Conference quark::mennotes-v1

I'll say what I'm sure a lot of others here will say - this is by no means
unique to men.  Women can do the same thing.  It's called "fear of commitment."

While you were apart, you were "safe".  No matter what promises the two of
you made, inside he didn't believe that he was committed, because of the
distance.  But when you moved closer, you eliminated the "safety buffer" and
suddenly he realized that perhaps this wasn't what he wanted after all.
But rather than have the courage to tell you, he pretends you don't exist
and doesn't call.

My advice would be to try to forget him.  There are also some notes in
HUMAN_RELATIONS on long-distance romances that may be of interest.

				Steve

    Are you sure he isn't already in a "committed" relationship?  Just a
    thought.  In general I agree with Steve.  It's an emotional issue, and
    he might not even have felt it until you actually arrived on the scene.
    I don't think too many people are like that, but from what I read, it isn't
    exactly uncommon either.
    
    					- Vick

    three years ago, shortly after I got a divorce, (a very tough time for
    most folks), I "pulled back" from a long distance relationship. 
    (actually three of them... which, while not as serious as yours seems
    to be, were involved enough for me.)
    
    Two of the persons were angered and hurt by my withdrawal, and those
    relationships soon ended.  The third "understood" my crisis and stood
    by me.  We are now married.
    
    Please don't jump to any conclusions about *why* he has withdrawn.  Try
    to confront him with your feelings and discuss it openly.
    
    I suggest there may be something else in your SOs life which may be
    causing his withdrawal than just fear of committment or proximity to
    you.
    
    
    tony

    I remember the 5 years after my divorce, I avoided committment.
     I dated lots of men instead of getting too close to 1, dated men
    in different towns and just plain never told them I was in love.
     But, I will admit that it was fun to pretend to be in love.  The
    romancing was fun.  But I remained honest about my feelings with
    these fellas and lost some.  To be fair, you have to be on the same
    wave length.

    I agree with Steve's comments about maybe this man is afraid of
    committment.  I was once in love with a man that was incapable of
    committment, but I didn't learn that until it was way too late for
    me to get away from him without being deeply hurt.
                                                 
    The thing about your message that really stands out to me is it sounds
    like you're giving this man the power to be the one that makes you
    happy.  If you are really miserable without him, I suggest that you get
    yourself into couseling *right* away.  There's nothing wrong with being
    there for him (as one noter mentioned, he may be going through a very
    tough time), but don't move any of your own boundries for him.  Be
    friendly towards him, but not at the cost of your own happiness.
    
    -Janice

    re.5
    "Great!"

    possibilities;
    
    	1)	He's already committed and is now scared/ashamed because of
    		the dishonesty
    
    	2)      unsure of his feelings 
    
    	3) 	I hesitate to say "fear of commitment" because, IMHO, that
    		is a load of cr*p
    
    In any case, he needs to face up to you and be honest about what is
                            ^(have some b*lls)
    going on so that you (individually or together) can get on with life.
    
    Good luck...
    
    Tom

    How about mid life crisis. This is very real in some men.
    
    
    Steve

Fear of commitment is not 'crap'.  It is... fear of commitment.  It's when 
reality thumps you in the guts and makes you see what you've gotten yourself 
into and you realise that you're not ready and sometimes you go to pieces 
instead of being cool, calm and ultra-mature because after all you are only 
human.  It's unfortunate, maybe unnecessary (in a preventive sense), but it's 
very, very real.

    .8> How about mid life crisis. This is very real in some men.
    
    It may be very real, but that doesn't mean a woman* should have to warp
    her life around to accommodate it!  It's real, it's a problem--it's
    just not HER problem unless she decides to affix herself to it.
    
    Leslie
    
    *"Woman" and the feminine pronouns used only as default, as I know the
    situation applies in homosexual partnering too.  And women have midlife
    crises as well....

re .10

>    It may be very real, but that doesn't mean a woman* should have to warp
>    her life around to accommodate it!  It's real, it's a problem--it's
>    just not HER problem unless she decides to affix herself to it.

