Posted by trouble on February 8, 2002, at 22:54:30
In reply to Re: Touch » Dinah, posted by Krazy Kat on February 6, 2002, at 12:18:04
> Dinah:
>
> I once went 8 months w/out touching another human being, just to see what all the fuss was about. That was 20 years ago. I'm no more settled on the issue today than then, I'm just really glad to see people talking about this.
I've beaten the crap out of men in bars for grab*ss*ng me, often to the cheers and whistles of fellow females before they pulled me off the jerk. I've been fearful of how far I could go in situations like that, but since middle-age I haven't had to beat 'em off the way I used to.
That's the main kind of touch I've experienced in my life so I'm ambivalent about the whole thing, but in my gut I think people can get real sick from lack of touch, so a couple times a year I go get a massage, cryin salty tears.
When someone I want to touch me does I become passive and brooding, look down at the ground, mumble, shrug it off, toss my hair, make a wry face, god knows what all. But I remember it, and keep going back over the memory in my head.I can't touch a person w/out first spending 15 hours in excruciating self-examination which rather queers the whole casual, spontaneous vibe I'm trying to affect. Had a therapist run and tell her supervisor in wonder that I'd touched her b/c it was the first time after seeing her over a year. I've been seeing my present male psychologist over 2 years and there's been no physical contact. It seems significant.
I have a friend who, like me was way abused as a kid but unlike me is real outgoing and gregarious, beautiful too, so people naturally
want to touch her but she reacts violently-jumps a foot in the air, throws their hand off, grimacing, meanwhile she's saying-
Forgive me, don't take it personal, it's not you at all, it's me, I just have this crazy hang-up about being touched, please accept my apology.Which makes her 10 times more adorable.
Anyway, thanks for bringing this out of the closet.
poster:trouble
thread:17803
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20020202/msgs/17981.html