No! No! No! No! No! No way! (problems, reason, sensitive)
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Marriage is very hard work. So if you are not ready for the give and take. I suggest not getting married and wait until you are mature enough to handle it.
I hate to hear it come to this. I was really excited about you getting married.
I hope it all works out
^^^ A really good post. And... I hope that JeepGirl comes back to read it.
I admit that when I was younger, there were things that would bother me about my exes that I couldn't forgive them for. And those little things would cause strife in our lives. But looking back, a lot of those grievances I would now find petty and insignificant.
When I talk to older people in happy relationships, most will say that the secret to their success is knowing what stuff NOT to sweat about and also having a good sense of humour.
And again, I am not disputing JeepGirl's side of the story. But there are always at least three sides to every relationship situation. His side, her side and... the objective truth. Their last couple of conversations were too much coloured by their emotions with both sides feeling very self righteous and defensive. And in the big picture, I'm pretty sure that JeepGirl has made the the right decision about her relationship, but part of me really wishes that she had waited until she had cooled down and was seeing him in person before talking things out. And even calmly making a list of all of her grievances with him. Doing that would be beneficial to her and help give her closure.
And in every failed relationship, it almost never happens that one partner is completely blameless and innocent. For every time that her man did something wrong, she could have responded better and more firmly to either point out the problem and/or correct it. And between men and women, men tend to take a very simple and straight forward approach to life, but I find that women overthink things, inject extra emotion and hope for a miracle of mindreading on the part of their man. I know from my experiences, that it's best to spell things out to my men exactly what I want. And better yet, make them a written list for them to refer to. For instance, with V-day, I've discovered that my boyfriend really does care about giving me something, but he's very much afraid of giving me something I don't like. And on my part, I've given him some suggestions of things that he could do for me if he wants to that I would really appreciate him doing for me. And it's oddball activities like making sure that we have a working printer attached to one of our computers, suspension work on my car, a couple of other house projects... things that I can't do myself and would rather not pay someone else to do for me. But it's also his choice if he decides to tackle any of them. High on my want list is him setting up an old school computer with Windows Officeworks as I love the photo editor program in that software program. I can't seem to deal with anything fancier. lol But I need a setup like that for my eBay sales. My regular computer is running on Linux so I don't have to worry about getting viruses on it.
Anyway, men AREN'T mindreaders!!! And in JeepGirl's case, her ex was in Las Vegas, the city of mega distractions AND for a convention. When my boyfriend is away for work or with his guy friends, I never ever bother him by phone and just wait until he gets home to try to talk to him about whatever. I trust him completely and I also know that his buddies usually have their own agenda that he has to go along with. And with a place like Vegas, there is the casino action, shows, and dinner buffets to compete with for his undivided attention, so I'd just pretend that he was on another planet for his stay. In addition, I have no desire to appear to be a clingy and demanding girlfriend to his buddies. I will never be called (even jokingly) "his ball and chain".
Quote:
Originally Posted by Capt. Dan
I dont think Jeepgirl expects any more from a man than she is willing to give in return. And I dont think expecting to not be cursed at by your fiance is wanting to be treated like a princess.
Well it's two extremes of behaviour, both of which are wrong. And without actually hearing a recording of the conversation, there's no way to really judge his screaming or how she phrased her disapointment over V-day. But... what couple in a long term relationship manages to get by without any heated discussions or fights at all? Even in happy relationships, passions can flare. So it seems like this was the first real fight between the two of them, and JeepGirl decided to bail out on the relationship.
^^^ A really good post. And... I hope that JeepGirl comes back to read
I admit that when I was younger, there were things that would bother me about my exes that I couldn't forgive them for. And those little things would cause strife in our lives. But looking back, a lot of those grievances I would now find petty and insignificant.
When I talk to older people in happy relationships, most will say that the secret to their success is knowing what stuff NOT to sweat about and also having a good sense of humour.
And again, I am not disputing JeepGirl's side of the story. But there are always at least three sides to every relationship situation. His side, her side and... the objective truth. Their last couple of conversations were too much coloured by their emotions with both sides feeling very self righteous and defensive. And in the big picture, I'm pretty sure that JeepGirl has made the the right decision about her relationship, but part of me really wishes that she had waited until she had cooled down and was seeing him in person before talking things out. And even calmly making a list of all of her grievances with him. Doing that would be beneficial to her and help give her closure.
And in every failed relationship, it almost never happens that one partner is completely blameless and innocent. For every time that her man did something wrong, she could have responded better and more firmly to either point out the problem and/or correct it. And between men and women, men tend to take a very simple and straight forward approach to life, but I find that women overthink things, inject extra emotion and hope for a miracle of mindreading on the part of their man. I know from my experiences, that it's best to spell things out to my men exactly what I want. And better yet, make them a written list for them to refer to. For instance, with V-day, I've discovered that my boyfriend really does care about giving me something, but he's very much afraid of giving me something I don't like. And on my part, I've given him some suggestions of things that he could do for me if he wants to that I would really appreciate him doing for me. And it's oddball activities like making sure that we have a working printer attached to one of our computers, suspension work on my car, a couple of other house projects... things that I can't do myself and would rather not pay someone else to do for me. But it's also his choice if he decides to tackle any of them. High on my want list is him setting up an old school computer with Windows Officeworks as I love the photo editor program in that software program. I can't seem to deal with anything fancier. lol But I need a setup like that for my eBay sales. My regular computer is running on Linux so I don't have to worry about getting viruses on it.
