T.R. in the U.K.

[jay-ell]

I been dating this girl for just over a month now, though we've known each other for about a year.  I think I love her, I know she loves me, but right now my heads in a real mess. She thinks this is it, I'm the one you know, and I thought that about her, but lately I been cracking up. I been thinking about just running away. Going somewhere new and working so much that I can't think about my problems, partially part of the fact I really don't like myself and it would help make me feel like I didn't. Like I was a different person. And the last couple of days I've been doing just that, and for someone as lazy as I am that's something!
But anything I tell myself, or think I'm sure of, my mind asks me whether I'm  just telling myself that.
One thing I know is that while she keeps saying she wants to break up cos she can't deal with this happening, I really don't want her to just go. I can't face that.
I know I probably need to go see a therapist, but I just figure I should gather some more advice, in case someone says those magic few words that make me fix it all!
 
What I'm hearing from you sounds a lot like desparation.  You're at a point in your life where you have to make a choice, you just have to, but you'll do anything to avoid choosing.  You want to be with this woman, and she wants to be with you, but you're afraid that -- someday -- that will change.  You're afraid that you'll eventually realize that you didn't really want to be with her, or, worse, she'll leave you for a wealthy but homely banker thirty years her senior.  

This really doesn't have much to do with not liking yourself.  (Although I do reccomend seeing a therapist on that one.)  This has more to do with not knowing what you want out of life.  Because I know your identity and a few other things about you, I know that you're fairly young and have yet to complete your education.  Basically, you have your whole life ahead of you and it has you scared shitless.  I remember being there myself, not too long ago.  I went a little psycho, too.  

So how do you deal with it?  First off, tell your girlfriend that you care for her deeply, but you really don't know who you are at this point.  Tell her you'd like to try and make things work with her, but first you have to get some things sorted round in your own noggin (or whatever the Brit vernacular is these days).  I see no need to end the relationship -- if this woman is really fantastic, she could be a valuable source of support and counsul for you.  Girlfriends are, more often than not, really good listeners, and it might even save you money on therapy in the long run.  

Second, figure out who you are.  Maybe you have a career path mapped out; maybe you don't.  Re-evaluate everything -- as a great British poet once wrote, there's still time to change the road you're on.  Maybe you think you don't like yourself because you haven't met.  That's why you keep second-guessing yourself, thinking that you're fooling yourself.  Here's a tip: you don't figure out who you are by sitting around and gazing at your navel.  You do it by trying things you've never tried before to see if you like them.  Granted, you're more than a checklist of likes and dislikes, but developing hobbies and interests outside of school, work, and your girlfriend not only helps you establish a value system and an external identity; it also helps you create a framework for evaluating yourself.  You may find out you're not such a bad guy after all.  And when you've dealt with yourself and know where you're headed, everything else -- your girlfriend included -- will just fall into place.

In theory, anyway.  

[Nabubrush]

(I'm assuming that it's ok to post our thoughts on these subjects.)

My girlfriend and I have decided (due to things coming to a head) to take some time off. She has moved a few thousand miles away, and I have been getting therapy and getting my head together, as it were. This weekend, I talked to her (we have made an arrangement to talk on the phone every three - four weeks). I took the risk of asking her to wait a year for me to get things figured out, and she said yes. I say took the risk, because my way of dealing with relationships up to this point has been to never ask for anything, and to try to give the other person anything they wanted. Through my therapy, I have come to realize that it's extremely unfair to put that burden on the other person, and it's really fear that causes me to do that.
Perhaps this isn't helpful; I don't know. But I can tell you that I've done the avoidance thing for years, and while dealing with things is very, very hard at first, it becomes easier. And surprisingly, it doesn't take long for it to become easier than avoidance. Also, good things feel about a thousand times better when you actually feel. I know this next year is going to be hard, and there are going to be times when I just want to drop everything and go to her. Luckily I'm in a situation where I can travel to see her now and then - though that's going to be hard as well. As a matter of fact, in September I'm going to Seattle to see my Dad and she's going to drive up and see me for a couple of days. !!!
I know for me I wouldn't have been able to take my own advice 10 years ago, or maybe one year ago - I hadn't got to that point. But for what it's worth, I think you ahould at least try talking to her about this. My gf doesn't want to wait, but she agrees with me that when I finish this work, there'll be a much better chance of us succeeding. And before anyone chimes in about the yearlong wait, know this: the purpose of my request was getting to a place that I could ask for the wait. I know that anything can happen in a year. It's basically like the old story of the kind who gives the man a death sentence. The man says "give me a year to teach your hoss to sing - at the end of the year, when the hoss can sing, you let me go." His friend says it'll never work, and the man says "anything can happen in a year: the king might die, I might die, and just maybe, the hoss learns a song." That was bastardized, but the theory is the same. Even if things don't work out, being at a point where you can deal with your problems is a great goal. Good luck!

