I am 16 years old and have a girlfriend for 9 months now. Recently she told me that her uncle has tried to abuse her sexually three years ago. We have already talked about marriage and we have promised each other to keep (always and as long as love reigns) our relationship another six years. What do you think about our relationship? Do you think the attempt of her uncle abusing her could have left any trauma, and if so, in what way might it affect our relationship in the future?

These are some comments regarding the information you have given me.

1.A relationship of nine months during the teen years is a remarkable time. It means that you make each other happy, that you share common interests and view the future with responsibility.

It is possible that you both mature together and remain your relationship up to your adulthood. But do always remember that you both will face changes independently from each other according your own ideas and particular and legitimate interests. It is a normal process of development and don't get upset than at some point in the near future your opinions might diverge.

I want to say that it is well possible that you marry and live together one day according to the idea of an adult relationship that you choose. But you need to understand that there is still a long road to go until you reach adulthood and in this phase, in this transition, your personalities and interests will finally be defined. This is the point where both should assume their respective individualities.

I find it normal that you have already talked about marriage and I think this is a way of exploring each other. But be careful with assuming a commitment for another six years at this young age. You can do it and it is absolutely legitimate to do it. I did it more than one time at your age. I was filled with illusions and I loved this girl just the way you love your girlfriend but it turned out to be a different road for me than for my girlfriend. I remember her very well and it was a beautiful and intensive time for more than three years. But everything fell to peaces when she was 17 and I was 19 years old.

Regarding to what has happened to your girlfriend with her uncle, it is important that, at some moment, she tells you, with your help and support, if it really was only an attempt or if it actually happened something that she might just not have dared to tell you.

If it was only an attempt, it leaves a wound although not as meaningful as if it had really happened.

In both cases, it does need a diagnosis made by a specialist, especially by a psychologist. There are a lot of factors that can form part of a trauma. But I really advise her to leave it in the hands of a specialist.

On the other hand, and for your personal point, as bad as this may have been, it shouldn't affect your relationship with her.

If you like to help her because you feel the need to do so, you should try to talk to her in order to find out whether it really happened or not. It depends on you and you delicacy to broach this matter another time without hurting her.

At last, consider the following:

1. In life you love the persons for what they are and not for the accidents that have occurred in their lives or the misfortune they have had.
2. Love someone that responds your love for what you are, not for the social condition in which you were born, neither for the place where you were born nor the actual personal situation.
3. You love someone as long as their love doesn't hurt you neither the loved one nor the others around you.
4. Understand love as a natural condition of the human specie, as a genetically inherited mechanism that seeks to be kept and complement us as individuals.
5. Also understand that within a human body, in you as well as in your girlfriend, there are biochemical mechanisms far beyond reason and that in some moment may lead us to choose someone and later break with this person and keep us going to find somebody new and to break with him or her again until we finally find someone that meets our ideal.
6. Keep loving and respecting your current girlfriend as you are doing now. Understand her because she has been honest with you. Help her. Talk about your personal things, your inside, your problems and situations. Share with her and encourage her with nice words and accept her in times when she might be puzzled or irritated.
7. And, if you feel at some point in the future that this love is fading, tell her openly. But if your love for her gets even stronger with the time, pass the stage of your adolescence that you still got ahead together with her and keep going and achieving the stage of young adults that are proud of themselves.

Asked by a boy from Salvador
He responded a second time writing me another e mail.