Relationship help thread...

Pitbull, I don't buy the attitude of 'This is who I am, I can't change'. Really, that just interprets as 'This is who I am, I don't want to change because I find it easier being this way, and screw what you think.'

That's not a great attitude to have, and it's lead to every bit as many divorces as you feel it's lead to happy marriages.

Whatever YOU think defines you, it's the result of a bunch of choices you're constantly making. This is why our personal tastes change, and we adapt. How can anybody enter a relationship with the attitude of 'This is who I am', when in fact that's just who they want to be right that *minute*, and ten minutes down the line they might be somebody completely different so long as it suits them? I wouldn't trust that person.

I'd really like to just say 'Oh sure, everybody go along their merry way and do what they want', but I can't stand the way insensitive guys hurt well-meaning women all the time from being selfish a-holes. Especially when just a little conversation would go a long way, rather than a 'I'll put her in her place' approach like we've seen above.
 
Pitbull, I don't buy the attitude of 'This is who I am, I can't change'. Really, that just interprets as 'This is who I am, I don't want to change because I find it easier being this way, and screw what you think.'

That's not a great attitude to have, and it's lead to every bit as many divorces as you feel it's lead to happy marriages.

Whatever YOU think defines you, it's the result of a bunch of choices you're constantly making. This is why our personal tastes change, and we adapt. How can anybody enter a relationship with the attitude of 'This is who I am', when in fact that's just who they want to be right that *minute*, and ten minutes down the line they might be somebody completely different so long as it suits them? I wouldn't trust that person.

I'd really like to just say 'Oh sure, everybody go along their merry way and do what they want', but I can't stand the way insensitive guys hurt well-meaning women all the time from being selfish a-holes. Especially when just a little conversation would go a long way, rather than a 'I'll put her in her place' approach like we've seen above.

That is your opinion and if you're happy living a life you don't want I suppose that is your prerogative. The OP had a date with this woman, she snoops on his phone and then has a bitch fit? I would have shown her the door and not even taken her home tbh. She had no business on his phone to begin with. And if he doesn't let her know it's not on then it will keep happening. If you don't like your partner getting pissed every weekend at the bar, do you tell him or adapt? **** it, tell him how it is and move on. The wife and I are extremely happy as we don;t have petty issues because we know each other in and out, we're exactly the same. I can go out and get pissed on a Friday night if i want to, so can she. She can go away on holiday with a friend if she wants and so do I.

would I have had such an awesome wife if I was trying to impress her by being someone I'm not?
 
That is your opinion and if you're happy living a life you don't want I suppose that is your prerogative. The OP had a date with this woman, she snoops on his phone and then has a bitch fit? I would have shown her the door and not even taken her home tbh. She had no business on his phone to begin with. And if he doesn't let her know it's not on then it will keep happening. If you don't like your partner getting pissed every weekend at the bar, do you tell him or adapt? **** it, tell him how it is and move on. The wife and I are extremely happy as we don;t have petty issues because we know each other in and out, we're exactly the same. I can go out and get pissed on a Friday night if i want to, so can she. She can go away on holiday with a friend if she wants and so do I.

would I have had such an awesome wife if I was trying to impress her by being someone I'm not?

Im not arguing or anything, I just want to know.

Lets just say your wife was on her phone for hours and you hear messages going back and fourth and when you ask who she is chatting to etc and she says "nobody". Would you not be slightly tempted to look at her phone when she doesn't have it?
 
That's where you're wrong, Pitbull, I AM living the life I want. The life I want is one of mutual understanding with my wife, and an acceptance that neither of us is perfect. You can disagree with how somebody behaves but still engage with them because you love them, to try to figure out what lies at the root of behaviour you don't like. In the OP's case, maybe his girlfriend had been cheated on by her last three boyfriends. Does that *excuse* her snooping on her very first sleep-over session? No, it doesn't ... but it does at least help to explain it.

Nothing in life is a complete mystery, so long as you know some of the back story, and care enough about the other person to discover it. It's a way of turning your focus outwards, away from yourself, and really seeing your partner and what they need from *you*. It's a Next Level experience for anybody who hasn't experienced that break-through yet, so don't ever think it's about deliberately selling yourself short or lying to yourself about what you want.

