Hello, everyone!

I'm feeling quite confuse about my relationship these days. Well, not just these days. I have a history of a prior abusive relationship that traumatized me a lot. I'm thirty years old and I broke up when I was 26. Just after the break up I met my current fiancé and he was very sweet to me. I couldn't help but to compare him to the other guy and he would win the competition in various aspects. He's very sweet and care about my feelings. He always supports me in everything I do.

However, there are a few things that irritate me: he's too dependent of his mother. He tells his mother stuff about our relationship he shouldn't. His mother does his laundry, his meals and the cleaning. (He lives with his parents). He wasn't successful in keeping her away from the wedding planning, so she was kind of pissing me off telling me how I was supposed to do everything. I told him this would ruin the relationship, so he talked to her and it didn't work. She actually came to me saying that she was going to meddle. I like her so I was very polite in every situation, but that is growing on me every time I think about it.

Also, he is not very good with conversations. He keeps giving these short comments and I feel like he's not curious about learning new things. He doesn't even read, and I totally into books. I think he bores me, although he's funny to be around sometimes.

Although I'm pretty sure I love him, when he's not around I don't miss him. Is there a sign? I feel like I'm released of something when I'm alone. We are in lockdown and I came to other city to stay with my mother. He is there with his parents. It's been more than a month and I don't miss him. Actually, it irritates me when he talks about the day we are going to meet when everything gets better. I'm afraid to get married and the marriage fails. I'm also afraid to break up with someone I love. Especially because my family loves him and I'm thirty, my mother keeps pressuring me about my age. But is that old to start over? I feel like I'll lose freedom if I marry. I want to know the world a little bit, because I've never had the opportunity.

What do you think? Is this relationship doomed? Just so you know... I have ADD, so I get bored pretty easily. I never know when the reason is the person or the ADD thing.

Thank you

Welcome to MB. Have you read Dr. Harley’s information on dating? As we say around here that dating is an interview for marriage.

Have you read Dr. Harley’s basic concepts?

Please read Preparing for Marriage and tell us what you think.

I read the things you told me. Some things only apply to married couple, I guess...

However I found interesting the 30 dates to find the one thing. I guess I haven't dated enough and I keep thinking I'm letting someone more compatible go. I'm not on my 20's anymore and in the middle of the pandemic would be really difficult to start dating. Breaking up right now would be devastating so I would have to recover. I'm not decided though.

I feel like he doesn't meet my emotional needs... That's because he's very immature and I always have to tell him right from wrong in most of the situations. He doesn't take me to dates very often. Although he's caring I think he acts needy most of the time. He's like a boy, not a man. That's the problem. I was attracted to him in the beginning, but I know I'm not so much.

Well, if we married and had children, I guess I wouldn't trust him completely with them. I don't trust his decisions. I always come up with solutions for him in difficult situations, I don't know how he'd act alone, but from me experience things would be a mess.

About the compatibility thing. We have:
Intelligence: I feel weird saying this, but I'm smarter than him in daily life. I guess even in the academic life... I'm postgraduated and I'm curious about other cultures and everything. I take courses and study by myself. He doesn't read and although he finished college, he is not curious about many things in life. During our conversantions I'm constantly explaining what I mean about different subjects, it's exhauting. He also does this thing that I hate. When I'm talking to friends about a famous book he hasn't read, he gives a general opinion like "it's a wonderful book." It gets to my nerves because I know he haven't read it. I try not to be arrogant though. Nobody needs to be interested in things I enjoy.

Energy: About this... Not sure. I guess we have similar energy.

Social Interest: He's an extrovert that can't handle being alone. I'm an introvert, but I love to hang out with my friends. I prefer to keep my time alone undisturbed though.

Cultural Background: We are from the same culture, raised in the same city.

Values: That's probably where it's complicated. He's not a bad person. In fact, he's one of the biggest hearts I've known. When it comes to values though, he can be really confused. I guess he lives like a teenager. When he does something irresponsible he always justifies as if he may die tomorrow. He also agrees with me in a lot of stuff, but I don't know if it's just to make me drop the subject or not. Sometimes it was almost clear that it was.


And about HONESTY: I have a problem with being too honest. Even when it's a rough truth, I just try to get it out of my system. I always expected the same from him, but I guess I've never had it. He doesn't talk about things with deepness. He avoids some subjects so we don't fight. He pretends to agree with me to make me happy. Stuff like that. I had this conversation with him several times. That I need honesty and openness.

