Dear Rhaenys:

“I do feel a bit scared, as I’m 33.. is it too late and are all the good guys taken?”-

– My answers: it is not too late, and not all the good guys are taken. Many good guys are taken, but many bad guys are taken too, so what is available is still, as always, the good and the bad, and all that’s in between.

In your recent post you shared about your parents’ marriage, which ended when you were 20, an ending that you expected much earlier. You expected it much earlier because “They were fighting.. they didn’t get along, there were some nasty fights, not just between them, but between my brother and me, and us with them.. We also had some fights after divorce”, “but even when they were not (fighting).. I felt it’s not working.. their relationship didn’t work”.

You blamed your father a lot, feeling “that he didn’t try enough”. He was often away and your mother “was home, she did almost all of the housework and was always there for us”. Soon after the divorce, your father had a new woman in his life and wanted you to get to know her and her family; you didn’t want that. Next, your father’s parents whom you were “really close with” got sick and died.

My understanding as it is today: you were never married, so you never experienced your own marriage. But you did experience your parents’  marriage by proxy, as if it was your own marriage (children do that). This experience has been very powerful in your life, particularly in the context of your adult love-relationships with men.

There was a lot of aggression in your home, between all parties, at different times, and even when no one was fighting, there was aggression in the air, hanging in there, spoiling times that were supposed to feel good, like Christmas dinner, trips and vacations.

When you were not fighting with your brother or with your parents, you witnessed your brother fighting with your parents, and you witnessed your parents fighting each other. At times you identified with one parent, at other times- maybe you identified with the other parent, so you were emotionally involved in the fights even when you were not part of them.

You were often anxious growing up, uncomfortable and at times angry. Fast forward- this is how you feel in your relationships with men: anxious, and “when things don’t go the way I planned it, I start being angry”.

You wrote about that last relationship: “I think he wanted a relationship, but in terms of seeing each other and dating.. I wanted something more“-

– I think that this “something more” that you wanted was to feel that enough-feeling, that nothing-is-missing feeling, and that-something-missed-is-back (“I remember a feeling that when our family was together… somehow it was not enough.. that feeling that somehow our family isn’t enough, that something missed, went away“).

That Something-is-missing is Safety = feeling comfortable, calm and warm inside when together.

You were angry at your father for being away a lot, for leaving your mother alone in the home, so you decided that you will not leave a boyfriend alone (“I never went with my friends instead of him”). You were angry at your father  for not trying enough, for leaving your mother alone with all the housework, so you decided that you will try enough, and you not leave your boyfriend alone with his work (“I did put him first.. I still helped him with his exams.. I helped him with college a lot”).

Overall, within a relationship with a man, I see your challenges being:

1. Anxiety, fear that the relationship will go badly, just as your parents’ relationship went badly again and again and again. This anxiety is  likely to be there not only when there is a conflict but at any time, just like it has been for you as a child during trips and vacations, the aggression and anxiety hanging in the air, spoiling the moment.

2. Anger, which often accompanies fear. Animals, including humans, feel fear right before the anger.

3. Conflict: not wanting to be like your father (not try hard/ break up with him), and on the other hand wanting to break up with him so to not be stuck in .. a marriage like the one between your parents, the marriage you experienced as your own, by proxy.

anita