A lite half soy, half skim, decaf caramel Cappuccino is on the menu and it hasn’t been ordered by your girlfriend…
Your wannabe David Gandy in his chinos, leather lofas and Ralph Lauren shirt has a little bit of a problem and his problems are becoming yours.
(This is David Gandy in case you have been living under a rock)
I’m fine with compromise (especially if you are David Gandy and staring at me like that) – it’s essential to any relationship, and my shameful subservient admission is that I actually love Destiny’s Child’s song “Cater to you” because I adore the concept of giving yourself so completely and wholeheartedly to the person you love (insert feminist bra-burning uprising here). I play it on repeat as I drive around the burbs believing I'm Beyonce. Just like Beyonce, I think it's o.k for Girls to "run the world" while 'catering to you' and telling "nasty to put some clothes on." I think it’s o.k to be feminist and to love and since love is giving, it’s also o.k to do the washing, iron the shirts and cook for him (provided he shares the load in equal or greater proportions than me). I think you’d love your man even more for valuing your equality which would mean a greater willingness to do more for him. All feminism is, is an admission that women are humans too. Sorted and a little bit off track.
But what of our actual roles in relationships?
How do you take to a whiney male? Not to say that women are whiney but perhaps to say, it’s more o.k for women to nag than for men to. Yep, that's exactly what I'm saying.
When I think of the man that I want – I envision a man, not a baby who I have to burp and breastfeed. Sorry for the visual. I hate poo so I don’t want to be elbow deep in his. Again – happy to carry the load but I’d rather a man who can carry himself and carry me in the process. Isn’t that the whole idea of being with one; that they can support you, protect you, be that backbone you need when YOU feel weakness?
I know what the Germaine Greer’s of you are thinking. Why are women painted as weak? We can hold our own, we can manage without men and if we are equals then we don’t need rescuing etc…and you’d be right. Congratulations, we have the same thought process. Smart minds think alike (it must also be because we are female and amazing).
HOWEVER…. in a relationship, I only want what is better than what I already have and if it is not better and it is not enhancing my life in any way, then I simply do not need it and will ask to be excused while I examine the room for the nearest Exit.
I’m always told relationships are more work than fun but I want my work to be like Richard Branson’s or Oprah’s – fun, thrilling, adrenalin-charged and while sometimes exhausting, it should always be rewarding.
So what happens when you’ve been seeing someone and while they are wonderful in many areas, their insecurity is all that is ever projected onto you?
If you’ve just started seeing someone, are you expected to uplift them right away in one month of positive adjective filled conversations about how much you love them and how they’re enough when you don’t really even know them yet? I think this is the reason that I’ve always argued that you should feel complete as a person before entering a relationship so you’re not constantly projecting the same negativity repeatedly onto the person. Be ying and yang, be Ren and Stimpy, Be Beavis and Buthead for all I care, just be enough for yourself so you don’t seem less than that to your partner.
I know this post is hypocritical of me because I’m a sucker for both praise and attention. I love attention so much that I imagine my name in headlights, my own talk show, my own empire, songs written about me, you name it – I’ve dreamt it. As much as I love compliments is as much as I give them; frequently and fabulously BUT when I’m in a relationship I want to praise when I want to but be praised constantly. I don’t need them, but I do really enjoy them; however I am female.
Irrespective of my love for being loved; I wouldn’t ever believe it existed in the first month of dating someone. So I wouldn't ask for praise, I'd wait for it. As such, I'd take issue with him forcing emotions out of my mouth before I even felt them. So if he’s asking:
How much do you love me? I’m answering as much as won’t get me hurt.
If he’s asking what it takes to have my heart? I’d answer his.
If he’s looking for a compliment? I’d tell him the mirror was enough praise (and the fact that I was with him)
and if he was looking for a bootycall? I’d tell him to hang up.
Tough love? Maybe - but I’m always going to be on a woman’s side in saying that behind every bitter woman are a few men who have broken her heart so please excuse the wall we’ve put up while you’re wooing us with potentially empty words. Prove it and everything will be reciprocated.
I want my partner to feel like the luckiest man on earth for being able to court and captivate me. I will feel infinitely luckier for having found a man that feels that and I hope that that will be enough. I don’t want to constantly need to reassure him of my love because he will feel it and know it. I don’t want to have to tell him he is handsome if he asks because if I didn’t love being with him, I wouldn’t. Simple.
Nobody wants a cry baby or there’ll be dummy-spits on both ends.
The dating manual is easy to read and goes a little like this:
1. If someone is going to cry it’s going to be the woman.
2. If someone is going to wipe tears away it should be the man. Mine not his.
3. If someone gets flattered it should be the female,
4. If someone is to give it, it should be the male.
5. If "I love you is said," the man should initiate it.
6. When he does that, know that everything else will surely follow and gentlemen, that’s when your lady friend will step in and step up.
Compliments will come wherever they are deserved. Love will hold hands with shared experience and walk its way up to your heart but false and futile flattery is a waste of words and time for both of us.
Love is what we’re waiting for, anything less is a high-maintenance lie.
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