catfeeder

This may be true of you, but given this woman's hostile and creepy reaction to a minor comment about helping a coworker, is it worth the risk? Decide how much you want to tip-toe around a mine field to appease a potentially unhinged person.

I agree. The child has already had the rug pulled out from under her so early in her life. I'd make resolving this issue a priority and a condition before bringing it into your partner's household. This is the kind of stuff that comes out sideways and ruins relationships. People have no trouble hiring a plumber or a tax preparer when they need those levels of expertise, but this is a quality of life issue for 3 people. So why not work with a professional to help you manage this before taking such a huge leap?

Think of it as similar to the millions of people who fall in love with celebrities they don't even know. Certain people have the charisma to trip your fantasy wire, and this is true of most of us who have formed a crush on a teacher, a boss or someone else who is confident in their charm. Don't make your hill too steep by shooting for coldness. There's nothing fun in that to aspire to.

My heart goes out to you. If I heard this ^^^ from someone in whom I've already invested 2.5 years of my life, I'd kindly thank him for his honesty, and I'd begin planning the moment that I tell him I am done. Actually and purposefully done, not as some manipulative tactic to squeeze the guy into operating in ways that he feels are not in his own best interests. You can't force someone into wanting what he doesn't want. BF doesn't have the same bio-clock in terms of family planning. The moment you 'win' this battle, you can start anticipating your loss of the war. It could come after you get the ring, it could come after you wear a white dress--but the fact that one partner carries resentment about the timeline means that your goals are not aligned, and your bond carries the highest odds of imploding. I would make this less about the man and more about how I want to live my life. Would I want that to include a hole in my stomach lining because I cannot trust that my partner is equally invested 'us' and 'our' timeline? Not a chance.

I'd gently let BF know that he doesn't need to respond to what I'm about to say in this moment, he can take some time to think on it. Then I'd tell him that I'm not willing to spend my best fertility years waiting for a proposal. He gets to decide what that means to him, and he can let me know when he wants to discuss this again. Meanwhile, I'd be making plans for another place to live. If he doesn't revisit the conversation before I've secured my plans, then I'd carry them out, and we'd be over.

That’s really a shame, and I’m sorry to hear it. They’re not sophisticated enough to appreciate you, and that speaks of their limitations rather than of any deficiency in you. Shop around for friends at the new school who can resonate with you, and while you can be kind to the ones who don’t, I wouldn’t try to befriend them. Remind yourself of the ugly duckling fable, and embrace your Swan. Ducklings are a dime a dozen. You don’t need their influence unless they are mature enough to be kind.

If you could win a million dollars to figure out anything that may have put these people off, what would be your top guesses?

Take this one step further. Why would you be ashamed, if not for the fact that your family or friends would question why you would put up with that, right? But the answer is, you wouldn't. And good for you!

Often as people are exiting a job, they just want the clean break they've been craving. The idea of connecting with anyone from that job is less urgent than that feeling of freedom. She has your number, she knows you want to get together with her, and I'd leave it at that. If she catches her breath and then gets the chance to grow sentimental, if she wants to see you again, she knows how to reach you. Head high.

Hi Sindy, great topic. Your friend was not on these dates with you. So regardless of having your best interests at heart, nobody else has experienced all of the micro-impressions you picked up from this man. Your gut responded to any number of inputs over both dates that amounted to your reaction. I would trust that. Even if the front of your mind believed that everything was wonderful until he ruined it all in that moment, or whether you'd been unconsciously picking up tiny flags along the way--none of which, on their own, stood out as anything that shouted 'red'--but then he went and tipped the scale with this behavior, none of that matters. We've seen you hold out for a good outcome with a guy in whom you were invested enough to learn over time whether he would invite you to his home and include you in his life in the way you deserve, and that didn't sound like an instant nix-over-nothing to me. I think you are intuitive, and you are not some kid who hasn't yet learned how to operate in her own best interests. I hope you won't allow even the best intentions of a friend to cause you doubts about this. If the guy's behavior struck you as rude and a potential problem that you don't want to engage, I think you did the right thing. Congrats on using your head instead of adopting rose colored glasses that can bite you in your butt later.

Terrific! Every time you can pull this off, it feels like a win, which builds more confidence. Then you carry that confidence into the next situation, which can curb the initial negativity. And when it doesn't, you also have the confidence to shift rather than allow the negativity to always rule your outcomes. So it's like an upward spiral. This is not about inserting 'false' positivity, it's just making the room to challenge the 'default' negativity. When your knee jerk is always to drill into the most catastrophic outcomes, you squelch your own potential for joy. But if you can squelch the insta-negativity instead, just long enough to credit yourself with the resilience to handle unknowns as you encounter them, then you're not building anything false, you are building your own resilience. I hear, and I'm glad you're working with someone who can support you in this goal. Holding yourself accountable to one who is on your side can make all the difference. You have someone to confide in whenever you do spiral, which in itself is a mental safety-net to catch the spiral. You'll need to use the rational part of your brain to narrate how you will describe this experience to someone else. THAT pulls your rational thinking into your emotional thinking, which taps a completely different part of your brain. During spirals you can ask yourself the kinds of questions your counselor might ask. This forces you to reach for rational thinking ABOVE the emotional thinking as you try to answer those questions. You're right, it's a learning process, and perfection can't be the goal. Our best learning comes from our most challenging experiences, and what can be a better challenge than to learn how to allow yourself to enjoy love rather than fear it?

Not good, and it will only escalate and get worse if you stay there.

My sympathy for the loss of your father. To make this your best day possible, I would stay focused like a laser beam on the joy that I'm bringing to my mother on this day. She birthed you and raised you, so this is a milestone for her, too. Congrats on your graduation!

I don't understand. I've never heard of anyone going on an actual job interview with their friend. That's something adults who are old enough to work can do solo.

You don't 'need' the reassurances, but you've sought them and have been rewarded for that. So you'll need to figure out how to stop fishing in that pond before you over-fish it dry. If you believe that your self-talk is within your control, then you can do this. In that case, it's a habit you can shift by changing the critical voice you use in your head to one of an inspiring coach. I worked with a coach on my job who taught my team that 21 days is the length of time it takes the brain to form new synapse patterns to replace a habit. Consistently 'catching' and replacing my initial thoughts really worked, and the results were life changing. I only wish that I had learned to do this earlier in my life. However, if you've been drilling into rumination, and you find yourself spiraling into obsessive thinking beyond your control, it might be a comfort to consider that there are people professionally trained in this stuff and can work with you. One low cost source of this help can be a university that offers PhD and PsyD programs. You can book sessions to work with their doctoral candidates who are supervised by practitioners in the field. It's your call, and I wish you the best. Head high, and write more if it helps.