40岁的我至今单身,是不是因为童年不幸所致?

You can meet a partner at any stage of life, says Mariella Frostrup. But to hold onto someone, you need to deal with your insecurities first.

玛丽拉·弗勒斯楚普（Mariella Frostrup）说：人生的任一阶段，你都可能遇到自己的另一半。但和某人长相厮守之前，你需要消除内心的不安全感。

I am a 40-year-old single woman. I have had a number of short relationships, but only three lasting more than a year and my longest was three years. I was recently dumped after a few months and it has greatly impacted my self-esteem. One issue was his long stretches of non-communication (four-day periods of non-response). Having experienced childhood abandonment (which I told him about), I could not accept this.

我是位40岁的单身女性。曾经有过几次短暂的恋情，但只有三段恋情维持了1年以上，最长的一段恋情谈了3年。前不久，我被人甩了（谈了几个月），这极大地影响了我的自尊心。我们俩的主要问题在于：他可以很长时间不和你说话（4天没有消息）。小时候，我被人抛弃过（我告诉过他这一点），所以我无法接受他的杳无音信。

Do I have to be perfect and ask for nothing to find a partner? Are my communication needs really too much? I am positive and celebrate others and their happiness. But if loneliness is my fate, how do I learn to be OK with it? I have begun planning for a life alone. I've bought an apartment and contributed to a retirement plan. I have accepted I will never be a mother. Yet, I am ashamed of how much the lack of a partner still saddens me.

我必须完美无瑕，寻找另一半的时候别无所求？我对沟通的需求是不是太高了？我乐观向上，也为别人的幸福而开心。我买了所公寓，做了退休计划。我承认我永远不会生小孩儿。但是，一想到没有另一半我还是会感到伤心。

Mariella replies

玛丽拉回复到：

At last a subject I'm qualified in. First, be careful what you wish for. I know plenty of women in the opposite situation who'd be delighted to find themselves unfettered again. I was just a year younger than you when, at 39, after a similar dating history, I met my now husband and went on to have two children in my early 40s. It's information I offer you to assuage the cloud of impending doom that you're currently engulfed by.

终于有一个适合我的话题了。首先，好好想想你究竟想要什么。我知道，很多恋爱中的女性会为自己不再受约束而感到高兴。我39岁，只比你小1岁。我的恋爱史也和你差不多，现在我遇到了我的丈夫，计划在40岁出头生两个小孩。我希望我所提供的这些信息能缓解你目前陷入的困境。

Meeting a partner with whom your future collides, can and does happen at any age. While it's worth making contingency plans for what might be irrevocably lost in the interim (fertility being an example). You are "chronically" single only in so far as you are recurrently so. You're definitely a catastrophist, though! Buying your own apartment and investing in your retirement shouldn't be deemed acts of desperation, but sensible investments towards your own security and comfort. Hooking up with a fellow human doesn't normally have an impact on securing your finances, unless you marry a millionaire.

找一位和你志同道合的伴侣吧，这是人生中任一阶段都可能发生的事。但是为过渡期不可避免将要失去的一些东西做出应急计划（比如生育能力）也是值得的。你经常这样，所以你才会"长期"单身。但是，你肯定难逃这一劫。买公寓、为退休后的生活投资不应该被视作绝望之举，而应被认作是对安全感和舒适感的合理投资。通常，和某人在一起并不会对你的财务造成太大的影响，当然，嫁给百万富翁是个例外。