How can I stop sabotaging my relationships?
What you need to know:
- Making stuff up and then believing it is a sure way to self-torment. Unless you change your way of thinking, you will not be able to sustain this relationship – or any other in future
Q: I have been in relationships but I am not able to sustain them. I was dumped by my first boyfriend and I was very hurt. Ever since, I haven’t really been able to trust any other man. I ended two other relationships for fear that I would be left, in order to avoid the hurt of abandonment. I’m now in another one with the same feelings of insecurity. If he's quiet I start panicking, thinking: ‘What's he planning? Is he going to end it with me? Has he met someone else?’ If I don't know exactly where he is I get suspicious. He constantly has to reassure me. What can I do? I need to know whether he loves me and if the relationship will work.
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A: Thank you for your question. When we enter a relationship we may feel emotionally vulnerable, especially if we have felt let down or hurt in previous relationships. The fear of rejection you are experiencing is the feelings of a chronically insecure partner. One of the sources of your insecurity is imaginations which, according to you, represent reality.
Bear in mind that making stuff up and then believing it is a sure way to self-torment. Unless you change your way of thinking, you will not be able to sustain this relationship – or any other in future. A great way to overcome this is to challenge your own fears and imaginations rather than just accepting them. When you have such thoughts, ask yourself what it is that you are imagining, and refuse to put such thoughts into reality.
You say that you want assurance from your partner that he loves you and whether this relationship will work out. Well, it takes two people for a relationship to work out and yearning to know whether he really loves you will only put unnecessary strain and tension in your relationship. You will need to relax and let love take its course as you do your best to make it work.
I'd like to discourage you from leaving him: give the relationship time to grow and space to breath. Don’t focus only on what is not working. Look at the positive as well. Doing this will get you and your partner to naturally become more positive; and please stop comparing this relationship with previous ones. The future doesn’t have to be like the past.
