There are times that you will be on a date, first, second, or third, and your date will surprise you by seeming like a different person. Does that sound familiar? There are many reasons this could occur and the sooner it happens, the luckier you will be.
When you meet someone new, they will be on their best behavior and you will not discover the
real person for a while. Once you do, the question will become if who they really are is someone you can live with, in a manner of speaking. There are many reasons that someone can change who they are, but let’s cover some important basics that you should be aware of.
What a lot of people do not realize is that there is a possibility that their mate has been abused, has bipolar disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, ADHD, or a number of other factors that can affect how they relate to you. This does not mean you should leave the person, not at all, but it does mean that you should get to know them better and know how to handle them.
No one is perfect, and that includes you. We all bring our baggage to a relationship. Even without these mental-health issues, there is no such thing as normal. Some people have more of one trait than another, others have this trait over that one; each of us brings to the table qualities that can be improved. The challenge is that when your mate has qualities that he or she cannot control, you cannot hold them responsible but you need to know how to address and deal with these challenges, and yes, they can be extreme challenges. Let’s look at some:
- The person you are speaking to has the need to always be right. There is a difference between telling you their side of something and trying to convince you of their point of view, and, on the other hand, being right. There are two sides to this. One side, is that they will go to great lengths to convince you that they are right, even if their recollection of the facts is wrong; they may take ‘some’ of the facts and then generalize them to imply that ‘all’ of their facts are right. You will see this behavior labeled in common terms as ‘gaslighting’; they will make you believe that you have lost touch with what really happened. The second part of this is that they will get extremely defensive if you are able to prove them wrong about something.This behavior is very difficult to deal with and can destroy a relationship in weeks, if not sooner. Being on the receiving end of this behavior can wear you down to where you cannot conduct your daily activities as your mind is so worn out.
- The second behavior to be on the lookout for is for persons who generalize. They will take one thing that you had stated and generalize it to mean everything across the board. For example, you may tell a woman you like her without makeup. She may take this to mean you never want her to wear makeup, and later blame you for stripping her identity or worse. You are at fault.
- The third one that you want to look out for is a person that constantly interrupts you when you want to explain your point of view or perspective on something. There are many reasons a person may be interrupting you, such as ADHD, but those conditions aside, one of the reasons people regularly interrupt is because they think they know what you will say, don’t want to hear anymore, and want to respond/attack back asap. This is not a good habit to have. Conversational dynamics are very complex and we all speak through our own mouths and listen through our own ears; we may share the same words but we do not speak the same language. Each of us has our own language, and the meaning we ascribe to words. Hearing, truly hearing your love is critical and a foundational element in a relationship. Interruptions destroy a train of thought and also indicate that the person interrupting either does not value what you have to say, or it is more important for them to be in charge of the conversation than honor your sharing and practice common conversational courtesy.
I hope you do not have to endure any of these three issues with your partner. They can be caused by a variety of factors and I could write for another 8 hours on the topic, but at this point, I simply want to make you aware of them so that you do not ignore them early on, and only see them in retrospect, when you are too deep in the relationship to simply make a decision and perhaps walk away. Before you walk away from any relationship it is important that you fully understand the dynamics and ask your partner for all of the information you require to make a fully informed decision; it is not easy to find someone you gel with, and the decision should not be taken lightly. Examine all of the great things the relationship offers and then conduct a balancing test.
