Peter Pan Syndrome

What if you're attracted to a man and he isn't committing to you?

He likes spending time with you, and you're sleeping together, but each time things get too intense, he backs off, becomes distant, and stops asking you out.

Are you also enduring a situation where he blows hot and cold and keeps you so off-balance that you never know where you stand with him or where the relationships going?

Well I call it, “The Peter Pan Syndrome”. 

I had a man I'd been seeing for about more than a year (I suppose) who seemed totally over the moon about me in every way, and who'd been a "friend" and co-worker before we started dating (if I may call that way).

We both agreed to being "just friends", but when I did, he almost immediately changed his mind.

I knew he was just scared. I knew he thought he was in over his head. I knew he cared for me but just didn't think he was ready for any kind of commitment (well, that's what he told me). But, knowing all that didn't make me feel any better.

In the space I tried to create for a couple of days, I'd gone from being a "goddess-like" woman he'd always thought was "out- of-reach" and "out-of-his-league" to a powerless, insecure woman who felt at his mercy.

How did I allow that to happen?

Because I know deep down - I FELT "not enough" - and he just tapped right into that and grabbed all the power in the relationship. It took me years and years to figure out how this was always happening to me. How I'd give up my power in the relationship and let the man run my emotions. And then it took me more years to stop that from happening ever again.

From the moment I will be able to figure out what I needed to do and not do to really take care of myself – maybe that's when the great men will start to show up.

Well, what if one day he's coming on strong, pursuing you, and then he practically ignores you. One day he's affectionate and warm, and the next he seems completely cold and withdrawn from you. One day he calls you five times in a row, and the next day -- nothing.

The hardest thing in a situation like this is to know what to say to him when you're feeling so disappointed and frustrated...without pushing him away or getting into a fight.

I worried and complained to my friends, and tried to act as if it was all okay and that I was handling things. I actually tried to make it seem like I was okay with being treated badly. Like I was okay with being introduced as a "friend", (well, I know friends lang naman kame) and "okay" with not even being kissed or just touched once in an evening out with his "other" friends. 

It took me a long time to get that needing or wanting a real relationship - wanting a man to behave with me the way a man is supposed to behave with a woman he likes (let alone LOVES) was not a sign of weakness.

It took me a long time to get that I DESERVED to be loved and FEEL loved.

It feels humiliating and horrible.

So, what if I pull away from a man who wants to be "friends," without having more and more discussion about his point of view - is this running away?

Is it selfish?

Is it treating him as "disposable"?

I guess, some men (including him) don't need more than what he has with me right now. I really don't know. There may not be another woman. There may be many other women. There may not be another woman for years. It makes no difference. He may never be into any woman. He may frequent prostitutes for all I know.

But the most important question has nothing to do with him. The important question is: do I want to be right, and make sure he knows I am right, and make sure he knows what he did wrong, or should I question myself, do I want to be loved?

If I can put all that "right-ness" aside, maybe I can change my love life overnight.

But what usually happen is this --  the moment I stop making him wrong, berating him, complaining, or telling him what he should have done or should do, he'll relax.

He'll relax in a way he has never allowed himself to relax with any other woman. He'll suddenly stop being defensive. And we all know what a man does what he feels defensive right?-- he pulls away. He doesn't try harder to make us happy -- no -- he'll just withdraw.

He'll stop FEELING affectionate.

He'll stop wanting to do anything for you.

He'll just use all of his energy to protect himself from what he perceives as a threat. He'll walk away.

The most awful part of this is that I "think" what I was doing is just "letting him know" how bad he makes me feel. But the sad part was, its just getting worse. :|

I think, a man with this kind of syndrome (Peter Pan Syndrome), can be a no-win situation.


I don't know how long I will wait. Or how far I can go. All I can say now is... I don't know.