Hey do8, you raise a very good and very important point.
First, I want to talk about respect. I believe that after some point when the girl is literally walking all over his guy, it is practically impossible to get back the respect. The best thing to do, is move on, and learn from this mistake. However, if everything is caught early, when the problems are still manifesting, then it can be dealt with. So this respect thing is not so black and white, and it's hard to really talk about everything here. There will be some cases where simply proper communication would be enough. A more "progressed" case would require a bit of being unavailable. Not talking about being rude, and going no contact, that's not going to solve anything, as you have said it too. I'm talking about more subtle things. Asking for more, and providing less, and passing the shitstorm that will accompany this path. Of course this needs a lot of energy, work, and inner realizations too.
Unfortunately, providing a guideline on finding the proper balance is beyond me. It's a topic that is just too practical to be discussed in theory and in details. It's a skill, one has to obtain through experience and learning from each and every mistake. This, and the fact that every girl is different. What works for one may not work for the other, that's what calibration is all about.
What can be helped though, is how to realize a problem early, and coming up with appropriate solutions immediately. And really the best way is to communicate with your girlfriend. If a guy doesn't know his girlfriend well, he will surely not notice when something goes downhill in time, only when it's already too late. That's why it is very important, and why I always emphasize this critical thing.
I'd provide examples, but these are just too complicated. I'd have to completely describe an entire relationship. There is no perfect relationship. There is always something that needs work, and if you think there isn't, that's already bad. The thing that can be done is trying to prevent most of these with paying attention, and catching most manifesting problems in the early stages before they disrupt the harmony of the relationship itself.
I know what I've written is really vague, and probably not what you have expected, so I'll try giving one example, but it's not going to be a full coverage, because that simply can't be done in a topic like this. To actually cover everything, it'd be enough for an entire book, and I don't consider myself a master in the relationship section, an expert, max, so this is simply beyond me.
As for the example, I'll describe my very first relationship.
I was 18 years old, and the girl was 17. We met at a party on New Years Eve. Things clicked pretty well, and we kissed and spent the night together(no sex at this point). She was still a virgin, though I was her fifth boyfriend, and I lacked experience and tried taking things slow to not make her think that I only want to fuck her. I wasn't actually needy, because I didn't mind. I'd describe it more like I was overly patient and didn't give a shit. I thought it was a good policy, hell how wrong I was...
Not long after we "got together", she asked me out, and I agreed. We met and she asked me if I thought I could fall in love with her. I wasn't too confident in my reply, but I said that I thought so. (I really did, actually). She answered that she's not sure if she could fall for me. I thought, well, that's okay, and I told her that I thought it was best if we gave it a shot, as we realy had not much to lose. We agreed, and soon, as she found out more about me, she started feeling it. After this pretty bad start, everything was going great.
After about a month, we were drinking with some friends, and we started making out. I gently slid one of my hands under her shirt, and started massaging her breasts. She liked it very much actually, it was pretty bold and I was doing well at this point, because really, noone noticed. (Those were my closest friends, they'd have instantly started telling things like "Find a bedroom guys" or something like that, if they'd noticed it...)
So another 2 months passed, and she was at my place in the afternoon, and my parents weren't at home. This was the first time that the panties came off and I could start doing some things. I wasn't quite the expert, since it was my first time too, though I've read up on things and learned a few things from porn. At first it was quite inconvenient for her, but soon enough, it got better. Well, this was not the case on my side though. She was just way too gentle with my dick. Basically too afraid to do anything, she was really just stroking it as if she were afraid of hurting me or something like that. I told her that she shouldn't worry much and to do it stronger, but that lasted for about a minute before she went back to useless mode again. I never even came close to having an orgasm. After a while I was able to make her come though.
Now this started to frustrate me a bit, but I was like "well it's okay, we're having sex soon anyway..." I was so naive, and I couldn't calibrate properly, couldn't communicate properly, I was just a noob having a pussy that I couldn't handle.
So this went on for another 5 months, when she told me she was ready to have sex. Unfortunately, it hurt for her way too much. So I had to move really slowly, I couldn't put it in all the way through, and I had condom on too, so technically it was still impossible for me to come. This really disappointed me, but I thought, well okay this was her first time, next time it'll be better.
Stupid... Next time it hurt for her only a little bit less, I wasn't even close.
Next time... Oh. there was no next time... Well, next time we met we were already on long distance mode, since we applied to different universities. I visited her, and she was having an extraordinarily bad time. Something like this never happened, I had no idea how to do anything with this. At first I was trying to comfort her, but it was useless, so intead I decided: "Fuck this shit. I'll enjoy myself anyway". So after this bad evening, we got back to her place, and I was ready for action. She didn't want to do it. I was massively disappointed. I could hardly sleep, trying to figure out what the hell was wrong. Surprisingly, next day I didn't give a shit. I left, and somehow I forgot about her for an entire week. I had so much going on in my new life since it was my first year in the university, in a different city. It was not an intentional freeze-out. I REALLY forgot about her. So after a week she calls me up and tells me that she wants to meet. And then she called me out on why I hadn't called in a week. I striked back with "well, you didn't call me either". And so there we were sitting in the park and both of us new that this realtionship has no future. We broke up, and this was the end of story.
The amount of mistakes I committed in this relationship is shooting through the skies.
As you could see this had multiple issues. I wasn't pushing for sex, big mistake. I wasn't doing much to spice up the relationship, just got comfortable with the feeling that I have a girlfriend. Super big mistake. Sometimes I acted a bit needy, sometimes I was a douchebag. I couldn't communicate my needs to her properly so instead, I didn't communicate them at all to not look like I'm needy. Hardly ever did I have the correct attitude, it's actually a damn wonder that it lasted for so long.
Note that this was only 4 years ago. Only 4 years have passed and I'm on an entirely different level. And throughout those 4 years it was not the topics I have read here that got me good with relationships. It was actually having relationships and learning from my mistakes. So this is why I have really no better advice. I have started as a complete AFC too, eventhough I had lots of material in my head. Only experience truly enlightened me.
Hope this clarifies at least a few things, because in reality, I don't think I can do better in this aspect...
Peace,
In$tinct.
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