The world (and your female friends) will tell you to steer clear from a “bad boy.”
“He’s no good!”
“He will only break your heart!”
“He will never give you what you need!” (the more enlightened friends that like therapy will tell you that one๐)
“You’re only addicted to the idea of him!”
Sound familiar? But I challenge each of these statements above as someone who has loved her share of “bad boys” (I’d also like to challenge that label as ineffective and not even totally accurate).
My first bad boy crush was the ultimate bad boy—the bad Man among bad boys if you will: none other than W. Axl Rose himself . It probably helped that being a 10 year old girl, my first exposure to Mr. Rose was Sweet Child O’ Mine( yes, that’s “O” not “Of” for the true GnR connoisseurs out there). This was the video that Axl and the boys immediately dropped the hairsprayed make-up look that they briefly sported during their debut video for Welcome to the Jungle. Only poser bad boys stuck with that look and even at 10, I knew the real thing from the pretender!
Many, many decades later, including a large chunk of my 30s where I ran from bad boys or even a hint of a bad boy as fast as I could and made the mistake of going too far in the opposite direction (overcorrecting, which I will talk about many times in my blog), I can now look at “bad boys” and the whole phenomenon of why girls are so attracted to them in a different light.
“Bad boys” are often “hurt boys.” They had messed up childhoods, sometimes REALLY messed up childhoods. When you grew up as a child who never had any structure or stability in your home and your parents were always fighting, drunk, or gone…..is it any wonder that this child will grow up to live a life of chaos, avoiding any responsibility or commitment like the plague? What could he possibly know about responsibility or commitment when his only role models showed him the exact opposite?
Or what about the boys who grow up with more of a structured, responsible home but with parents who belittle them, criticize their every move or smother them with constant attention and expectations to be perfect? Can you see how a boy like that would grow into a man who may seem like he has it all together at first and probably seem like a perfect boyfriend but will confuse you, avoid you, criticize you and push you away as you get closer?
But here’s the flip side of this “bad boy” behavior: they also tend to be a lot more loving and understanding than other guys.
Because they’ve been stepped on, ignored, criticized…..they get how it feels when a woman is treated like this. And since they’ve been hurt and betrayed at an early age, their hearts are more sensitive than others who may be blissfully ignorant as to why you feel the way you do. Because they never grew up with love, they cherish it more and they don’t take it for granted like someone who never lived without it might.
That’s why these guys are so attractive, especially in the beginning. They are more passionate, understanding and seemingly, emotionally connected than others you may have dated.
But, as time goes on and the relationship progresses, their childhood hurts will rear their ugly heads, just like ours do in a relationship. That’s what relationships do: they trigger our old hurts and neglect from childhood because our subconscious brain is still trying to correct what happened to us.
And that is also why we find a “bad boy” attractive even if we spot red flags that we want to avoid, we feel a magnetic pull to him. This is because he may also have similarities to our parents or to the trauma we went through in our homes and childhoods and because our brain is subconsciously trying to make sense out of and fix what happened in our past, it will make us automatically attracted to anyone who fits that same pattern of neglect or abuse. And vice versa, the “bad boy” is also attracted to the person on the other side who triggers those same subconscious feelings from his past within him.
This is also perfectly natural and occurs all the time so please don’t start beating yourself up if this strikes a chord within you. I have done it, you have done it, we all do it. The only people who have not done this are people who had very secure childhoods and parents…..and while these people exist, they are in the minority.
So if you have loved or currently are loving a “bad boy” right now, that’s ok. Remember that they are hurt boys who desperately want and need the love they didn’t get as a child and SHOULD have gotten. Just like you! And respect and honor the simple biological truth that as a woman, you are created to be maternal and loving towards all creatures. This is your power as a woman and there is no need to deny it.
BUT, loving a bad boy and merging your life with a bad boy are two different things and the one does NOT require the other.
While it is okay and even admirable to give a bad boy understanding for why he acts the way he does, you do not and should not condone his actions towards you that are disrespectful, dishonest, hurtful or even abusive. Just because you know WHY he does this does not mean you have to be OKAY with him doing this to you. Moreso, you also should NOT tell him it is OKAY.
Because it is not, not ever, and he knows this. He knows this behavior is crap because it was crap when it was done to him. Deep down, he is trying to understand why this was done to him as a child and if you condone it as an adult, all you are doing is reinforcing that same behavior.
You can’t take responsibility for him, for what happened to him in his childhood or for what is happening with him now. You can only take responsibility for yourself and the best way you can do that is by not allowing him to treat you badly. Walking away from his bad behavior calmly and respectfully is the way that you finally model for him what healthy loving behavior ACTUALLY is.
Whether or not he chooses to get the help he needs to work through his childhood and learn to integrate his pain in a way that allows him to move forward and adopt mature behaviors as an adult man is completely left up to him. Whether or not you can still be a loving supportive person for him during this process is completely left up to YOU. But just because you love him doesn’t mean you have to live with him. And please, for your sake and HIS sake, don’t do that. Love him if you want to, but do it from afar. Let God handle his journey from within and yours as well while you stand firm as that loving example of safe healthy love with your personal boundaries (and sanity) intact.
And you just never know what life will surprise you with, that “bad boy” just might let God in finally and transform into the most wonderful man you will ever know. โค๏ธ
Still loving Axl,
Coach Alicia
