Stress Center Peer Support

Can I start a discussion of expectations of other people? I broke up with my girlfriend before Christmas and now that I'm facing the New Year without her, I'm getting depressed and a little freaked out. I don't know if those are negative thoughts in my head and if I should push through them.

I'm just wondering if my expectations of people (particularly her) are completely out of whack. She's been tremendously good for me, but she's 38 and still lives in her parents' basement. It's not like she doesn't have a job, though, she teaches singing lessons out of their house. That's more to say about me, because I don't have a job right now and I'm 33.

Part of why I broke up with her was because I wanted to see what it was like to date other girls now that I'm not as anxious as I was when I was younger, but I've never been into the whole bar scene. I started looking at a dating website that I was on before I met her, and it completely depressed me. I was thinking, "Why am I doing this? I have a perfectly good girlfriend."

The other piece of the puzzle (and this is huge for me) is that I think in the past I've used my relationships with women (and sex) to feel better about myself. It's been pointed out to me that sex addiction is a form of OCD (which I have), and I'm wondering if part of the reason I broke things off (so I could date other women) is just my brain barking at me, and I shouldn't bother listening to it.

Another one of the reasons I broke things off was so that I could find a job outside of my city, and now I don't know if I even want to. If my expectations of myself were too high. If I'd be happy just having a job stocking shelves in a bookstore like I used to. I don't have the huge desire I used to where I wanted to prove myself to people and be special. Now I just want to be content.

Can anyone relate?

I can relate.

I find that I have a lot of expectations of others from the way they act to the way they live.

For example: My dad rents a room in a house. You should see his room...it's a total biohazard. When I go over there I'm completely disgusted and I always think, "What can I say to get him to stop living like this?!" Then I think, "Why does it bother me so much? I'm not the one who has to live like this. Sure, I would never want to live like this but if he doesn't care, why should I?"

I've come to the conclusion that if it doesn't directly affect me, I need to let it go.

How does your girlfriend feel about living in her parent's basement? If it doesn't bother her, then it sounds like it's only bothering you and you should examine why. What is your perception of someone who lives in their parent's basement?

My girlfriend doesn't care. She helps pay the mortgage. She thinks that other people shouldn't care what she does, either. Some times I feel fine about it, other times I don't care. She's also had an anxiety problem in the past (she was told she had "schoolphobia," which is ridiculous). But that was years ago.

I wonder if part of it is that I'm not worried about what I think of it, but what other people would think of it. Like, "How can you date a girl who lives with her parents?"

I dunno. I don't know what I believe anymore. I listened to Lucinda again about expectations of other people, and really, who cares how other people live their lives?

I think I need to write up my "should" list...

I'm struggling a bit with this as well. Perhaps over-analysing, but it seems to me that there are different categories of expectations: how others should behave towards me, how others should behave towards themselves, and how others should behave towards the world.

For the most part, my expectations of myself have been much higher than those I have of others in all 3 categories (I have so many flaws to make up for!) Possibly this is why I ended up married to an emotionally abusive man, and why I stayed with him for 9 years. And why, once I realized that walking away from the marriage was an option, that it took me 2 years to finally make the decision to leave. My expectations were that a husband should be a partner and treat me with love and respect, but I had to convince myself that these were valid expectations to hold.

It was a few years before I could even contemplate getting into another relationship -- I had no faith in my judgement, and was terrified of losing my sense of self again. Part of re-establishing my sense of self was identifying my boundaries, values and expectations, and holding myself and others to them.

So I'm having difficulty relating to the concept of holding too high expectations of others and the world around me. It's not that I expect the worst of others -- I hold positive expectations, but I'm working to stop second-guessing and devaluing them. I'm very good at excusing and forgiving others if they don't meet my expectations. Is this unusual?

I suppose that in evaluating whether expectations are out-of-whack, though, it doesn't really matter whether they're too high or too low. The question I'm learning to ask myself is whether or not the issue/expectation is important to me. And to actually value what I've identified as important.

I'm queen of second-guessing, and it sounds as though you're pretty good at it too, doogiet. You made some pretty big decisions before Christmas, and now you're questioning them. There's a world of difference between dreams and overly-high expectations, even though they may seem very similar at times. And I know that my fears and negative thoughts are very good at coming up with seemingly valid reasons and distractions to keep me from reaching for my dreams.

Expectations-----we should save our dreams for when we are sleeping.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by doogiet:
Like, "How can you date a girl who lives with her parents?"


Hmmm... that sounds like an opportunity to me. Haven't you heard that young girls tend to grow up to become more and more like their mothers? You have an opportunity to observe your girlfriend's mom in action. That should give you a good clue about what's in store if you stay with her.