We're kind of going off the OP's point here, though. All I'd add is to say 'Don't throw the baby out with the bath water.' Too often people have ended relationships that would have changed their entire lives for the better, over the most petty things. Stick around, and honestly talk about it ... there's a good chance the woman you're with will appreciate that and open up to you in return, allowing you to have a deeper and more meaningful relationship.
 
*facepalm* Why, Random Hero, why???

Right up until that comment I was giving you the benefit of the doubt, but now I'm thinking this girl might be right about you.

WHY did you ever think it's cool to 'put somebody in their place', especially when it's a woman who is justifiably concerned about committing to somebody who has a sketchy chat history with multiple women?

I was also thinking the same thing until I saw his explanation. I think he was just carried away by the silly advice the men here are giving him about not letting himself become her b-tch.
 
Im not arguing or anything, I just want to know.

Lets just say your wife was on her phone for hours and you hear messages going back and fourth and when you ask who she is chatting to etc and she says "nobody". Would you not be slightly tempted to look at her phone when she doesn't have it?

I'm 100% honest here and say it would bug me. But I will never snoop on here phone ever. And she won't do it on mine. Our passwords are saved for facebook, gmail and so on for our pc's If I wanted too I can view her facebook, her e-mails and even her phone. I don't I honestly never do and neither does she.
 
That's where you're wrong, Pitbull, I AM living the life I want. The life I want is one of mutual understanding with my wife, and an acceptance that neither of us is perfect. You can disagree with how somebody behaves but still engage with them because you love them, to try to figure out what lies at the root of behaviour you don't like. In the OP's case, maybe his girlfriend had been cheated on by her last three boyfriends. Does that *excuse* her snooping on her very first sleep-over session? No, it doesn't ... but it does at least help to explain it.

Nothing in life is a complete mystery, so long as you know some of the back story, and care enough about the other person to discover it. It's a way of turning your focus outwards, away from yourself, and really seeing your partner and what they need from *you*. It's a Next Level experience for anybody who hasn't experienced that break-through yet, so don't ever think it's about deliberately selling yourself short or lying to yourself about what you want.

We're kind of going off the OP's point here, though. All I'd add is to say 'Don't throw the baby out with the bath water.' Too often people have ended relationships that would have changed their entire lives for the better, over the most petty things. Stick around, and honestly talk about it ... there's a good chance the woman you're with will appreciate that and open up to you in return, allowing you to have a deeper and more meaningful relationship.

Don't get me wrong, the wife and I have words from time to time, we argue and so on. I'm talking about being yourself here. There is a difference in making sacrifices as each and every relationship has them, no one is 100% compatible. Wife loves watching Girly movies and I don't. But she accepts me for who I am and I accept her for who she is. None of us have ever had to pretend to make the other one happy. I'm that friend where if my friends phone to ask me to go do something with them, a weekend away or even go clubbing with them so they can pick up chicks they know my wife will never have an issue with it and I don't give her a reason not to trust me. I'm not that guy who fights with his wife because he wants to go and she says no.
 
Which areas do you hang out in? I want to steer well away. I have never met a woman who doesntt want sex, in some cases more than men, but we're all the same in that department.

Maybe the women you hang around with are like that. But it's not all about sex for most women. wwoman. We're definitely not all the same in that department.
 
I was also thinking the same thing until I saw his explanation. I think he was just carried away by the silly advice the men here are giving him about not letting himself become her b-tch.

That's the worrying thing, isn't it? Peer pressure is super-real, and super-dangerous. Imagine if he'd just had a discussion with his worried new girlfriend while all carried away with selfish male gung-ho ... it would have ended only one way, and where would the people here have been to mend his broken heart?

Oh that's right, real men don't suffer broken hearts...
 
That's the worrying thing, isn't it? Peer pressure is super-real, and super-dangerous. Imagine if he'd just had a discussion with his worried new girlfriend while all carried away with selfish male gung-ho ... it would have ended only one way, and where would the people here have been to mend his broken heart?

Oh that's right, real men don't suffer broken hearts...

