Free Advice

Writing a newsletter on dating advice for women, I get a very big response – and a considerable amount of questions from those who are subscribed to my column. I make my best effort to answer each and every question I get, but there are some dating questions that I truly believe all the women subscribed to my column can benefit from. This is one such question from a great reader needing some dating advice on regaining her ability to trust.

For privacy’s sake, we will call this reader Selina…

Thank you Sarah, for all those newsletters. Firstly, I’m sorry for not replying to you sooner. I have come upon a bit of a situation in my life, where I met up with my first true love after being apart for several years. We had gone our different ways and we just found out each other’s whereabouts and started communicating again.

The thing is, during those two years I went through quite a bit of heartache with my ex boyfriend and we broke up, which left me not wanting to have anything to do with guys again. My first love then comes back and it seems that our relationship only fell apart due to the long-distance aspect of it. He seems to have also gone through a lot regarding relationships in the meantime as well. Right now he says he trusts me but I just cannot come to trust him – though I do love him – I am so confused about what to do. I still think that he is cheating behind my back and I have just had enough of players in my life.

Please Sarah I am so lost. Can you please give me some dating tips?

Love,

Selina

I just want to give Selina a hug! I think each one of us, as women, have been in that place in our lives where we just feel that ONE more heartache will send us running to the nearest convent. Or at least, into hiding for a while!

Here is my reply to Selina’s question ….

Thanks for writing in, Selina, I would be happy to talk to give you some dating advice on your situation with your first love.

I think the first and most important thing you said that reaches out to me is that you think he is cheating on you. What do you mean by cheating? Do you think he is physically involved with someone else, or do you think that he is perhaps involved in emotional infidelity? What is leading you to believe this? Is he doing something, or is it your own, self-limiting belief that you cannot have a good thing?

So many girls get caught up in a cycle of distrust, in part, from experiences where their trust HAS been broken, but also partially from their own beliefs that they do not deserve what it is they want, or that great things (particularly relationships) just do not happen to them. They are both really one in the same if you look at it closely. If you think you do not deserve something that you have, you will unconsciously act in ways that will CREATE the very situation that you fear – in this case, losing the boyfriend.

You see, fear and distrust can make you do some pretty dumb things. It can make you do things you would not normally do or act in ways you would not normally act. Maybe your fear makes you act clingy or needy, or makes you act furious when you are trying to hide the fact that you are hurting inside. All these things can be interpreted by GUYS in ways that make them think that you are high maintenance, needy or whiny, and that will drive a man away, or drive him toward emotional infidelity or out of your life. If he cannot get what he needs emotionally from you, he will go looking somewhere else.

But here is what I want YOU to do today. You need to understand, for yourself, what it is that is holding you back. You need to know what you are afraid of, and what behaviors you are exhibiting that are caused by this. You must remember, too, that the only one you can fix is YOURSELF – if he has issues, you cannot fix that, you can only fix yourself and be the best person you can be. Don’t ever try to change a guy!

Ask yourself some hard questions, and be totally honest with yourself about the answers.

The first question you need to ask yourself is “What exactly is it that I am afraid of?” (You may say at first that your fear is that he is cheating or just a general “being hurt” answer. Not good enough! What EXACTLY is it? Pinpoint it. Face it. Figure it out.) You have to know your fears in order to face them. Don’t wuss out!

Then, go through the situation in your mind – your WORST fear about dating this man comes true. Ok – so what happens then? (Like if your worst fear is that you will begin being intimate and he tells you that your breathe smells like 3 day old crab. Imagine what you would do. Imagine how you would feel. Imagine what you would say. Work yourself through and live through it in your mind.)

Next, realize that whatever that fear was – you just lived through it. You just thought yourself through it, and you lived. You CAN get through it. Whatever it is!

So – figure it out, live it, get through it, and then GET OVER it. Make yourself a stronger YOU by knowing that you can GET THROUGH whatever it is you fear, and begin to face your relationship with fearlessness and courage, and therefore be able to give yourself what it is you want the most.

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Love,

Sarah

You Can Get The Guy