Dear Theresa

 First, I probably didn't have quite as strong of romantic longings at the time as I indicated I did when I said I wanted a relationship, not casual dating.

You definitely were, and still are, attractive physically and otherwise. And, your interest in the arts, your Japanese-inclusive multi-ethnic background and other things made you attractive in the bigger picture.

That said, having had a couple of long-distance relationships putter out, and not having been in one for a while, I think that's part of why I spoke.

And, at the same time, there were also red and yellow flags.

The biggies were on money. You indicating I didn't make enough money, I guess is "understandable" from your point of view. Between teacher pay, department head stipend, master's boost, etc., plus private music lessons, you surely made twice as much as me. And, until a recent Google to your LinkedIn page and other stuff, I didn't even think about money you made off performance gigs.

At the same time, money was a red flag the other way. Yes, you had a mortgage payment vs. my rent payment. At the same time, you were renting out a garage apartment on the detached garage at your house. Probably a wash at "best" from my fiscal POV; at "worst," you were probably 20-25 percent ahead of me.

Yes, you were also finishing paying off your SMU master's of music degree loans, I expect. But? The flip side of that was department head stipend and master's boost.

Making half as much money as you, I was saving more.

And, this, second to the moves, moves, moves, since Today Newspapers closed, is probably the main reason I'm unattached today. I don't want someone more spendthrift than me putting me at financial risk.

===

There was one other problem, though.

Your comment about my hiking being just one big circle.

First, to riff on Heraclitus, it's never exactly the same trail twice.

Second, is not surfing, your passion, pretty much the same? You're paddling out in the same ocean and coming back in a loop on a wave.

===

Also, although not overtly, and nowhere in the way of a similar degree to Cathey, I occasionally had the impression that you thought I might have "issues." Maybe I'm wrong, to the degree I thought that then. Maybe I'm over- or misremembering now, driven by some version of motivated reasoning. 

But, to the degree I am right, in picking up on signals, that was troubling.

===

I'm not totally sure why I'm blogging this. 

I know it's a form of journaling. But, I could just keep it in a Word doc without posting it.

However, I think I'd like my few readers to know this about me, and also for the insights it may have in the first part, about "wanting a relationship" yet knowing that this want is "general" and not connected to a specific other.

As for "why" I'm blogging, writing or journaling this wherever, at this time?

Shannon.

Also unavailable to me, no doubt.

Physically? Oh, yes. 

Otherwise, and setting aside the issue of her kids? Less compatible in several interests ways than you and I would have been, Theresa.

But? More compatible in some personality ways. Though probably even less so than in others.

===

Part of this was on me, though. One part in particular.

Theresa was certainly physically attractive.

But? The same "shoulds" that said I should be wanting back in a relationship of some sort said I "should" feel sexually attracted by her. 

And I didn't.

I think in part that some of the other ancillary issues where I had flags pop up had done so early enough that I didn't move further forward otherwise.

And, that I didn't feel the desire to.

===

I won't die if I die alone.

But, even if well short of permanent, I'd love to have one real relationship, starting with the physical and sexual side, better than before.

Early life regrets — and even anger — aren't dead yet.

I don't think they ever will be, until I'm dead.

Take child sexual abuse and child PTSD seriously

Let’s stop blaming priests, or dirty old men on park benches, and instead look inside the four walls of home, or relatives’ homes, a lot more. And, let’s recognize that this causes “PTSD on the home front” (now that, due to the Iraq War, we’re sadly aware of PTSD). That, and more, is in my annual April column.

Child abuse changes the brain

Specifically, it changes RNA in an epigenetic process known as methylation.

PLATONISM AS PSYCHOLOGICAL BALM

When I was younger,
I believed in the Platonic ideal.
I especially believed in the ideal of myself;
Perfect, and so, incorporeal.
The Platonic equivalent
Of the Pauline spiritual body.
Why?
Was it a love of Platonic philosophy,
Or rather a Pauline loathing of the physical?
I believe the latter.
Not only had I internalized
Augustinian angst about concupiscence,
I also had been buffeted by childhood slings and arrows.
Bullying by neighborhood acquaintances,
Abuse of various types at home,
Asthma, allergies and other breathing problems,
A bit of a lisp,
Late growth and skinniness.
What shy, quiet, lonely, hurting boy
Wouldn’t harbor Platonic thoughts
As a secret dream of salvation
From the curse and burden of the physical,
Deliverance from a body
That brought nothing but pain?

NIAAA: Child abuse-alcoholism link

And, this research points up alleys I have wondered about, such as why different people react differently to child abuse, sexual especially. Read the details on this study:

Girls who suffered childhood sexual abuse are more likely to develop alcoholism later in life if they possess a particular variant of a gene involved in the body's response to stress, according to a new study led by researchers at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The new finding could help explain why some individuals are more resilient to profound childhood trauma than others.

"With this study we see yet again that nature and nurture often work together, not independently, to influence our overall health and well-being," says NIH Director Elias A. Zerhouni, M.D.

"This finding underscores the central role that gene-environment interactions play in the pathogenesis of complex diseases such as alcoholism," adds NIAAA Director Ting-Kai Li, M.D. A report of the study appears in the June 26, 2007 advance online publication of
Molecular Psychiatry.

Previous studies have shown that childhood sexual abuse increases the risk for numerous mental health problems in adulthood. However not all abused children develop such problems, a likely indication that genetic factors also play a role. Recent studies have linked the monoamine oxidase A (MAOA) gene with adverse behavioral outcomes stemming from childhood mistreatment.

"MAOA is an enzyme that metabolizes various neurotransmitters that regulate the body's response to stress," explains first author Francesca Ducci, M.D., a visiting fellow in NIAAA's Laboratory of Neurogenetics in Bethesda, Maryland. DNA variations occur within a regulatory area - the MAOA-linked polymorphic region (MAOA-LPR) — of
the MAOA gene. Two such MAOA-LPR variants occur most frequently and result in high or low MAOA enzyme activity. In a recent study, researchers found that maltreated boys who possessed the low activity MAOA-LPR variant were more likely to develop behavior problems than boys with the high activity variant.

"Our aim was to test whether this low activity variant influences the impact of childhood sexual abuse on alcoholism and antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) in women," says Dr. Ducci.

She and her colleagues analyzed DNA samples from a group of American Indian women living in a community in which rates of alcoholism and ASPD are about six times higher than the average rates among all U.S. women. Childhood sexual abuse is also prevalent in this population, reported by about half of the women in the community, compared with a
U.S. average of 13 percent.


Analyses of MAOA-LPR genotypes in this study revealed that women who had been sexually abused in childhood were much more likely to develop alcoholism and antisocial behavior if they had the low activity variant whereas the high activity variant was protective. In contrast, there was no relationship between alcoholism, antisocial behavior and MAOA-LPR genotype among non-abused women.

"Our findings show that MAOA seems to moderate the impact of childhood trauma on adult psychopathology in females in the same way as previously shown among males," says Dr. Ducci. "The MAOA-LPR low activity allele appears to confer increased vulnerability to the adverse psychosocial consequences of childhood sexual abuse."

Dr. Ducci and her colleagues suggest that the effect of MAOA on the hippocampus, a brain region which is involved in the processing of emotional experience, may underlie the interaction between MAOA and childhood trauma. They note that previous research showed that people with the low activity variant at the MAOA-LPR locus have hyperactivation of the hippocampus when retrieving negative emotional information.

Now, the $64 question is, what medical benefits will result from this? Will we fine-tune new anti-PTSD medications?