Do We Have A Future?
[ 15 September 2009 ]
“I have been living with & dating my boyfriend for 3 years. I adore him, most of the time ;D, & feel as though we are going to be together but also at 26 am starting to feel a bit taken advantage of. I try to help him through life as much as possible. I do know for sure he is a bit of a late bloomer but I convinced him to enroll in university this year as he was tired of a dead end job & he has been going through with that so I am happy for that.It isn’t as though I personally am necessarily afraid of the dating & age thing, but I see myself settling down with someone by or around 30, even moving in the next year when I finish university & he could if he wished to transfer. Ideally I would love to be with someone who will discuss moving & planning some sort of future with me. This kid won’t even plan a vacation consisting of a road trip with me next year. My mom says he isn’t the one & a lot of other things which I won’t bother mentioning. I don’t tell my friends because I fear the same answer.
I don’t know what to do Gala. I love this guy but something still feels wrong because I feel like the one who is trying for something bigger. Is there any hope?”
It’s a cliché, but I think it’s true when I say that the two of you are in very different places. That’s okay. It happens. I think it’s pretty rare that two people grow & change at exactly the same rate. There is always going to be a bit of push & pull in a relationship, that’s just how it is.
A bit of push & pull. A BIT. The whole thing shouldn’t be Sisyphean. You shouldn’t have to be the one driving this relationship. You shouldn’t have to feel that you are constantly pushing him, or that you are the one dragging him, kicking & screaming, into the next phase of his life. Where’s the fun, balance or mutual respect in that situation? Furthermore, if going back to school, travelling or moving aren’t things that your boyfriend wants to do, then that’s just how he is, & you need to respect that. We are all entitled to our own lives, after all, & to do whatever it is that makes us happy. It sounds like he is kind of happy being a bit of a slacker, but it doesn’t sound like you’re happy allowing him to be that way.
I think this is a classic case of falling in love with someone & then expecting them to become someone else. It happens all the time, but people come into relationships with their own stuff, & it is their stuff! You don’t have any right to tell him to discard this or that habit just because you don’t like it. That is who he is. That is who he will probably always be, unless he decides that he wants more, & starts to change his life on his own. You cannot change people. They can only change themselves.
I was actually talking to my friend Barbie about this the other day, over dinner. We were discussing past relationships & the various ways in which they had gone awry, & she said that her biggest problem had been always expecting her boyfriends to become someone else. We are all so guilty of this! There is no such thing as a perfect person, & honestly, if you did manage to mould your lover into your ideal, could you really respect them? I spoke to my mother the next morning, & we started discussing the same thing. She told me that often when people get married, one half of the couple thinks, ‘Oh, now that we’re married, they’re going to be like this or that’ & it is NEVER that way! It will be exactly how it has always been! Just as we have to learn to accept ourselves, flaws & all, unconditionally, we have to learn to accept our lovers exactly as they are. Right here & right now, without any extras & in this very moment.
I’ll say it again: no one is perfect. We all do annoying things, & despite which, one person’s dream girl is another person’s evil shrew. It’s really a question of working out how much your partner’s flaws bother you. Some flaws might be deal-breakers, while others are ones you can grin & bear. This is not to say there isn’t room for compromise — you can easily ask your boyfriend not to leave his toenail clippings on the coffee table, or request that your girlfriend get her goddamn dog trained so it doesn’t pee on your floor — but most people are pretty into being how they are. It has worked for them for however many years, after all. Why would they change now, & why should they? Just to appease you? It doesn’t work like that. Sometimes people will try to change for others, but it never sticks. They have to want it for themselves.
Your mother could very easily be right that he is not “the One”, & I think the reason you haven’t asked your friends for their thoughts is because you know, in your heart, that your mother is right & your friends will mirror that back at you. I guess the question is, do you need to be with “the One” right now? If you’re happy with your boyfriend, & can learn to accept him the way he is, then maybe that will do for the time being. But if what you really want is an equal, someone who is on the same page & someone who is enthusiastic about planning a future with you — & by the way, none of those are unreasonable things to want, & there are thousands of guys out there who could be that for you — then it might be time to bail.
We could easily sit here talking about your boyfriend’s failings & perceived lack of maturity, but what good would it do us? None at all. All you can do at this point is either change your reactions to him, alter your expectations, or hit the road, Jack!
Having said all of this, the truth is that if we concentrate on the negative, that’s all we will see, but if we focus on the good things, they will grow & multiply. Just like writing a Things I Love Thursday list, positivity is infectious & colours your whole world. So you can choose to obsess over your boyfriend’s failings, or you can decide to love him just as he is. Despite your mother’s opinions about your relationship, no one knows what goes on behind closed doors. No one knows what your relationship is like except for you & your boyfriend. Only you really know what is right for you & your relationship.
I’ll leave you with this. No relationship is perfect, & there’s nothing wrong with having a whole lot of not-so-serious fun with someone whose company you really enjoy. But if a future together is what you’ve decided you want, both of you need to come to the party — & you both need to do so with absolute joy & 100% commitment. If one person isn’t ready for that, I don’t foresee the situation turning out very positively for either of you. What you do from there is entirely up to you.
