You need to find out why you’re a biter

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 04/01/2012 (5311 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: I bit my boyfriend’s hand very hard and left teeth marks. He won’t forgive me, even though we were semi-playfighting. I just wanted to end it and he didn’t, so I bit him and that fixed that for the moment. We are not a violent couple (both of us are in our teens) but I do have a childhood history as a biter. I must admit that it kind of felt satisfying to sink my teeth into him. Am I sick or what? He says I need help, that I’m crazy in the head. — Biter Girl, St. James

Dear Biter: The enjoyment aspect is worrying. It’s not natural to enjoy biting someone hard like you did, unless you’re an impulsive angry child. You need to learn better ways as a teenager to express anger and hostility. Vampires may be the vogue these days, but biting is not cute in real life. Talk to your guidance counsellor at school about what you did and how you felt and why you get so angry and don’t express it other ways. What are the triggers for it? How did it work for you as a child? Hopefully, the light bulb will turn on for you.

Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: I ate three crackers all day yesterday. That’s all I could keep down. My husband left me on Christmas Day after dinner. He bolted down his dinner with my side of the extended family, went out for a drive ‘to think” and phoned from a pay phone to say, “I can’t take it anymore. We’re through.” He hasn’t even come back to get his clothes. I don’t know where he’s staying. he’s not at his mom’s although she says she hears from him every day from “wherever he is staying.” Do you think she knows where he is? — Broken Hearted, Fort Rouge

Dear Broken: Without a doubt, his mother knows where he is, but she’s not telling you because you’ll go looking for him. That tells me she doesn’t want the two of you to get talking and possibly work things out. He may even be living in her basement with the car parked on a street nearby or locked in her garage. Mothers will do that for their sons. So what is the real story here? Why did he go? When you write with no context for the break up, it’s hard to help you. It’s odd he won’t even come by and get his clothes. Write me back with the whole mess if you can. You must see your doctor or a walk-in clinic doctor ASAP and get some help so you can eat and sleep. If you let yourself get low and become sick, you will be in no shape to fight for your marriage or stand on your own. Milkshakes and food replacements like Boost can get you through a few days of heartbreak but you need more than that. Your doctor may prescribe medication for a temporary time. Buy TV dinners if you can’t cook right now. Do whatever you can to get back on your feet. There’s nothing attractive or helpful about being so weak, you can’t deal with him when the time comes — and it will come. He needs his things. Call a relationship counsellor or go to Klinic free walk-in counselling, hours at 784-4067, and get it all out. Call your friends, your mom, a close cousin so you’re not going it alone right now.

Questions or comments? Write Miss Lonelyhearts c/o Winnipeg Free Press 1355 Mountain Ave. Wpg R2X 3B6 or email lovecoach@hotmail.com

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