I'm a straight man whoâs been dating a woman for not quite four months. In the beginning things were light. But things started to get heavy quickly. Two weeks in she revealed her very serious abandonment issues and then began asking me whether I really loved her and demanding reassurance that I wasnât going anywhere and she wouldnât be âjust a single chapterâ in my life. After a month, I met her seven-year-old son, her parents, and her ex. Then we had a pregnancy scare. She told me that if she was pregnant she would keep it because then I would have to stay. That alarmed me. I voiced that weâd been dating for very a short time and this wasnât a good time for either of us to have a child. She wasnât pregnant, luckily. Even before...
Passionate Reassurances Extracted So Soon Undoes Relationship Exit
As I explained to a reader in a similar situationâŚ
âWe need someone's consent before we kiss them, suck them, fuck them, spank them, spoon them, marry them, collar them, etc. But we do not need someone's consent to leave them. Breakups are the only aspect of our romantic lives where the other person's consent is irrelevant. The other person's pain is relevant, of course, and we should be as compassionate and considerate as possible when ending a relationship. (Unless we're talking about dumping an abuser, in which case safety and self-care are all that matters.) But we don't need someone's consent to dump them.â
Voice that itâs over, PRESSURE, and then refuse to get drawn into negotiations about whether itâs over. Itâs over. If she needs to cry on someoneâs shoulder, sheâll have to call a friend. And if she brings up the promises you made after she ârevealedâ her abandonment issues weeks into this relationship, apologize for not being strong enough to resist her obviousâif possibly subconsciousâefforts to manipulate you. She shouldnât have asked you to swear your undying love after youâd known each other for such a short time and you shouldnât have made the promises you did. You failed her and yourself by not telling her it was too soon for that shitâtoo soon to say âI love you,â too soon to know whether she would be a chapter in your life, too soon to meet her son (!), her parents (!!), and her ex (!!!).
Demands for premature reassurances of everlasting love, like all demands for premature commitments, are intended to make exiting the relationship more difficult. Not for the person making the demands, of course; theyâre always free to go. They make it more difficult for the person those demands are being made of to go. And while Iâm not calling your girlfriend an abuser, demands for premature commitments are often red flags for abuse; being asked to make a premature commitment after a few weeks or monthsâby moving in together or adopting a dog or (God forbid) getting marriedâmakes it infinitely harder for a person to leave once the mask slips and they see the abuser lurking behind it. Again, I donât think your girlfriend is an abuser, but she weaponized her insecurities (âItâs nice to meet you, now let me tell you about my abandonment issues!â) to extract what amounts to premature commitment from you. And she involved her son in that effort, which is really unconscionable. And while thatâs on her, PRESSURE, not you, you shouldâve refused to meet her son so quickly and seen her desire to introduce you to him as a red flag.
Learn the lessons, PRESSURE: When someone youâve only recently started dating says, âWill you love me forever?â the correct answer is never, âOf course I will!â The correct answer is always, âI think youâre a wonderful person and I want to keep seeing you but we canât knowâat this stageâwhat the future will bring.â If they respond by saying, âYou know what? Youâre right,â keep seeing them. If they respond by melting down and bringing up their abandonment issues, well, theyâve just demonstrated that they arenât someone you would want a future with.
And finally, Iâm #TeamAmanza on the issue of meeting a new partnerâs children from a previous relationship. You should be seeing someone for at least six months to a yearâyou should be well out of the honeymoon phase if not quite into the farting-in-front-of-each-other phaseâbefore being introduced to your new partnerâs kid(s).
Iâm a 32-year-old straight man dating a 31-year-old straight woman. Weâve been seeing each other for eight months and became âFacebook officialâ (if thatâs still a thing) in June. We are both in our first serious relationship after being divorced from relatively long marriages. (Me: eight years, two kids. Her: ten years, no kids.) My question is when does suspicionâsuspicion of cheatingâbecome something you should bring up? I tend to spill everything thatâs going on in my life, which she says she appreciates but isnât used to doing. Sheâs a very independent person, which Iâve never experienced before. Itâs refreshing to know that my partner has her own friends but there are moments when I get stonewalled. Sometimes I get vague answers or no answers about where she is or who sheâs with. She often tells me she âaccidentallyâ turned off her notifications. Sometimes she will say sheâs staying in and then I later find out that she went out. Maybe Iâm taking things way too seriously considering the amount of time weâve been together but I feel I have to take things seriously since kids are involved.
The Absent Girlfriend
The uncharitable read: Your hunch is correct and your new girlfriend is being cagey about where sheâs going and who sheâs with because sheâs cheating on you.
The charitable read: Your new girlfriend is 31 years old, she was married for ten years, and youâve been dating for eight months. Math has never been my strong suit but assuming her marriage didnât end five minutes before you met, TAG, your girlfriend married very young. Which means she spent her entire adult lifeâmost or all of her twenties and possibly a chunk of her teensâhaving to answer to a spouse. She only recently begun to experience the kind of autonomy most of us get to enjoy before we marry and settle down (if we marry and settle down), TAG, and she may be reluctant to surrender that autonomy so shortly after achieving it.
She may also have different ideas about what being Facebook official means. Does that mean youâre monogamous? If it does, does she define monogamy the same way you do? Some other questions: Was going Facebook official your idea or her idea? Did you ask for a premature commitment? Youâre only eight months inâis it possible you involved your kids too soon?
You obviously need to have a conversation with your girlfriendâif you can get her on the phoneâabout your expectations and definitions. If you expect her to let you know where she is at all times and whoâs sheâs with, TAG, make that clear. But if that is what you expect, well, hereâs hoping she dumps you. Because even if you lived together, even if you were married, even if she wanted to spend the rest of her life with you, your girlfriend would still entitled to a little privacy and her autonomy.
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