Feeling like a caretaker

[SensitiveMacho]

Been dating a girl for 10 months now (23M/23F). She's great. Very lovely girl and very sweet, but not always. She's also extremely needy and insecure in our relationship whereas I am not. She wants to be part of everything I do and complains when she cannot be a part of it. I'm going to a convention tomorrow with the boys for example, just the 5 of us and we want to keep it that way. I told her this and she just cannot accept it or let it go. Then I can either ignore her complaining or comfort her. Sometimes I ignore, to which she blows up my phone or I comfort her. Both suck.

I just feel like I need to constantly look after her and her emotions and it's draining me. Especially since I study full time, work at the university and practice sports 3 times a week. Having to deal with her feelings is just too much for me. It's turning into an almost daily thing where I have to comfort her for her home situation, her insecurities or neediness regarding me. At the same time I am afraid of breaking up because I will hurt her feelings, and I am scared of not being able to find another girl.

What do I want? I want her to not be so dependant on me, and to live more free of each other. She should not need me to take care of every single problem in her life.

[GLYC]

Talk go her about it in a mature way. Say that you enjoy being with her, but feel as if things would work better if you both had some time apart at times, encourage her to have girls nights out

In the end, if you're with someone just to not hurt their feelings, or are scared of not being able to find someone else you're with them for the wrong reason.

[SensitiveMacho]

Talk go her about it in a mature way. Say that you enjoy being with her, but feel as if things would work better if you both had some time apart at times, encourage her to have girls nights out

In the end, if you're with someone just to not hurt their feelings, or are scared of not being able to find someone else you're with them for the wrong reason.

I will tomorrow when she comes over... I can't do this any longer. Whole day long I am busy and she is still whatsapping me all ****ing day, I just get tired and frustrated and feel like yelling at her to leave me the **** alone for a while. I have talked to her about this before though and it changes for a day or two and then it's back to normal.

[TheEvilJester]

I agree with GLYC. Especially in that being with somebody because you don't want to hurt their feelings, or simply because you are worried you won't find anybody else... those are absolutely not the right reasons at all to be with somebody. In the end, being alone may not be all that great... but it is so much better off than being with the wrong person and/or somebody who just makes you miserable... just for the sake of having SOMEBODY.

Now, I'm not saying she isn't the right person for you, I'm not saying she is. I obviously cannot know that. But, her behavior certainly is not okay. Yes, it is great for a couple to have plenty of time to spend together.... but you should also be able and willing to spend time apart as well. There is certainly no reason you shouldn't be able to go out with your buddies on your own now and then. As long as it isn't like you are always making other people more of a priority than her, there shouldn't be any problem with sometimes having interests that don't involve each other.

So, definitely talking to her about it is the right move. Unfortunately, it sounds like you kind of have already. MAYBE in doing so, you sort of did it more in passing. Like, you kind of casually brought it up in hopes that you didn't have to be very direct about it to get things to change. I could understand that. It is an awkward and uncomfortable conversation to have to have. ...Or maybe you already HAVE been direct about it and it hasn't helped. I don't know.

If you haven't been all that direct about it, that would be my advice. To have more of an actual, sit down conversation to talk about it. Not just a sort of in passing "Hey, you really don't have to worry about this, we are good" kind of thing hoping she'll finally take the hint. If you HAVE already been more direct, then it may be time to be firm.... but yet still fair. To tell her that you love spending time with her, but that this behavior is really making that difficult.

Either way, though, I do still thinking discussing it with her is your best bet. HOWEVER... do NOT discuss it at a time when you are upset. For example, don't call her out immediately after she's been blowing up your phone all day. It is better to give yourself some time to cool down, to calm down, and THEN discuss it with a level head. When at heightened emotions, it can be so much harder to avoid the pit fall of it turning into just an argument. You mention you've sometimes wanted to yell at her to leave you the heck alone. Believe me, I definitely understand the feeling... but that illustrates my point about how none of us handle things in the best way when our emotions are heightened.

