1. If you try hard enough you can make someone love you, or to stay with you when they have already decided to leave.
2. Habits you find annoying will disappear after the wedding, or after the new house is built, or when he or she gets a new job or a new car.
3. Having a baby will fix a troubled relationship.
4. Living together is the same as being married.
5. Men want sex more often than women want sex.
6. Real love means you will love everything about the person you love.
7. Forgiving means forgetting.
8. Time heals.
9. Jealousy is an indication of love.
10. Loving another requires self-denial.
11. Real love is two people in the “same boat.”
12. People who are in love always know where the other is, and what the other is doing.
September 7, 2006
A dozen fallacies about romantic relationships
September 7, 2006
Can’t stop talking to her ex….
Reader’s Question: My girlfriend keeps in touch with her ex-boyfriend. She says this is normal and should not bother me. I think messaging him almost everyday, phoning him on her way home almost every night, and talking to him more than she talks to me is a bit much. If I make too much of it she says I am jealous. I tried to ignore it. I cannot. Please help. (Letter revised to isolate central issue)
Rod’s response: It seems your girlfriend is not ready to fully separate from her ex, to the point where he is truly an ex. Her lingering connection, demonstrated by her ongoing communication, suggests she is not sufficiently emotionally disconnected from him, or ready to be fully focused on her relationship with you.
You might have noticed romantic and emotional connection is only possible with one other person at a time. Any attempts at multiple, romantic and emotional connections usually cause severe problems for all who try it, or who are victims of such attempts.
I’d suggest you recognize her lack of focus by suggesting she explore her residual hankerings, while you agree to sever your ties with her so as not to cause her any interference while she determines what it is she wants.
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