LFA Café
Advice about Relationships => Questions and MaryAnne's Advice => Topic started by: MaryAnne on December 11, 2001, 09:16:11 PM
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Dear MaryAnne,
I have been with my fiance for four years now. We have been engaged for almost that long. He wont make any effort towards setting up a wedding and now I don't know if I even want to stay with him.
He can't hold a job, he has had and lost about a dozen jobs and is currently unemployed. I have to pay all the bills and have been for months now. He never hesitates to remind me that we lived in another state for six months while I couldn't find a job and he had to do it all. I am sick of this excuse though because I drained my saveings and checking paying for groceries and gas, he did not pay everything as he implies.
He also is never satisfied if I don't dress up he tells me I should so people will think he is with someone pretty, then when I try to look my best he says I'm just showing off my body for other guys.
Since I am paying all bills anyway I was thinking of keeping the place I was renting and boot him out. I can also stay at my parents for awhile since Im only 20, he's 24. The only thing is I don't know if I want to brake if off for good, we still have some good times together. Please send me your advice.
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Becca:
My you answered your own letter. Just be glad that you have not married in the last 4 years. I believe your “feelings” of not wanting to let go are because he was and is probably your first real love and those feelings are very strong. Though they do not make it “love” for life. Whatever you have now Becca with him is only going to get worse after you are married. You are only 20 years old. You have plenty of time to marry and there is no way to “lose” Mr. Right. Otherwise it wouldn’t have been Mr. Right. When a love is the right one it is strong and nothing can break it. So you have nothing to lose by having him leave and you going on with your life. If you really love him and he really loves you then being apart will only bring out the best in your love and bring you back together. Though I doubt it will on your end. He is loosing a free meal ticket and he may try harder to stay or get you back but you, I can not find what you will lose other than that feeling of familiarity that comes from a long term romance and a first real love. That will hurt and you will miss the “image” of him. Not him, as he is not what you thought he was, but we all have this “image” we make up about someone we have feelings for to justify our staying and putting up with things we would not normally put up with. We are so smart at “convincing” ourselves when we want something to be the way we want it. But if you read your letter to me the answer is perfectly clear.
You, Becca, deserve better and I want you to believe that so you will want better for yourself. If you are willing to settle for what this man gives you now at 20 and then marry him, your self esteem will go down more and more then I wonder what you will be willing to put up with to “stay” married or have children and then what you will be willing to “compromise” for the sake of the children. No Becca, you are young now is the time to grow into yourself and make that self a strong, independent woman who has made a life for herself and then meet someone that you want to “share” yourself and life with. Not marry and support someone giving up more and more of who you might have been. No matter what it takes you can make it on your own. If you have made it supporting the both of you, well it will be easy for you to take care and support Becca. He has already started getting you to doubt yourself and what you know is right and wrong for yourself by using that example of those 6 months when he supported you. That should not even be an issue. Again, whatever you see and have now is only a slight glimpse of what will be after you marry. It will not get better only worse and more and more of yourself you will lose. That is too great of a loss for anyone at any age but for you at 20 years old before you have even developed all of who you are and what you could be that is too great of a loss that will take years of repairing, therapy and building when you can see the inevitable now. Why do that to yourself?
Take your time, find yourself and who you want to be proud to be, find a dream that you can make into a reality then look for someone to share your great finds with and if it is this guy he will straighten up, find a way to “deserve” you and you will go back when he has proven his worth to you. It is a great mistake when we come from scarcity we always make mistakes come from security and love for self then you will make the right decisions for your life.
Remember you have plenty of time take it now before you make the mistakes.
I hope this helps and that you go for it.
If you need to talk more I am here for you,
MaryAnne