Good luck to you. Hopefully she can realize that you two can have a great relationship and yet still also be able to be individuals as well. If not, well, then hopefully you can take your leave of the situation without too much drama and allow yourself time to heal before you go back out there and try again.

[Hooo!]

I would assume that she is a hurt person. She is depending on love and got serious issues about that.
Meaning she sees certain acts as not getting love or being in danger of losing love.

This may be due to someone leavin her or being unloving. Usually parents or exes

Let us say she calms this behaviour a little
How would you like your relationship to develope?

[SensitiveMacho]

It is of my personal belief that being in a relationship means depending on each other, but not to the point of not being able to be without each other. She is my number 1 girl, but I have a bunch of friends as well. We like to do man things in a man group, that's how we operate.

So we spoke about the matter, and I told her that she is pushing me away with this behaviour and that I don't want to kick the relationship to the curb yet despite the current state of affairs. I told her that I am currently unhappy and that if I continue feeling this way that I will break up with her due to being unhappy. It'd be better for us both. She cried for a little while but calmed down and told me she will work on the matters we discussed. Today went much better.

Is she a hurt person? Possibly. Lack of a strong male figure in her life and an over dominant mother. Her father left when she was 6, and her mother is domineering over her. She is always doing all the chores at her place because her younger sister does not give a single ****. I do think her mother is the source of a lot of her problems. Her mother yells a lot at her children and the animals they have at home. My girlfriend cannot deal with this in a normal, calm manner because she has taken over her mother's mannerisms.

I would want this relationship to develop in such a way that we she is not so dependant upon me, that she has her own life. Her own hobbies and friends and that she can spend a day without me while still feeling loved, safe and secure. I already do. It would be a much more pleasant relationship. And if it cannot develop in such a manner then I will break up unfortunately.


With that being said, I still have my own lasting confidence issues I am dealing with. Alopecia universalis hasn't done my confidence much good, but it's getting better every day. Especially since when it started 10 years ago. I still fear not being able to find another partner despite my development of confidence and some interest that women have shown me. Also there is an issue in my life called pornography and masturbation. Already kicked weed to the curb lately which my girlfriend is aware of. Now there are more areas to conquer.

[TheEvilJester]

It does sound like she has a lot of pain in her past that likely caused her to be so clingy. I would have assumed as much. People don't generally become so clingy for no reason. Believe me, I do understand that, and I do feel her pain. You are a great guy for caring enough about her to want to be able to help her with that. To some degree, you can and should. But... to some degree that is also her demon to concur. There's only so much you CAN do. At some point, she can't bring that kind of baggage into a relationship or she will drive the other person away.

She deserves to stick up for herself more, by the way. Her mother shouldn't treat her that way. Nor should she be expected to break her back and work her fingers to the bone doing all the chores while her sister and mother don't do a damn thing. That is wrong. But, again, that is her problem to tackle. You can't MAKE her deal with that, you can only try to help boost her confidence and tell her how you feel like she doesn't deserve that.

As far as your relationship, I think you are on a good track as far as how you've handled it so far. If you worded it to her anything like you did to us, that was a good start. In the way you described it to us, it sounds as though you didn't blame her or make it sound like an attack on her. You simply shared that she has no reason to worry about your relationship just because you sometimes do things away from her. You shared that her inability to accept that is causing problems. You did good so far.

Hopefully she can come around and get better at this. And, especially I hope she can learn to appreciate herself more. I think that may really be the biggest problem here that is, at least to some degree, causing her other problems. She doesn't love herself enough. That is definitely a problem I understand. So I hope she learns to appreciate and love herself more... and enough to stop accepting the poor treatment from her family, people that should be amongst her best allies helping to build her up, not amongst her worst enemies tearing her down.

[Hooo!]

Sometimes I am bound to be right spot on.