From his post they have been chatting for about a week and had a shag... No where does it mention gf :confused:
 
Don't get me wrong, the wife and I have words from time to time, we argue and so on.
You do know that's not what I was talking about when I emphasised the need to communicate? lol

There is a difference between two people having different interests (e.g. her watching 'girly' movies) and one person begging the other to do something, and the other refusing purely on the principle that they feel they'll be weaker if they agree (even worse when they don't actually have a real reason not to agree).

I honestly don't see all the men here claiming that they will do what they want, and never mind what their girlfriends/wives think; being happy if their girlfriend/wife uses the same attitude on them.

To take this to a psychological level, we DO something because it gives us pleasure. In a deep relationship, however, you can easily start gaining pleasure from giving your partner pleasure (and I'm not - just - talking sexually), to a point where this starts to off-set your own loss of independence by having to compromise. Sometimes (to use your example) if that husband had just stayed home when his wife asked (because she was feeling lonely), they'd have had an amazing dinner together and watched a wonderful movie; compared to him going out and leaving her to sulk, and coming back to a cold and bitter home.

Is the latter a victory for the man, especially one great enough to balance out the victory for the couple that the former is?

One can debate relationships for years, but really you just have to live them to figure them out.
 
That's where you're wrong, Pitbull, I AM living the life I want. The life I want is one of mutual understanding with my wife, and an acceptance that neither of us is perfect. You can disagree with how somebody behaves but still engage with them because you love them, to try to figure out what lies at the root of behaviour you don't like. In the OP's case, maybe his girlfriend had been cheated on by her last three boyfriends. Does that *excuse* her snooping on her very first sleep-over session? No, it doesn't ... but it does at least help to explain it.

Nothing in life is a complete mystery, so long as you know some of the back story, and care enough about the other person to discover it. It's a way of turning your focus outwards, away from yourself, and really seeing your partner and what they need from *you*. It's a Next Level experience for anybody who hasn't experienced that break-through yet, so don't ever think it's about deliberately selling yourself short or lying to yourself about what you want.

We're kind of going off the OP's point here, though. All I'd add is to say 'Don't throw the baby out with the bath water.' Too often people have ended relationships that would have changed their entire lives for the better, over the most petty things. Stick around, and honestly talk about it ... there's a good chance the woman you're with will appreciate that and open up to you in return, allowing you to have a deeper and more meaningful relationship.

Can I just say this. You said very sensible things. You sound like a very level headed and mature man. I was very surprised when I realised you were a man.
 
Can I just say this. You said very sensible things. You sound like a very level headed and mature man. I was very surprised when I realised you were a man.

Well thanks SaoirseB, I think. It's so sad that anybody online who doesn't only say 'Women are just there to shag, hur hur hur' is immediately presumed to be a woman. As a man, I'm pretty ashamed by that indictment.

It hasn't been easy for me to recognise the negative aspects of masculinity that I've been raised into, and to try and address those. That really starts right from the basics ... like taking in the washing even when I'd rather watch TV, just because I actually DO recognise my wife was the person to hang it up on the line in the first place, and she's also tired. It's a bit of an eye-opener.
 
Can I just say this. You said very sensible things. You sound like a very level headed and mature man. I was very surprised when I realised you were a man.

i'm shocked and surprised too, the decency and insightful posts from men are nearly absent on this forum, i thought we were all womanising, homophobic, racist, cheating, immoral meat eaters ;) :p
 
i'm shocked and surprised too, the decency and insightful posts from men are nearly absent on this forum, i thought we were all womanising, homophobic, racist, cheating, immoral meat eaters ;) :p
What do you mean???? You don't like the thread with the photo of a woman lifting donuts with her lady bits? I though that was extremely sensitive and thought-provoking. :P
 
i'm shocked and surprised too, the decency and insightful posts from men are nearly absent on this forum, i thought we were all womanising, homophobic, racist, cheating, immoral meat eaters ;) :p

:D I was pretty much convinced of this too until now.
 
I'm sure there must be women out there like that, but it's not the majority. Most women want to just cuddle and not necessarily have sex.
Women who make claims for most women are idiots or trolls. Which are you?
 
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