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RichardBrooks
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Default May 15, 2016 at 11:22 PM
  #1
I posted this in another section, but it mostly got little attention (though I am thankful for the whopping 2 replies it did get). So I'm thinking maybe readers here may be able to relate better?

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I don't want to go crazy with details in the first post here. To summarize as much as possible, I have been in a handful of serious relationships in my life, and they have all ended the same way (with some slight variation). I think things are going great until suddenly, whether it's a few month or a few years in, she breaks off ties with me because she has met someone else. I don't just mean breaks up, I mean cuts me out of her life completely, with not so much as an explanation or even a discussion of what went wrong. And, yes, there is always someone else in her life immediately.

I have been engaged twice. My first fiancee flat out told me she was cheating on me, and "if you were a real man, you'd have known it." The second, I caught cheating when her (then) 4 year old son was playing with her cell phone, and when I got the phone away from him, on the screen was the text conversation between her and her ex-husband. In addition to references to a night they had spent together (when I thought she was working), they were talking about her wanting to leave me for him, but needing to keep me around because she couldn't afford to pay the bills on her own. (He had no job.)

The last relationship I was in was with someone I knew from online She was the one who pointed out that many of my prior experiences actually qualified as emotional abuse. She had nothing but disparaging things to say about the women I had been involved with in the past, and told me that if we were together I would finally know 'how a woman should treat a man'. (This was before our friendship developed into a relationship.) We were involved for about two months when she unexpectedly told me she wanted to back off because she had a lot of stress in her life already, and a long-distance relationship was too much at the time. I was understanding and tried to take things back to the level of friendship... until I discovered she was already seeing someone else. This after many reassurances (from her and her best friend) that she would never do something like that. When I confronted her about this, she admitted it, but when I asked her why, the closest to an answer she ever gave me was "I can't tell you because I don't want to hurt your feelings." This was the very same behavior she herself had called abusive.

So my question is this: How do I break this cycle? I have been through three therapists in the past year, and the only advice I get there is I need to learn to be okay with being alone. Well, I'm not. I cannot accept that being alone is my only option. I cannot accept that numerous women from various backgrounds and various walks of life have all cheated on me and lied to me, and there is no explanation for this and nothing I can do about it. I see other "men" in long-term relationships every day, "men" without jobs, "men" with prison records, "men" with kids they don't pay child support on, "men" who abuse and mistreat the women they are with. What are these so-called 'men' doing right that I am doing wrong? Or what is so d***ed unacceptable about me? But, most importantly, how do I change this? How do I break this cycle? How do I ensure that I don't get treated this way again? Are there any honest and decent women out there, or was that just a fairy tale?

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Default May 15, 2016 at 11:29 PM
  #2
Quote:
Originally Posted by RichardBrooks View Post
I posted this in another section, but it mostly got little attention (though I am thankful for the whopping 2 replies it did get). So I'm thinking maybe readers here may be able to relate better?
Be more discerning in your choice of women and remember that 3/4 of women are *****es and liars and like most men, don't know what they want or how long they will want it. Wish I could give you more useful info.
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Thanks for this!
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Default May 16, 2016 at 03:19 AM
  #3
look for signs that show how serious a person is about you and your relationship and talk honestly about your expectations.
will the person run ar the first sight of obstacle? will s/he leave you when someone new comes along?
these are questions nobody can answer but you can attempt to seek out a person who takes your companionship as seriously as you do and always puts your needs first. It can be little things like making you soup when you are sick or picking you up from work so you can go on a date together..
Some people may not be able to put in that much effort but will show you in other ways that they care. They will want to know how your day went and build you up after a bad day for example.
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Default May 16, 2016 at 05:46 PM
  #4
It sounds like you need to make a lot of changes and perhaps face a lot of truths about yourself.

I firmly believe if a person mistreats you, it's because you mistreat you.

Or to put it another way. You ARE what YOU think.

So you have to ask yourself, is there some kind of issue you have with yourself, some kind of negative core belief which you have which is attracting this sort of person into your life. You must have some kind of idea why this is happening to you.