Same goes to the problem with his mother. I had the conversation about him taking care of himself several times. I told him it's not acceptable for adults to have their mothers do their laundries and meals. If we ever get married, I wouldn't be doing that. I wasn't raised that way.

Sorry about the big text...

What do you think? I think I love him, but is that a chance of that resulting in a happy marriage?

Oh, and sorry about my English mistakes, I'm Brazilian.

I actually have a growing anxiety about this. What do you think?

Welcome to MB.

The issue here is not his mother, but whether he will in future listen to your concerns about her, or indeed about any family member or friend, and use the Policy of Joint Agreement (POJA) to make a decision about that person. When the two of you have made a decision about which you are both enthusiastic, will he break the agreement if persuaded to by the family member?

If the two of you had enthusiastically agreed that his mother should stay out of the wedding planning, he should have spoken to her and made that agreement stick. If he wanted to change his mind about the agreement, he should have spoken to you. The two of you should have "done nothing" about the wedding planning until a new agreement was reached. In the future, is he going to follow POJA or will he give in to his mother, or anyone else, rather than stick to his enthusiastic agreements with you?

If you already feel like this, why would you marry him? Do you expect this to change after marriage?

Nobody can tell you whether the relationship is "doomed", but I think, by the way you have written about him and the doubts you are expressing, that you can already see that marriage to him is not a good idea.

This says everything, don’t you think?

In addition to all the good advice SugarCane gave you. Have you and your fiancé tried POJA?

Why are you thinking of marrying this guy?

SugarCane, BrainHurts, thank for the insight and advices.

I didn't try the POJA exactly, but I did some agreements with him and he wasn't able to commit to it.

I guess I'm just scared of never finding someone with a good heart to marry. I've been in an abusive relationship before, so I'm scared I'll regret letting him go. He's caring and have a good heart. What if I can't even find one good match? I get very emotional with break ups.

Do you want to risk marrying someone who is not a good match? What do you think will happen if you do?

If he could learn how to become a good match - which is to say, learn how to meet your emotional needs - you could have a great marriage. That is true for anybody who is paired with anyone else. They don't need to be the perfect from the word go. Each of us can learn what the other's emotional needs are, and work hard to meet them. That is what Dr Harley says he did when he met his wife Joyce when they were teenagers. Joyce seemed to meet Dr Harley's needs effortlessly, but the reverse was not true. He had to try and discover what would make her fall in love with him, and he set about doing so, and he succeeded in making her fall and stay in love with him.

Does your fiancé show any desire to work to meet your needs? Have you ever asked him to try new things, like reading and the other things that interest you?

The period of dating allows you to see not whether he is already perfect, but whether he is prepared to go above and beyond to make you happy. POJA is a major part of this. If, after you ask him to put your views at the centre of his thoughts, he shows that he isn't willing to do that consistently and as a matter of principle, during marriage he will engage in independent behaviour and this will make you unhappy.

Another test is whether he will try the new things that you would like him to try, and whether he will generally try to please you. By this I don't mean giving in to whatever you want, or agreeing to whatever you say. He seems to agree with anything you say already, and that just irritates you. By this I mean really learning about who you are and what makes you happy, and trying to find a way to meet your needs in ways that are acceptable to him. He also needs to eliminate love busters, and there seem to be a number of those.

You gave a list of things that disturb you about him. The thing is, all of those things can be overcome. He can stop living like a teenager. He can read more, and perhaps even study for a degree, or take short courses. He can work on your need for openness and honesty, and stop saying whatever he thinks will please you. He can work towards being mature. The question is: would he work on these major changes in order to make you fall in love and stay in love?

If you don't ask him, or he he refuses to do them and says that you should accept him as he is, it is obvious that during marriage you will become more bored and irritated. He will make decisions that you think are poor, you won't feel romantic love for him, and the marriage will be unhappy. Are you willing to go down that route, just to be married? Will you stay married even when you are unhappy, or will you divorce him in 5 or 10 years, after you've had a couple of kids?

Thank you, SugarCane!

That gave me a lot of perspective on this matter.

I'm going to give it a try to see if he's willing to make the effort to make this work. It should be my last try.

It's really serious when I think about kids, because I really don't want to break my future kids' hearts with a divorce. I should be careful.

Thank you again.