Advice from those with engaged kids, please...

nottelling
Mon, 21 Dec 2015 04:18:39 +0000

PS – Please try NOT to convey your anxiety to your son. I’m someone with a pretty severe chronic illness, and, despite working unbelievably hard to appear normal to the outside world, there’s a part of me that feels essentially unloveable because of my “defects.” It is very, very easy for a chronically ill person to internalize the sort of anxiety that you are conveying here as doubts as to one’s own essential loveability. I know 1000% that is not what you mean or intend to convey. But imagine if your son secretly harbors some (potentially unconscious) doubts about whether anyone could really love him because of his illness, and you start grilling him about whether his girlfriend truly knows the extent of his illness and truly knows just what she is in for, emotionally, physically and financially. I am telling you this could be quite damaging.

(And just to show how deep this goes – even though this is an anonymous forum and you are all total strangers – I feel compelled to add that if you met me you would never know I was sick. I am very reluctant to reveal this info even in this context because I feel it affects my likeability even here.)