Dear Aura:

You wrote: “My family is a very jealous one, I have three sisters and none of us had ever brought home a man that my parents liked”- and so it goes, four sisters who didn’t bring home a man (your mother) liked. Well, she liked him at first, but she corrected herself.

He reads like a loving, wonderful man. Your thinking and going about this relationship, the way you proceeded, taking your time, asking the questions, noticing all that you have, all are reasonable and quite impressive, if I may say so.

Unfortunately, what a girl’s mother thinks is so important to a girl, and the girl in you, that child that is in you (aka inner child) cares so much, that the importance of what I type here, of what anyone shares with you, pales in comparison, pales by a whole lot.

For a child, a little girl, there is no difference between herself and her mother, the two are one, a unit. With functional maturing, the girl separates from the mother. What you are experiencing is a going back to that unit. The answer, of course, is in reestablishing the separation that you did achieve, the undoing of the blur.

If such is not possible, this separation from her, mentally, then a marriage will not be fair to him.

It may be time for quality psychotherapy. If your mother continues with her negative and unreasonable input regarding this planned marriage, I do not see how you can establish and maintain the separation I am talking about. If she doesn’t change her input, and you keep hearing it, keep receiving it, your mental health is at great risk as well as a marriage with him, if it is to materialize.

If you keep contact with your mother and she continues to give her input regarding this man and the marriage with him, then your marriage and your emotional health are in trouble.

If she wouldn’t stop all of her input regarding this man and the marriage, all negative or positive input (at this point I don’t see how the latter can be trustworthy), then I think that the following choice is in front of you: end the relationship, cancel the wedding or cut all contact with your mother/ all contact that will deliver to you her input and resurrect the wonderful relationship you had and get married.

anita