Well, Becoming, it is really great that you have the insight to recognize this is an issue for you. Good job!!!! Can't solve a problem if you don't know about it.

Realtionships are not something I have been good at, for whatever reason. I was married for 15 years. She was quite selfish and only interested in money and living like a movie star. I should have divorced her, but stayed for my son. She left when I got really sick. I was in another complicated and long partnership as well, which I kind of ended because I knew I was going to be in the state hospital for 5 years and did not want her to suffer by trying to be with me while I was away for so long. We aere still very close. She never left me despite how sick I got, so, that one, I do not consider a failure at all. Gorgeous daughter out of the deal, too!!!!!!

I am 56 now. Had a pretty successful career until got super sick in my early 40s. I have worked closely with tons of people all over the world. Had a few GFs over the years. There have been many, many disappointments, betrayals, scumbags, cheaters, liars, sociopaths, people stealing, totally fu**ing me over in business deals worth millions, etc. These people are present in every country, they are everywhere, not just your exes. You may find this odd to hear, but, this actually is not about you. It almost certainly has nothing to do with you. Until you can get to a place where you get that, see that, believe that, and live it, it will be hard for you to move on, because you are stuck in some negative neural loop pathways of shame and self-blame. I am not good enough. Nobody will ever love me. Everyone leaves me. So on and so forth. Been there. For years.

I have come to some personal realizations about human beings having been through what I have. One of those is that, with extremely rare exceptions, extraordinarily rare, in my opinion, just exceptionally rare, most people, when they say, "I will love you and be ny your side," whether a spouse or a sister or even a parent, the vast majority of people, when they proclaim these words, they actually, do not, in fact, really mean them. What I mean by this is, they may think they are capable of that level of commitment, they may wish for it, but very, very, very few people, when things get messy and ugly and super duper hard, very few will actually still be there. Why do I say this? Because it is exactly what has occurred in my life and in the lives of the 700 severely mentally people I lived with in the state hospital for many years. Over and over again.

So, what I would suggest to you is that you recalibrate your expectations. I, myself, other than the very committed recent partner I had to leave to save her some serious pain, I would not get married again. But I am not 26, so, there is always that. I now live my life accepting people while they are around, try to enjoy that while it lasts, and absolutely treasure the very tiny number of people who will always be there forever. For me, that is my dad, my ex, my daughter, and three dear friends. Not very many people at all.

But that is fine. I am grateful for what I have. Do I still get mad at the boss who discrimnated against me when I got sick, teh women who cheated and lied, teh friends who took advantage of my kind and generous nature? Yes. yes, I do. But, I very quickly pull myself out of that because I actually do not care about those people. I do not care what they think. I accept that I was hosed multiple times. It is part of life and I am much happier now acccepting that and enjoyin gthe good things I do have in my life.

Life is short, trust me. It is not worth spending any time on these people. If you want a long-term partnership, it will happen. There are some good people out there. There are also some scumbags. Focus on the good ones. Foget about those losers.

One trait all extremely successful people share is the ability to get over disappointment. Keep that in mind.