Dear Peace,

after I’ve read your “Guilty or not?” thread, I agree with Anita that your relationship with men has probably to do with your childhood wound.

There’s been a pattern in your relationships where you feel guilty about leaving: it happened with your first, long-term boyfriend, whom you started dating at the age of 15. You said he never showed you much love, but when you wanted to leave him, he threatened to kill himself. He also was saying he’d burn the first letter of your name on his body, or cut his hand nerves as a “proof” of his love for you. That emotional  blackmail made you feel even more guilty for leaving. Your toxic boyfriend also blamed you (and harassed you and made you financially broke) when you wanted to break up with him. This boyfriend might not be blaming you (or not yet) but you’re blaming yourself.

You said:

“yesterday in the video call conversation he asked me whats wrong and i couldnt reply .he was hurting i was hurting too..than he asked ,if i m not having feelings for him i said yes … he started crying i was saying :i m really sorry ,i m trying ,i dont know what to do i was saying again n again..i have been trying i started to cry and i couldnt stop in that video call”

When he asked you what’s wrong, you couldn’t tell him the truth that his irresponsible behavior and empty promises turn you off. You couldn’t verbalize that you’re disappointed in him or have issues with his behavior. Instead, you started blaming yourself, like it were your fault that you simply just “turned off” and lost love for him, as if it didn’t have anything to do with his bad behavior.

A pattern I see here is that you get involved with a man, after a while you realize he doesn’t make you happy, you want to break up, but then you blame yourself for wanting to leave. And they blame you too. You start believing the problem is in you, not in them.

The reason for that is most likely in your childhood, because when the child doesn’t receive the love they crave, they blame themselves, not the adult. The child starts believing they are unlovable, and that something’s wrong with them. The same as you’re now believing about yourself…

In your description of your childhood, I noticed you didn’t mention your father, only the male cousins who harassed you. Your issues with men might be related to the absence of a father figure. If you’re comfortable with sharing a bit more about your childhood, I think it would explain a lot of what you’re experiencing in your relationships with men.

Dear Peace,

thanks for explaining a bit more. That was truly a traumatic experience, your first bf was definitely a psychopath. Just the fact that he told you that you need to pay him back, when he was actually living at your place almost for free, and you took care of him while he was sick – despicable! I am glad you managed to stand up on your feet again and that you’ve learned a lesson from that experience!

“may be thats what attracts these guys are that i wont be ( burden)dependent on them in any way ,and still they can spend good time without investing much (as i dont expect for beautiful expensive gifts from them)”

Yes unfortunately it does seem like that. And you’re willing to help them and even sacrifice yourself for them, while they hardly contribute anything. It’s almost a free ride for them…

So I guess this could be another lesson for you – not to get involved with men who’d try to use you. One example would be not to date men who want to move in immediately with you, because they don’t have a place to stay. Or not to give them money for their financial troubles. So, create some precautions and boundaries before you get more deeply involved with them.

Dear Peace,

I’ve read your previous thread, from 7 months ago, and there’s one thing that stood out: that you’re very susceptible to the social/cultural pressure to get married, and also about “what the people will say” (e.g. you felt uncomfortable when your previous boyfriend would stay with you on the weekends, and you weren’t married). So, perhaps the greatest dilemma is – do you want to follow tradition and indeed get married as soon as possible, because that’s what’s expected from you, or you want to give yourself time to meet the right guy – someone whom you really like and respect and feel you can rely on?

It seems you feel pressured to decide ASAP, and that’s why are now pressuring your current boyfriend to come up with a marriage proposal, which he’s reluctant to (“I told my bf abt proposal he got very upset.. I asked him to talk to his mom about our proposal he said he will do in 2-3 days.. And till today i got 0 update about this..“) It’s good he’s reluctant, because he doesn’t seem like someone you could rely on, and he would probably cause you great pain and frustration in a marriage.

However, an even bigger problem, in my opinion, is the need to rush things and then get completely lost and don’t know what you really want for yourself. You seem to be an intelligent, independent woman, who can take care of herself very well financially. You’re also a very kind person, willing to help others. You don’t need to rush to marry someone just because it’s expected from you. You need time to get to know the person and see if you like them, and even see how they behave in various life situations.

So my advice is think about what you really want for yourself, and if expectations and other people’s opinions are more important than your own long-term happiness.

Dear patelh,

your situation reminds me of my cousin. Her in-laws never accepted her, were telling she’s not good enough for their son, because she’s a few years older, hasn’t graduated from college, and that she’s messy and doesn’t keep order at home. Well, that may be true, but she’s a good person otherwise and was a good match for her husband. They did well and had 2 beautiful daughters together. The husband was loving in the beginning, but then started to criticize her more and more, falling under the influence of his parents. Eventually he filed for divorce, and they did get a divorce. She was devastated but she’s survived, and probably she’s better off now without the constant criticism and put-downs by her husband and in-laws.

The problem is that he was a weak man, insecure in himself, and didn’t have the guts to confront his parents and defend her. She had low self-esteem issues, and so she tolerated his criticism, and partly thought she deserved it. He was the superior one, she was inferior. She believed it.

