ask dr. nerdlove Archives - Page 2 of 89

Ask Dr. NerdLove: How Do I Rebuild My Confidence?

June 21, 2019 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Hey Doc,
It’s been a year since I joined the military, and looking back, I’m in a much better spot now than I was then. When I joined, I had just withdrawn from college due to drug addiction and was living with my parents, feeling like dirt. I joined because I felt like I needed a kick in the ass, I was tired of feeling like a flunky who blew his chance at a good life, and I wanted to try and start a career in a different direction.

A year later, and I’ve got a much better relationship with my parents, I’ve lost weight, and I’m doing well financially. By all metrics, I feel like life is going better, and that I’ve made immense improvements to myself.

So why can’t I stop feeling like a fucking loser?

When I was skipping class, doing drugs, ignoring my well-being and relationships, I was getting more dates than ever and felt more confident than I do now, despite my life being in shambles. In my mind, I went from an awkward nerd who had trouble talking to people let alone women, to someone who partied, hung out with friends, and could chat up women easy.

Everything fell apart. And I’ve built myself back up. But I’m not valuing that. And I can’t stop thinking that the me that appears when I’m an addict is more appealing than the me that has my shit together.

I can’t even trust my own mind. I guess that’s why I’m asking you; How can I get myself to start valuing my accomplishments again? I want to have the same confidence I had before but without the same self-destructive habits.

Very respectfully,
Hyde wishing he was Jekyll

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Ask Dr. NerdLove: Is It Time To Abandon A Friendship?

June 17, 2019 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Hi Doc,

My question is about dealing with the aftermath of confessing romantic feelings to a close friend and dealing with his rejection while not losing that friend and going the nuclear option.

Long story short, I’m a late bloomer in her early 30s with limited experience (had a first kiss and sexual experience when I was 30, only one relationship, and had sex only 3 times in my life). So, the last summer I have developed a crush on a very close friend who I knew for 2 years by that time. The problem was that he was about to leave the city to move across the ocean in 4 months. Despite of this, I still wanted to pursue a short-term relationship with him, I felt like having even a short-term intimate experience with him outweighed the fact that it’s going to be a relationship with an expiration date.

So, being a firm believer in direct communication, I asked him if he would be interested in us dating each other and I let him know that I realize that most likely it’s going to be a relationship with an expiration date and if he doesn’t feel that he is into that he shouldn’t be afraid of saying ‘no’, I can take it. He answered that he was also thinking about us dating each other but he was afraid he doesn’t have time to date someone in the next 4 months (he was supposed to travel quite a bit for work reasons before leaving the city). Anyway, he said that he will think about it. Three days later we got together for drinks with another woman who is very closest friend of mine. I couldn’t stay long and left, the next morning I got a news from her that things escalated after I left and they decided to play a variation of truth or dare game by stripping off their clothes and telling each other crazy sex things they have done (but they didn’t touch each other) and that I should have stayed that night to join them. Honestly, I felt horrible upon hearing that news, even though there wasn’t any reason. Several hours later he messaged me saying that he doesn’t have any secrets from me and I’m free to ask about his crazy sex experiences that he confessed to a friend of mine while naked, but he needs to be in the right mood, so I shouldn’t push him to tell about them.

A month later the three of us were hanging out (he still didn’t tell me those stories) and I was being playful with him put his hand on my back to have back massage. The next day he wrote me that he was actually considering having an intimate relationship with me despite the limited time we have, but because of this ‘hand thingy’ (that I didn’t ask him for his consent), he decided that he is going to change his mind. This came out of the blue (I hadn’t brought us being together since the last time I asked him) and I was devastated, had to take a sick day off work. I slowly recovered after that, but the fact that he was keeping secrets (the things he told the other friend) was slowly eating me. Several weeks before he left the city I told him how I felt about him having those secrets from me. He revealed those secrets, via a text message, not even face to face, and it felt like it wasn’t genuine.

Those secrets turned were the facts that he practiced some BDSM activities several years ago and that he was embarrassed of them. Now, here is the thing, I’m also into BDSM (never practiced but I know I want to do it), so I told him that those things he shouldn’t be ashamed of and I find them amazing and that I’m also into them. During the last week we were talking a lot about them, and several day after he left the city he said that he might be up for trying some of them with me, 1.5 months later when we were supposed to share a hotel room for a week during a music festival in another country. However, when we actually met, he felt a bit distant and irritated (I don’t know what caused it, but he was stressed looking for a job in another continent), at some point at this event he said that he prefers going for dinners with other people and not me (before that we were having dinners together and planned on celebrating New Year’s eve together at the festival). He also said that I should change my plans of visiting him across the ocean (fortunately I didn’t book my flights yet). The rest of the event was quite depressing for me.

