How many compromises do long-term relationships last?
After almost three years of relationship, was it still the excitement of the first infatuation? The 41-year-old Susanne M. (name changed by the editors) did not even know why her heart beat every time she called her friend Rolf. Or was it panic that something had happened in the meantime, an accident, another woman? No, deep in her heart, Susanne M. knew exactly what it was. It was the fear of his reaction. "I can not stand women who keep calling from behind me," Rolf Dressler, who was a few years younger than her, said at the first breakfast,
"Love needs air and no leash!" Susanne M. still remembers this morning well. Her well-being after a night full of passion, his homemade porridge with fresh fruit, her blissful incredulity, having met another man by the end of 30, who was so perfect for her - cultivated, adventurous, a good cook. His love-air-leash phrase was therefore just off her. After a gentle goodbye kiss she heard nothing from him. For a painful week, she finally could not stand it anymore and called him. He was in Barcelona and was happy about her call. "When will we meet again?" She asked. "I'll contact you," he replied.
A pattern began that weakened from then on, emotionally-motivating - for her, not for him - through her love. Because love became it, on both sides. Even if he insisted on separate apartments and needed much more freedom than they needed. And she had to drastically reduce her need for closeness and her calls so that he would not feel emotionally constrained. But if she stuck to it, everything was wonderful. "We laugh, travel, cook together, and even in bed it is great," says Susanne, "so I swallow the toad.
"Many women swallow" toads ", big and small, when it comes to love, and the heart, Woody Allen has already noted, is a" very ductile, resilient little muscle. "If love matters, that becomes what Women, like Susanne M. want to avoid closeness, move into the country as inveterate townspeople, quit smoking as consumer smokers, and vegetarians, even though they like to eat a juicy steak from time to time, are suppressive Fear and jealousy, when once again an unknown woman called and immediately reissued.
True love, as the myth demands, fed by books, operas and films, means unconditionedness and exclusiveness. Love, as it says in the Letter to the Corinthians, tolerates, believes, hopes and tolerates everything. But that could be a very big, completely unrealistic error. Huge and overwhelming is our claim to love, but what we live then is much smaller. Everyday life. Habituation. Adaptation. Compromise. "The love myth requires the total symbiosis, complete recognition, seen, being accepted, total openness," says the Hamburg psychologist Oskar Holzberg, "but after the initial intoxication must open spaces, one must take distance from the myth, otherwise love is claustrophobic . "
How many toads can one swallow in long-term relationships?
Love, if it remains unconditional and intoxicating, goes beyond its limits, is unbearable in the long run, destroyed. Liz Taylor and Richard Burton had such an uncompromising love in their best movie "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" Oscar-crowned lived out.
They were each other the human being, who means everything, touches everything, knows everything, yet they could not stand it, despite two marriage attempts. It did not go with me, but not without each other. Simone de Beauvoir, on the other hand, withstood him, the balancing act between love and freedom, attachment and independence, loyalty and autonomy. Separate apartments, no monogamy, long in the shadow of the great Sartre, de Beauvoir suffered from being regarded only as a large "Sartreuse" and not as a "great beauvoir". But she swallowed all the toads.
The total congruence does not exist. In the early days, when endorphins neatly cloud our mind, nothing bothers us. No snoring, no disorder, no showing off or his habit of interrupting us permanently. A new relationship is like a freshly knotted carpet, everything is solid and colorful, everything is stable. But with every compromise she gets a bit more fragile. What's stopping her, before the carpet becomes threadbare? Love can be a sham, the packaging can be deceiving. Tricky things usually only come to mind when falling in love has become trust and habit, when you're emotionally hooked.
That's what 36-year-old Sabine Meiners experienced when she met a successful entrepreneur. Tall, attractive, sporty. Sabine Meiners was in love with her. "The pink glasses phase" she calls it, "but then I noticed that my dream man has a little dating problem, that he says 'because of my brother' instead of 'because of my brother' and he has me and me once Only once, but it was enough, because I'm a language fanatic, I'm excited about every language carver on TV ".
It was his only flaw, but one that suddenly disturbed Sabine Meiners so much that she considered a breakup. How could she be happy in the long run with a man who did not speak German grammar perfectly? But then she got pregnant. And she got used to it and corrected it gently, this dating problem of a man who was not only a grammar carver, but above all a fantastic father.
