I'd Rather Be Miserable With You Than Without You

Are all your past relationships totally messed up? Are your current ones not much better? Do you stay with someone even when you know you shouldn't? Why do we do this? We want true love, we want one that feels good and yet we do nothing to go find it. Maybe it is just that feeling like crap can feel good from time to time. What is familiar is safer than what is new or unknown. We put up with more than we should because we don't want to be alone.

Misery loves company.

Life is less frightening when you have someone there. It means no loneliness -- or at least that is what it is supposed to mean. When we feel dissatisfied, we want someone to share in our misery. We want someone to bitch to -- and about. We don't want to be alone or truly happy so we stay in a situation that feeds our self pity.

It is better to have fights than to have no one to talk to.

Arguing is exhausting and exciting. It is easier to focus your energy into arguing than it is to focus it into dating all over again. Fighting is better than the silence that comes with being alone.

We don't want to go through the pain of losing someone. Again.

Breaking up sucks. That's the truth. Staying in something unsatisfying is better than being heartbroken. Something broken is better than having nothing at all, right?

We hope the relationship will be what we want instead of what it is.

We trick ourselves. We trick ourselves into thinking we have something better. We can't see, acknowledge or accept what is right in front of us. We ignore red flags and keep going like nothing is wrong. We hope. We hope the s/he will change and become the person we so desperately want them to be. We are lost in our fantasy partner.

We don't know how to communicate.

We are afraid to ask for what we want from a relationship because we are afraid doing so will scare off our SO. We worry that speaking up for ourselves will make us more trouble than we are worth and we will end up alone. So, we power through, all the while growing more and more unhappy. The more unhappy we become, the more silent we become. We shut right down. We settle for being treated poorly because don't know how to ask for what we deserve. We tell ourselves it will get better and if it doesn't, it is better than being alone. But maybe we need to change our view. It won't just get better on its own. It will get better if we make it better. It will be better if we ask for better. Maybe it will mean being alone. And really, maybe that isn't such a bad thing. h/t: Elite Daily