After all of this I feel still have hard time processing what have happened (that naked night with a friend of mine after he told me that he doesn’t have time for casual sex, the fact that he was hiding his interest in BDSM while telling me that he trusts me and doesn’t have secrets from me, or his weirdly distant behavior at the festival). I feel depressed and have a hard time sleeping when I think about all of this things that happened between us the last year and I think about them almost every day. Am I overreacting and just need to get mental help? The thing is that I really value his friendship and I still keep contact with him. But sometimes I think if I should go full nuclear option? But I’m afraid of losing a close friendship with him and that doing the nuclear option and losing contact with him would do more mental damage rather than keeping a contact with him.

Thanks a lot for any feedback!
Nukes and Friends

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Ask Dr. NerdLove: What Do I Do About My Irresponsible Boyfriend?

June 14, 2019 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

My boyfriend and I are in our mid-30s have been together for 13 years. I love him dearly and we get along great. My life with him is truly the happiest I’ve ever been. We have no interest in getting married or having children as a personal choice, but are looking forward to having a long cohabitating life together. He’s truly a sweet, loving, and hard-working guy.

However, he isn’t financially responsible.

For a bit of context, I grew up in a low-income home and he was raised upper-middle class. We are currently a middle-class working couple in different careers, but make almost the same amount of money. We also live together in an apartment and share all of our bills equally. However, everything is in my name in order to ensure that everything is kept up with and paid on time. I wish I could share that burden of responsibility, but I can’t. I have retirement, non-retirement investment, and savings accounts. He does not. I have my financial paperwork generally organized and in one place. He does not. I occasionally check my account balances and credit score. He does not. When I make a big purchase, I do my research. He does not. I pay my expenses by the deadlines. He does not.

He’s not a lavish over-spender and has enough money to take better care of his finances, but just doesn’t care about it and neglects these (and other) responsibilities either entirely or until the last moment. Even when he faces consequences for his indifference (like losing $1500 because he forgot to fill out a piece of paperwork on time, has to pay late fees for expenses that could have been easily taken care of in advance, or loses his tax documents for the 4th year in a row and having to pay everything to be re-printed) he doesn’t make any changes, is completely unfazed, and makes the same mistakes over and over.

We’ve never argued about money, but I want to make sure we are protecting ourselves and each other. I’ve tried to talk with him about it a few times and find some solutions, but those conversations never go anywhere. He’s not mean or openly dismissive. He just doesn’t seem concerned or feel any urgency to make changes. This isn’t an issue that affects our day-to-day life, but it does come up sometimes.

What do you do when you care about someone, but they lack any desire to develop financial insight? Should I just let it go and focus on me while he hurts himself?

Bad Credit, No Credit, Big Problem

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Ask Dr. NerdLove: Should I Still Hang Out With My Ex?

June 10, 2019 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Dear Dr. NerdLove,

I would like to thank you for all the great tips and information that you have given over the years; it’s been extremely useful. I just wish I knew about your work sooner, because I am going through a break up situation that could have been different if I knew the things I know now after reading your guidelines.

I would like to ask for your advice on my situation. Let me sum it up for you:

Summer 2015:

I met this girl in a summer program at my college. We connected immediately and we were together for 10 days until the program ended. We both knew that this was not going to go any further because she is from a different country, but we kept in contact.

January 2016:

She met a guy and they started a relationship and I was happy for her. I decided to go my own way and try meeting other girls too, but she had left an extremely high standard that no other girl ever met, and I would get disappointed every time.

September 2018:

She’s been with her boyfriend for almost three years, but we never lost contact. When we’d text, I would made sure to let her know that I’m still attracted to her and she started to flirt back with me. I wasn’t sure what to do, because she was still in a relationship and I didn’t want to be disrespectful.

By this time, I had moved to NYC to work , while she was in still in college in her country with 3 more years to go.

October 2018:

In our conversations, she let me know that things had been going badly with her boyfriend. I was trying to be there to support her, but to be honest, I was also there to see if I had an opportunity with her.

January-February 2019:
Our conversations had became very intense and shortly after she broke up with her boyfriend. She let me know that she is interested in me and shortly after we started a LDR. I didn’t know anything about LDRs, but I thought that we could make it work.

April 2019:
We were doing well for two months, talking and texting all the time, having our ways to show our feelings, having cyber sex to make up for the lack of physical contact and much more. We planned a trip for June in which she would come to NYC and stay with me for 2 weeks. In April, her school workload had increased and we started to reduce our frequency of contact. I got scared and asked her what was going on and she said that everything is fine, it’s just the amount of work that she had to deal with.

May 2019:
Our conversations diminished quite a lot but I was patiently waiting for her semester to finish and get back to where we wer… but that never happened. She kept being distant, and one day she called me to break up with me. To summarize the call, she said that I never did anything wrong, that we would be together if we were in the same place. But she hadn’t realized how much she needed the physical contact in a relationship, and this LDR was not working for her. She also mentioned that she is still coming in June, but she’s not staying with me and that she wants to see me at least once. For the trip, we had reserved a car to pick her up at the airport, we have tickets for a show and a concert. We decided that we would not waste that money and meet up on those three occasions.

