The Single Girlfriend

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The Reoccurring Fight

I had dinner with a good friend on Friday night who had just begun living with her boyfriend of over 5 years. When asked how things were going she had lots of positive things to say. She also brought up how they continue to get in the same fight over and over and over again. About cleaning.

During lunch this past Monday my coworker also mentioned a reoccurring fight she has with her musician fiancee- that she wants him to be successful but that touring 9 months out of the year isn’t okay with her.

Reoccurring fights are present in every romantic relationship- they center on that one (or maybe more than one) thing that you and your partner just can’t seem to meet eye to eye on. Sometimes it’s a rather large issue such as one partner’s idea of success is different than the other’s ie. touring for 9 months being positive or negative. Sometimes it is a smaller issues such as cleaning.

The weird thing about moving from living together to doing long distance with the student is it has changed our reoccurring fight in some ways but the essence is still the same. It used to be that he was on his IPhone too much and not paying attention to me. Now it’s that he doesn’t use his IPhone enough to pay attention to me.

(Full disclosure: I needed to call the student to ask his thoughts on our reoccurring fight because I couldn’t put it into words. He mentioned the IPhone complaint. He then chalked it up to me being an only child. Student, if you are reading this right now- playing the only child card? COP OUT. Enough said.)

Anyway, the core of our reoccurring fight is that I feel he’s not paying attention to me and he feels like he pays all the attention to me he can. It’s interesting to me that there is this common thread that unites our pre-distance and distance reoccurring fights. And you know what? I am convinced that our post-distance reoccurring fight will be the same as well.

Reoccurring fights are like wounds, or at least they’re like my wounds. When I get a wound, the first thing I decide is whether it really needs to be taken care of. A paper cut? Forget it, I just lick it and move on. The time I sliced through my finger trying to open a Jyoti can of saag? What warrented minor action- a call to mom and some tisses and deep breathing. If I had chopped my thumb off? I would definitely get myself to the hospital.

What I am trying to say with the above far-fetched metaphors is that a reoccurring fight is like a wound to your relationship. It can either be a minor irritant that doesn’t bother you enough to fix or it may be that your missing your thumb and don’t want to paw things for the rest of your life so you better do some major damage control. 

My coworker and her fiancee have been talking about the touring issue because they feel this is something that could really affect their future life together. The fact that my other friend’s boyfriend doesn’t use a trash can? Yeah, it could break them up but she needs to decide whether they need to come to some sort of compromise on it or if it can continue to be a reoccurring fight forever. I don’t really see that being a deal breaker.

Now I haven’t decided if the fact that I feel the student doesn’t pay enough attention to me will be a deal-breaker. As I’ve gotten to know him I’ve realized that’s the way he is.

I’ve also realized that I need to choose my battles. And frankly, right now I’d rather fight for him to buy new bike shorts that don’t smell rancid and eat less Hamburger Helper than to have him pay more attention to me. Because bottom line- I’m way better looking and more entertaining than his accounting homework. And Siri’s got nothing on me.

The single girlfriend doesn’t worry about what she can’t change.

Gabby Bernstein recorded this vlog on what she calls “the 24 hour rule.” She talks about the importance of slowing down before making any decision to avoid impulsive action.

Now, this is a great rule to exhibit in all areas of life but what I’ve learned over the past 9 months is the that 24 hour rule is one of the most important rules you can adhere to within your long distance relationship. Like, top 5. Up there with not cheating- it’s THAT important.

Recently I took a survey from a research group who I have been working with since high school. They have studied me and my classmates for a number of years and now offer to pay me each year for my participation. At the end of each survey, they ask if I have three friends who would be willing to answer questions about me for $40 each. I volunteered my roommate, a friend from Bates and of course, the student.

Well, what I didn’t know was that the “friend” survey asks the person being surveyed to compare their relationship with their girlfriend/boyfriend to their relationship with me. As you may imagine, this was confusing for the student.

I forced my roommate to tell me about the test one day at work and she said they asked all sorts of questions about not only her relationship to me, but how she viewed my relationship with my significant other. It was then I realized that the student had to answer whether I fought a lot with my boyfriend and if I complained a lot about him.

In thinking about how he answered these questions, I began to consider the questions myself. Do I fight a lot with the student? Did I complain about all the time, sometimes or never?

And these musings brought me back to Gabby B’s 24 hour rule. I try, oh-so-hard, to take heed of the 24 hour rule in my life, especially when it comes to my emotional reactions and ESPECIALLY when it comes to the student.

Now, I may not be perfect but you can be sure that if I’m angry at you, I’m really angry because it probably took me 2 1/2 days to process my feelings and decide I that I was angry. And sometimes this confuses the student because I’ll lament about something he doesn’t even remember because it happened two days ago. But most times, it saves me from being a psycho hose beast.

I cannot tell you the number of times in the past 9 months that I’ve felt so betrayed I thought I would die/never speak to the student again/spend the rest of my days plotting revenge, only to fall asleep and the next morning belabor over what shirt to wear to work rather the massive heartbreak I had suffered the night before. 

A day is a powerful tool in a relationship, any amount of time is, so use it. A day or two can change a lot.

On the other hand, a day or two can also change nothing. And that’s when you send passive agressive text messages. 

Yay for Blogging!»

This NYT article about how blogging has been proven therapeutic for teens makes me so happy. Not for blogging perse, though Tumblr is super cool and hip and blah blah blah, but for the fact that blogging gives people a forum to express themselves and get feedback on their thoughts and feelings. 

The world can be a lonely place. Certain online communities make it feel a little less so. So blog away teens! I can wait to read your posts about prom! #betterthanajudyblumebook