July 23, 2019:

"My fear of intimacy."

I'm unconvinced. She'll fall asleep with her head on my chest, whispering, as I run my fingers through her hair, "I love the way you touch me." That feels pretty intimate to me.

I suspect but can't claim certainty that her "fear of intimacy" is actually mistrust of adults, where the grownups in her life have abused her, or raped her, or let her down to such egregious and overwhelming degree that she no longer views them with anything but suspicion. Until she feels she's the adult: the family Hero who protects the younger children, who liaisons with the authorities and who when necessary has the bad crazy grownups arrested.

Where her mistake is in not trusting me. The adult whose loyalty isn't so much steadfast as ferocious; the adult who takes bullets for the girls he tries to rescue; the adult whose own life is a tranwreck from the damage those "rescues" have done.