When your past repeatedly rears its ugly head

There are things that happen to us, at different stages, and to a larger extent, they dictate the direction our lives will take. One could say that we are a result of different effects and stimuli, a compilation of different things that have happened to us. Genetics plays a major role, but also, there are those moments that steer us in a very different direction, marking us for the rest of our lives.

Like this one man that I know. He is an intelligent man, by fair standards, has a good job, not bad looking – that is what the girls say and, when all is said and done, he is fairly okay, more than okay, by at least by average standards. But then, you get to know him and realise that this man has one of the lowest self-esteem issues this side of our dusty city.

He is quite calm, but then when he gets drunk, the truth comes out; he talks about his rich family, how he probably earns more than anyone in the place, and says all girls are sluts... there. That is where the issue is; the girls. Apparent he has had two very critical turning points, all triggered by girls.

As a young boy, he suffered the unfortunate incident of being rejected, publicly, by the very first girl he had a crush on. He had kept his feelings to himself, until his older brother dared him to go tell her. Which he did. And older brother taunted him for the next four years, calling him a loser.

Several year later, when he seemed to have managed to move on, he met another girl that literally stole his heart. By then he was just finishing school, interning at an international company, and had his life well laid out. To say that the girl led him on would not be accurate, but she did not seem averse to his attentions. Even when he asked her out for coffee, she was okay with it, and they met several times after this.

She was everything he liked in a woman, especially her directness; she always spoke her mind. So, one day, when he saw some guy coming to pick her from work, he asked her who he was, she told him it was her new boyfriend. He thought she was joking. He asked her what she was talking about, and she told him that he was her boyfriend. “But I thought I was your boyfriend!” she gave him a long look and said, “You are not my type, you are a nice guy, but me and you cannot be. Sorry” and off she went, just like that.

He does not seem to have recovered from that. He has dated several girls, all not lasting more than six months and they all say the same thing; he treats them like trash, and there is something seriously wrong with that guy.

“ He has dated several girls, all not lasting more than six months and they all say the same thing; there is something seriously wrong with that guy.”