moodindigo91

I agree with others, having hobbies or something to fill your free time with is huge. For me, I go to the gym almost every day, which takes up the majority of my free time when I'm not working during the weekdays. Group classes at gyms might be a good option for you if you like exercising, as you typically socialize at the very least with the instructor of the class, and probably more people too. Plus, I am hardly ever "alone" because I have a dog. She even comes to work with me a few times a week. I get a lot of interaction with people at work, as well. Otherwise, I would recommend joining a club or meetup group, going out and about alone. I take my dog to the beach or some park or some hike or some other place nearly every weekend. Read a book, take a yoga class, go hang out at a coffee shop or a bar. IDK if you have these near you but things like those wine & painting nights are great things to go to alone. Check out Groupon or similar apps for deals on similar things in your area. So many things!

Okay, good. I really think you could benefit from some therapy. Try journaling if you can't get into therapy. If you and your girlfriend have already worked through this issue, and she has forgiven you, then you should not go back and rehash small details. That is something you need to work out yourself through journaling or therapy. It seems to me that you are overcome with guilt and possibly panicking about the possibility of losing her. Honestly, I think you should do your best to really leave what happened in the past and move forward. There's no sense in you rehashing the details and reliving that moment, keeping yourself stuck in a cycle of guilt. You are allowing a lot of your mental energy to be sucked into this guilt cycle. You could be better using this energy to really be a better man and make your girlfriend feel loved and secure. There's nothing you can do about what happened in the past now. All you have is the present. Quit ruminating and focus on how to continue being better.

Yes. I mean, by yourself with the help of therapy. You should really be questioning why you are putting yourself into situations where people have the opportunity to take advantage of you, especially if those people are suspicious women when you have a girlfriend. That isn't very responsible behavior. You should also ask yourself why in the world you are continuing to associate with someone who, according to you, uses you, takes advantage of you, tries to make you cheat on your girlfriend, etc. And finally, I think you should question and determine whether you're actually just feeling guilty, and trying to make yourself out to be some innocent victim in this whole situation because you feel bad for being irresponsible and putting your relationship with your girlfriend on the line. When it comes down to it, that's what you did. At the very least, there were some mixed signals between you and the person you claim was taking advantage of you, otherwise, I can't imagine how you would end up in the situation you ended up in.

You can offer him encouragement, brotherly advice, share with him your experiences with your parents and finding your own independence, etc. But I wouldn't get more involved than that.

All of this should tell you everything you need to know to answer your question. He has begun the process of pulling away. You enjoyed a wonderful time together, and now he's getting on with his life as planned. You should do the same! He told you it was time to start seeing other people. He's going to dinner with "someone"? It's definitely time to bow out and let the connection be what it was, a great way to spend 5 months. Google the Chinese concept of "wu wei" - it's all about going with the flow, effortless inaction, doing nothing. This is all you need to do. Take what comes to you, be grateful for it, and let it go when it is no longer serving you. I think you could benefit from this philosophy, especially as you continue dating, since this type of thing may happen quite often.

I say that it's really none of your business. I wonder if you realize that you're sort of mirroring your parents' with your behavior. You're being over-protective of your brother. If your brother wants you to interfere, he will ask (although, in my opinion, he shouldn't). He needs to learn to stand up for himself, and make his own decisions.

Well if he wasn't ready to be a father he shouldn't have stopped using condoms. I mean, what did he think would happen? How far along is she? If she is willing, there are non-invasive DNA pregnancy tests that can be performed during pregnancy after the pregnancy reaches a certain threshold. You don't necessarily need to wait until the birth to find out if your son is the father. I would recommend getting a paternity test before contributing financially to this woman but the decision is ultimately yours. I'm sure she'll welcome financial support, as I can't think of another reason why she would have contacted you. I honestly would try remain as removed from the situation as possible. However, I also understand your desire to care for this child and the mother. If you really feel the need to be involved, then you should be level-headed and non-emotional. It sounds like you are already emotionally attached to this unborn child who may not even be biologically related to you.

