Is This Cub Too Young?

                                                                               

Hi Lucia,

I met a very, very attractive successful younger man on line who lives in another state. We have passed the last several months talking via phone, email and IM. He has already said he will fly out to visit with me, which I am looking forward to. He is 26 years old. Can this really work?

I tried asking my girl friends and family members but everyone just laughed and said, "No". I am a hopeless romantic. Am I reading too much into this?  Hoping in Florida

To read the answer, go to The Cougar Club

Is This Cougar Interested?

                                                                            

Hi Lucia,

I'm 21 years old and recently I thought I was being hit on by an older woman. We talked for a while and she seemed to really enjoy our conversation. She was the one who initiated the conversation, and after a while I assumed she was interested in me. I did get the old "That is so funny!" while she reached out and touched my arm.

A friend of hers came over and made a comment about her talking to me, and she ended up saying something to the effect of "Are you kidding me? No way! He’s a baby!!"  I’m 21 and was absolutely puzzled.

I have no idea how to read an older woman and now my likeliness to approach one has gone WAY down. Is there any way to not embarrass myself in the future? How does a male tell if an older woman is interested without the "I’m old enough to be your mother." answer?  Evan Hall

Read the answer at The Cougar Club

Is Your Relationship Worth Fighting For?

                                                                                            

We as humans have the tendency to find the easy way out, instead of fighting for something even when we believe that it is worth fighting for. This is all too prevalent in a number of relationships. 

 

When a relationship begins to find itself heading down a slippery slope, people have the aptness to end the relationship instead of attempting to work things out. If you and your partner are facing relationship problems, decide on what it is you really want. 

On the other hand, if your partner has already decided to break it off and you want to nip it in the bud, give this adequate thought to what will be best for the both of you. 

Couples break up for a variety of reasons. Often the main reason is infidelity or that the relationship has grown stale and stagnant resulting in the sudden death of the attraction you once felt for each other’s company. 

Be that as it may, the good news is – a number of us have faced this problem at one time or another, and many at times have been able to rejuvenate the spark in our relationship. Hence, if you want to stop a break up that is looming in your relationship, you have nothing to worry about – but with a little conscious effort coming from you it can make a colossal of a difference to your relationship. 

Ask yourself about what it is you really need  

Though this may seem like a redundant point right now, it is an important factor – you need to be completely certain that you want the relationship to work out. Make sure that it is not merely a knee- jerking reaction to the fact that your partner may be threatening to breaking up with you. 

Sometimes when you are facing an impending break up, all you want to do is salvage the relationship, even if you are not happy in the relationship. Ask yourself, “I am really happy in this relationship? Should I stop this break up?” 

To further assist you in this quest, you can make a list of the things that you like and dislike about your partner. Do not be biased, do not sugar-coat your opinions. Just be honest. Once you have completed the list, find out if the positive qualities outweigh the negative qualities. If this is the case, you should definitely begin to fight to save your relationship. 

Value the love that you shared

 

Remember that the two of you shared a truly happy relationship in the beginning. Both of you being together after all this time through thick and thin must have meant something.

Just because there is a lack of understanding in your relationship, does not mean that the love should not exist anymore. Therefore to value the love that you two shared for each other – you will discover that preventing the break up is certainly much better than curing one. 

Speak your mind - be honest

 

Dependable communication is the key to any relationship. Thus, if you can talk to your partner in an open manner, a lot of issues in your relationship may be resolved and you will find that you have no reason to break up. 

Allow a two-way communication to take place between your partner and you. Make sure that you are honest in your opinions and give attention and adequate importance to what your partner has to say. If you can manage to have a mature conversation without making or tossing any accusations around, you will be able to work out the differences with perfect grace. 

Ask for professional help

 

If you feel that, you may not be able to make everything work out in the relationship by yourself, seek the help of a professional relationship expert. Relationship counselors have managed to save countless relationships – they know what is best for a certain couple. Allowing an expert to assist you in stopping a possible break up is not be a bad idea after all. 

Naturally, I am incline to ask you what are your New Year’s relationship resolutions? Are you going to nip it in the bud or just walk away?

About the Author:  Slay Chernoff the founder of Loveawake, a dating website and blog dedicated to changing romance and relationships for the better. They provide a place for people to meet and start relationships online.

Guest Post: Response to "16 Ways to Spot a Cougar"

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Go From Friends to Lovers

                                                                          

     

Friendship is meaningless. There I said it. Now before you shoot one of your nasty emails, actually read this column to understand the context where this is true.

A young man in his 20s came up to me after a workshop I conducted. He had really made an effort to participate to learn about how attraction works, and he seemed troubled by something I had said. It was in the context of calling friendship meaningless when one person has affection for the other, but the other person does not return that affection. He was in a situation where he was spending every Saturday night with a female friend that he was in love with.