Anyway, men AREN'T mindreaders!!! And in JeepGirl's case, her ex was in Las Vegas, the city of mega distractions AND for a convention. When my boyfriend is away for work or with his guy friends, I never ever bother him by phone and just wait until he gets home to try to talk to him about whatever. I trust him completely and I also know that his buddies usually have their own agenda that he has to go along with. And with a place like Vegas, there is the casino action, shows, and dinner buffets to compete with for his undivided attention, so I'd just pretend that he was on another planet for his stay. In addition, I have no desire to appear to be a clingy and demanding girlfriend to his buddies. I will never be called (even jokingly) "his ball and chain".
Well it's two extremes of behaviour, both of which are wrong. And without actually hearing a recording of the conversation, there's no way to really judge his screaming or how she phrased her disapointment over V-day. But... what couple in a long term relationship manages to get by without
any heated discussions or fights at all? Even in happy relationships, passions can flare. So it seems like this was the first real fight between the two of them, and JeepGirl decided to bail out on the relationship.
I wasn't implying that I thought JeepGirl wanted to be treated like a princess. My concern was that she did not deal with things that were bothering her, namely her fiance's inattention and escalating control issues. These issues reached critical mass and exploded in a matter of hours, to the point that she decided she no longer wanted to be married, sent the ring back, trashed her ex's character pretty roundly, and moved on with her life ... in one morning.
I'm not saying she should have married him or that there's anything right with his behavior. My first suggestion was to postpone the wedding, and my second suggestion was to cool off before deciding anything, because I think JeepGirl can be kind of a hothead. I'm saying that without any malice whatsoever--I used to be Queen Hothead. And my years of being Queen Hothead taught me to cool down before acting rashly, and to deal with issues rather than letting them fester, because that gets my temper up and I do things I regret.
julia i was like that too...i would jump off the handle without even thinking. Then after I cool down and think about...it just wasnt worth it.
This IS lengthy, but I need to vent so I can get my head a bit more straight.
I have not been posting here lately as much because I have been mostly been in my cave hiding - frustrated and confused. I was sad before - now I am just pretty mad.
Here it is just under 4 weeks away from our wedding date.
Situation:
Thursday he leaves for a convention to Vegas that lasts until Sunday evening. No biggie - have known about it for weeks. V-Tines Day would be spent apart.
The morning of V-Tines, my friends call me excited about how their boyfriends and husbands did this for them to make V-Tines special, etc. Having been missing him, it pulled on my heart strings a little bit.
Fiance then calls me. We talk a few minutes. His spirits were really good. he even asked me if I wanted to take the next flight to Vegas and get married that evening. I declined - our kids want to be there. He was cool with that [see, every week he CONSTANTLY tries to get me to marry him earlier and I do not understand WHY??? All he says is he is eager to begin our life together. So my sticking to March is NOTHING new]
OK---I tried to hide the slight "low" in my voice and forced a more bubbly me as best that I can, that failed, evidently - he asked what was wrong. I said, "Just miss you. Friends called with their happy V-Tines Day events with their SO's - you know how it goes - and I'm just pulling my chin up. Your call couldn't have called me at a better time, thank you."
He caught me totally off guard, raised his voice angrily, and said, "WELL EXCUSE ME, I DIDN'T SEND YOU FLOWERS OR ANYTHING!!! WTF DO YOU WANT ME TO DO FROM 3000 MILES AWAY!!! HUH!!! WTF DO YOU WANT ME TO DO FROM 3000 MILES AWAY!!!"
*CLICK* - He then hung up on me.
I sat for 15 minutes like this-------->
Nothing was about flowers or any delivery. We both knew that V-Tines Day would ping being apart. Pretty normal for couples apart. At that point, for all I knew, flowers could have been on the way. He's always sending me flowers and stuff. So his comment of "WTF, 3000 miles.." blew me AWAY. I have NO idea what that crap was about.
I did not call him back. Why would I? - I do not call back people who scream at me and hang up on me. 2 hours later, the doorbell rings. Flower delivery - to add insult to injury - not from my Fiance - flowers were from MY EX BOYFRIEND who just sent a note w/ it saying, "Have a great Valentines!"
I called my ex-boyfriend to thank him. He said that he was thinking about me early Sunday afternoon and ordered them for me and was happy I received them and liked them. Nothing more, nothing less - and we hung up.
It's 5AM on Tuesday morning and he and I still have not called each other. It feels like a stand-off.
My friends feel that he treats me like a possession, like property. In the past month, he's been yelling at me more out of the blue. VERY unlike the normal him.
After what happened Sunday - and his not coming back to me to at least apologize, explain - JUST SOMETHING ---I do not want to get married in March. His yelling at me more so recently over the most stupid stuff really has my red flags up at full mast. His yelling at me as he has started to and did on Sunday is NOT OK. I will not allow someone to continue to treat me like that, lest marry him. I'm not freaking desperate or insane. Hell, if this is a PREVIEW of what's to come. . .