Now, it has been 4 days since we broke up, we ended in good terms, we never fought or anything, and she asked me to be friends because she would like me to keep being part of her life. I told her that it’s possible, but I would never see her just as a friend.

I found your website a few hours ago and I read the sections and I realized that our relationship was doomed from the beginning and now, I’m not looking for trying to get her back. Although, here is where I am kindly asking for your advice.

Do you think that it is correct to meet up when she comes to NYC?
If so, how should I be with her when we meet? And texts?
Do you think that it is fine to try to be friends from now on?

Thank you in advance,

Regards,
Loved and Lost

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Ask Dr. NerdLove: How Do I Get Over My Fear of Being Hurt Again?

June 7, 2019 by Dr. NerdLove Leave a Comment

Hi Doc,

I started reading your column a couple years ago and it helped me through some issues in my first real relationship, but things have changed beyond what I can process solo. Asking for help is something I have trouble with, but I’m at my wit’s end. Maybe I’m missing something, maybe I just need a jolt to get me moving again, but I could really use a second opinion.

The backstory: a year and a half ago, my life was on track—my courses were going well, I had three straight appearances on the Dean’s list, and (after managing some minor depression while simultaneously working two jobs and taking three upper level summer courses) I found myself in the first serious (actually, first, period) relationship of my life. I was busy, but happy. I had enough credits to graduate, but needed another year to do my student teaching.

A little over a year ago, my life started to unravel. During my student teaching, I worked harder, and more, than I ever had before in my life. Paperwork, planning, creating materials, teaching, grading — they consumed me. I had had to leave my other jobs to make time, and I was living off my savings (paying for rent, utilities, groceries) while working 80+ hours a week for no pay. My marginal social life vanished, my sleep schedule became increasingly disturbed, and my panic attacks, which I had conquered six years earlier, returned in force. Somehow, I kept my long distance relationship intact.

Eventually, it became too much. Sleeping maybe four hours a night, on an even tighter budget because of dental work on a broken tooth, and with my panic attacks coming four or more times a day, I withdrew from the program. I was convinced that if I didn’t quit, the job was going to do permanent damage to my health.

As a result, my GPA was heavily dented (diminishing my chances at grad school), and I was left with an almost unusable degree in history. Cue six months of job searching, of trying desperately to convince employers that I was worth their time, that a history degree was incredibly versatile, that I was readily adaptable to any number of fields. Rejection after rejection piled up. I became depressed, but kept trying. My family applied pressure, disappointed that I hadn’t been strong enough to follow through and become a teacher.

Then, my girlfriend broke up with me, effectively saying that the whole time she’d felt she was working down a “relationship checklist.” She’d basically never really felt all that much for me. She stayed with me because of her own insecurity. We’d been together a year.

Two days later, I had to put my dog to sleep. My best friend was dying of cancer, and I couldn’t watch him suffer anymore. This, combined with the breakup, with the shame of failure, the sense of years wasted—this broke me.

Today, I’m 24 years old. I work in a presumably dead-end job in a grocery store, bachelor’s degree seemingly irrelevant, and live in a tiny studio apartment crammed next to the workshops on the family farm, because it’s the only place I can afford. At work, I am surrounded by people, but there, as in every part of my life, I am alone. Isolated, insignificant, all the potential I used to feel drowned in the bath. My breakup left me with staggering trust issues, a paranoid fear of ever being vulnerable again, and a jealous not-quite-hate of everyone who has real, genuine love in their lives. My depression has seemingly sunk into my bones.

I’ve tried online dating, but conversations peter out, everyone ghosting on me within a message or two, no matter how polite, interested, etc. I am. The last two times I tried to ask someone out in person, a panic attack hit, stopping me from getting the words out. My work schedule doesn’t align with any of my few remaining friends, preventing me from seeing them much more than once every couple of months, and that number is about to get smaller, as my best friend is about to leave to take a lucrative job on the other side of the country. I doubt I’ll get to see her again.

My psychiatrist is changing my meds, so that will help with the depression, but it won’t change any of the underlying issues. I’m trying to be proactive, trying to be more social, but the social anxiety is just getting stronger, and even though I’m happy for my friend, glad she has this amazing opportunity, I can’t shake a sense of betrayal at her leaving. Our relationship has always been completely platonic, totally safe, and she was the one person I had left I could always be totally honest with, and know that she would be the same- honest, that is.

My work leaves little time for my art, which is the one thing that still brings me any lasting happiness. One day working at my craft is generally enough to keep me going for a day or so, but those free days are few and far between. And much as I wish I didn’t, I still want to connect to people, even just one person. Maybe especially one person. It’s so much easier to be myself, to be comfortable with myself, if I know that someone other than me likes me. Even just one other person.

But looking at my life right now, I can’t see why anyone else would want to be part of it.

Anyway, there are a bunch of issues all tangled up in those last few paragraphs, and I would really, really appreciate it if you could offer advice on even one of them.

Please, thank you, and please,

Barely Holding On

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