They would watch movies at home, and even hold hands, but when he tried to kiss her or talk about getting into a dating relationship, she would reject all his advances. She was a single mom and had no interest in dating anyone. All she wanted was to raise her kid, and spend time with friends, but not get involved with anyone. So, he continued to hang out with her every Saturday night, sometimes holding hands but nothing else waiting for the day she would change her mind. At the same time, there was a second girl in this story that was interested in dating him, however he could not see past his "movie buddy" to give the second girl a chance.

The guy is this story is wasting his time on a meaningless friendship. He wants a romantic relationship with a female friend that is sexually rejecting him. The second girl in this story is also wasting her time in a meaningless friendship waiting for a guy that does not value her enough to give her a chance at a deeper connection.

If either rejecter in this story had taken the chance with the person who loved them, they could be enjoying the benefits and happiness that can result from being in a loving relationship with someone that can know you like a friend, and feel you like a lover. However, many rejecters are reluctant to take the chance, often citing not wanting to lose the friendship. Herein lies the irony. You cannot lose something that does not exist. There is no friendship to lose, because once someone has feelings for the other, the friendship becomes a facade. It is not real, because the one in love with the friend is holding out, waiting for the other to change. Waiting for someone to change to like you enough to make the leap is not an acceptance of a friend, which is a requirement for friendship. If there was a friendship there originally, before the feelings of one person surfaced, then that friendship is now over. Romantic feelings negate the friendship.

Through my personal experience, as well as my practice as a relationship coach, I am very much convinced that constant exposure to a friend that you are in love with, that does not return that love, can be very emotionally damaging to the person who is on the receiving end of that sexual rejection. Constantly exposing yourself to regular sexual rejection from them same person helps establish a repeating behavior pattern where you will eventually end up associating having feelings for someone with the feelings of being rejected. This means that over time, you will have your attraction for someone triggered if they reject you and mistreat you, yet if someone that treats you well, or shows you positive romantic attentions, you will eventually train your emotional intelligence to get turned off by the very person that values you enough to take a relational risk with you.

This is why when someone sexually rejects you, it is important NOT to continue to spend time with that person under the guise of a friendship, in the hopes they will be open to it later. That constant exposure to being rejected sexually again and again, instead of seeking the attentions of someone new, runs the risk of become too familiar to you. If constant sexual rejection becomes too familiar to you, you could develop an unhealthy attachment that would forever forge you into pursuing people that don't actually like you, or would just use you. (A-ha moment anyone?) That same attachment would also turn you off from those individuals that are actually interested in having a legitimate loving relationship with you.

Staying in a friendship where you are constantly being sexually rejected is bad. It could make getting into a loving relationship in the future more challenging because you have trained yourself to respond to people that reject you, instead of responding to people that like you. The kind of friendship where this is going on is a bad friendship. If you have to choose between maintaining a bad friendship or having no friendship of any kind with the person you asked out and rejected you, then it is better to have no friendship at all. A bad friendship is a meaningless friendship.

So, are you still confused on how to go from “Friends” to “Lovers”?  Then, take a look here.

Frank Kermit, ND NaturoTherapist

Is He Just Using Me?

                                                                               

Hi Lucia,

I have been seeing a guy for about 2 months.   I am 35 and he is 30.  According to him, he is only dating me.  We have never had the "talk" yet we joke around about not being boyfriend and girlfriend.

Normally we talk 1-2x a day, text each other between 5-15x a day and see each other 2-3x a week.

I know that his ex girlfriend broke up with him 5 months ago.  He recently told me that he was dating a woman in her 40s when he met his ex, who is also 30.  He said he broke up with the older woman when he began to fall in love with his ex.

I didn't ask him for how long exactly he was dating his ex before he knew that he was falling in love.  He told me that the older woman went nuts on him and hacked into his email, wrote emails to his ex.and other crazy stuff.

He sounded like he just didn’t understand why the older woman went crazy on him since he, "Never told her that he loved her.”  He said that they had a good time and had fun together.

He loves to come over to my house, he loves to spend the night (if it was up to him, I even think he would move in) and he loves my expensive car. I am now wondering if I am the new older woman until he meets someone to fall in love with.

On our dates he does take me out for dinner and to the movies, but because of our schedules, 70% of the time he comes over later at night, usually between 9-11pm.    We have had a few whole day dates, hiking and biking, but that can still just be considered "having fun".

How can I know if he comes over to my house to see me because he likes me and not just because he has 4 roommates and sleeps on the sofa but I on the other hand have a nice 2 bedroom house?

How can I make sure that he is not just killing time until he finds that new "girlfriend"?  My worst fear is that I get used.  Amy

To read my answer, go to The Cougar Club