Annie Fox for Teens... Hey, Terra!

Annie (AKA Hey Terra!) has been around long enough to have experienced a lot of what Life can dish out. But, it hasn’t been so long that she's forgotten what it's like to be your age. Check out some of the thousands of email questions teens from around the world have sent to Terra. You may learn something useful from her answers:

Long-distance relationships:
“I just don't feel that we belong together.”

Hey Terra,

Recently me and my guy have recently entered a "long-distance" relationship and it's been ok so far, but I have no clue why I'm feeling like this all of a sudden. I periodically have these gut feelings that we won't last. It's such a terrible feeling. Why? I've done nothing wrong. He's done nothing wrong. I just don't feel that we belong together. It's not like I'm gonna up and do something crazy, like cheat on him, but I feel so bad because of these feelings. As much as I say to myself that I have to have more faith and believe in the relationship, I feel so naive because these feelings are strong, not strong where they are overbearing, but they are strong. What am I going through? Am I just subconsciously upset that he's gone? All I know is that I feel terrible.

Will it work?

Dear Will it work?,

Sounds like there are a couple of different things going on here. One is that you say "We won't last." That's your fear of abandonment coming back to haunt you from past relationships. That has nothing to do with the here and now.

The other thing you say is "I just don't feel that we belong together." Now that's a whole other feeling. That's intuition, that's your inner voice saying "Something is not right here. Something doesn't feel like a good fit." That IS in the here and now and whenever I get a feeling like that I pay attention to it. I look deeper into that feeling and ask myself some direct questions like: What is going on here? What is the basis of this feeling?

Your inner voice is to be respected. It's telling you something you need to hear. So, why do you think you are getting the feeling that you two "don't belong together"?

In friendship,

Terra


Need some advice? Write to Terra. She'll give you a straight answer you can trust without any lectures.


What's New?
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''Middle School Confidential, Book 3: What's Up with My Family?'' by Annie Fox, Illustrated by Matt Kindt
''Middle School Confidential, Book 2: Real Friends vs. The Other Kind'' by Annie Fox M.Ed., Illustrated by Matt Kindt
''Middle School Confidential, Book 1: Be Confident in Who You Are'' by Annie Fox, Illustrated by Matt Kindt
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