melrich

It's a bit hard not to tell you to seek therapy. You describe yourself in terms used to describe a psychopath. That's not all bad, there are millions of psychopaths out there all living relatively normal lives. They learn to live with their condition. But I am not sure it is something that you can self treat or treat by getting opinions online. I guess it's up to you. you can learn to live with it by yourself or you can seek a professional to help you manage it.

I think this thread has run to a dead end. Let's not make claims to "higher standards", let's agree on different standards and further agree to disagree in this case. Eva, hopefully you have got the feedback you need through the course of the thread. Thanks guys.

My family makes me happy. I focus on them and they focus on me and we are happy so I guess what you are saying is right for me.

Yeah. 7 times should tell you something. You are better off without him. Go out and have some fun, put him behind you knowing in your heart that it wasn't right.

Your email to her was really well put but would have been better put face to face. Her email to you was immature, rude and inconsiderate. But it sounds like you love her very much and that your relationship has been good to this point. Maybe she had a bad day. Maybe the whole Valentines thing got on top of her. I would not be making any hasty decisions. Let the heat go out of things a bit and then talk to her about this face to face. Email is not a great way of communicating, you can rarely convey the emotions you wish to in the written word. Take a deep breath and find time to sit down and talk to her openly about this.

It's hard because what helps sustain long term relationships is shared experiences and friendships, that is you build up a history together to talk about. Because you guys are in a LDR, you don't really get that. I'd suggest you cut the phone calls back a bit, maybe say hi every day but have a longer talk every two or three days. There is nothing worse than awkward phone calls.

I'm really confused. I have no idea how to offer any advice except that she seems interested in someone else? so maybe it is best to let that go?

LOL...good luck with it!!

There could be something in that too. As DN said, some countries don't celebrate it. Even here (Little USA) Valentines Day has only been a big deal for the last 8 or 9 years. Before that many Australians would not even have known what it was. What country is he from (if you want to answer)?

I'd be very surprised if your income limited who you would appeal to. In fact I'm thinking a high income guy would proabably have less interest in what you are earning than someone on a low income.

Very carefully.

Yes I think you may have been exceptions. I think we are about the same vintage. In my day I knew my local myths, I knew what I was taught at school, I was a reader so I knew what was in the papers and on the limited media available, I had a vague understanding of overseas events. There were not too many other avenues of information. What I knew about sex at 14 you could write on a Post It note. Nowadays my 4.5 year old gets onto the internet (it is heavily policed) he has access to things I could only have dreamed of. In a few years he will be chatting to kids his age around the world, he will be flirting with his classmates on line, probably late into the night. Girls will send him texts and messages asking him to meet them. He will respond. Sometimes he'll text asking them to meet him. His interests will be far more global than mine. His exposure to cultures beyond his neighborhood culture or city culture will be far more extensive than mine ever was. He will have a mobile phone at 10 and instant access to whomever he wants to contact. He will live in a time where women have more equality in the workplace than ever before and a woman in a career is not looked at sideways in fact it will be desired because the cost of living demands two incomes. Likely he will marry and have kids far later than my generation and his experience as a single person will be longer and more varied. He has cable TV and can watch TV from the US, from Hong Kong, from South Africa. The best I could hope for was one multicutural channel which came on line when I was about 18. Already he astounds me with the things he has learnt. He will come to sites like eNotalone and ask how he should handle dating. The young ones will tell him their way and it won't be my way. The list goes on. His opportunities to access knowledge will far far outweigh his capacity to absorb it. His exposure to other ways of doing things will far exceed the relatively narrow world I was brought up in. He will have career counselling at about 11 and a range of career options far greater than ever in the past. And he will grow up watching girls having and being encouraged to pursue those same options. It will be a vastly different growing experience than I ever had and I expect that the consequences (as I am seeing already) are going to significantly change what I know as the norms of male/female relationships.

I think in any transitory stage there is confusion. But what I absolutely notice is that the 14 and 15 year olds today (the ones I am close to anyway) are so much more knowledgeable, confident and worldly than they ever were in my day. I'd really be surprised if in 30 years time, some of the norms we took for granted are still around. Everything comes and goes in cycles I guess. As DN said elsewhere, many of the things we consider traditional are really no older than the 20th century. I often look at my daughter (1) and wonder what sort of world she will live in. I kind of think I'd like her to have lived in mine because I know it and I can advise her on it but I am pretty sure that is not what is in store for her and by the time she is 15 my advice will be largely irrelevant.

LOL...that's very funny... well I guess it's a pretty harmless gesture, sounds like your relationship has been damaged beyond redemption anyway. Hopefully she gets a laugh too.

The way we live and the norms of society are changing so quickly these days. I mean I am only 20 years from being a teenager and it all seems so different to me. My partner is only 10 years from being a teenager and it's different to her. I think we tend to operate based on the norms of our generation. I think it's important to realise they may not be as relevant as they were (I generally never get into dating posts because it's a whole new world to what I knew). The sons and daughters of my friends do seem to live in a dating world that is far more "equal" than the one I came from. The 14 and 15 year old girls seem to have no trouble asking the 14 and 15 year old boys out. I think sometimes we get anchored in what we know. Me, I am definitely from the man asks/man pays era but I suspect my daughter will not be.

Wow that is a very tough gig to slip straight from relationship to friendship after 4 years. Good luck with it but I have to agree with finewhine a bit.

The guys may well have ulterior motives. That's nothing you can control. At some point you have to trust your partner. Who knows what will happen in the future, there are never guarrantees. But if this is the person she is, trying to get her to change that or change the way she interacts with people is going to drive her away quicker than anything else will. I'm in a slightly different boat as my relationship is much longer. But my partner is a very vivascious, flirty person. She was when I first met her, she is now. She sounds similar to your g/f. It's part of what I love about her. Part of loving someone is trusting them. It doesn't always work out, I agree. But it is a better path to take than trying to control her behaviour.

You are stalking her. Keep seeing your therapist and try as hard as you can to break the cycle of this activity.

Yes you are over-reacting. Being in a relationship doesn't mean you have to suddenly change who you are. She's a friendly girl with lots of friends, let her be who she is. That's who you fell in love with.

I don't think anyone was suggesting that. Just that you be aware and maintain an APPROPRIATE degree of caution.

I read once that something like 70% get some nausea and 30% none at all. So yes I think it is normal and you are very lucky so far.

If you are working during the day what does it matter that he drives to his moms? Is he staying the night there? In that case I think you are right to ask him to come back in the afternoon.

I don't know why you would feel bad for taking the pictures in teh first place. Lots of couples do it, it's not as though it's a weird thing to do. I guess only you can really work out the answer to that question.

Why don't you go on the drive with him? I don't think you are being selfish. If the day has special meaning for you and he can put his mother off for the day then personally I think that is what he should do. If he can't put her off maybe you can spend the time driving there together, stop off for lunch on the way?

Talking on the internet is hard. Body language is so much a part of communicating emotions and you obviously don't really get that chatting via computer and the written word is so easy to misinterpret. Good signs are obviously a friendly manner, maybe a bit of flirting and if she is asking lots of questions about you. Otherwise it would be best to try and see her in person and it would give you a better idea.