its wrong. Where should I go from here?