[Two Pronged] My love and sex life are complicated, and I want a committed relationship

• Anna shares her experiences with two relationships, one fulfilling but lacking commitment, and another volatile, leading her to reflect on her needs and desires in love.
• The advice given highlights the need for self-awareness and the distinction between immature and mature love, encouraging Anna to seek clarity and understanding in her relationships.

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Rappler’s People section runs an advice column by couple Jeremy Baer and clinical psychologist Dr. Margarita Holmes.

Jeremy has a master’s degree in law from Oxford University. A banker of 37 years who worked in three continents, he has been training with Dr. Holmes for the last 10 years as co-lecturer and, occasionally, as co-therapist, especially with clients whose financial concerns intrude into their daily lives.

Together, they have written two books: Love Triangles: Understanding the Macho-Mistress Mentality and Imported Love: Filipino-Foreign Liaisons.

Dear Dr. Holmes and Mr. Baer,

 I wonder these days why people enter relationships. While getting in one is not the center of my life, I have questions about the intersection between desire, life direction, and relationships.

I’m now at a point where I’ve experienced the most satisfying sex I could ever imagine with someone but he will not live in the Philippines permanently and when he leaves he knows he cannot maintain an LDR (long distance relationship).

I found myself in another two month relationship with a man with a volatile libido. I ended up walking on eggshells, crashing my libido badly.

I reconnected with the first guy. I was able to let my guard down and bare my raw self and act in a way that I’ve never been before.

Right now, this man is someone I can’t let go of but still I can’t just plan my life around him, so it’s a dilemma, a floating connection.

I now allow myself to talk to anyone that makes me happy.  I don’t become loyal anymore to anything hypothetical and I have more reservations now.

I’m also deeply aware and learned the hard way that I don’t want to feel ever again that I’m good enough to f*** but not worthy enough to commit to.

– Anna

Dear Anna,

Relationships are complex and come in many forms, as it is clear you already know.

You ask why people enter them yet in reality you have answered your own question already. A relationship offers the opportunity to reveal yourself fully and safely with someone else without having to sacrifice your own dignity and integrity, an aim that is achievable but often only partially.

The two relationships you describe illustrate this. The “eggshell” one showed you what happens when
there is no safety — having to deal with mood shifts can kill desire.

The “reconnection” one demonstrates the effect of safety – you can reveal your true self. The contrast is critical and can usefully inform your future.

 However, the way you describe your current attachment is scarcely ideal. He is someone you cannot let go of but cannot plan a future with either, or as you label it, this is a floating relationship.

That the sex is extraordinary is a bonus but also a distraction.

After all, great sex doesn’t mean that he is the right partner for you any more than a missing label means that he isn’t.

The real issue is: is he willing to move forward and label your relationship or are you shoring it up with hope that may be misplaced?

A way forward would be to ask him: what does he want from the relationship? Is he willing to build something? His answer, or avoidance, will tell you much more than any guesswork on your part and if in the final analysis he wants intimacy without commitment, at least you will know where you stand.

Best wishes,

– JAF Baer

Dear Anna:

Thank you very much for your letter. You ask a very important question: Why do people get into relationships?

A cursory search will give you a plethora of reasons, but in truth one can probably divide said reasons into two:

• neuroscientific ones — mirror neurons, oxytocin, etc. but one of the simplest ways to describe this is that we are social beings that need relationships because our brains are wired to connect with others; and
• practical and social reasons, such as when relationships result in children, it is much easier to raise the kids when said relationships continue; to avoid loneliness, etc.

From the theoretical standpoint above, let us now proceed to a more personal level and try to gain a larger perspective on your love and sex life.

At the moment, you seem to not just want, but actually need relationships with the opposite sex. In the last four months, you have been in a relationship first, with man A, whom you felt safe enough to have terrific sex with; but when his lack of commitment hurt you so much, you went to volatile man B who, thankfully, you realized after 2 months was not the sort of man you wanted in your life.

The following (4th) month, you went back to man A, not just because the sex was, once more, absolutely fantastic, but because you reveled in being the woman you felt you truly were (and you could well be right) when with him. And because you felt complete, cherished and truly seen by him, you wanted the relationship to continue.

Yet even as the relationship continued, man A was honest enough to say it couldn’t last forever because for whatever reason, he could not or would not stay in the Philippines forever. Man A, despite knowing that you could end the relationship prematurely (in his eyes-because I have a feeling not just the sex, but the while experience of being with you was also mind boggling for him), was honest enough to continue telling you the truth.

Some writers divide people into two types:

“Those who run away from something” or “Those who run towards something.”

Actually, I would include a third type of person: those who run towards something (like a seemingly perfect relationship with man A) but then realize it is best for their mental health to run away from that same something.

I would like to say that your last two paragraphs show what a mature person you have become. And this is true but, perhaps, not the complete truth.

If you can hold off from sex with someone you genuinely like whom you know also genuinely likes you, is willing to commit to you but is honest enough to say, but I am not sure if this commitment will be forever, then terrific.

You can still have a warm, funny, fulfilling relationship with him but not have sex.

Another option is to believe that just because a relationship (with sex) doesn’t last forever, it does not mean it is empty or worthless.

If you can truly manage one of these two options, then I say, “you go, girl!” But I am not sure you can.

This is not to demean you in any way. This is merely a recognition that people are different and some feel they need sex more than others.

If one is particularly blessed with the right experiences and/or the right therapy, one’s needs and one’s wants can live together harmoniously OR this can be a goal worth aspiring to.

And if one is self compassionate enough to forgive oneself for the same “mistakes” with the same generosity one could forgive one’s best friend, then each relationship you have can be a learning experience.

Hopefully, each relationship can also have more positive than negative elements in them.

That way, in time, you might agree with what the brilliant psychoanalyst and humanistic philosopher Erich Fromm once wrote in his 1956 book The Art of Loving:

Immature love: I love you because I need you.
Mature love: I need you because I love you.

The best of luck to you – to US! — my fellow work in progress

– MG Holmes

– Rappler.com

Life got complicated? Write to our Two Pronged duo at twopronged@rappler.com.