Red Flag #1: He Loves a Martyr.
!["You gotta a problem with my boyfriend? Then you gotta a problem with me. Prepare for battle." [My Joan D'Arc routine] [photo: Milla Jovovich,](http://funnyinthehead.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/Joanofarc.jpeg "Milla Jovovich, \"The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc\", 1999")
My Joan D'Arc routine: "You gotta a problem with my boyfriend? Then you gotta a problem with me. Prepare for battle."
Jump ahead a month and we’re in a “Relationship.” On the surface it looks like I’m still the same me, but in fact me has gone on an extended vacation to one of those places far away with no cell coverage. That left me minus me and you know what that means, him. In other words, I had given up my hobbies, interests, dreams, my clumsy ways, and even my beloved foul habits and crazy friends, only to take on of all his, becoming him.
Like a sailor raising a finger to the wind every ten minutes, I followed his every emotional shift and tightened my sails accordingly. I plotted political revenge on his boss. I wrote polite but strategic emails to his ex-wife, hoping to keep her from hauling him back to court for more money. I pretended to find his coworker accountants fascinating. I even started shaving in the morning, giving him some extra snooze time.
It was my greatest disappearing act. In the course of two months, I had lost myself, developed a bad case of depression, and become the perfect female Jim. Which brings me to the Red Flag: he was the happiest man in the world. He loved me this way. For him, it was the perfect relationship: woman sheds her life to orbit around man; man continues orbiting around his life (buoyed by her extra centrifugal force); all is well in the world.
This perfectly horrible perfection became glaringly obvious at an Italian restaurant one evening. We were talking about moving to his corporate headquarters, located in some small town in the middle of some small nowhere. The real me flashed back for a quick guest appearance, laughed dismissively, and announced it was “San Francisco or bust.”
I got the “bust” part, alright–a busted relationship. He exploded, quickly remembered we were in public, contained his fury, and then said hissing, “The topic is closed.”
As Me had already bolted from the scene again (no doubt to returning to her favorite beach in Goa, figuratively speaking), I started salting the lasagna with my tears.
Why I didn’t read the writing on the wall and break up then and there is beyond me, though it no doubt was connected to the fact that my head was lodged up my vagina. But more than that, it was a testament to the powerful effect of female conditioning. Nobody seems to notice if you’ve given up everything you are for a guy. In fact, they glorify it and call it romantic love. Well, I say, no thank you! Any guy who doesn’t notice your Joan D’Arc martyrdom routine because that’s what normal looks like to him is sending up one giant Red Flag. Take the sex and run.
I was dating a guy. Let’s call him Jim. The sexual chemistry was so strong that we jumped into be on the second date. He didn’t care that I had a weepy cold sore blister on my upper lip; I didn’t care that I couldn’t remember his last name.
Jump ahead a month and we’re in a “Relationship.” On the surface it looks like I’m still the same me but in fact me has gone on an extended vacation somewhere far, with no cell coverage. That leaves me minus me and you know what that means, him. I had given up my hobbies, interests, dreams, clumsy ways, even my beloved foul habits and crazy friends, only to take on of all his. In short, his life had become mine.
Like a sailor raising a finger to the wind every ten minutes, I followed his every emotional shift. I plotted political revenge on his boss. I wrote polite emails to his ex-wife, hoping to keep her from hauling him back to court. I pretended to like his accountant coworkers. I even started shaving in the morning so he could sleep in an extra ten minutes.
It was my greatest disappearing act. In the course of two months, I had lost myself, developed a bad case of depression, and become the perfect female version of him. Which brings me to the Red Flag: he was the happiest man in the world. For him, this the perfect relationship: woman sheds her life to orbit around man; man orbits around his life; and all is well in the world.
It all became glaringly obvious at an Italian restaurant one evening. We were talking about moving to his coporate headquarters, some small town in the middle of some small nowhere. I laughed dismissively saying I wanted to go to San Francisco. Unbeknownst to me, real me decided to show up for a guest appearance.
He exploded, quickly contained his fury, and then said, “The topic is closed.”
Me bolted from the scene again and I started crying, big tears salting my lasgna.
Why I didn’t read the writing on the wall and break up then and there is beyond me (though no doubt it was connected to the fact that my head was lodged up my vagina). Any guy who doesn’t notice your Joan D’Arc martyrdom routine because that’s what normal looks like to him is sending up one giant red flag. Take the sex and run.
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Comments
Hi Lela, yes, not marrying him was very good move. What’s odd is how easy it was to slip into this role. Now that I’ve got a little more experience behind me, I catch things a little faster…any thoughts for those struggling to get out of this kind of situation, Lela? (Great to hear from you, btw; hope you’re well!) PW
You know, the odd thing is I think (hope) this is a generational thing. Women of our age were raised with only one toe in the Women’s Lib pool. We still played with Barbies and Easy Bake Ovens. We still believed in the Cinderalla story. We wandered into adulthood believing that true happiness would be found under the wing of a good man. Harrumph.
I raised two boys and several of their cohorts and the one thing I stressed to them over and over and over was: Never Lose Your Self. Because I did and was and am eternally sorry for the loss and the amount of Self I’ve not been able to get back after declaring my independence. Evidently, if you bury your Self, some of it truly dies off after 23 years and no amount of CPR will bring it back. Sad, but true.
Anyway, thank you for writing about this. I wish more people – men and women – would read it.
Yes, this syndrome happened time and time again to me as well, raised by my women’s lib mother in the 70′s (wearing my t-shirt proudly: A woman needs a man, like a fish needs a bicycle”. And yet as Mossum said, perhaps our play times where we imagined the fairy tales remained an undercurrent to who we became as adults.
In my marriage, I found that over time I gave away the best parts that made me unique, trying to fit his utopian ideal of what a marriage should be. Divorce helped me shed the cloak of compromise that I had taken on. While I will still find myself questioning myself in successive relationships, finding that I’ve given “me” up, yet again, I am catching it sooner and sooner (in weeks, instead of months or years).
Trusting my intution ALL the time is my goal, I find that when I don’t, I lose myself.
[...] taken a break from the Red Flags of Dating Over Forty (see Red Flag #1, #2, #3) series to talk about another matter: my [...]
Yikes…that hits home, especially the part of “trusting my intuition”…just had a situation where I felt it so strongly and yet didn’t act on it. As you say, Liz, we can only learn and though we may repeat mistakes, we get a faster each time. Thanks for your thoughts! PW
WOW…..does this ever hit home. At least YOU didn’t marry him.
I totally relate to every part of this.