Why people think you're not "complete" without a partner?

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chris1989
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02 Oct 2024, 10:10 am

I do get irritated when some people especially some people in my family whom I love like my dad who have sometimes nagged me about finding someone and I feel like it just reinforces the over awareness of being single in my 30s and makes me feel bad. I know he maybe saying it from his perspective because through his 20s and 30s, he was in a relationship and married to my mum and never really been single and so it makes me look bad and that's why sometimes I feel I "shouldn't" be single at this stage of life. It doesn't help either when I have seen and know others in their early, middle and late 30s who are married and have kids.



IsabellaLinton
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02 Oct 2024, 11:17 am

I don’t know anyone who believes that.


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Tim_Tex
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02 Oct 2024, 12:58 pm

IsabellaLinton wrote:
I don’t know anyone who believes that.


Except maybe JD Vance.


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bee33
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02 Oct 2024, 3:11 pm

There aren't any "shoulds" in each of our personal lives. We make up our lives as best we can and we sometimes don't have the things that we want, but that doesn't mean we "should" have them, and it's not helpful to feel badly about it. It's not easy, if it's something we want that we don't have, and sometimes other people are making us feel even worse when we are already disappointed. There isn't anything you should or shouldn't be doing. Just try to make the best of what you have and what you can accomplish, trying not to beat yourself up for the things you don't have.



Benjamin the Donkey
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02 Oct 2024, 8:39 pm

I don't believe that and I dont know anyone who does.

People who believe that are probably projecting their own needs onto others.


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Mikurotoro92
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02 Oct 2024, 8:43 pm

chris1989 wrote:
I do get irritated when some people especially some people in my family whom I love like my dad who have sometimes nagged me about finding someone and I feel like it just reinforces the over awareness of being single in my 30s and makes me feel bad. I know he maybe saying it from his perspective because through his 20s and 30s, he was in a relationship and married to my mum and never really been single and so it makes me look bad and that's why sometimes I feel I "shouldn't" be single at this stage of life. It doesn't help either when I have seen and know others in their early, middle and late 30s who are married and have kids.


Then...find someone and get married

Complaining about it won't lead to change!! !

You have to be proactive in going after what you want



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03 Oct 2024, 4:53 am

IsabellaLinton wrote:
chris1989 wrote:
Why people think you're not "complete" without a partner?
I don’t know anyone who believes that.
I grew up around people like that -- people who seemed to believe that no one was 'complete' unless they could define their identity in relation to another person -- especially women who seemed eager to put a 'Mrs.' in front of their names.  A concurrent belief was that something must be 'wrong' with people living single.

Where I live now (Philippines) the patriarchal culture is very much like that -- it takes a husband or wife to make an adult person 'complete', and if they do not have children, then there is something wrong with both of them.



DuckHairback
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03 Oct 2024, 5:11 am

I think it's just expected. And not without reason. The vast majority of people couple up, whether they do so within some kind of legal or religious framework or just because. We're kind of hard-wired to do it, since the perpetuation of our species depends on it. Animals do it too.

I don't know if Christianity expressly refers to the woman completing the man in that sense, but since in Christian theology, woman was created from a man's body part, man is by definition incomplete and returning her to him (I think it does say they become 'one flesh') is an act of completing him.

It's been a part of the romantic myth for ages too though. "You complete me." This idea that there's someone out there who is a perfect fit for you, like two jigsaw pieces. It's bs, of course. But it's enduring because it gives meaning and purpose to something that is chaotic and random. As fnord points out it's cultural too. In the west in latter years we've had this cult of individuality developing and the idea that another person is necessary to complete you is falling, I believe, out of favour.

But I don't think it's strange for your parents to want to see you in a relationship, as annoying as that probably is. That probably goes quite deep psychologically. Part of parenting, maybe all of parenting, is about giving your child everything they need to be able to live without you at some point. Perhaps your parents see your lack of progress in the relationship department as their own personal failure to prepare you for that.


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cyberdad
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03 Oct 2024, 5:28 pm

DuckHairback wrote:
But I don't think it's strange for your parents to want to see you in a relationship, as annoying as that probably is. That probably goes quite deep psychologically. Part of parenting, maybe all of parenting, is about giving your child everything they need to be able to live without you at some point. Perhaps your parents see your lack of progress in the relationship department as their own personal failure to prepare you for that.


^^^ this. Ultimately most parents want their children to be happy and to be looked after once they pass. Its not just their own conditioning and their parents before them...parents were once single and likely want you to experience love and companionship from a partner like they did. Also big picture, societal expectations/perceptions, married people are stable, contributing to society and adding to the population (1.5 kids).

I wouldn't be hard on your parents for this reason.



bee33
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03 Oct 2024, 6:00 pm

For myself, I don't think of it in an oppressive patriarchal way but I am not complete without a partner. I need someone to share my life with. Without someone I feel lonely and distraught and it's very difficult for me to cope. I have a partner now and he's wonderful but it's still relatively new and we're not as close as I would like and I don't spend as much time with him as I would like. It's great but it's also hard.



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03 Oct 2024, 8:23 pm

I don't have any solutions, but I'm dealing with the exact same thing. So I can commiserate :heart:

Last year I was the same age my mother was when she was pregnant with me. So she spent the whole year harping about how I should be married and pregnant by now. This year it's about how she was married with a baby by now and how come you haven't found anyone and started a family yet? I know she means well, but it's grating. Especially the biological clock stuff.



Fnord
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03 Oct 2024, 8:34 pm

cyberdad wrote:
. . . parents were once single and likely want you to experience love and companionship from a partner like they did . . .

. . . OR . . .

. . . by the time they've been together for ~20 years, some parents may realize they have made a Big Stupid Mistake, and do not wish to see even their own children being any smarter or happier.

(e.g., Jealousy)


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cyberdad
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04 Oct 2024, 1:15 am

Fnord wrote:
cyberdad wrote:
. . . parents were once single and likely want you to experience love and companionship from a partner like they did . . .

. . . OR . . .

. . . by the time they've been together for ~20 years, some parents may realize they have made a Big Stupid Mistake, and do not wish to see even their own children being any smarter or happier.

(e.g., Jealousy)


Well that could happen but my experience of parents is unless they are hippies, they want them to get hitched.



Benjamin the Donkey
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04 Oct 2024, 2:02 am

My sons can choose to be coupled or single or something in between. It's their life, not mine.


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cyberdad
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04 Oct 2024, 2:08 am

Benjamin the Donkey wrote:
My sons can choose to be coupled or single or something in between. It's their life, not mine.


Yes but do you want them to be single?. I am sure you would want for them to be in a relationship like you.



Carbonhalo
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04 Oct 2024, 2:10 am

^^^someone seems to have a defective G44PIC gene.... That's the one responsible for parental interference compulsive disorder.
You may require professional help to learn how to fake effective interference.