On Good Girls and Bad Men...

What makes good girls fall for bad men? What is the attraction? Is unreliability sexy? Or is there some kind of magnetic attraction where North attracts South and like poles repel?

My two closest friends have both done this in the past. Sarah went through a Gothic phase in her life when she went into the sixth form at another school. I didn't understand why she did it. We drifted apart but living opposite each other we still knew what we were up to through parental gossip. She started going out with a guy called Dan. From this point on I barely saw her again. She was round his place almost permanently. There would be nothing wrong with this, other than the fact he'd done time, was covered in tattoos and got into trouble on a frequent basis. One evening she came back to her parents place in tears as he was in hospital having been burnt on the arm by a petrol covered torch during a fight. And guess what, she went back to him. Why? Why would you go back into a situation like that? She moved in with him for a while before she left school completely.
A few years later, she moved into a lovely house with a guy called Adam. It was only round the corner from me so I got back in touch and went to visit. Adam seemed a really nice guy. They were happy together. Both had good jobs. Within a few months of catching up with her she was back at her mum's because she had been hospitalised by the violence he inflicted on her. This time she didn't go back to him. He moved his next victim in and she moved on.
The last man I'm aware of her seeing is the father of her two daughters. He always seemed slimy to me. He was a banker in the city, and a "merchant" one too if you ask me. He had to quit his job after getting so caught up in dealing drugs with his city mates and getting severely into debt that she ended up back at her mum's again, but this time with 2 daughters in tow.
She now lives in a council flat and has a good job in a school. Whether there have been any more men recently I don't know, but if there have I bet I can guess what they were like.

My other friend has been out with some really genuine people that she dumped before too long for someone more exciting. One was a drink driving loser who lost his job through being drunk at work. This happened to be the father of her child. They got married and bought a place together about an hour from her friends and family. After 4 years she got bored and started seeing someone else. I can't blame her though. The pub, gambling and his mates were far more of a draw than her and their son.
She moved back up to be near her friends and family. Unfortunately the adulterer moved in too. He was ok, but had previously tried it on with most of us at works do's. I think he was faithful, but yet again was a drinker and gambler with a lot of debt. They eventually moved out of the rented flat and into a place they part bought. Within a few years she was on her own again. He had done a runner to Europe with the cash from his shop and took a week to appear on the radar again.
Since then she has been through the 25 year old, the 56 year old, the married man, the moody, violent ex-marine and the stalker. She is now planning her wedding to someone who actually seems to be a genuine bloke with no baggage and cares for her.

What has made these friends of mine go for such obvious problems. They are both middle children of 3. Did they rebel with middle child syndrome? Were they just bored with their life and wanted excitement? Or were they just really bad judges of character?

DOC

On making friends...

It's 30 years ago. You are at school. You have trouble making friends. You get lonely. You live with it. You get on with your life in your own special way. People pick on you because you are "different"; you are an easy target.
What did anyone do about it? Absolutely nothing. You remained a shy person, not mixing well with new people.
What happens today? Tests are done. You are observed. Your parents worry that you might have x, y or z. Where did the shyness come from? Is it hereditary?


In my case I found making friends one of the hardest things to do. I was far happier with my head in a book or playing on my Atari games console/BBC B/Atari ST/PC as I grew up. Did I want to make friends? No, not really.
I had a couple of very close friends at primary school. I was happy and enjoyed school. I did well and moved onto Grammar School - without my close friends.
Does making new friends get harder as you get older? I say it does. Nearly 20 people from my primary school went with me to secondary school, but none of them were my close friends. They split us amongst the 6 new classes so that we didn't stick together as a group. It was supposed to help us make new friends. Did this help me? No way. By now I am scared. I am slow to get into the new classroom on the first day and find the other 2 girls from primary school had sat together, and I don't blame them. You would think that a Grammar School would be full of like minded individuals who were there for the study and not to become bitches of the century. It seems I was wrong there.

I went through the first 3 years of senior school without a true friend. I was always the third member of a group. And whoever said "three's a crowd" was so damn right. It just doesn't work. In each year I was in a different three. The other two would meet up after school and at weekends and I wouldn't get invited. Why? Was I that freaky? I was called names and laughed at.
Why is it all the bitches are good at sport? I was hopeless at sport and so ridiculed constantly. I was last to be picked for teams. This to me was some form of psychological bullying. They were saying to me that I was useless and they were never going to be friends with me. So there I was guaranteed to be excluded from the "it crowd" for the rest of my school days. Being good at maths or chemistry just wasn't cool.

It was only when we moved into the fourth year - current year 10 - that I finally fell into a friendship that has lasted 25 years and is still going strong. She had been through the same sorts of things at senior school and always been on the outside of a group. She had been persecuted and called names that you would think 14 year olds knew nothing about back then.

I know this is part of growing up, but are children allowed the same naivety that we were 30 years ago? Would it have helped either of us to have been called "autistic" or have "aspergers syndrome"? Probably not.
Does it help now? As a parent, it answers questions, but does it really benefit the child. I hope so. Will it help them make new friends? I doubt it.


BASHFUL