The "Dark Side" of your romantic type

In My Humble Opinion
1

Most of us probably have this romantic ideal in our heads as to what our ideal romantic partner would be like (both physically as well as in terms of personality, common interests, etc.). There was a recent thread on just this (and undoubtedly older ones).

But, once we actually get into a relationship with someone (hopefully close to your conscious ideal), we may notice other, concomitant aspects which inevitably seem to come along for the ride, even tho we may not have consciously been aware of them or purposefully sought them out. Typically we might perceive these qualities to be “negative” in some way, as in you would normally find said qualities to be abhorrent in a conscious sense-yet they puzzlingly keep reappearing in just about anyone you get involved with.

Certain pundits who dispense romantic advice will typically say that these qualities are attempts by your psyche to deal with earlier trauma, giving you a chance to triumph over that which originally scarred you. You thus might tend to look for men who remind you of your father (just an example), even if your father was emotionally distant. Lo and behold the men you actually date turn out to be emotionally distant too (tho this may not be immediately obvious initially).

So, as a means of exorcising said demons, feel free to list those qualities which keep popping up over and over no matter whom you seem to end up with. Yes I am in bad need of such exorcisms myself right now, in case you haven’t deduced that already. :frowning:

For me, it’s very simple: she is ultimately unavailable. This has taken several forms within my life, including but not limited to

Most generally, getting involved with women who are commitmentphobes. Weirdly, it’s when things just start beginning to go very well that they tend to inexplicably break it off (a passionate kiss, long involved heart-to-hearts deep into the night, etc.). This is the most maddening kind, since there seems to be absolutely no reason why we should part ways, yet she does so anyway (and during the “break-up” talk, she is unable to provide a convincing excuse).

More specifically:

Being just younger enough than me (we were teens) to cause her parents to force her to break things off with me, even tho up to that point I had never clicked with anyone the way I had with her. I also was highly reluctant to take advantage of her in any event.

Long-distance relationships: I am hugely wary of these anymore; seems like you end up having a romance with the person you imagine them to be, in your mind, and then when you finally meet you have to start over from square one, and often the chemistry you imagined was there doesn’t actually exist, up close.

LDR with a twist: this one woman wanted all the romantic trappings of a relationship without actually trying to, you know, have an actual relationship. She would be constantly sending me all these cute romantic cards and such, but when I asked her when we could see each other again, she’d just make excuses (she was 250 miles away on the other side of Pennsylvania).

I have to be on guard against highly controlling women. In college I met a girl who was my physical ideal, and at first our personalities seemed to mesh fantasically well. But she would constantly belittle me here and there in small little ways, and never relaxed enough when we were together so as to just let things happen without her feeling a loss of control. As a result we never could get close, and after yet another round of her trying to boss me around I just told her to (politely) get lost.

The most recent one (and thus the impetus for this thread) involves 2 (related) very practical and sound reasons why we can’t get together, right now. It’s too bad because she was able to instantly suss me up (my overall ideals and motivations) soon after we first met, and we have a ton in common overall. The strides I’ve made personally (ye old Buddhist non-attachment that I’ve been cultivating) has helped a lot tho; I just wish I could meet someone where I don’t have to keep enduring this same old ridiculous song and dance, because, frankly, it’s getting extremely old, and I myself am getting old.

Well, that’s mine; feel free to describe yours.

2

I have a savior complex. It’s led me to stay in several bad relationships because I thought I could help them, usually drawing them out way longer than I should and making the inevitable break up that much harder.

3

I love my men mysterious, I love to over-analyze and figure things out.

4

Everybody says, “don’t put it in the crazy,” but I’m a sucker for the crazy. And Jewish women.

5

He killed 10 million people and was a bit on the paranoid side. But he was always polite to his mom.

6

Malignant, narcissistic bass players with no concept of accountability from Easton PA who used to be in a band called the Psyclone Rangers are right off my list these days.

What? Too specific? :smiley:

UT

7

I tend toward the slightly broody types. Too broody and I’m out of there; there’s gotta be a sense of humour. But I seem to generally end up with guys who just will not open up all the way; that destroyed a relationship for me when, after 3 years, I gave up trying to ‘get inside’, apparantly just at the time he was trying really hard to open up. >.<

So, yeah; show me a guy with a ‘past’, especially military or law-enforcement oriented, and I’m right the hell on it, though decades of knowing I can’t/won’t handle being on the outside all the time will make me break for it.

Good thing I’m married :smiley:

Oh, and we did have a major breakthrough about a month ago, when, instead of not ‘poking the bear’ when he was in an inexplicable mood, I poked him until he finally told me what was bothering him. It was his past, it’d been a bad week, topped off by coming face to face with someone he used to work with who also had similar issues. (Prison work is never fun and games) Anyway, ptsd kicked in; I asked him after, if I hadn’t kept pushing him, if he’d ever have told me what was bothering him, as I’d been on my way out the door to just leave him to his mood, and he said ‘no’. So…maybe it’s me that’s changed and that’s why this one works and the others didn’t. Sometimes you just gotta push it, I guess. Too bad I’m so non-confrontational by nature, sigh.