In case it slipped your notice the whole point of .0's problem is that she 
wants to be a part of the relationship only it's not working well right now.  
So all this defensive feminist crap about how the woman shouldn't 'affix' 
herself to the problem is not only irrelevant but destructive - partnerships 
are about sharing the bad times with the good.  This problem affects two 
people and so two people will have to work it out.  It will *not* be worked 
out with one side laying down fixed boundaries and refusing to move until the 
other 'gets it together'.

    I saw the basenote as asking "what _happened_?" She's just realized,
    due to his sudden obnoxious behavior coincident with her move, that
    this relationship is NOT (now, nor maybe ever had been) what she'd
    assumed.  My .10 was meant to 1) agree that a midlife crisis _may_ be
    "what happened"; and 2) suggest that she not assume responsibility for
    this adolescent behavior on his part.  IMO, giving a tidy name
    ["midlife crisis"] to <grownups-acting-petulant-because-their-advancing-
    age-is-suddenly-unpleasant>, or "deal[ing] with situations by pretending 
    [they] never existed", does not sanctify that kind of behavior.
    
    No, I don't think she should be expected to put up with it, though when
    she figures out what DID happen she can weigh the value of treading
    water for X amount of time until he grows up enough to fish or cut
    bait.
    
    Leslie

>    assumed.  My .10 was meant to 1) agree that a midlife crisis _may_ be
>    "what happened"; and 2) suggest that she not assume responsibility for
>    this adolescent behavior on his part.  IMO, giving a tidy name
>    ["midlife crisis"] to <grownups-acting-petulant-because-their-advancing-
>    age-is-suddenly-unpleasant>, or "deal[ing] with situations by pretending 
>    [they] never existed", does not sanctify that kind of behavior.

This is still distinctly unhelpful.  A mid-life crisis is not 'adolescent 
behaviour', nor is it based on anything so flimsy as finding advancing age is 
suddenly 'unpleasant'.  Adolescents deny the reality of their mortality.  A 
true mid-life crisis is a *crisis* triggerd by the failure of existing denial 
techniques to repress the knowledge of one's impending death.  It involves a 
complete reevaluation of one's value set and ultimately demands a 
reassessment of one's attitude towards life and death.

It is a time when men ask themselves just what they've achieved, and for many 
the answer is very little (of worth).  It is a time when they have to 
acknowledge the end of their dreams, and when you take a man's dreams away 
you often take away just that which keeps him going when things get 
toughest.  Women tend to suffer less from this psychological malaise because 
by this age they generally have achieved something of worth, ie., they have 
had children.  It is no accident that many of history's great women achieved 
their greatness after menopause, when the freedom from procreation allowed 
them to exert and develop their other talents.

For men it is different.  Socialised into a fiercely competitive environment, 
this is when they must contemplate the notion that society is going to 
discard them.  Retirement for some will be a boon, but for many men it is a 
death sentence.  It is no accident that most of history's great men achieved 
their greatness before their forties, and today we have no substantive way to 
assist men in the transition from youth to maturity (Jung defines a young man 
up to the age of 35).

If the man in .0 is in fact going through a mid-life crisis then neither he 
nor his prospective partner will be at all assisted by your glib throw away 
lines about what for him is an existential crisis.  Or perhaps we should 
apologise because we aren't all great at handling trauma?

    .13 should probably be moved to the MLC note.  And whether one agrees
    on its definition of MLC or not, and whether "what happened" is MLC or
    not, his shoddy treatment of the basenoter is inexcuseable IMO.
    
    Leslie

    This is my first entry into this notes conference, but from what I've
    seen so far, it seems to be one that may offer some value.
    
