-- Question for John --
I’ve been in a relationship for 4 years and up until about 6 months ago things were good but lately my girlfriend has been going out with her new girl friends a lot and I feel left, abandoned. She used to be my side all the time now I have to try to fit in her busy schedule of friends and am having a hard time dealing with this. I love her and don’t wanna lose her…
-- Answer from John --
The way I’d look at this situation right now is with these questions:
“What I do need to learn to better deal with this change now?”
“How can I grow in order to better deal with what my girlfriend is doing?”
“What sensitivity do I need to heal within myself so that this situation does not upset me as it does now?”
I cannot fault your girlfriend for needing her time away from the relationship. That, in fact, is healthy.
It can rapidly become unhealthy if you start making demands on her from the point of view of your own insecurity, feelings of neediness, or sense of abandonment.
That goes down a well-known road, and the result is almost always very very bad. What happens next is that she starts feeling more imprisoned by your demands and then she starts looking at you as if you were a little boy instead of the grown man she wants to be with. That, in turn, starts making you feel even more abandoned and upset. From there it races downhill quicker until, usually, a break-up occurs.
You can stop traveling on that predictable and all too common road. But only by changing yourself. Not by changing her. You need to really see that and get that. You are looking at the wrong person in the relationship right now (her) for a change. You need to look at you. You need to change you.
This is a tremendous opportunity for your own personal growth, emotional maturing, and inner healing. You would benefit greatly from experienced help in this matter. I mean a coach or counselor. This is a very common issue, and it mostly splits couples up. I recommend you do the uncommon thing, get up the courage, and beat the odds.
If you do decide to shift your vision and look at yourself and make such a change, and you are looking for outside coaching,
