Dear Evokun:

You are a 34 year old Chinese- Indonesian man. On April 7, you met a 32 year old single mother of a 5 year old living in Bali (a province in Indonesia, Indonesia main tourist destination). She is “Very fun personality, great body, able to bring any conversation unlike anyone I’ve met, and cancer survivor.. an agnostic”, and your relationship took place via video calls because of the pandemic.

As a single mother in Indonesia she suffers discrimination, the reason why her three previous relationships failed- the men’s parents objecting to marriage with a single mother. After some time, you both had feelings for each other, you deleted all your dating apps, and the two of you video called 2-3 times a day, going as far as planning your future, “where to live, sharing the same views about weddings, what are we gonna do when we finally meet around June”. You didn’t bother telling your mother about the relationship, “know(ing)she wouldn’t agree.. she’ll probably get seriously ill”. You told your advanced-stage cancer suffering father about the woman in your life: he “initially said no.. then he had mixed feelings.. Then a few days later, he tried to convince me to break it up with her”.  When you told your girlfriend about your father’s reactions, she cried, and you cried as well.

Next, your uncle ran off to Australia and the family’s company was about to collapse. Your girlfriend, being knowledgeable in legal right, told you what to do, trying to help your family business.

May 17, a month and ten days of a video calls/ long distance relationship, she told you that she “needed a break.. under her mum’s advice”. A week later, you asked her if she meant a breakup, and she said: “You can call it whatever you like.. you have to focus on your company and dad’s health. Besides, none of your family likes me. What can I do? Force them to accept me? You know that’s almost impossible. No matter how much you love me, you can’t just throw everything you have now just to be with me.. Your life can’t accept someone like me”. When you asked her if the two of you will ever meet again, she replied: “Dunno.. depends on you”.

You lost your appetite and you are miserable.

My input: what she told you is very reasonable. When she said “depends on you”, to me it means that she gave you the option of either successfully convincing your parents to approve of a marriage with her, or going against your parents and proceeding with your plans of marriage without your parents’ consent.

You didn’t proceed to do either; you didn’t confront the issue she brought up to you and instead, you ignored it. If you were to confront the issue, you would figure out for yourself if this short but meaningful long distance relationship with her is worthy enough for you to take some action on the matter.

What do you think about my input?

anita