A new acquaintance, Cathy, 42, remarked on a recent discovery: that her husband actually meant it when he said that he’d never move from London. She’d quietly hoped, over 15 years, that he might ?see the light? and decide that the countryside beckoned. Is she disappointed? You bet. Devastated, even, that either a wrangle looms, or she accepts that he had always been honest and her hopes were unfounded.
Just how wrong can you be? Very wrong, in many cases, when, surprise, surprise, people often mean what they say about moving home, having babies or not believing in marriage.
But some of us stubbornly hang on to what I call an ?eternal hope mechanism?. When a partner says something counter to our expectations, the thinking goes: ?Oh, he doesn’t really mean that. He wants what I want.?
