Quote:
Originally Posted by Flames Fan, Ph.D.
Ah the life of an academic...
You're in location 1 for 4-5 years, wherein you familiarize yourself with the surroundings for a year, try to have a friend with benefits for 6 months, and then have a gf for 2-3 years that eventually breaks up. You start thinking back about other women that could have been.
Then you move for additional post-graduate studies. Restart meeting new people process. But this time, you feel less inclined to jump into a relationship. You hold out for a few years while you "concentrate on your studies." Eventually you give in, have a new relationship, but you're somewhat uncomfortable that your solo life is being encroached upon.
You move again for a putative academic position. Your lifestyle has been to live by yourself for 10 years. You want sex, and you say you want a relationship, but you don't want your actual lifestyle to change. You're mildly standoff-ish. Women sense it. But you're getting older, and you don't have anything in common intellectually because the women that you're still attracted to physically are 23-27 years old (and you're mid 30ish).
You get tenure. You have graduate students of your own. You bang their friends in exchange for long conversations about Marx and Engels, God and Angels.
Moral of this story: I read some confusion in your opening post and follow ups, as you first noted that she broke your heart, but then you made mention of her using sex to get her way (which implies you're happy to put up with certain things in exchange for sex), and then you made mention of a danish chick. Methinks you need to spend some time really thinking about what you want now and in the future. I don't get the feeling that you really want a firm commitment at this time, but rather want to enjoy different women. If true, then it's better to be in the right frame of mind and honest with yourself. That will make the next few months easier and less confusing.
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Good post. You are actually totally correct. I've sort of theorized my own perspective on the one hand and realized that I wasn't getting what I needed out of the relationship. So you are actually alarmingly precise in your analysis and I appreciate your comments.
On the other hand, I am hurt that she lied. That was really effed up, because I would have given things another go. Another moral of the story, once you get to the point where you decide to have a last go at things, don't give things a last go. End it. I would have exchanged the feelings for different women for an entirely different woman than the one I was dating for 3 years. That sort of made sense to me last night actually.