8

Good lord, double post; how did that happen?:smack:

9

My BIL calls this the Captain Sav-A-Ho complex. And yes, he went through a couple of those before meeting my sister. :stuck_out_tongue:

10

Did your parents never tell you to not fuck musicians? My mom would whisper that to me every night.

She has a record by one of my prospective fathers that…

11

Had this conversation too many times: “He’s a drummer. For God’s sake, a drummer. Only a bit up the food chain from a bassist. Just what are you thinking?” But “He’s in a band!” seems to work for women. I’ll never understand it.

12

I’m not sure how much is it maleness and how much them, but one thing my guys had in common was a certain likeness to locomotives. Or maybe tanks.

Even the ones who weren’t particularly burly sometimes got into one-track mode; when they got like that, they would barely hear that someone was trying to talk to them. The Bestest Boyfriend? Oh man…

You see, we’d met in an online game before we met in person. He played a type of character called a “tank”. A bunch of people from the game were spending a weekend together, and he was late (no surprises there). At one point I said “that’s him, that’s TBB!” “How can you be so sure? There’s got to be five dozen guys here who match his description!” “Yeah, but he’s the only one who moves like a Sherman tank. He walks like he expects people to walk out of his intended path instead of weaving.”
When TBB started in one of his completely off-target speeches, the rest of us would treat it like it was a TV show. He’d be ranting about how “Catholics always fast on Fridays” and we’d say “yeah well, cept it’s only during Lent and not everybody does it, plus there’s dispensations”“well, there’s the First Fridays devotion too” or “when he says ‘fast’ is he talking about food or cars? Because my car doesn’t go any faster on Fridays” “is your car baptized?” “well, no, but I’ve named it!”
And he wouldn’t hear a word… blahblah yadda purification yadda yadda penance yadda yadda

Sometimes I think that if I’d been able to find a way to break into those wordstreams we would have gotten married. He wouldn’t have had time to ask me, I would have dragged him :stuck_out_tongue:

13

The one thing my guys have always had in common is unemployment/underemployment. I’ve always, ALWAYS been the primary breadwinner - or in the few cases that he’s made more than I do, the job never lasts.

14

I’m going to work that term into quite a few future conversations, thank you BIL for me. Very useful word.

15

Maggie, what was the " light side" of that trait? Were you attracted to those guys because they were artistic, idealistic, rebels, in need of rescue of some sort ?

16

They’re smart, they’re funny, they’re goofy and geeky, and they think I’m awesome. :smiley:

I just have no idea why that package is usually bound up with the “can’t keep a job” trait. :frowning:

17

dropzone:

I must defend myself. :smiley:

I am a corporate wonk. Event planner/project director. I favor clothes by Talbots and Jones New York. I am everything a band “groupie” (for lack of a better word here) is NOT (making generalizations here, obviously).

The relationship with the aforementioned musician came about after the brutal, cruel end of a 15 year relationship. I was looking for a man who was the antithesis of my previous man - a driven, self-made businessman.

The musician was tall, well-read, attractive, and we had a lot in common despite our basic social differences (he’s blue collar, HS drop out (GED later)). I thought he was an iconoclast and I liked that. I’d never dated a musician and no, I never got that “avoid them at all costs” lecture :slight_smile:

It turns out he was a lot of other things, too, that I didn’t become aware of until I was in too deep. Cut me to the bone, and I’m still recovering. I don’t trust people in general now, and I’ve withdrawn a lot.

So there’s my sad story, although I do like “Dr Softness” by the Rangers an awful lot :stuck_out_tongue:

UT

18

Meanness, in general, had always been a weakness of mine. Girls who are mean and bitter for some damned reason have always hit a certain button of mine. And like “Captain Save-a-Ho”, I’ve always had a thing for rescuing people - I always called mine “White Knight Syndrome” - and its a trait I share with all my siblings. We all have had disasterous relationships with people we felt we had to save.

Thank Og I broke the cycle with wife #2 - she is everything opposite emotionally that my ex was and that the women I used to be so drawn to were. She’s loving, emotionally open, warm, inviting…and it is amazing, after so many years involved with someone who was an emotional iceburg (and proud of the fact).

The only “dark side” to my relationship with my wife is having to deal with her psychotic ex - but then, she has to deal with mine, so it’s a fair trade. :wink:

19

My problem is two different criteria that often don’t mesh. I love overly affectionate people, huggy-touchy people, and I love people with whom I can hold an intelligent conversation. When I do find these people, they are very often taken.

I don’t really have a savior complex, but I do have similar trait: I often am attracted to the less girly women, but I feel this need to find their girly side. At least it’s a little less impossible.

What I never get is why this doesn’t seem to ever apply to the keyboardist.

Yes, I play keyboard. Why do you ask?

20

My advice to you is to start drinking heavily.