I've been with my GF for around 3 months now. She's 33 yo and is very ambitious. She's a HB9 and gets hit on quite a lot. She knows what she wants from life, knows what she likes and doesn't like and does what she wants. She doesn't come across as very flexible.

My analysis of her is that she does what she wants when she wants and doesn't really take my feelings into account. This can come across as quite fussy and she shoots down a lot of my suggestions on where to eat or go hang out and comes up with alternative suggestions and I normally agree because I don't care, I like her and just want to hang around with her. Should I put my foot down more and insist on going where I want more? I just think it would be petty since I don't think it matters much where we go eat etc.

Similarly sometimes she's all over me and then suddenly her emotions change and she'll be distant. She'll be affectionate for a few days and then be distant for a few days and then become affectionate again and so on...

So basically we'll have good sex and be affectionate for a few days and then maybe on the third or fourth day she'll push me away when I try to cuddle with her or be affectionate. I'll give her space and then she'll come back. I don't emotionally react or anything but this behaviour does bother me and I find it draining to deal with even though I don't show it. Maybe I am being needy but I like girls who are more affectionate. For example, if she's starting her distant phase and we're sleeping on the same bed, I find it quite lonely to sleep with her when she's not in the mood to cuddle.

Should I continue to just ignore such things and give her space or try and talk about it in order to find out if there is something deeper going on? I do feel that our communication is quite poor.

I realise that there is a fine line between being non-reactive and making her feel like I don't care about/understand her feelings and being a door mat.

You're now in a relationship - so you have to take that into account.

Relationships are about communication and compromise - and you've posted this on a pickup forum.

Don't game your girlfriend. Communicate with her.

How old are you, btw?

I'm 29 and she's 33. She's a single mum and her 6 yo son is with her parents in another city for a month and a half.

I want to talk to her about it but a lot of the advice I see is that it might make things worse.

When she is not acting moody I'm thinking of bringing it up in a way that doesn't seem like I am judging her or blaming her and also not coming across as needy. Maybe something like:

"[Name] I like you a lot and enjoy spending time with you. Sometimes I feel that you need your space and I understand that but it does bother me when you push me away when I try to be affectionate. It makes me feel alone. I want us to be happy and I feel it is very important that we both learn to freely communicate our feelings to each other. "

How does that sound?

Where have you seen that advice? On this pickup forum or somewhere else?

Listen: pickup is great. It's a life changer for some and its positive effects on guys who stick with it and become confident are wonderful.

There are elements you carry into relationships. Certainly the confidence, the knowing your value... Things like that, but there are also things you don't. You don't freeze out girlfriends. You talk and communicate. And I think you have the right idea... But I'm not sure if you're proposing putting this in a text or just talking to her.

The actual content of the message should just be sincere. You don't need all the bells and whistles.

The bigger question, in my opinion is why you're even with this woman. She sounds like a bag of shit to me.

The problem is that you're in a relationship with a bad person. She isn't the problem. It's you...for taking what whatever you can get instead of devoting overall attractiveness and finding a quality girl that isn't moody or full of baggage.

You brought this up on yourself, enjoy 60 years of this. You can't change people, it's about finding someone is compatible. You have fallen in love with the idea of having a LTR. You will be single again and you will be worse off.

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The guys are right.

Or maybe you're too needy for affection. Is there a chance you're suffocating her?

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Thanks for the reply CharlesFinley. So for example in the following post, there's some advice about "Drama free relationships" which advocates ignoring her when she is bad i.e. don't reward bad behaviour and a soft next for really bad behaviour:

drama-free-relationships-3-the-soft-next-vt125554.html

On the other hand the following post talks about communicating more:

extended-relationship-guide-vt170687.html

Then over here there's some advise that says calling her out on bad behaviour can come across as needy:

is-calling-her-out-on-her-behaviour-alph-vt132449.html

So I was a bit confused on how to handle bad behaviour since there seems to be contradictory advise.