Maybe she will eventually get it.
It probably helps her if you open up to your emotions on a more regular (and not in a so BAM in your faceish) Basis
So she knows where she stands.
It will help if you go out with the boys if you are gonna say
Oh we are going to have so much fun and Tomorrow we will be doing x and I’m really looking forward to it.

She is scared of being hurt. Knowing where you stand emotionally will help her deescalate.

[SensitiveMacho]

But... to some degree that is also her demon to concur.

And I am trying to make that clear to her. She will often turn to her victim mentality and I end up comforting her. Costs me a lot. You make a good point, I can not help her too much. I am trying to push her in the right direction of self-love and self-acceptance, in the form of self-affirmation. She is very much reliant on external validation, whereas I am not. It's not fair to blame her problems on her mother and sister either, she should look at herself first and I am helping her.

Lately I have been speaking to some women at my gymnastics classes. I seem to hit it off with most of them. And I discovered that they all have their baggage. Makes me wonder if I can really find myself a good woman who loves herself and is emotionally stable!

Knowing where you stand emotionally will help her deescalate.

And that will be my challenge to conquer. I tend to be distracted or detached from my own emotions. Often I am not able to surrender to my own feelings. I've been working on that for a good year now. Quitting weed definitely helped me.

[thelonelyone]

You just have to have balls and tell her how you feel, exactly what u just told us. Explain to here that it's not normal not to have any private time.

[Hooo!]

You don’t have to surrender to your emotions. You just have to notice them and if they are nice or helping kn the long run communicate them to her
That’s a huge difference

[TheEvilJester]

And I am trying to make that clear to her. She will often turn to her victim mentality and I end up comforting her. Costs me a lot. You make a good point, I can not help her too much. I am trying to push her in the right direction of self-love and self-acceptance, in the form of self-affirmation. She is very much reliant on external validation, whereas I am not. It's not fair to blame her problems on her mother and sister either, she should look at herself first and I am helping her.

Lately I have been speaking to some women at my gymnastics classes. I seem to hit it off with most of them. And I discovered that they all have their baggage. Makes me wonder if I can really find myself a good woman who loves herself and is emotionally stable!

That is great of you... but again, you can only do so much. She has to want to help herself. You can't do it for her. Take it from somebody who knows from experience, if she refuses to do anything to try to better her own situation, she'll only pull you down with her. Even worse, she may start to resent you, think you don't understand, etc. just for trying to help. And, I will say that to some degree she certainly CAN blame her mother and sister. It definitely sounds like they are very much a part of the problem. ...But you can't just cry victim and roll over and let yourself continue to be a victim.

So, to some degree you are very much right. She can't just blame her family and leave it at that. She's an adult who can either tell them they need to treat her better.... or decide she needs to keep them at a distance for her own well-being. I had a similar experience myself. An ex whose mother was very emotionally abusive. My ex legitimately had an excuse for blaming her mother for some of her problems.... but then no matter what happened she'd refuse to do anything to change the situation. She'd just keep letting her mother back in completely only to get hurt again. I realize it is family we are talking about, but sometimes family doesn't necessarily deserve their spot in our lives. Sometimes, if they are toxic in our lives, they need to be kept at a distance, or even removed from our lives entirely. I know that isn't easy when you are talking about somebody so close such as family, but you can't just keep letting them abuse you and think it is okay to then cry victim when you could be doing something to change it.

On a side note, EVERYBODY has baggage in life. Sometimes can be harder than others, but it is just about learning the best way to deal with your baggage and become stronger for it rather than letting it way you down. If you are expecting to find a woman without some baggage, you will NEVER find anybody. But, you definitely should want to find somebody who is well equipped to deal with their own baggage rather than just dumping it on everybody else. ...Which, don't get me wrong. That doesn't mean they can't occasionally need help. We all do sometimes. It just shouldn't become the default like it seems to have with your current gal.