Q:

My fiancé and I have will have been engaged for two years on Xmas day. I try to show him that I love him but he’s very distant. He doesn’t kiss or cuddle me, and he can praise me at times or put me down!

He goes to a pub near by and i don’t mind him going but it’s practically all the time. He has triplets with his ex and i feel as if I’m not good enough for them all including my partner. I love him dearly. When we make love he’s passionate but when we’ve finished he turns his back from me and i feel used.

What can I do? I want to be with him but I can’t take any more rejection!

I was in a violent relationship for 6 years before and I have got 3 kids by my ex. They live with my parents but they are split up. My daughter is coming back to us and she sleeps 3 nights a week. If she does wrong he can’t stop having a go at her.

What I do?

A:

The first impression I get from reading your letter is that you feel rejected by everyone around you. Your partner rejects you and you do not have your children around you to raise your spirits.

You also feel like you are not good enough. You have had one broken relationship and I think you are worried about it happening again.

I always say that family members are the most important people in our lives. They are the ones who will love us unconditionally. If your partner isn’t supporting you as you try to re-build your relationship with your daughter so that she can live with you again then you need to cut your ties with him and be there for your daughter and your other children. Your kids are the ones who matter the most and you need to make them your priority.

If you are sure that your partner is the man you want to spend the rest of your life with then you need to sit him down and tell him everything you have told me. Relationships only work if the people involved are honest with each other.

Ask him to cut down on his trips to the pub, have more patience with your children and be more loving with you. If he truly wants to marry you then these requests will not be a problem for him.

You also need to build up your self-confidence and start to respect yourself again. You previous violent relationship will have taken away all of your self-respect and you need to start re-building your mental strength. Don’t let your fiancé get away with putting you down. This is not what loving partners do and will stop you recovering from the past. Tell yourself that you deserve love and respect and start to expect it from the people around you.

Q:

My wife had an affair with my so called best friend while i was away at collage. Also when i returned she said that she did not feel loved.

Every time i tried to be romantic or friendly she kept pushing me away, then she says she loves me but only as a friend and she does not want me sexually.

Am I wasting my time staying with her or is there any way this marriage can work out and my wife becomes a real woman as she comes from a very strict Christian background. Please help!

A:

This is a very hard question to answer as only your wife truly knows how she feels. Have you asked her if she wants to make your marriage work? It will only work if both of you want it to.

I take it that the fact that you are still together means that you have forgiven her affair? If this is the case then for your own sanity you need to forget about it too. You have made a decision to stay with your wife so you need to move on and stop raking up the past.

I assume that by wanting your wife to “become a real woman” you mean you want her to want you sexually?? I do not like how you have put this as there is more to a relationship than sex. If she does not want to make love to you then there is nothing you can do about that. You need to respect her Christian beliefs as they are a part of who she is. If you can’t live with out sex then you should be with someone else who can satisfy you.

There must have been a lot of love between you two at some point for you to get married. You need to talk to your wife and find out what you both want. Be honest with each other and only then you can move on. I hope you can both be happy in the future.

Q: I am three weeks late and I have taken two pregnancy tests and I followed the instructions to the letter. Both were negative and I even left it a few days between taking the second one. Is it possible I could still be pregnant?

A:

A missed or late period can be the result of many different factors, stress being one of them, and so try not to worry about your situation at the moment.

These days most pregnancy tests claim to be 99% accurate, but it is still possible for them to give a false-negative result if your hormone levels are not high enough to register on the test.

I do not know what type of test you used but there are tests on the market that you can use from the first day that you would normally expect your period to start, and waiting a few days before repeating a negative test is also a good idea as this gives your hormone levels chance to increase. See http://www.clearplan.com for further information on a common brand of pregnancy test.

If you have taken two tests since you expected your period to start, and these have both returned a negative result, then I doubt that you are pregnant, but you could visit your doctor or local family planning clinic for a further test to be sure. This will also put your mind at rest and you will be able to discuss how you feel about the result, whatever it may be.

Q: I have been ‘chatting’ to a guy online now for a few weeks and he wants to meet up in real life. I would really like to meet up too as he seems really nice but I am a bit uneasy about meeting someone new for the first time. Could you please give me some practical advice on arranging our first ‘date’? Thanks.

A: Meeting someone new for the first time can be very daunting in any situation, especially in today’s world when the papers seem to be full of crime and other horror stories. You are right to feel anxious as people can be whoever they want to be when they are ‘online’ and all may not be as it seems, for these reasons while you are chatting online never give out your telephone number, last name or address until you know who you are chatting to. When YOU feel ready to meet this man the please stick to the following safety tips, which are applicable for any first date, and will hopefully make you feel a bit less nervous and a bit more secure;

1. Always tell someone where you are going and who you are going to meet.

2. Always meet in a public place, like a bar or restaurant.

3. Ideally take a friend (or two). They can always sit at the next table but will still be close at hand if needed. If this guy really cares about you he will not mind you bringing someone else along if it means he gets to meet you.

4. Never invite anyone to your own home or go to their home until you are very sure you can trust them.

5. If you do have to go alone arrange for a friend to pick you up at a pre-arranged time. If this is not possible get a friend to phone you at a pre-arranged time to check all is well.

6. Take a mobile phone with you. If you haven’t got your own borrow one. Make sure it is fully charged and you have plenty of credit and also make sure you have an “emergency fund” of money with you just in case.

I’m sorry if these tips seem a bit over the top, but you can never be too careful. Good luck with the relationship, and let me know how it goes!