Things were Good - She Changed her Mind
Visitor's Question from a 31-40 year old MaleI'm ten years older than my girlfriend. We met in a unique and very original way and instantly connected and fancied each other and have spent much time together since. my girlfriend has been horribly hurt in the past and so i never pushed her to have labels or change facebook or anything like that, we just got on with it and knew we were together. she said she was taking big steps and trusted me and then asked me to be her boyfriend officially only a few weeks ago.
the week that followed she was off of work and we spent days and days together, we went away for a few days and everything was going so well and we both talked about how great it was and how everyone was saying we were so suited then.
on the monday night she came over briefly and felt ill so left, but the following day she seemed different. i was getting increasingly nervous about her sudden change of tone and behaviour towards me, and when we met for a drink on thursday could tell something was up. i stupidly reacted at her not paying attention to me when i was talking and she insisted she go home because the atmosphere had changed.
she has since said that something doesnt feel right and that suddenly shes not sure if she even likes me anymore. this she said came in the space of just a few days. we talked about how great things are and shes herself expressed to me how she really doesnt want to lose what we have, but that she cant tell me either way what she wants or how she feels.
i'm in limbo and just cant believe that everything went from being so amazing to so awful in such a small space of time. i know she will break up with me, because she said that she did this to the last guy she dated...so i'm not optimistic, even though she said she likes me way more than that last guy.
i'm lost. confused. sad and in need of advice. she said she felt suffocated, but only a week ago we spent, happily 10 days out of 12/13 together. and there was no problem. she said that she knows shes been moody this week and felt agitated, but surely thats not enough to end things?
help.
RomanceClass.com AdviceIt is really quite odd that nothing at all spurred this change. It's not quite usual for a person to feel one way and then to feel the complete opposite way without something - even a tiny something - causing the change.
I would give serious thought to what happened before Monday. It seems unlikely that your brief visit on Monday caused such a life-changing event. It seems much more likely that something happened *before* Monday to upset her. She got upset about it but came over Monday anyway - and it was eating at her and caused her to leave. So what could that be?
Clearly she has issues communicating so she's not going to make this easy for you to figure out. But something is there. If you want to keep her you have to figure out what. You also have to figure out how to help her learn to communicate. Your relationship won't last long if you are constantly having to play mental guessing games about what she is thinking.
So I would sit down with her and tell her you promise to be completely calm and quiet. You want to learn how to improve - even if it means she has to leave. That you won't want to judge her. You just want to figure out what the challenge is. That way she feels no pressure and feels safe. Then ask her to think about each day and how she felt. Ask her where she started to feel differently. Draw her into sharing. It's of course important that you not get upset! It's hard but the key here is to teach her how to talk. You can try to then fix it later - but for now focus just on the talking part. Focus on drawing her out so she feels like she trusts you.
Good luck!
-- from Lisa
One of Your Friendly Advisors at RomanceClass.com
