The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:
-
Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.
-
Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.
-
Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.
-
Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
I've been seeing a woman for two months now. Both early 30s. She's very busy with work (which often takes her out of town), but even so, we've had an all-day date each weekend. She's finally in town during the week, so we're getting dinner tonight. I think I'm going to ask her to be my girlfriend. We talked about things a couple dates ago and established that we're not seeing other people. I feel like exclusive and girlfriend aren't even very different, but a little. More expression of intent to grow things. It's not that we discussed and avoided bf/gf labels last time, we just didn't talk about it.
It's been a minute since I've gotten this far into things with someone. (Four years ago, a three month relationship; seven years ago, 7 months; some fucking the ex mixed in there...) And the last couple times I have, I felt like I had more sense that there was a reason things wouldn't work out. This one actually seems plausible, which is scary. It's not entirely clear to me how I feel about her, which is reasonable for two months. But it just makes me feel guilty, like am I just saying things and following steps because it seems like the thing to do (and also, sex)?. I don't think so, I really think there's something here, but feelings are confusing. Who knew.
We've both basically lived alone and had intense jobs forever. It's weird imagining fitting someone into my life, maybe even living with someone eventually. Weirder, I think I like the idea. This just in: even programmers are social mammals.
Also weird is that I'm in good shape and have money now. I've never been terrible on either front, but man, does seem to be helpful. How to split expenses is an awkward thing I haven't figured out yet, and I just don't care that much. She seems quite well off actually, for not being a programmer/doctor/lawyer. Also, hot. And not crazy. Didn't seem to particularly care for my briefly discussing the motte style politics, but also just doesn't seem to care about politics or generally be terminally online, which might be better than agreeing with me in the first place...
I didn't know people asked (said?) this anymore.
Don't get me wrong; I am a believer in relationships beyond 'hookups' or whatever the current term may be among the young. I came of age (or should have) in the 80s, smack in the thick of the AIDS epidemic, and, like everyone else then, had monogamy hammered into my skull. I also grew up fairly conservatively. But if life has taught me anything about the wiles of the fairer sex (and sometimes it seems it hasn't despite repeated opportunities) the open stating of one's desire has a way of dousing the flames of that same desire in the other person--in other words the mystery of how you might (or might not) feel is part of your allure.
Showing your hand at this point may seem right, but in my view is just an effort at a dopamine hit. Which very likely may not get the desired reaction.
This may seem counterintuitive, particularly in light of the mainstream view that one should "say how you feel" and that doing so is romantic, etc.etc. In my experience this is almost the opposite to reality. Perhaps I've only ever been with emotionally stunted women. Or read Love in the Time of Cholera one time too many.
In Japan where I now live (I feel like I throw that into every post but here it's perhaps relevant) theres a term called
紅白 or kouhakuKokuhaku thank you @Kevin_P (literally "confession") which in practice means the act of making the request： "付き合ってください!" or "Be my significant other (please)." It is, I am told by others and made to believe by popular television, the right and proper method for beginning a courtship. The girl, or whoever is on the receiving end of that request) says then "Hai" or "Gomen nasai (the presumably devastatingly flabby "I'm sorry") and one then carries on. As far as I can tell once one gets the "Yes" it's then okay to have sex (whether this has already happened or not is irrelevant, this seals the deal, as it were.) I only ever tried it once. It didn't work.Anyway all this by way of saying this cultural trait isn't just American as suggested by @arjin_ferman, though the Japanese version may be equally disturbing.
Good on you for being in there fighting the good fight. Love makes the world go round; there's nothing like it. And if not love, the dance. So many young people rage against it or try to work out crib sheets to fake the steps, and that is all fine, but it's really an amazing part of life.
You might be right.
I asked, she said yes, but also something vaguely dismissive about labels in general. It didn't go super poorly, like she said yes, and I don't get the impression I'm going to wake up to a "hey sorry about this but". But I was hoping for it to be a little more... Romantic?
It seems like she is really intensely trying to find a life partner, and I'm vaguely skeptical that I would ever want to put up with someone forever. It's not that I go into a relationship hoping to break up with someone, but five for five, I have gotten bored and done just that. Life partner kind of sounds like a thing I would want, I'm definitely a boring suburban person and fond of routine. But also, the ADHD, it's a thing , so always hard to know if I am right about what I want.
Listen I am all ready to walk you through your entire relationship from this point forward, just to see if my madskillz actually work. Short of that, if you wisely choose to decline, I would say to you that you may possibly be approaching commitment assbackwards. Let me explain what I mean.
At some point you need to project into eternity. Do you want kids? Or, a kid? As a father myself twice over (both boys) I would say that there is nothing quite like it--you imbue them with the movies you grew up on, your music, your food tastes, your general approach to life, pretty much everything. They will no doubt eventually reject much of it, but there was nothing like that first time I sat my sons down and we all watched the 1963 version of Jason and the Argonauts and they asked to watch it again, eventually knowing the music as well as I do. There was the added benefit that they understood more of the Greek myths that I read to them when they were too young to know anything but sounds.
This is not me being flippant. Having children is huge. It is, arguably, why any of us are here. So ADHD. Believe me, you can not have ADHD and still get bored AF with your significant other. As it happened I was utterly smitten with my wife during our courting phase, and even now I have moments (usually improbable times such as when I leave early in the morning and see her lying in bed with her mouth open, having stolen all the covers) when I love her completely, when I would die or kill to protect her. But there are also those moments where she pisses me off, where I think WTF woman? There are moments when I walk through the city and see 20 women who I would rather know carnally than my missus. But I realize, or--have realized, late in life--that all of that is bullshit.
This romantic gloaming is, I would argue, inevitable. Do not imagine pairing yourself with a female will be roses and lust ad aeternum. Perhaps it is, for some. But I seriously doubt it.
Where does this leave us then? Other than having read the ramblings of an old man, that is?
Well, back where you are right now. I am not saying you should throw yourself onto the pyre of forever love, but I am saying: Don't be such a doubter. Marriage ain't about the one true one. It's about making a goddam decision and choosing. And just like the cheese tray that comes around, there's always a bunch of camembert, or gruyere, or Stilton, or havarti, or even American fuckin' cheddar. As my former Aussie roommate of 20 years ago (thrice married) once said: "At some point you gotta take your hand off it."
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link