    In any event, my feedback on this situation:
    
    Yes, it seems reasonable that this guy suddenly feels the physical
    proximity too overbearing and doesn't know what to do about it, so
    does the easiest thing (it is the easiest thing, guys, whether we
    like it or not) and simply tries to push it aside, either hoping it
    will eventually resolve itself, or give him enough time to resolve it
    and go on from there.
    
    I had a similar experience when I was about 22 where I moved into my
    first apartment. Alone, on my own for the first time. My girlfriend
    at the time would visit me every weekend, and when she didn't come up
    I would go to her house. Well, after a month or so of that, I started
    to 'like' to freedom that solitude offers and delayed my departure to
    her house longer and longer each weekend, until such time that I simply
    didn't go. At the time I knew that something had changed, but I didn't
    understand what, so couldn't verbalize it, so had no way of communicating
    this to her. I know she was hurt but I was too emotionally/
    intellectually immature to even attempt a conversation around it. Actually,
    I realized what had happened only in retrospect, after our relationship
    ended.
    
    For me it was an essential and very significant turning point. My only
    regret is that I was too 'something' (I can't come up with a suitable
    word), so was unable to talk to her about my feelings (I guess I was
    also afraid of losing her, which I did. But at the time, my resolution
    of this emotional dilema was more important to me than my relationship
    with her).
    
    So, I guess what I'm saying is, is that this person may be going
    through a similar thing within himself, is having diffculty verbalizing
    it internally, and thus can't verbalize it externally, and is maybe
    hoping that it can be resolved via the passage of time and his own
    inner resources. But I would also recommend attempting to bring it
    out of him, but being direct, but empathetic.
    
    I also agree, however, with a previous comment that it is an unhealthy
    situation to 'need' someone too much. I've been married now for 10
    years, and the best part about it is that neither my wife nor I feel
    'trapped' (oh, we have our days like everyone else, when all we'd like
    is a few minutes to ourselves - we have two little daughters, 2.8 yrs
    and 2 months), because we both know that our decision to get married was
    born out of a conscious choice to go through life together - not
    because we 'needed' to, but because we 'wanted' to. Not because it was
    going to be all roses, but because we wanted to help each other along
    and share in whatever came our way. Assisting in the growth of each.
    
    For me the reluctance and the inability to even begin a conversation on
    my emotional state back when I was 22, was that I was afraid of what the
    other person might do, i.e. get mad, be happy, etc. My own personal
    'boundaries' were not stable enough to be able to deal with all cons-
    equences, thus I avoided the whole mess by shutting her out. I could have
    grown a lot more if I had at least made an attempt, and even if it didn't
    work out, I'm sure she would have respected me more for it.
    
    	I hope this helps.
    
    Bob S.

    Hey basenoter,
    
    How goes the battle?  Have you found out what's going on with him yet? 
    Is he returning your phone calls yet??
    
    Leslie

    Well... I stopped calling when he kept his machine on to pick up
    the calls.. I did'nt leave any message as I was afraid that he
    might not return that call also.  So I stopped calling.  I'm in
    a quandry - let it go or pursue as he might need a push.  Who
    knows.   Some replys here say ... find out... some say its
    kind of obvious what his message is saying.  I get the same
    responses from my friends.  I really don't know what to do.  If
    anything.
    

    re .17......What do you want from this man???	sit down & 
    
    understand exactly what you want & write it down....Do you need this
    man or do you need a deep relationship?? You say that you have stopped
    phoning him but have you tried direct contact?? have you visited his 
    house??
    
    	If you do this,be prepared for all sorts of excuses etc & ensure
    that you get from the meeting what you want - understanding maybe???
    At some point you have to allow your life to get back on the rails &
    get rolling again...It seems that you are now relying on his next move 
    to decide how your life is going to be run....try taking control of
    your life again....regardless of his reasons,it is you (& maybe him)
    who is suffering,but it is due to his unwillingness to talk to you
    that you are now confused........
    	
    	...give him no option other than facing you then at least you will
    get some answers...