So much yes lol even on posts where people are not even really looking for advice and maybe just came to vent, people are like, so what advice are you asking for? 🤣

Good luck! Keep us posted!

Honestly, and this probably goes without saying, but just finding people who are compatible is the hardest part. You have to go through a lot of people and rejection to find one compatible person and even then, that relationship, if there is one, may not work out in the long run. It can be pretty soul crushing at times. You just gotta stay motivated. I've been adopting a more "go with the flow" attitude toward dating lately. Opens me up to a lot of experiences I might have missed out on and is nice in that I'm not over thinking connections. I'm just allowing them to come and go, and if one sticks, then that's great lol.

The moral of this thread is that there is no one specific explanation for why OP has not had any relationships yet and everyone has their own theory of attraction. It was probably a confluence of factors, and OP's looks probably has at least something to do with it but to what extent we cannot know. You just have to find what works for you, but it takes work, and the willingness to maybe step out of your comfort zone and try new approaches.

Well, I don't know. I agree with @smackie9 that your BF can't be held liable for the cousin's BF's poor behavior. His cousin should rightly be mad at him for lying to her to cover for his friend. As far as his integrity, this is a personal issue for you. It seems like you think less of him now, and that your level of trust in him has been reduced. You can either more or less ignore this and continue on in your relationship trusting your boyfriend, or acknowledge that you no longer trust your boyfriend and try to address that with him. Alternatively, you can acknowledge you lost trust in your boyfriend and leave the relationship. If you have not been together for very long, it might be best to just leave, especially if you think your feeling that he lacks integrity will grow with time.

Yeah, I agree with others. It seems like he could be interested in having a serious relationship with you, but it's hard to say. You should ask him at some point, sooner rather than later, what the status is of your connection, or his feelings toward your connection.

Yikes 😶 I think this is your own personal interpretation of the language in Genesis. Leaving and cleaving does not mean completely severing yourself from your parents/elders and abandoning them. This is more about finding someone to procreate with than anything. The Bible also says honor thy father and mother. In any case, I wouldn't recommend arranging your entire life around what the Bible says.

I'm not a man but it does sound to me like he just wants some casual sex. But I could be wrong. I'm curious, do you guys spend time together outside of your individual condos? Like do you go on dates? Are you affectionate with each other in public?

I'm curious what makes you anxious about it?

This is an odd belief in my opinion. Since when did you have to choose between your parents and your spouse? Typically, I would imagine you'd want both in your life. I think this is bad advice. To just abandon your parents as they age and concentrate solely on your wife and kids. I think the wife is being unreasonable and dramatic. Maybe I'm just not that sensitive but I wouldn't really care if someone scoffed at the name I chose for my child. I understand that people have their opinions and I'm not going to like or agree with all of them. Why would you purposely hold onto a grudge like that and cause friction in your marriage when you could simply let it go and move on with your life? No one is suggesting the wife is crazy. But she seems unwilling to compromise. In my opinion, that's a straight road toward a broken marriage. In-laws get inflicted on each other as soon as two parties get married. They are going to have to deal with each other thereafter for various reasons, it has nothing to do with "blending". They don't have to like each other, but they should learn to be able to deal with one another respectfully.

Honestly it sounds like your wife should be the one in therapy

I would definitely move then. You will live closer to your family and see them more often than I currently do and I reside in the same country as them lol

This is definitely a difficult situation to navigate and it sounds like you really are doing your best. You mentioned how you attend therapy to better understand your relationship with your mother. I'm interested in what you think about your relationship with her and why you need therapy to understand it? I also think it might be helpful for you and your wife to attend counseling sessions together to really dig deeper and understand what the issue is here. I can understand your wife's point of view, but it also seems to be like she's being pretty unfair and controlling. Without more context about your relationship with your mother, it's hard to say, though. It seems to me like your wife needs to be more open to compromise on this matter. I'm also curious how much your mother knows about your wife's disdain toward her, if anything?

