Newbie & relationships

Hi Rearna, when I was young this happened to me every time - I'd be planning my life together with the wonderful person from the first meeting! It's now ten years since that last happened, simply because I've got too old, so I can't offer any clues on how to stop it, but perhaps some advice on how to feel better about it.

When you love somebody it feels wonderful, and it is the love coming through you that makes you feel good. Getting a broken heart later never stopped me loving a new person and thus feeling good again. Over the years I think having all this internal love made me a better person, more compassionate with everybody. This in turn led to me becoming attractive to more thoughtful people, not just the users. So my advice would be not to stop loving, but in these days of HIV etc perhaps be careful about not leaping into bed too soon. Anybody who is really interested will wait a bit and anybody pushing you too fast is not worth having in the long run.

Good luck!

I think this "Exchange" and Mating Dance, let's call it - affects males somewhat differently than females. While I do know a few men who 20 years married now divorcing are dealing with the financial repercussions, they are highly proficient at their jobs while their wives, having halted careers to rear children are ill-equipped to find suitable income (add ageism is very problematic for women after 40).

I say this because females don't always consider the drastic impact a bad marraige can have on thier futures. There are default "programmes" let's call them, hard-wired into most women that, if unaware, can cause them to simply Relinquish all their Power to their Male Partner. The only 2 woman this ever worked for were Queen Victoria and Queen Elizabeth, who's power cannot actually be given/reliqunished except through abdication & they were both raised with enough agency and sense to draw a hard line. 

The issue you are running into is the classic psychological issue of Reason Vs. Nature. Where nature is your inner natural self and reason is what we use to discipline that self, lest we remain immature. 

Reason is of little use if one lacks the tools or wisdom / understanding or rules of engagement for relations-to/with. So here are a few things to note:

1. When emotions and 'feelings' (which are very valid), are overwhelming, it is best to always take a step back from the thing we are responding to and either allow the impact or obsession to wear off. I will not pretend this is the easiest in the slightest. Breathing Space or room to regain one's capacity to reason or problem-solve is immeasurably important.

2. This includes the ability to navigate abusive, manipulative humans. I was raised by a woman who was abusive, manipulative and controlling. It was not until I had years away from her that I was able to start growing as a human - I was in a perpetual state of 'Survival Mode'.  I married someone just as manipulative and controlling thinking I was escaping her (and divorced within a few years) but had never been given proper tools to sort out: Cruel from Kind or Authentic from Immature or Disciplined from Controlling. I started reading The Artists Way in my early 20's. I started looking for wise and prolific thinking. 

3. Learn principles of good values. I look to connect with humans who Take Care of themselves as much as they afford dignity and kindness to others. One without the other is worth stepping back from as caring for my health and also affording kindness are a sign of congruity, that it's not 'for show' - using an action to suit ones ego. I am careful about who I chose to be vulnerable with. If someone demands trust with out expecting to earn it, I disengage immediately. My father says you can tell much about someone by how they treat another they can get nothing from. Setting a bar for myself automatically sets up my expectation for others. My bar is simple: Afford Respect, Earn Trust. 

4. This doesn't imply that I am arrogant or unkind. But the impact of a connexion is so severe that if severed, it can set me back a great deal and that will impact my ability to work which will impact my abiilty to pay rent and has left me homeless in the past. I have an analogy for relationships that is similar to our Solar System. Who do I allow in my orbit? If I'm my own star (and we can romanticise being our own little ball of star-dust!) who are the Mercurians and Vesuvians with mutual investment. Earthlings are typically in my family, though there are family members I do not get close to, I just don't have time or we don't quite connect.  But one can have mutually respectful 'satellite' friends who we may not see but every 10 years, and one can have Plutonians who we only see on a night out, maybe buy a drink for but never betray our souls to. 

It's complex!!! But the heart is worth protecting. Not everyone has the time or energy to think of my best interest, nor should I expect them to. I do not mind taking years to get to know someone - for the close friends I have, it becomes the best investment eventually. 

I can't give advice, I'm afraid, I can only relate. I'm very gullible, been lied to and cheated on in most of my relationships. Found someone I thought was different but she did the same, and I just came to the conclusion that I was better off alone than inviting people into my life who I knew would hurt me. Shitty outlook to have but it's just self preservation, and it became harder to go through the motions of dating because it all started to feel so repetitive, the same conversations with different people about the same subjects, it all started to feel more lonely than sitting at home getting drunk and watching Wyatt Earp did, but I realised I enjoy doing that stuff more than going to pubs or clubs or any of the 'normal' stuff, I'd rather get high and go to a castle or something myself but I'm weird

I'm also drunk at the moment so apologies for the ramble. 

can u run thing by your mum or a friend. You need someone to keep an eye on what you do and someone you can tell if  you are being taken advantage off  

Hi, that's a difficult question. If anything I had the opposite problem. I realised very early on, that if I became intimate with someone, anyone, I could see that I might easily go down the path of marriage with an unsuitable person, just out of kindness and not wanting to hurt the other person. As a result, I became emotionally unavailable. Until, that is, I connected with my future wife. I realised that she was ideal for me, and made myself very emotionally vulnerable. I wore my heart on my sleeve, and it worked; we have been married for 25 years and have two children. I feel that, to get into a romantic relationship, we autistics, because we are poor at flirtation and reading unspoken communication, have to make ourselves unusually emotionally vulnerable, but the trick is recognising the people who are worthy of our affection and loyalty. The basic question to ask is, "Does this person make me feel happy and secure, are they kind and supportive?"