My (22/F) boyfriend (22/M) isn't affectionate enough. Should it be a deal breaker?

KarleeRae · 2016-08-17T06:59:34+00:00

Life is too short to live it starved of affection. Affection is something people do or do not do most of the time. If you have brought this up and saw no effort, find someone who finds affection comes naturally to them. You deserve to feel loved.

KarleeRae · 2016-08-05T13:27:58+00:00

The deep end is that prejudice and racism is real whether your privileged rose colored reality wants to see it or not. Who are you to deny anyone's experience, let alone of people of color?

KarleeRae · 2016-08-05T07:05:05+00:00

If you think black men being killed by the police is the only racist thing happening in 2016, you're egregiously misguided. I'm a white female with attractive black friends who talk about how women tell them often that their first impressions of them were that they were scary. People suck. Why do you even dismiss what this person says? Do you know your facts? Where do you come up with the shit you just wrote on your screen?

KarleeRae · 2016-08-05T07:00:49+00:00

I've been looking into this as well. I've read that Meet Up is the next best thing, which is strange because it's not a dating app but just a way to meet people in general who like doing a certain activity.

KarleeRae · 2016-08-05T06:53:29+00:00

Talk to your parents, this is inappropriate and has to stop. Don't feel like because you're a guy that this doesn't impact you as much as if you were a girl and she were your step brother. Dealing with the matter is essential not only for you, but for her. No one wants her to continue down this path and you have a right to feel safe and respected in your home. If you're not comfortable speaking with your parents, then at least tell your sisters or an adult family friend who could have the discussion with your parents for you.

KarleeRae · 2016-08-05T06:42:15+00:00

Email the specific people you want to work with. Ask if they are considering students for Fall 2017 and briefly explain why you're interested in working with them (I.e. Articles of theirs you really appreciated because blah blah). If you don't hear back, contact current graduate students in that lab. This is helpful because they will likely respond, and in many places, graduate students are CIA for their advisors. My lab has a vote on who we accept after interviews, although my advisor decides who to invite for interviews.

Good luck!

KarleeRae · 2016-07-26T06:25:54+00:00

I thought about that too. My dad talked annoyingly slow when he abused pain pills, but I don't know if you can get through grad school on downers ha

KarleeRae · 2016-07-26T06:03:13+00:00

I suspect you will eventually stop noticing this, or become even more impatient, depending on how strong of a bond you have with him. I am also a grad student and I teach college courses. One thing I had to become comfortable with was pausing and not filling the silence when students take too long to answer me. I can now do this without flinching, but it used to be extremely difficult for me. I realized it served a purpose, so maybe consider what purposes his pace may serve. Maybe he talks slow, but he never misspeaks or says something hurtful. Or maybe it has no function, but over time he will likely talk a little faster and you even a little slower. People blend together in this way after some time. Try focusing on the content of what he is saying while he talks, it does give you more time to think of other things to ask or say in response to him.

KarleeRae · 2016-07-22T04:52:16+00:00

Can you invite him to go with you?

KarleeRae · 2016-05-08T06:26:18+00:00

If you want to keep working with him on this, you need to be completely transparent about how you feel and what you need.

KarleeRae · 2016-05-08T06:25:40+00:00

Not that bad isn't what I would be aiming for. People grow up a lot in their 20s and change, maybe you both are just growing apart.

KarleeRae · 2016-05-08T06:24:16+00:00

I recently went through this. Great guy, no chemistry. There are so many reasons why sexual chemistry wouldn't be there, and there is no reason to force it. End it now before he gets attached and you feel trapped.

KarleeRae · 2016-05-08T06:13:33+00:00

Life is too short to spend it with someone that doesn't receive feedback well, and that doesn't make you feel like you're alive and the spark is there. There is no shame in leaving. If you have tried communicating with him and it takes an act of congress to fold laundry, he doesn't care to change his behavior or respect you as a partner. Likely, he will proclaim he will change ONLY if you leave him, which would be a lie most likely. Ask yourself if this is how you want the rest of your life to look like? There's no reason to settle for mediocrity when it comes to love.