I'm sorry for bursting your bubble again, destroying hope. While it is possible for people to breakup and get back together later, usually the getting back together part was an unintentional surprise (for the relationships that work out, that is). I have rarely ever seen a couple (who weren't married and going through the legal process of a trial separation or something like that) intentionally breakup for the purpose of getting back together later and have that actually work out. Whenever you breakup, you must assume that it is permanent. You should operate on that assumption thereafter. You should not expect that you will get back together. Even if you did, it could be YEARS from now. A decade, even. Be prepared for that. Don't miss out on opportunities in your life because you're waiting for this guy. You are only 23. When I was 23, I was dating a guy who I lived with, etc. We broke up because our relationship was toxic. I even moved out. I posted on here a bunch about it. Later on, I got back together with him, we moved back in together. It did not work out. As a result, I wasted basically my entire 20s on this guy, missed out on a lot of opportunities, including going to law school (which I did much later after leaving him), and missing out on dating who knows how many guys who could have been "the one". I know it's hard to imagine right now, but your feelings about him being "the one" will eventually fade away. But the longer you continue communicating with him, the longer it will take for that to happen. Don't waste your 20s on a guy who can't/won't commit. If he was really "the one", you'd be able to "work" on yourselves while remaining together, creating financial stability together, etc. You tried that, and failed.

I think you're still missing the point. When we (or at least I) talk about your attitude, I'm not just referring to your attitude on this here post. You say you are confidently asking women out, but I think that is very subjective. Maybe you think you're coming off as confident, but it translates as something else. Your attitude is displayed all over your face in every interaction, as well as in your body language. Your attitude is also on display in the written portions of your dating profiles. So it's not as simple as, "they turn me down based on my looks before my attitude surfaces." This is why I keep circling back to the issue being the way you carry yourself. How you're dressing, how you stand, your body language, your facial expressions, etc. If you're really interested in trying to find a partner, you gotta do some work. You can't just expect some advice here to be the magic key that will unlock a door to your first girlfriend. You also can't just sit here and disagree with what everyone is trying to say here. I mean, take all the time you spend responding to us and turn it inward and try to determine what small steps you can take THIS week to get you closer to what you desire. Personally, you should evaluate your general appearance including clothing style, haircut. This is probably the best place to start. I would also try to work on your approach to women both in person and online, your conversation style. I think it's really more about putting yourself out there, more than you think you are, trying new things, new approaches, new styles. I agree here. If your conclusion is that you're ugly and universally rejected as a result of this ugliness, then what is the point in continuing this conversation? But honestly, I'm super interested in seeing a photo of you to see whether or not you are, in fact, "ugly" subjectively.

I don't really think I am. I think YOU are missing my point, and the point of many others on this thread, which is the it seems like the main reason you can't get dates/a girlfriend has something to do with your attitude. The way you have resigned yourself to a foregone conclusion, and refuse to actually accept any advice on the matter. You just say, well I've been there and done that and it's never worked before. Plus, look at all this outside evidence I have that proves I have an ugly face. That guy in the video, for instance, not exactly traditionally handsome. Yet he got plenty of women to say "yes." The point is that you should think about what you're doing, that has nothing to do with your physical looks, that is causing women to turn you down. No matter how often we say, hey, ugly faces have not stopped plenty of men from finding romance.

Honestly, if it is a big deal for you to have your family like and approve of your partner, and your family doesn't like or approve of your partner, why would you bother continuing this relationship? Even if he did nothing wrong to you in the past, which it sounds like is NOT the case, having this amount of pressure, of knowing how important it is for your partner for their family to approve of them and also knowing that their family does not, in fact, approve of them, would make feel upset as well. This relationship is dead. Your family doesn't approve of him. This is something very important to you. He is who he is and you can't change him. Given that fact, what would be the purpose in remaining together? You're just fostering resentment between the two of you. Time to leave!

Hm I would opt for just "acting naturally" over keeping "a low profile".