Do you find yourself constantly saying yes to the man in your life, when you really want to say no? I'm not referring to a healthy, balance relationship, but off-balanced situations, in which many women have developed the unhealthy relationship pattern of being "yes women" in front of their mates, yet they are internally frustrated and complain about it behind their backs. Lord knows I get a bevy of emails and letters on a weekly basis that attests to the unfortunate condition of women suffering from the "disease to please" at the expense of their own happiness.

These are attractive, articulate, upwardly-mobile women, who display a strong self-assured picture around everyone else, except their man. When faced with a romantic or intimate interaction with their mate, they go out on a limb to accommodate and even enable behaviors they don't really support. It can involve a wide spectrum of issues, including, having sex even when they are not in the mood, constantly lending him money, or putting up with infidelity. This is a symptom of what I often refer to as band-aid bonding.

Band-aid bonding is when a woman is in an unbalanced or unhealthy relationship where she is the emotional adhesive trying to cover up or hold it together, by tending to her man's wants, yet neglecting her own needs. What's unfortunate is these relationships are never fair to neither the women nor the men involved. It is not a matter of finger-pointing or blaming anyone, it's a simple fact that no one wins-the woman isn't getting the true happiness that she silently craves-and the man isn't seeing the true woman who he's involved with.

I've spent many years researching the dynamics of male/female relationships and I've found that in specific situations when a woman keeps hiding her true feelings in order to keep a man, it usually stems from fear-either fear of losing him, fear of being alone, fear of what other people think, fear of abandonment, fear of being hurt, fear starting over with someone else, fear of biological clock ticking, fear of feeling unlovable, or fear of disappointing him. One of the biggest contributing factors to these fears is the false belief of the ever- popular "Male Shortage" myth. How many times have we heard, "There aren't many good men left so you better take what you can get;" or "Ten percent of something is better than nothing at all"?

Too many contemporary women are prone to bending over backwards because they've been falsely led to believe that there is a shortage of good, decent and available men in today's society. So they have gotten in the habit of hiding their true feelings, even if it means sacrificing their own self-worth. For example in many cases, a man will tell a woman to have patience and give him a "little more time" to make up his mind, either about marrying her or about giving up seeing another woman. The "little more time" slips into weeks, then months, and then years; and he still sings the same song, and she still listens to the same lyrics, hoping that if she acts the way he wants her to, that someday he'll change, or slip a ring on her finger.

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