I see a lot of similarities with your situation, because as you say, your husband doesn’t respect you and agrees with his parents and family that you’re inferior. It could be that he’s specially rude and impatient with you nowadays because you’re not working and decided not to look for a job at the moment. My cousin’s husband was similar – he didn’t like that she stayed more than one year at home after the birth of their 2nd daughter. He thought she was lazy.

My advice is to separate from your husband because it probably won’t get better. It could in theory, if you move somewhere else, where he’s further away from his family. But it’s not a guarantee because they can still influence him – and he seems very susceptible to their opinion. If he doesn’t respect you, that’s a huge and No1 problem. Another problem is if you don’t respect yourself…. You’d need to work on your self-esteem and decide that you’re good enough, there’s nothing wrong with you, and that you don’t want to tolerate this kind of attitude.

I guess if you’d like to separate, you would need to find a job, so it’s not the best timing for you now. But this situation with your husband isn’t really sustainable and will only make you miserable.

• This reply was modified 4 years, 8 months ago by Tee.

Dear Jane,

“I think back then I was trying to accept some responsibility for the way my son had grown into the person he was. When his father and I split I didn’t handle it well. At that time in my life I was dealing with so much other stuff maybe I overlooked the impact it was having on him. He was a teenager at the time and we had always been close, but eventually he went to live with his father. He always blamed me for the split.”

You and your late husband’s divorce must have impacted your son a lot, especially since he was in a sensitive age. You say you were close before, but then I guess he got distant, to the point he chose to live with his father? There must be a lot of anger and resentment on his part, which he hasn’t processed.

You say he has mental health problems – what kind of problems, if I may ask? You said he’s claiming there’s nothing wrong with him, and that professionals say there’s nothing wrong with him either. Has he visited at least one counselor?

I must say I feel compassion for him, and maybe I am partial, because I know that people often engage in self-destructive and irresponsible behavior, because they haven’t received something from their parents. They’re in pain and their behavior is a mirror of that pain. It doesn’t mean you should blame yourself for his actions, since he’s an adult and is responsible for his own life, but just perhaps try to see him beyond his current demeanor and understand that he might be hurting.

Dear Inquisitive Soul,

It appears to me you’re caught in a conflict of whether to choose yourself or others. When you’re with others and socializing, it usually turns out to be a bad influence on you and you’re forced to cut them off. In other words, if you open up to others, it might cause you harm. But if you’re alone, in your “shelter”, you feel lonely and you harm yourself in different ways, by e.g. indulging in video games. So you end up feeling bad in either scenarios. Am I guessing this right?

You say: Whenever mom sends me a message “how I’m doing?” I always answer “okay”. I’ve read your other thread, and based on your discussion with Anita there, it could be that you’re repeating the pattern you’ve seen in your family. They were trying to protect you from family problems, and now you’re trying to protect them from your own problems, by not telling them the truth of how you’re feeling. But the price of that is loss of closeness and intimacy.

Maybe you’ve got that pattern going on with your friends and acquaintances too – perhaps you’re showing a particular “front” to them, e.g. of a busy person, or a successful person, while you’re not really sharing your deeper thoughts and feelings, perhaps your doubts and struggles too. This might be why you attract a certain type of friends, which later turn out to be not the best influence on you.

Do you think this might be a part of what’s going on?

Dear c,

it’s reassuring to know that maladaptive daydreaming is indeed related to childhood trauma and that it can be healed by working on our traumas. It’s fantastic that you’ve managed to heal it, and are now able to regulate yourself with breathing and centering, when you feel the tendency to “escape”. Good work! I hope Javairia can benefit from your experience too.

Dear Neverdyed,

thanks for clarifying. Anita once noticed (and you confirmed it) that sometimes you use vague language, because you don’t want to reveal that you still care about this man. You’re a little ashamed that you still have feelings for him. But please know that the first step in healing is actually to admit all your feelings, even if they’re immature or inappropriate or illogical, or whatever. We can’t switch off our feelings on command, because they reflect our deeper needs, our wounding, our hopes and dreams. We need to work through and process those feelings, and only then can they transform. Only then can we let go.

I’m sure that there can be a friendship between a man and a woman, because I do have such a “pure” friendship going on, just wondered if I could be like that with that man, and you probably would agree that it’s not too possible as long as I still “hold on” to a degree.

Yes, as long as you have feelings for him and e.g. expect him not to contact you when he’s with other women, it means it hurts you when he’s with other women, so clearly, it can’t be friendship on your part. If you would be honestly unaffected and could even be happy for him if he’s happy with someone else, that would mean you could be his friend. But you don’t need to be his friend. It’s okay not to be friends with men you’re attracted to, where you cannot necessarily keep a “pure” friendship.

And yes, it upsets (or upset) me to think if he has chosen other women over me, I think it left me feeling not good enough.

OK, so one issue could be your sense of not being good enough. Do you often criticize and judge yourself that you’re not good enough?

As for what I need from him, I read the question as “what did he give to make me stuck on this connection?”, and thought the answer were the good old times, but what I remember better now are those bitter moments.

What was good about the “good old times”? How did the relationship look like? How did you feel back then? Answering these questions will help you identify what it is that you really miss now.