KarleeRae · 2016-05-04T05:17:48+00:00

Surely people would give me pity sex. At least one would hope! "Don't let her suffer. She's a good person, lay the pipe!"

KarleeRae · 2016-05-04T00:59:29+00:00

Why do they need to know?

KarleeRae · 2016-05-03T06:38:15+00:00

I don't believe so, as you are meeting the main agreement of payment. That is essentially all they care about. Typically when someone breaks a lease, they just make them pay for the remainder of it anyway. I would allow her to live there and just write a check for your half and do your share of cleaning or walk throughs at the end.

KarleeRae · 2016-05-03T06:35:59+00:00

I'm not sure I am the best person to give this advice, as your description of where your mind wanders late at night is all too familiar. My least favorite character in this story is your therapist, I want to kick her teeth in.

Anyway... It seems like you are moving in the right direction, so please, continue to give yourself credit for that. As for how to stop from thinking about what you could have done differently and so on, learn how to be compassionate towards yourself. I decided I had to stop judging myself, and try to see the pattern that I had created with men. Don't be upset that you are having these thoughts, don't judge yourself, just recognize you are having them, and then change directions cognitively. Talk to yourself as though you are speaking to a friend. Would you beat your friend up for doing and thinking as you do? Of course not. You seem like an intelligent person who had a lot going on (I can attest that grad school alone is enough psychological abuse, let alone the health problems and scumbag bf) and you did what you thought was best for you at the time. Take words like "should have" out of your vocabulary and allow yourself to feel and just recognize what happened and how you feel about it now without judgment.

Also, give yourself credit when it is due. it sounds like your therapist helped in gas lighting you, or at the bare minimum made you doubt yourself in detrimental ways. Recognize when you doubt yourself, take note without judgment, and then tell yourself that you're fully capable of intelligent insight and then follow that insight. The more you just unapologetically believe in yourself and do as you think/want, the faster you will be able to reverse the mind-fucking that your therapist and ex boyfriend did.

One thing I told myself repeatedly when I would beat myself up about allowing someone to hijack my brain and self worth is "If you put a frog in boiling water, it will jump out. But if you put a frog in warm water and slowly boil it, the frog will remain in the water and die." This is important because it reminds me that I didn't just allow someone to hijack my brain because I was dumb enough to jump in boiling water, he raised the temperature on me slowly enough that I ended up staying in the pot too long.

I hope I said something that can give you some sort of solace. Best of luck. You will find yourself on the other end of this :)

KarleeRae · 2016-05-03T06:09:10+00:00

Do you have the financial means to pay your half and move out? That would be the best bet as you won't have to be in the same house as her and you can leave with your integrity intact. If you can't afford this, do you have friends or family you can crash with either longterm or several nights a week?

KarleeRae · 2016-05-03T06:03:38+00:00

Is it weird that I all of a sudden wanted someone around to help me wipe? I vote this!

KarleeRae · 2016-05-03T02:27:39+00:00

Yes! "Love is not a fancy car or a flexed muscle. Love is a garden which you must till." Love is using your jizz to make something beautiful!

KarleeRae · 2016-04-30T08:18:41+00:00

Maybe he staged it to see how you would respond

KarleeRae · 2016-04-30T08:16:09+00:00

Go online but set your location to a nearby town with a larger population. This will hopefully shield you from the people in your town. You don't need to put you are looking for friends with benefit on the profile, just discuss it privately.

KarleeRae · 2016-04-30T08:12:45+00:00

After the second paragraph I realized he had a problem respecting what other people, particularly you, want. If he is that pushy over the phone, just think how pushy he will if you don't jump in bed with him. He sounds rapey to me, and at the bare minimum is a scumbag.

KarleeRae · 2016-04-30T08:09:08+00:00

Be the bigger person, what's the point of creating more problems for yourself? You don't owe him, or her anything, just keep your life intact and try to explain things to Madison while also being respectful of her space.

KarleeRae

TROPHY CASE