A quick note on brain stuff

[kaberett]

Also worked out last night: part of the reason I find it so very hard to ask for help is that I still - still - think of myself as toxic and unwanted; I work really hard at not vanishing from social groups, not deliberately fading, because for most of my teens that is what I did. I would show up for long enough to help, and then I would try to vanish again before I did any serious harm. (The reasons I believed I would are... long and tedious.)

So I position myself as caretaker and as advisor; I listen well and carefully and I offer opinions and I try very hard indeed not to "impose", even in the slightest, by requesting (or expecting!) reciprocation.

This is, as it turns out, a really bad basis for an equal and mutually-supportive relationship.