I don't think I am suffocating her. I normally wait for her to initiate contact and if she doesn't I only contact her once per day either through messenger or calling and wait for her to respond.

When we are together I am affectionate as long as she seems into it. If she pulls away etc. I give her space and do something else.

I don't get why people are saying she's a bad person or that she is a bag of shit. Maybe something was deleted. Dragula and Charles, you guys are cool but I respectfully disagree with your assessments. Maybe I'm missing something that you can clarify.

To summarize the problems:

1. She shoots down your suggestions.

Ok this is rude, and uncaring, and something you should address. Could be your pretty laid back and she just picks better places and doesnt think about it because you dont push or be assertive. I'd say be more assertive with your suggestions. But to me this just sounds more like this could be poor communication on both parts, and something that can easily be addressed.

2.She's affectionate some days, distant some days.

Honestly I dont think I could carry the same level of affection every day. Some days I want to cuddle, fuck, some days I wanna chill and watch a movie with a girl. Some days my mind is on work, some days I'm exhausted. If she is going from affectionate to bitchy, yeah I can see a flag there, but if its just that some days she is not as affectionate thats something else. I wont see this as a sign of baggage.

I agree though that you guys may not be compatible long term. If you need someone more affectionate find that girl. I'm just saying i dont read crazy or baggage from this girl, and at least be more assertive and communicate better. Maybe she IS uncaring in some way, or maybe she just is used to something and can work on some of her quirks. I'd just say address the problems first.

How can I be more assertive without coming across as childish? For example let's say I say "let's go get a pizza...there's a pizza hut 5 minutes from here" and she replies "no I don't want to go there. I want to eat chinese." Or maybe I say "let's go shoot some pool and drink some beer" and she says "no I don't want to. I want to go shopping."

I don't want to beg her or argue about such silly things but it does get annoying.

Did she do this kind of stuff BEFORE you got into a LTR with her?

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Did she do this kind of stuff BEFORE you got into a LTR with her?

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USER HAS BEEN BANNED FOR REPEATEDLY IGNORING MOD WARNINGS AND MULTIPLE RULE VIOLATIONS

Well I met her during the day and Fclosed her the same night. This was 3 months ago and we've been seeing each other quite regularly since then. She's kind of always been like this. I remember on the day I met her I suggested we use SPAM to chat but she said she doesn't like SPAM and told me to download some other app and was rather insistent about this. I thought it was quite silly to be honest.

See that's the problem. You're getting into relationships with these problems, and then trying to solve them along the way. It is really hard to change people which is why you should be picky who you spend the rest of your life with. She has lot's of red flags.

I know this doesn't help you now. But you have put yourself in this hole.

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Some background I didn't mention. She's a PhD student. I got her pregnant and she went back to her home country and got an abortion a month ago. I didn't mention this since I thought her behaviour was similar even before the pregnancy. Also her son is with her parents and ex husband and her ex husband will bring him next month to our city so she can be close to her son.

So she came back from her home country last week and was staying with me while trying to find a place to stay. So I talked to her last night. I told her that I notice that she acts cold to me sometimes and nice at other times and asked her why that is.

She told me it's because she misses her son, she's also stressed out about her PhD project that she's not getting enough done. She's also stressed about finding a place to stay. Also she's worried about getting pregnant again and she said that sleeping together every night is too much and she feels like she needs some space.

I told her I understand. This morning I told her that if she is worried about something she can always come talk to me about it. I also told her that I will give her some space but that she can still come stay with me if she needs to while finding a new place or not, up to her.

I understand that she's going through a lot and want to be there for her but at the same time want to respect her need for some space. So I was thinking of just not contacting her for a few days and if she doesn't get in touch then just call her maybe in a couple of days to see if she's feeling ok. What do you guys think? I don't want her to think I'm abandoning her at her time of need but at the same time I don't want to make her feel suffocated.