Crap at relationships

Not working means not setting the alarm and my mornings are getting later and later.  This has to stop, I don't need the sleep and I am wasting half of each morning.

We're on week 2 of living in the same house.  It was his house before but it is being TP-fied which will continue when the rest of my stuff arrives in the next couple of weeks.  I have learned that he is rubbish in the mornings and conversation is not wanted nor responded to ... suits me.  He has learned that if I ask for something to be done than I expect it to be done on a reasonable timescale ... I do not subscribe tot he manana principle

What I am really struggling with is the time it seems to take 2 people to make a decision.  I bought dining room furniture on my own ... took 5 mins.  We went to look at sofas and it took about an hour and a half to get him to say what he liked.

TP
Hour and half your training him well 

An hour and a half seems quite quick TP  I'll need to go sofa hunting myself when I move in a couple of weeks.  I've got a single futon to sit on in the interim though, so no desperate rush.  Unless I have visitors of course....hmmmm

I don't need furniture, other than a spare bed, but I would quite like some of the essential luxuries like a toaster and a printer.

Life without toast is not life. Nothing luxury about a toaster Caz.

Know what you mean about being ill Caz. I had nasty flu (not the man kind) after Christmas and it was a bit rubbish on my own. Cats loved it

I dont recall sofa issues. Mrs P chose the sofa in advance and I went to look and approve (30s cinema style). Took a few minutes to choose the fabric. i kept them

I had a great time at the Edinburgh festival on my own the summer after we split - 3-5 shows a day, often snapping up a late return for 'hot' shows. Couldn't do that with someone else - all that finding a show we both fancy. I have never minded film/theatre on my own. I like to digest what I think about it rather than immediately have to discuss, or worse, completely disagree. Still gets a bit quiet at the end of the evening I suppose

I've just made the decision to meet up with people for a swim on Saturday.  I would never have been able to do that at such short notice in the past.  Single life does have it's merits, although I would dearly love someone warm to snuggle up to tonight.  The heating has been on all day but the house is still cold.  I dont even have a cat to keep me warm

I have to admit I never had any issues with arranging things with friends at short notice when I was with my ex. If we had nothing already planned then we were both happy to let the other make plans with friends. We also seemed to have reasonably similar taste in film, comedy and theatre which meant there was never any arguments or big debates about what to see or watch.

Probably due to how easy that relationship was I don't see one single positive about being single!

I could do what I wanted during the week, but the weekends were our time, so I had to negotiate if I wanted to spend time elsewhere.  That was fine while Hubby was prepared to do stuff with me, but it wasn't much fun sitting around at home watching him be ill.  He couldn't predict whether he was going to be ill or not and by the time it because obvious which way the day was going to go I would have missed out on seeing my friends.

So I had the double whammy of watching him suffer and not being able to do anything about it, as well as knowing that I had missed out on fun stuff.

I never had anything like that to deal with, both young and in good health. Though back then I'd have dropped everything to look after my ex if she ill at all.

For me being single has actually meant seeing less of my mates as they have other stuff going on with kids/family etc these days. As well as losing contact a bunch of friends on her side, so I spend about 99% of my time out of work by myself these days. I have far less of a social calendar since becoming single.

I think the thing is it is easy to rely on partners in a relationship - if one of you arranges something, the other will go along etc.  Granted they're right there if you want to spontaneously go to the cinema etc., so you son't have to make the effort, so to speak.  I think us singletons have a lot of advantages - we can come and go as we like, and effectively answer to no-one!  It will take a bit of effort - you can't just expect things to happen or to be arranged for you - but it'll be worth the effort.  A lot of my friends have kids now, so aren't as flexible at the drop of the hat, but i see that as the ball being in my court to make the effort to visit them.  Yeah, it would be nice to have someone to snuggle up to at night, but I think being single has a lot of merits, if you make it work for you   It needn't all be doom and gloom. 

I have to admit though, if I do find a guy, I hope he is similar to me in terms of independence.....I'd HATE to spend all my spare time with him, and I wouldn't want to feel like going on on my own to see friends or whatever was a bad thing. We all need space....

I understand that many people enjoy and prefer being single. I'm just not one of them.

I do think much of that does stem from how easy my relationship was with my ex from day one until pretty much the end. I never did feel there wasn't anything I couldn't do that I wanted to do and while I still do things I enjoy I find many of them a far lesser experience doing it on my own rather than with someone I love. Be that the simple things like cinema, theatre, gigs, comedy show and meals out to the more extravagant things like travelling.

Some love being single, personally I view it as a far lesser experience than what I've had previously. I'd say the last four and a bit years have been the worst of my life.

That is a shame   it sounds really trite, but it is true when they say 'life is what you make it'.  Relationships breaking up are really hard, and we've all been there, gutted and thinking life will never be good again.  I think the real danger, however, is telling yourself life will never be as good, then acting that out.  If you don't do anything to change that feeling, then you will continue to feel lacking because of the breakup of the relationship.    Maybe i'm lucky - i've travelled myself and met folk along the way, I go to the cinema myself, theatre etc.  Yeah of course i'd rather go with friends, but why should I let life pass me by because i'm single?  We only get one life, and I don't want to be lying on my deathbed looking into the past wondering why I was miserable for years when I was on my own, instead of taking advantage and making the most of it.  If you rely on someone else to make you happy with life, chances are you'll spend a lot of time being miserable, which would be a real waste

I've not stopped myself from doing anything. I've been travelling, go the cinema, theatre etc by myself. The only thing I don't really do is eat out in restaurants on my own unless I'm travelling.

I've given up any hope of meeting anyone now, so I know I need to keep myself occupied and do stuff that interests me but that doesn't mean I don't feel that it's a bit futile deep inside.

I have a lot more friends now that I'm single.  Now that I'm not nursing Hubby I have been able to go out and meet new people, and have time to get reaquainted with old friends.  My life was restricted to those interests that we had together.  Now I can keep those up and add new experiences.

To start with I wanted to look after Hubby.  It was my job and I wanted him to get better, and I went to great lengths to try to facilitate him being able to live a full life again.  But he didn't want to get better and made no attempt to help himself.  I tried everything I could because I loved him and it broke my heart to see him in a mess.  But without him taking responsibility for his own health I was fighting a losing battle.

For at least 5 years I was living with the stress of watching him destroy himself, and the worse he got the closer he wanted me.  It got to the stage where he resented me doing anything at all.  I spent the time crying when I was at home with him, watching him suffer, or feeling guilty if I went out because I was abandoning him.  I wasn't even allowed to leave him long enough to do housework or make a proper meal, so my home environment began to suffer which added to my stress levels.  Eventually I realised that I wasn't living my own life at all, but I was purely an extension of him because he had become so controlling.

I would have loved to have back the person that I married, but it became obvious that he was gone forever.

Supercaz - That sounds tough.

I have less friends now, or more to the point friends I knew through my ex are no longer in my life. These days I'm lucky if I see any of my friends once a month.

Relationships are better off without women, they tend to spoil them!

That's why I stick to men, Lee

I am very glad I got the cats, especially in this weather, and when I was ill. It wasn't the plan, but she took so long to get sorted with her own place and it took a long time getting them settled here. She said it would be cruel to move either of them again. I miss her friends. Have seen some of them since, but not nearly as often.

SuperCaz wrote (see)

That's why I stick to men, Lee

me too  I'd love to have cats, even if i might be dubbed a cat lady.  In my current flat i entice cats into the garden with cat treats, so I can give them a cuddle, hehehe