Red Flags of a Stage 5 Clinger

1.       After Date #1, they are already talking about how their parents would love you and you must meet them ASAP!

2.       After Date #1, they non-stop text you that night and all the next day ending with “love” in every text.

3.       After Date #1 or #2, they start texting you more. Before you have a chance to answer the first text, they start getting upset and having a full text conversation with themselves.

4.       They make you feel guilty for rescheduling… saying things like “oh you found someone better, I guess”.

5.       You haven’t responded to their message, and they KEEP messaging you saying things like “did I say something wrong?” or “am I not your type?”

6.       When you haven’t even met yet and they are already emotional telling you, “I didn’t think you were interested and didn’t think I’d hear from you again.”

7.       After Date #1, they send you a collage of a picture of you online, them in the sunset, roses in the shape of a heart, and Krishna- the Hindu God that would be marrying you 2. (PS- this specific person actually ended up calling my work looking for me and I ended up having to block them from my cell phone, Match, and blasting them on my Facebook.)

8.       After Date #1, they become completely “EMO” telling you that they are sad without you… and they want to learn how to play Elton John’s Tiny Little Dancer to feel the pain.

Those just a few Red Flags of a Stage 5 Clinger… crazy, right? If not, and you’re actually thinking, what is wrong with any of that… I’m SO sorry but… YOU are a Stage 5 Clinger! So please take plenty of notes! Haha!

I guess these same circumstances would be different if you were equally into that person the same way that they were into you… or if you had been together for a while already. But still, would it be though? Because once the magic wears off, what do you have... this nagging boyfriend/ girlfriend that constantly needs your reassurance, attention, and explanation of your entire day and why? Maybe some of you are ok with this… but I, for one, don’t even like my parents asking me too many questions or making me feel guilty for anything I do in my life. Or maybe I’m just too damn independent for my own good. Who knows! Ha!

It’s not like I’m saying to only put your best foot forward in the beginning. You should always be yourself and you should always be you. But if this is how you are in the beginning, then how will it be when you are eventually in a relationship?! All this reeks of desperation, low self-confidence, overly emotional and sensitive behavior, anger management issues, and passive aggressiveness.  These are all things that ruin a relationship… and even perhaps a person’s social standing. Like do they have friends? How is their relationship with their friends and family? How are they in a social situation? Are they uncomfortably mean or awkward to other people? Are they jealous when/ if you are being social and outgoing? Obviously, these are things I think about since I am obnoxiously outgoing. Haha! I mean, THIS social butterfly cannot be held back due to jealousy and controlling behavior. Besides, if you are loyal to me, I will be fiercely loyal to you. As it should be. Period.

Like I always say, it is not easy to be a good person. It’s not easy to always do the right thing, to have self-confidence, to have great self-esteem, to have self-respect, and to have good, healthy relationships with others. Just get out of your own heads for once, I say! We are so preoccupied with our own thoughts, feelings, and emotions (and perhaps even our own insecurities) that it’s hard to be more rational and logical and be more understanding and compassionate towards others. It’s what I like to call: Hypocritical Emotions!! Hahahaha! A paradox... and yet easy to understand, right?!

Clinically speaking, someone that has this behavior often times has insecure attachment issues. This includes anxious-preoccupied attachment. People that have this tend to never want to be alone or without a relationship. Not only that… because (let’s be honest) some of us have no difficulty finding a new relationship… but they actually feel a deep seeded need/ or want to be emotionally intimate with others to the point of dependency. These people seek extremely high levels of intimacy where it is more like approval. This is due to a doubt in themselves and their own self-worth. And in this condition, they will blame themselves even for their partner’s lack of responsiveness to their own high levels of emotions. Compared to the securely attached people, these insecurely attached people tend of have less positive views about themselves.

After all this, what if I’m wrong? What if I’m being too critical and too judgmental myself? What if these guys that have done this to me actually have really just fallen in love with the thought of me and how good I look on paper? Or maybe they really do feel a connection, that “Spark”? And what if I have NO idea what that “Connection” or “Spark” feels like if it slapped me across the face? TWICE?!! And I have not given them a chance because I have already deemed them as “creepy”… and a “Stage 5 Clinger”? Am I missing out? Or am I just helping nature work its’ course a little faster…

This so called “Spark” people speak of anyway… what IS it? How do we know it even exists?? Or am I even asking purely because I am jaded and avoiding any and all attachment at all costs? LOL!

Yes, this blog entry I’m leaving open ended… stay tuned for the next blog entry that I’ve already started about “The Spark”.

Happy reading all! =)

XO Nina

PS- some of you wanted to contact me and I thought my contact info was on here… Well, I guess it’s not. So feel free to post your comments here… or email me at ninaannphan@gmail.com... Or post it on here: https://www.facebook.com/ninaannphan  Thanks Loves! (and no, that was not a pun… hahahaha!)