INTPs and Emotional Shortsightedness

[Atomsk the Anti-Hero]

I'm relatively new here, and I wanted to get like-minded opinions on a somewhat personal matter. The title of the thread will make itself evident shortly, so just kind of just bear with me in the beginning. However, it's obvious INTPs have emotional shortsightedness.

So, I've been with my significant other, who we will call "Anne", for roughly the past three years. Our relationship has endured some rather rough times, but we've always gotten through it in the end. I am not an expert on MBTI, but if I had to place Anne in a particular type, and looking over a few of the types, the ESFJ comes to mind very quickly. However she is also slightly introverted, but the ISFJ profile doesn't fit her too well. More on the point; I fear Anne's patients for me may be wearing thin as of lately though, as she complains about a few particular things I do. For example, I tell her that I am going to do a lot of thing, such as change a part of my personality (which needless to say will never happen), or change a certain way that I communicate to her. I put in the effort to do so, but ultimately I never completely change. Nonetheless, I will usually say these things just simply to please her and just so she hears it. That normally satisfies her. However, today that is not the topic I wanted to discuss.

Anne's younger sister was recently diagnosed with double Pulmonary Embolism (blood clots in both lungs) and has been in and out of the hospital now for the past few weeks. When Anne first found out about this, she immediately called me and told me all about it. We discussed what exactly had caused it, and what this meant for her younger sister in terms of her health and her life in general. Without getting into too much detail of what exactly the entire prognosis was, she has a genetic disorder that causes unusually high coagulation of the blood for no apparent reason, but the genetic disorder is only made apparent by some sort of catalyst. In Anne's sister's case, it was triggered by a birth-control hormone. Doctors consider this to be very life threatening, and if the patient does not get it under control through a combination of blood thinners and lifestyle changes, they are at a high risk of stroke, heart attack, ect. After the disorder is triggered, it will not go dormant and the sufferer is meant to live with it for the rest of their life. Go figure. Keep in mind that all of this is based off of what Anne tells me. I'm a tad bit skeptical of all of it. I haven't actually done any research myself, because Anne doesn't know what that disorder is actually called. *sigh*
After having this conversation and several days later, the topic of Anne's sister came up again. She informed me that her sister had stabilized and the doctors had began the drug treatment to thin her blood. They also had found out that she may have suffered a mild stroke. After informing me all of this, Anne had brought up the fact that I have not asked how her sister was doing at all since she went into the hospital. She is always the one to bring up the conversation. Her reasoning is that because I don't ask how her sister is doing, or contact her sister to tell her that I am thinking about her and I hope she gets well soon, I must not care about her. She said what upset her the most was that she thought that I was close to her sister, and she expected me to be the first one to ask how she is and wish her to get well, and then always be asking her how her sister was doing, but instead I said nothing. Anne says that even people that hardly know her sister will ask all sorts of questions and say that they hope she gets well soon. I told Anne that I get all the information on her sister because she is always talking about it! She still insists that if I care about her sister, then I would initiate conversations, not her. Anne is a very emotional person, which is usually frustrating, and she will also obsess over things. So since the majority of her time is spent obsessing over her sister's health, and the conversation of her sister comes up, I either avoid the topic altogether, or I will make the conversation very lighthearted. Anne will say that I never take take the conversations seriously, which I respond that in a situation like this, you either laugh or cry about it. She replies that obviously I have chosen to laugh about it.

Basically my question is do INTP's not care about anything other than what is going on in there personal life? Things that aren't related to them, they just don't care about? Regardless if it their significant other's sibling, or their very own sibling, they just don't care? Is it that INTPs lack the emotional sight to grasp the fact that something like this is important to other people?
I know I threw a lot at you guys, but feel free to comment on any of it really.

For me, it's not that I don't care about Anne's sister, she is actually one of the select few people that I get along with and enjoy their presence. So I anything, I care a great deal about what happens to her. It's that I just kind of get wrapped up in other things and then I honestly forget about the person. It's not intentional or anything, it just happens. Then I get accused since I forgot about it, it must not have been very important in the first place. It's a vicious cycle... >.>

 

[pjoa09]

You are dating an ISFJ.

 

[EditorOne]

"Basically my question is do INTP's not care about anything other than what is going on in there personal life? Things that aren't related to them, they just don't care about?"


Look, INTPs are not easy dealing with emotions and you are in an overwhelmingly emotional situation, a girlfriend, who has a very sick sister, with genetic implications for your girlfriend. You are prone to being misunderstood (because even when you do care, it usually doesn't show or it doesn't come out right, or something you do that you think shows caring doesn't mean anything to the rest of the world). The likelihood of making it through all this without some scorch marks on your wings is pretty small.

The best you can do right now, MAYBE, is engage in a discussion with your girlfriend about what I just said. And, admitting you are an emotional dork, ask her to help you show that you care. If she gets wildly indignant and says "if you have to ask, blah blah blah," then just say "right, I do have to ask, and I'm asking you to help me show you I care."

Things will get better or worse from there, I suspect.

Since you're new here, let me backstop that with a utilitarian overgeneralization piled on top a useful stereotype: INTPs do have emotions and feelings and all that, but since we aren't skilled in understanding them or using them to decide on appropriate actions and decisions, we tend to shunt them aside into the long-term parking area. A lot of times that leads INTPs who learn the trick of shunting very well into believing they don't actually have emotions. Everybody does. We just don't trust them or use them when thinking seems to work out so much better for us. But if you ignore them, or forget about them, there can be a nasty surprise when you finally go to check them out of the lot. Maybe a lot of rust, maybe a big storage fee in the form of overwhelming you. So probably trying to deal with really big ones like you're facing is the smart thing to do.

So think: What does your girlfriend need? You aren't sure, so you have to ask her how to supply it. Damned awkward, but not impossible, especially if she has a three-year clue that you might not be like most other people in some ways.

Good luck. Remember to keep us posted.

 

[EditorOne]

Also, postscript, read your own post, she already told you at least one thing you can easily do: Initiate the conversation and inquire into her sister's health. You don't do it because if things were reversed, you'd find it an awkward, uncomfortable thing to be asked. She doesn't, so ask away. She said it: It is what she expects.

 

[Solitaire U.]

The interpretation I'm picking up here is personal issues masquerading as INTP issues (though in all fairness I didn't read the monolithic paragraph...). Not much to recommend...you either autonomously express a genuine interest or genuinely lack an interest and express nothing. I'd consider neither as grounds for condemnation.

 

[Atomsk the Anti-Hero]

First off, I want to thank all of you for the responses.

I realize that I wrote this thread in a somewhat rushed, last ditch effort to try to convince myself that I wasn't totally alone in my thinking and actions. Looking back at the enormous paragraph I wrote, there is a lot of things I could do that I knew that whole time. I agree that I was very overwhelmed when all this had happened. I do believe that she gave me plenty of subtle emotional clues, however I only realized these were actually clues to what I could do until after the moment of kairos had past. I do believe that I need to address these things before they get out of hand, but the initial awkwardness and rational thoughts to do the opposite can sometimes be unbearable.
I understand that I have quite a bit to work on in the department of emotional responses and understanding what an appropriate emotional response would be. I'm just going to take it day by day at trying to understand it, and start by forcing myself to inquire about her sister's heath, regardless if I think something like that is trivial or not.

Thanks again.

 

[DannyBoy]

Don't tell her you'll change part of your personality for her.