You obviously believe the answer lies in a forum. How can a person on a forum tell you about yourself? They can't.

And if you don't know yourself, how can you even begin to know someone else.

You can love without the need to be loved but first you have to love yourself.

And once you discover this, you will attract the same self loving person into your life.
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Default May 17, 2016 at 01:59 PM
  #5
Have you ever heard of something called the Drama Triangle? Look it up and see if any of it makes sense to you.
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Default May 19, 2016 at 03:23 AM
  #6
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It sounds like you need to make a lot of changes and perhaps face a lot of truths about yourself.

I firmly believe if a person mistreats you, it's because you mistreat you.

Or to put it another way. You ARE what YOU think.

So you have to ask yourself, is there some kind of issue you have with yourself, some kind of negative core belief which you have which is attracting this sort of person into your life. You must have some kind of idea why this is happening to you.

You obviously believe the answer lies in a forum. How can a person on a forum tell you about yourself? They can't.

And if you don't know yourself, how can you even begin to know someone else.

You can love without the need to be loved but first you have to love yourself.

And once you discover this, you will attract the same self loving person into your life.
Personally, I think I'm a great guy and anyone who doesn't think so doesn't deserve me. I am fast developing some issues... with constantly being cheated on. I have no idea why this is happening to me, and I thought I might look to this forum for answers after not finding them from romantic partners, friends, family members, psychiatrists, self-help books... hell even a psychic because why the hell not, I'd tried everything else. (She started to read my palm, stopped, folded my hand shut and said one word: "verboten". Tell me what that's about.) I know full well it's possible to love without the need to be loved... but that still begs the question, why the hell can't I be loved? And why do people act like single people are somehow in the wrong for expressing a need to be loved? Companionship is a basic human need.

But, it's not just about not having found a partner. This crap bleeds over into every aspect of life. Throughout my twenties, I watched my friends pair off and pair up. I started getting invited around less and less because I guess I got to be a drag being the only still-singly guy in the room. Now I run into an old friend occasionally in the grocery store or whatever, we chat a bit, talk about getting together sometime, and they never answer or return my calls. I go out to eat alone, I go watch movies alone, I go to the park alone, I go on vacations alone. Whatever I do, I do alone.

I used to do work as a substitute teacher. When I hit 30, I started getting fewer and fewer calls, and when I asked a friend of mine who's an English teacher about it, he told me, "You're a man past a certain age who's never been married and wants to be around kids; people find that suspicious." Seriously?! Yeah, I liked being around kids. I liked seeing their faces light up when they suddenly understood a new math concept, or their sudden amazed excitement when chemistry class went from being a bunch of esoteric formulae on a dry erase board to blowing stuff up or making it snow in the classroom. Man, I can't tell you how it felt when a young man approached me a couple of years ago, introduced himself as Doctor so and so, and told me I was the reason he became interested in biology, which led to his interest in medicine.

But nevermind all that; I shouldn't be around kids because I never married. Really?

Four years ago, I was running for State Representative, and I was asked once, "How can we know where you stand on family values when you don't have a family?" Yeah, I probably should have had some kind of response planned for that, but I never even imagined myself being asked such a thing, but honestly, it rattled me, and I know it cost me more than a few votes.

Single men are expected to take fewer vacations and work more hours (it's not like they have a family to spend time with), but are paid less and promoted less often. Fortunately, this doesn't concern me anymore, as I own my own business.

If you're past your mid thirties, being divorced or widowed is understandable, but if you are still single, the first question people ask (once you assure them you are straight) is "what's wrong with you?" I have been asked this by people my age, people far older than me, and people half my age.

So do I have issues? Yeah, not just with being excluded from love, but also with feeling excluded from life because I was excluded from love.

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Default Jun 23, 2016 at 02:00 PM
  #7
Just checking in: Have you made any headway with this? Hope all is well with you. You did say you have been to three different therapists and nothing changed. Based on your narrative, you might want to search out a therapist who is more analytically/dynamically trained. Many therapists these days come from a more symptom focused, cognitive/behavioral/solution focused perspective rather than the former methods. Psychodynamics can provide insight if you participate and have the time and patience for it.
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