Nobody is perfect
Who demands perfection, often stays alone. But if you deny yourself too much, you give up. The age-old dilemma - where does tolerance cease, where does self-denial begin? Will I ever lose myself if I make too many compromises? A delicate balancing act. "Many women who do not have a husband have never gotten over the love myth," says Oskar Holzberg. "Those who remain demanding for too long and have an exaggerated expectation of Mr. Right often remain alone." Fatal, too, says Holzberg, "these woman-typical if-then phrases": If he loves me, then he would know what I need, how I feel, what I long for ... Men do not do certain things therefore not because they do not love or not enough, but because they are the way they are.
When do women finally realize that men change just as little as they do? When do you stop expecting a George Clooney when you're not Julia Roberts yourself?
Every relationship is a mix of needs that are constantly changing. However, the exclusivity phase ends at the latest with the first child, so there is no room for merging but for responsibility. When working life is exciting, you do not need extra excitement and excitement from your partner, but on the contrary, you can make some of it. But if you have lost your job or your life is just nasty, closeness and reliability are desired.
And when the house is built and the kids are tall, the craving for excitement and tingle rises again. Once again Hawaii, before long distance is no longer an option due to the risk of thrombosis! But if the partner rather pusselt in the garden, because he has already circumnavigated the globe as a professional frequent flyer? Or just does not feel like remote destinations? Life force and lust for life do not decrease with couples at the same time, often it is the woman who wants to give the years even more life than her husband. "Then it is important not to resign, but to find a meaningful compromise," advises Oskar Holzberg, "a city trip would be conceivable or a short flight to a Mediterranean island."
Separate myth and reality
Love is not a 100-meter run, love is hurdles and long-distance. No one can always shine, no one can always make his partner happy, everything grinds in, everything drags off. Every woman has to decide for herself how far she wants to go from her ideal. What makes sense and where do I deny myself? But there are also needs that are non-negotiable, life-desires that are vital. One of them is the desire for a child.
Gerrit Hehler-Hönig, 37, wished glowing one, the same-age nurse Philipp Gross, whom she met 15 years ago, seemed the perfect father. But he loved freedom and independence more than the idea of feeding a screaming baby at night. So he comforted her, over and over again, for years. "If we made a trip around the world, if the condominium is paid off, if I completed my training."
One day she even poked a hole in his condom in despair. When she could not stand it, she went to see a psychologist. She advised her finally to confess her desire for life and to spray in huge letters "I WANT A CHILD" to the bedroom wall. That did Gerrit, now she is pregnant. What often stands in the way of women, in order to be clear about their wishes in a relationship and to negotiate fair compromises, is not just a need for harmony, but emotional hunger.
Those who have never been full in love carry with them painful feelings of entitlement and fear of failure. Am I capable of relationship? Do I expect too much or too little? Will I ever get what I deserve? Am I good enough to make claims? But how do I know when the sparrow in hand is just not better than the dove on the roof, but just too small? "Our guts are reporting, but we often do not listen to them," says Holzberg. "We are suppressing his signals until we can no longer stand it."
The 39-year-old journalist gave her husband Thomas after the birth of her second daughter on her permanent employment and wrote only occasionally a column.For five years she held this career abstinence, five years in which her children and her large garden grew and thrived, while she herself had the feeling of withering. She lacked the job, the editorial office, the bustle, her old life. When her stomach ache finally became unbearable, she knew it could not go on like this. "I had to do something for myself," says Marlies Hohmann, "so I called my old boss and hired a nanny. Thomas was totally against it, but for the first time I prevailed, it saved our marriage."
So if the stomach grumbles, because something in the partnership feels wrong, then he asks us questions. What can I take out? What is important to me? Where is my upper limit? What can I do without and what not? Am I someone who gives up and throws out? Is my life full of broken stories, or am I holding out too long and denying myself? That's our decision - do I throw the game off bad cards, or do I play with licking until I've lost everything?
Susanne M. has since ended her relationship with Rolf Dressler. After a call from the emergency room where she had been admitted with an appendectomy. "I'm watching football," he had said. "Can you call me later?" This toad was just too big.