[slink]

Well, I don't mind not being anonymous on this one. Except for anyone who comes in and decides I'm an asshole for it
Thanks J, for good advice. I do need to spend a little less time sitting worrying about this stuff, or doing things to avoid thinking about it, and just kind of getting on with being me.
I wish I was still a teenager and felt like I had the time to do all this without having to deal with so many other things at the same time, but alas, the years creep away from you (I'm getting into further education very late, having not got on with it at all from my early teens onwards you see). I guess also, I forgot to mention, cos well, it's been around so long that I kind of ignore it, but I have ME/CFS, which has had a big effect on not only my general health levels, but my brains reaction to many chemicals (that is native chemicals not the additional ones that have been thrown at it), which plays a large part in not quite knowing, and probably never quite, what is going on in my mind. Both my current doctors, my GP and a specialist, have been thoroughly unhelpful, so I think I'm going to try and sort out a therapist who knows something about dealing with the condition.
As far as my relationship goes about an hour before I read all this she decided she can't deal with two peoples problems. I've been debating with myself whether she was actually giving me the support I need. Maybe I just missed it, and maybe she's right. Well as far as I'm concerned she's made the right decision, I know it's better for her well-being, but I'll miss her sorely!
Not often advice get's a followup
Thanks guys!

btw J - you hit a lot of it on the head, which will help me out lots - "but you're afraid that -- someday -- that will change. You're afraid that you'll eventually realize that you didn't really want to be with her, or, worse, she'll leave you for a wealthy but homely banker thirty years her senior." (not only btw, the wondrousness of the homely banker comment, much as it kind of disturbed me :S, but yes, I am afraid I'll feel that I didn't want to be with her in the future. And more over I'm afraid that if I don't make huge effort to make it work, that when it doesn't I'll hate myself for not having done so in the future.)

[jay-ell]

Thanks for speaking up, Slink, and for the news update.  Sorry about your girlfriend, but it does simplify the process of figuring yourself out a bit.  Not having to worry about someone else's emotions, and all that pesky stuff.  

Knowing you're starting your education a few years later in life doesn't change my response, actually.  Unless you're, like, seventy, you've still got this whole big blank slate that is The Future, and figuring out what you're going to fill it with can be daunting.  The core sentiment in my advice is this: take some time to identify what you love to do, and then throw yourself at a path that will allow you to do that thing.  If something else comes up along the way that intrigues you, follow it for a while.  

Here's an example.  I went to college thinking I was going to major in English and teach high school.  I got there and realized I really wanted to study History.  So I thought I'd teach high school history instead.  Then I realized I really didn't want to teach high school.  Meanwhile, I took a summer job as a secretary.  When I graduated, I had a degree in history and experience as a secretary, and guess which proved more marketable?  So I took a job as a secretary in the engineering department at a local university and started taking classes again.  Being on the staff side of a campus made me realize that I really wanted to teach college.  After 2 years, I got offered a better job as a secretary with the department that teaches professors how to teach.  So now I'm learning how to teach college by day and taking content-area classes for my Master's degree by night.  It's been a long and winding road, and I never would have guessed that I'd have ended up here -- I just walked through the more interesting doors as they opened.  And I learned a little something about myself on the way.  

Going to college is a huge step, and I think just being there and doing some different things with different people will open some doors for you that you never knew existed.  Good luck with that, and let me know how it goes.