I was on my way into Thailand, enjoying the slow and silent ride. I thought about many things, about my crazy colleagues who decided to get engaged (and now married) after 3 weeks, of The Boyfriends really close female-friend who expects her boyfriend to buy her things, about my parents, and about my relationship.

I wondered about the former two and how they could be so delusional in their expectations of relationships. How could they have this idea that they would fall in love so immediately, that its supposed to last forever. How could they think that he will forever be devoted to her.

How could she imagine he would forever love her, be loyal to her.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized the biggest differences that we all had between that 'irrational camp' and mine, they had different expectations because the only thing they have witnessed is your quintessential healthy relationship.

For someone who has seen first hand a dysfunctional relationship; to have to go through that for so long. To be a supporting hand, is it then any surprise that my expectations of a relationship is so warped? That even though I can recognize the signs of a healthy relationship, subconsciously I am out looking for the man that can fit the mould of a relationship I have grown so accustomed to? An abusive dysfunctional one?

After all, I have long ceased believing that a man could love me forever. Sure, I would like to have that happen, but trusting that there could be such a man out there for me... difficult. Worse still when I find out that the men who told me they loved me would so easily take it all back. I go in imagining the worst. I came back after two weeks away and saw The Boyfriend suddenly being super chummy with another girl. My immediate reaction screamed out to me "... eventually he will cheat and leave you too...you've only been gone for two weeks and he's suddenly really close with another woman... how would things be a few more years down the road? what if you leave again and he just gets closer and closer to this other girl... what if eventually he leaves you"

I had never expected a man to take care of me. To want to earn money for me, to feed me, simply because I dont trust my life in another persons hands. I have always been independent because I know... somewhere down the road, him leaving me, or my leaving him because I can no longer love him or trust him is a real possibility. I never trusted my soul in another person because I know sooner or later he will crush it.

Now these other couples that I talk about, she is celebrating her parents wedding anniversary with a big party. I have never had that ever happen in my family. Their family's are still together, tight and loving.

I... have not had the foresight of seeing that happen.

But the scariest thing of all, was realizing... that perhaps I myself am out seeking abusive relationships. Perhaps I am subconsciously looking for these people, or sabotaging my relationships because it is the only way I know how to have a relationship. Like I said... I have gone through enough to know that a man simply cannot love a woman forever, want to protect her, take care of her...as much as I would like to imagine it could be true.

But the thing is... if I am a result of my parentage... will I pass on this curse to my children? Would I end up in a destructive marriage? will my children grow up watching all the fights and hurt and abuse.

Will my children grow up witnessing their father fall out of love with me?

And will they continue the cycle? Will they too go forth and seek abusive relationships, destructive husbands, because the best that I can do in bringing them up would never be enough to erase the scar my relationship would have burnt into them.

I realized... it is one thing to live through this myself, but a completely different matter to already chart out such an unhappy life for the children I do not yet have. I cannot bear to pass on this curse to them such that they will live through life untrusting, hurting. Unable to have love come to them.

I want this to end. With me. But breaking the cycle is not as easy as one can imagine. Knowing your limits and identifying when you are jeapordizing your relationships are not easy to manage. It is difficult to try and see through rose tinted glasses again when the only pair you have are cracked broken and damaged.

I only know that for my world to right itself again, two things must happen.

A man who is willing to work this out with me, a man who will stick around no matter how much my subconscience is fighting against it is essential. A man who will love me forever regardless of how crazy I become. A man who does want to prove me wrong and that he can be trusted, to prove to me that he does want to build me a safe haven, to show me he can love me forever.

And for me to consciously break the mirror of my soul. Silence the harsh expectations. Jump again into the bonfire with my scarred soul and try yet again, to believe in humankind