Thursday, Aug. 20, 2009
He's Badly Stung By His First Breakup
Q: I am crushed. A woman I loved deeply has betrayed me. We were together eight months and talked about marriage. She told me last week that she was returning to her old boyfriend. I’m 25 and this is my first really serious relationship. I feel sick, can’t eat, am depressed. I have no interest in getting involved again. It’s not worth the pain. Am I wrong to feel this way?
STEVE: Well, as Sigmund Freud observed, romantic love is “admittedly an unusual state, but not one that can be stigmatized as pathological.” So, while it feels like it might kill you, it probably won’t. Go through two or three of these, and you’ll find your judgment sharpened and your heart a bit tougher, which are handy life skills.
MIA: Dude, join the club. We’ve all been there. That’s why there are so many sad love songs on the radio. When your heart heals, you’ll be interested in women again. In the meantime, do what you can to make yourself feel better. Go to the gym. Hang out with friends. Take a trip. Get a little counseling if you feel you need it. It takes time to heal after you’ve been dumped. But you will heal and love again.
Q: I ’ve been dating a guy for two years and we are close to getting married, but lately things have been rocky because of what I’ve found on his Facebook page. Old girlfriends have friended him, women he never told me about. I find myself reading his page every day. He says he loves me and that’s all that matters. It seems that as his fiancee, I am entitled to know everything about him. Am I wrong?
MIA: That’s the problem with snooping. It’s a lose-lose situation, because if you find something and wind up confronting your partner about it, then you become the bad guy. Why? Because then he’ll find out that you don’t trust him and that you’ve been rifling through his friends list. No sane person wants to be in a relationship with someone who doesn’t trust them. If I were your guy, I’d run for the hills, ’cause, girlfriend, you clearly have issues. Either you should check yourself or take a step back from the relationship, because something about the dynamics is making you uneasy.
STEVE: A nosy person often gets a bloody nose, symbolically speaking. You’re not invading his privacy – many can read his Facebook page – but you are obsessing about it. If you love and trust him and he loves you, then frequent Facebook visits are unnecessary. One more thing: No one is “entitled” to know everything about anyone else.
Steve (not his real name) is 50-something and has been married to his second wife for 20 years. Mia (not her real name) is a 20-something single immersed in the dating scene.
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