7 Powerful Life Lessons I Learned After 25 Years of Dating
How dating can be affected by cultural differences and values
I am a self-identified lesbian living in Sweden; my family background is South Asian and I grew up with parents who are practicing Muslims.
As you can imagine the culture I grew up in has a different ideal for what happens in adulthood. You are supposed to find an eligible husband, get married, have a couple of children, and live your life happily ever after.
My parents were even very open-minded and gave their children a choice to choose their own partner. My parents had an arranged marriage, my grandmothers made the choice and selection; my parents had to learn to love and live with each other for the rest of their lives together.
Bollywood influenced my perception of love, romantic relationships, and how desires were portrayed in the movies in the late 70s and 80s.
My second girlfriend (German) put it eloquently that we are influenced by Western culture and values. Our parents are dismayed by our extreme independency. Our life choices are not what our parents desired.
- I as the eldest sibling, a lesbian who has had many partners and chosen to be children-free. Living a very untypical unexpected life.
- My brother married a Swedish woman and is a father of three children. He lives a typical Swedish life with very little South Asian influence.
- My youngest brother just did not bother with getting a partner and is happy with his self-chosen single-hood.
Dating and culture clashes
Since my first girlfriend, I have experienced cultural clashes over and over again. We were passionately in love at the age of 23 and 21. We started living together after a month of dating and engaged after three months.
The song “Tusen och en natt” by Swedish artist Charlotte Perrelli summarised my first relationship; when we broke up I was devastated since I dreamt of a “happily ever after” with my first girlfriend, all I got was barely 1001 nights. Many reasons for the break-up, cultural differences, and fundamental issues related to self-perception, values, and beliefs.
Reoccurring dating patterns
I noticed that my partners and I differed in what we valued the most in our relationships. Largely due to my cultural background and influences of religion, I have been fixated on caring, loyalty, and self-sacrifice. However, the Western or perhaps Swedish culture emphasizes more on autonomy, conviction, respect, and will.
Conflicts happen in every relationship and should lead to a better understanding and gain trust in each other's perspectives and opinions. When you live in a culture such as the Swedish one which avoids conflicts and makes people uneasy, unable to share their innermost thoughts, needs, and desires — then a culture clash is inevitable.
When you live in a culture that values personal freedom above caring and reciprocity — then trust is not easy to build. Trust requires appreciation and affection. An ability to listen without judgment. To be able to confide in each other and simply be trustworthy. Trust cannot be built if a person bashes you and tells you: your behaviour is unacceptable.
Class and money have played a role in my life and affected my relationships since many of my partners have not had the same economical means as me. Having a good economy has been crucial for me due to personal circumstances and growing up with very few resources in Sweden.
In my 20s I aimed for a high-paying job. So that I could live independently and not rely on anyone or the Swedish welfare society: free to be whatever I want.
I was forced to be self-reliant and self-dependent. That pain sipped out subconsciously as tiny daggers of verbal offenses to a partner. Making my partner feel belittled and hurt for not having enough means or ambitions.
Surviving in Switzerland
My longest relationship to date was with a Swiss girlfriend. I moved to Switzerland in 2001 after 6 months of dating. Being a lesbian couple in Switzerland, I faced racism and homophobia, directed at me by elderly people in public spaces when they saw me together with my Swiss partner.
Those 7 years were devastating for me, not being accepted, difficulties finding new friends, and simply not connecting with the Swiss. My Swiss partner's family barely tolerated me, I connected more with their toy poodle than ever having any meaningful interactions with anyone in her family. I stopped interacting with her family as it was such a numbing experience, not to be seen or acknowledged.
The pain of dating grew exponentially when being a foreigner in a country. Learning a new language, culture, values, and their whole belief system.
It requires so much of both persons involved, as your partner literally becomes the center of your world not only as your partner but also substitutes all other social relationships; your friends, and your family members, and carries the burden of your whole universe of happiness.
After 5 years in Switzerland, I found myself being a workaholic and disliked the person I had then become. I ended the relationship and broke my partner’s heart. My biggest mistake was to try to salvage the relationship and rebuild something that could not be fixed. Heartbreaks cannot be patched up. We were both heartbroken and depressed, departed after 2 years of trying, and went our separate ways. That was my longest and most profound relationship to date.
I struggled with my pains and failures. Despair and disconnectedness. Not finding my place in the world. Not knowing how to cope with my pain, but just crying and crying while listening to this particular album.
Where did I go wrong?
The innocence of youth is a growing ground for trauma; as we have no boundaries or understand how to protect our inner core. The first love relationships did fuck me up, and the effects may have lasted for 20 years.
Healing the pain and trauma caused by these relationships has taken a very long time. Unconsciously triggering. Unforeseen and unaware that these still lie deep inside and burdening me. Just because I lacked coping strategies and didn’t know how to deal with my circumstances, I messed up many relationships.
Heartbreaks lead to parts of my heart dying and never being able to be mended again. It didn’t matter how much effort I made to heal the pain, the memory and emotions lingered around in my system.
For the past 15 years in Sweden, I have been in a loop of self-care and pausing romantic relationships, refusing to date, dating, and fucking up detrimentally.
I acknowledge all the fuck-ups I caused. Hurting the person I am dating. Hurting myself in the process. How not to date. I do not want to label myself unworthy of loving and caring. I do not want to be a person who hurts. I do not want to repeat my destructive relationship patterns.
Dissecting patterns
Dissecting my relationships over the past 25 years, I can conclude my 7 powerful lessons of dating:
- The first love relationship illuminates your emotional baggage; where that baggage comes from (parents, traditions, norms, and values).
- You will struggle with finding common ground and understanding when your values and beliefs are contrary to or differ from your partners.
- Even in LGBTQ relationships stereotypical gender roles and norms affect us, be aware of the assumptions you are making about each other.
- Your partner will challenge the perception of who you are, who you want to be now and in the future; and affect who you choose to be.
- Whom you connect to in an emotional relationship will mirror yourself, both your subconscious patterns but also invisible traumas.
- Your partner can’t be your everything! One person can’t carry the burden of being your only friend, your confidante, your lover, your companion, your therapist, your joy maker, and your life partner.
- Understand that your needs, desires, and wishes differ from your partners; communicating honestly and openly can bring you closer to each other.
As a final note, I leave you with the song The Manual by the Swedish artist Miss Li; or Instruktionsboken in Swedish. We are all working on our own personal instruction manual.
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