[mommaxo]

I always seem to wind up with a guy I end up resenting later on.
They are hostile, bitter, coldhearted, abusive, drunks, screw ups, and going nowhere in life. I'm trying to change this pattern.
I'm starting to learn how to walk away from bad relationships.
My relationships always end up being completely unhealthy, and unstable. But things are so great at first. and then out of nowhere, everything goes to crap. My last serious relationship ended with me going to jail, and living in shelters for a few months, and drinking like a fish to try and deal with the aftermath of everything that happened. My friend told me because I'm in screwed up situations, I attract screwed up men. Maybe I need to just keep focusing on myself, and being more independent, and the right guy will eventually come along?

I'm kind of giving up on men right now. I've had bad experinces with the men in this city. One guy I dated off a dating website (lame I know) ended up having a girlfriend in a different city. I feel like it's pointless even bothering looking for a guy. especially now that that I have a baby on the way. I probably won't even have the time of day for a guy once my baby is born. It just sucks, because I'm sort of lonely, and wouldn't mind having a good guy around, and I'm so sick of guys treating me like crap.

[ChipperMonkey]

I think a big part of it is learning to see those flags quickly and when you do, not hesitating to walk away. I tend to jump into things, too, but to my credit, when I see those red flags flying, I have NO problem dropping a guy. Of course they're blindsided as apparently I'm much more intense than other people, but oh well. My intensity is no indication of my willingness to put up with bad behavior!

[~Christina]

I think if you just work on making a life for yourself and your baby. You will attract a better quality of men. Seems the good ones pop up outta nowhere.

After my First marriage ended.. I dated 2-3 guys that wound up just being a mess for a variety of reasons...

My father said to me one day while out to lunch with my 6 year old daughter and I "Everyman you meet ask yourself if you would be happy if your daughter was seeing someone like that"

Bam ! that's all it took.

[indygerry]

We go towards the things that seem familiar and comfortable. Finding a 'better' partner will probably be really uncomfortable or feel awkward at the start. Dating a healthy balanced partner may cause you to consider if it was the right decision or make you long for the 'bad boy' who will drink himself into oblivion and swear at you.

Here's the secret-- you can choose who you attract by how you react to their advances and behaviour. Ultimately you set the standard for how you want to be treated. When someone crosses the line you can choose to accept their behavior or not.

The truth is, balanced healthy relationships are sometimes without the excitement and chaos and edgyness of disfunctional ones and this can be hard to adjust to at the start. If you can work through it, bear with it and give a healthy but less colourful guy a shot at dating you then you will likely find new take aways from a relationship and will find that long term you are getting what you want and need out of those relationship more than you did from the previous somewhat crazier ones.

The key is riding things out at the start and looking for guys that give you butterflies instead of thunderbolts.

Oh the other part of this is, is that you'll probaby have to wait a little longer than you did in the past to find a suitable partner. That's goes back to the rules of quality over quantity. You'll have to weed out a few frogs before you track down a prince.

[mommaxo]

you are absolutely right. I usually get bored very easily when it comes to happy stable men. yet I get so attached to the men who treat me like crap, and who are emotionally unavailable. I guess I will have to start keeping the good ones around, and stop going for "the bad boys".