Why in the hell would I want to marry someone that would do that to me on V-Tines Day - a month before the wedding - and STILL no call and we are on Tuesday now? Forget it - I won't marry anyone that will disrespect me like that and will not communicate w/ me. The closer it gets - the LESS he puts into this relationship! I feel taken for granted! Which I do NOT get since he is trying to drag me to the alter faster every other day. Why is he trying to pull me into a marriage more quickly. . .is all I can think now. There HAS to be an ulterior motive based on his behaviors lately.
My friends, male and female both tell me to run and to run away FAST. They used to really like him, but again, with the way he's been treating me lately the closer it gets to the wedding - and his increasing his attempts to marry me much sooner.
I am RELIEVED I am seeing this NOW.
Your thoughts. . .
BTW here is my dissection of her first post. For a start, her first poll choice of "Jeep, do NOT marry this guy! Run! Run! Run! " is overly dramatic and is the one she wants all of us to vote for. Again, I wanted a poll choice of "postpone the wedding and try to talk things out".
Otherwise, she's been getting cold feet about the wedding for a while. And that's fine, but she has to recognize that by V-day, she was looking for any excuse to stop the wedding from happening. I don't see anything wrong with him being an enthused puppy dog and wanting her to fly to Vegas and marry him early. I don't think that he was rushing to get a wedding band on her finger just to be able to control her. Again, her feelings of cold feet about the wedding date was making her more sensitive to every misstep he was making with her.
Then add in that her friends were all bubbly over what the men in their lives were doing for them on V-day. Then her ex-boyfriend sent her flowers... which put JeepGirl in a really bad place. Her pride was hurt every time one of her friends told her about their V-day, her ego just kept getting bruised over and over... because she let it get to her. But none of her friends had guys away for a week long convention in Vegas. They were all home with their women. And while of course she should tell her boyfriend why she was down in the dumps, I don't think that telling him that her friends got a better V-day than she did was quite the thing to tell him over the phone. I can't think of any man that wants to be compared to what other men do. For JeepGirl, delivered flowers ASAP might have made her happier, but to a man, sending flowers might not occur to him as the appropriate response, or maybe it would seem not good enough a sorry and too automated.
As to the situation being a standoff and him not being a good communicator, well again, all the men I know HATE long involved unhappy conversations over the phone with their women. Women love words, men don't. I really think that he was waiting to get back from the convention before dealing with this emotional mess. He just wanted to keep having a good time at the convention instead of being wound up over the situation 24/7 until he got home. On the other hand, some women seem to thrive on drama and emotion, and suck up all the sympathy they can get from their girlfriends.
And it takes TWO to have a good standoff. Obviously, since JeepGirl thought she was completely in the right, she expected her fiance to call her back. She drew the line in the sand and was settiing the rules... but in any good relationship, it's got to be give and take. JeepGirl is so mad, that she wanted her man to call her up and crawl for forgiveness. And in the past weeks and months of having cold feet about the wedding date, she may have been unconsciously doing and saying things that were pushing her guy's buttons in trying to be more controlling of him.
So I see a huge problem of JeepGirl's hurt pride and a big lack of communication between the two of them. For every time he yelled at her, she needed to wait until he calmed down, then asked him what was really bothering him. What if he's on edge because he's having business or other financial problems? In this economy, most businesses are doing worse than in years earlier. And most men don't like to discuss business problems with their women. They try to solve their problems on their own and they don't want emotional support. They figure that the women in their lives can't help give them good business advice. They also don't want to worry their loved ones. And when they are home from work, the last thing they want to do is discuss work.
Maybe JeepGirl's friends can hook her up with a guy that they all approve of... but I know that I've never picked a guy to date based on my friends' taste in men. And none of them have ever dated or married a guy that I'd want for myself. I'm NOT putting down my friends' taste in men, just that I know that my tastes and relationship needs are very very different from theirs. And as long as I'm happy and they are all happy in our relationship, none of us ever critique anyone else's s/o's. And if anyone was getting stressed out or upset in their relationships, I will be a good listener, but unless there is real physical or emotional abuse that I am sure of, I would never ever think of encouraging a friend to breakup with someone.
Ok Jeep-I didn't read all 28 pages but I'll comment on your OP. To not send you SOMETHING (card, flowers, chocolate, etc) on V-Day was wrong. He is about to marry you for god's sake. And then on top of that, to yell at you and be a tool on V-Day?? FIRED!!!
I highly doubt that anyone who has been on this forum for such a long time would just tuck and run. I am pretty sure she is coming back to read updates. Sounds a bit dramatic to say "I won't be back" after spilling all your personal business like that.
DISLCAIMER: NO, I don't give a damn if I come across insensitive.....
I highly doubt that anyone who has been on this forum for such a long time would just tuck and run. I am pretty sure she is coming back to read updates. Sounds a bit dramatic to say "I won't be back" after spilling all your personal business like that.
DISLCAIMER: NO, I don't give a damn if I come across insensitive.....
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hmmmmmm
