Shygirl & Self-Sabotage

In February I wrote one of the hardest blog posts as I detailed my first relationship and how much of an impact that it had on me and unfortunately still has on me (I believe it will get better in time), but I wanted to reflect on how it has affected me…

A few years ago when I was thinking about my relationship with this person I realized that I molded so much of myself to fit into what I thought they would like and want in a significant other. I started watching this person’s favorite tv shows, listened to their favorite music, and just noticed that I basically changed myself for this person. I wasn’t doing anything that was inherently bad or wrong and I wasn’t becoming a bad person I just was not being true to who I was and doing several things hoping to get a positive reaction from this person. I basically was trying to do things to get them to like me or I guess continue to like me since their feelings for me seemed as they were never consistent.

I remember driving back to school with my mom for my senior year of college and I was so anxious about my last year… I was thinking about so much and I just started crying because I realized that I was basically “living” for this person. This sounds very dramatic but when I really thought about it that’s what I was doing or had been doing when I was still trying to gain their love. I remember feeling that I felt so stupid for trying to impress someone for so many years that clearly could not commit to me…

Though I knew this was problematic behavior on my part I didn’t really actively address how I could go about getting back to my true self and living for myself instead of someone else. Even if me and this person worked out, I should never want to get into the habit where I am constantly trying to impress my significant other because that will end up becoming exhausting. Reflecting on my second relationship, I feel that I was not consciously aware of this, but I never was questioning my significant other’s commitment to me so I didn’t feel the need to alter myself to fit an image that I thought they wanted. Though I felt comfortable being myself in my second relationship, I eventually ended this relationship because we were just very different and I knew this would cause problems in the future.

So when I sat down to write this post I wanted to focus on my last relationship because I feel as if my first relationship significantly impacted how I was in my last relationship. When I first started talking to this last person I for sure thought this person was the one for me. I had usually liked guys who were very different from me and some of our values did not match, but I enjoyed spending time with them. I also ignored red flags of how they treated me because I thought their behavior would change. This person was completely different. They showed me from the beginning that they were consistent and that they cared about me even before we were officially in a relationship. This person was very similar to me so I was so excited because I was like “yes, finally I found the person who is for me”. If you all know me personally you may know that I don’t drink or party much, which most people my age do, so as far as finding someone who doesn’t do that is pretty difficult. This person was exactly like me in this aspect. So not be to be cliche or anything but I thought we would be perfect match…

Recently, I have even been thinking that they might be perfect even though I know no one is perfect but as close to perfect as I could find. I was super hesitant to be in a relationship because even though that’s what I had been wanting I didn’t know if I was ready since my previous relationships ended badly. I decided to start a relationship with them and it was pretty great. There actually was nothing inherently wrong about it…

One of my good friends has told me from the beginning that she felt that I was self-sabotaging the relationship. When I think back, I probably was because it felt too good to be true. Though I had only been in two other relationships all of the “situationships” or flings that I have had were always so complicated and filled with so much drama. I feel in some ways you get use to the drama and when it’s not there you feel that something is wrong or missing because it’s something new that you have never experienced before.

I do feel that self-sabotage was one of the reasons I chose to end the relationship however I do feel that me finding out that my first ex was engaged almost a month after my relationship started might have contributed to it as well…

I was literally with my last boyfriend when I received a text from my friend telling me and since I had already told him my history with this person he understood why I was upset but I’m sure that probably hurt him. After that happened I felt that I was not as present in the relationship because I was still dealing with the hurt from the past relationship that will probably only heal over time. Instead of trying to focus more on my current relationship I feel that I pushed it away which probably only made things worse.

Instead of trying to fight through these feelings of hurt from my past relationship and trying to be positive about the new relationship that I was in, I basically ran from it and pushed it away. This person was so so nice to me and considerate. I hate that I felt the need to end a new relationship because of self-sabotage and fear that the relationship would be too good to be true.

I say all of this to say that your past relationships can definitely affect how you are individually as a person and how you are in a relationship, and that you should be aware of this. If you are aware of this you may be able to prevent self-sabotage of the relationships that you value the most.

Erin Alexandria