Nonpareils, have you ever been in a similar situation? What did you do? How did it turn out? If you had to go back, would you do things differently?
Love letters & feather headdresses,
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This summer I met a Dutch boy while I was on holiday. We talked a lot and me and my friend hang out with him and his friends, but he had a girlfriend, so I didn’t hit on him, we just had a great time…
When we got back from the vacation he wrote to get some of the pictures we took, and we starting writing together. I already knew he was something from talking to him before, but this just blew my mind, we can talk about everything, never tire of subjects, have the same stupid humor, etc. We just talked more and more, several times a day, and of course I am now completely in love with him.
I struggled for quite a while with that.. It’s been many years since I’ve felt just a hint of this, and right now I can’t focus on anything but him pretty much all of the time. I know he has a girlfriend, so I wasn’t gonna do anything.. Until I found out that he feels exactly the same! I live in Denmark, and I know all the long-distance objections. I know it’s wrong when he’s taken, but I just cannot let go.
So now I’m pretty much stuck, waiting for him to figure out what to do. He said his heart knows what it wants, but it’s hard to just throw the years away he has with the other girl..
So here I am.. I honestly thought I had lost the ability to feel like this, and I know it’s so wrong, but I just can’t let him go when he says he’s in love with me, too! And I honestly don’t see the distance as a problem, all I want is to be with him…
Please let me hear what you think of this!
LOVE! x
It’s similar to those relationships whereby one actually realizes that one doesn’t love the things they love about the other that they initially fell in love with, if that makes any sense. Say for example you love the way he/she can goof around all the time towards the beginning of a relationship, quite quickly, and especially at those times when goofing around is not appropriate, one can quite quickly fall out of love with that particular quality in the person you happen to be dating. Over time, the more goofing around the person does, the more you begin to resent them and the relationship in general.
I suppose this is related to being in different places whereas one person wants to take things to the next level, as in your case, but the other either won’t or can’t seem to let go of his/her current situation. I agree that we all develop at different speeds and times, however when you’re with ‘the one’, I tend to believe that both in the relationship are roughly synchronized in all facets of their lives together.
Life is too short to be waiting around, saying what if’s and such, waiting around for him to rise to your level. You’re in the absolute prime of your life at the figuring stuff out stage, enjoying the beginning of a career and having much more independence than you had even 3-4 years ago thanks to this thing called a salary! I suspect whatever happens, sadly he will always be those couple of steps behind. If you’re ok with this, then thats great and I admire you for being able to do so, however if you’re not ok with waiting for him to play catch up, this only leaves you open to a lot of disappointment in the future.
Good luck on whatever you decide. Always remember that there is a reason why you both found each other, even if the time spent together was only for a specific period in your lives. I sort of look at it almost like my favourite sweater (or jumper as we call it in the UK) – it fits like a glove, and always looks great in every situation and I would never tire of wearing it. It’s always current and I need never question it’s existence. It suits me and I suit it, we’ve been through good times, bad times and will always be hung on a wooden hanger.
The best thing you can do is get the numbers out of your head. If you have a “goal” to settle down at a certain age, have kids at another age, etc…you’ll start pushing for things one or both of you might not be ready for, consciously or not, in order to meet a “deadline.” Relationships can’t really be crammed into a schedule of when you feel like things should happen. Don’t let impatience drive a wedge between you and your guy. Take it from me. I learned the hard way. :/
Ultimately, if you love him and want to be with him, you won’t leave no matter how much you dream about what it would be like to have a holiday or dates with someone else (oh my god, sooooo understand the planning a holiday thing!) Because at the end of the day, you know that any other relationship would come with it’s own special set of problems.
Talk to your boyfriend. Do you really want to have the next years of your life planned out or are you feeling insecure and what something to cling on to (nothing wrong with this!)? Do you love him with all your heart, or do you love the “project” of moulding him into someone else? Or are just frustrated at watching potential and intelligence go to waste and what to stamp your feet at his laziness?
Everything Gala has said is spot on, but I’m in exactly the same situation. I’m operating on the basis that relationships are built on hope, hope that it will work out, and hope that if it does it will be what you want it to be. My boyfriend and I have discussed things calmly, loudly, angrily, tearfully, every way you can imagine, and decided that right now, we’d like to have another go and see where that hope gets us with our eyes wide open and accepting who the other one is.
There is always hope if you want there to be.
Amen, Gala! So many women see marriage as the be-all and end-all, and they often ignore the good in front of them because they’re focusing SO HARD on the future. I don’t believe any relationship is a “waste of time.” Why chuck something wonderful that’s making you happy now out of FEAR that it MIGHT make you unhappy LATER?
Makes no sense to me.
My two cents:
Move forward with your own future. Plan your own move/transfer, your career, and your holidays (with friends instead, if necessary). If he won’t work with you at all on anything, consider moving on without him.
Don’t panic! It doesn’t have to be an ultimatum, and it doesn’t have to be forever.
Perhaps in a few years, once you are established where you want to be, he might have matured enough to join you, and the old spark may still be there.
Relationships don’t have to be non-stop, or all-or-nothing. You may find a distance romance, or some kind of “break” while you are at different life stages, works best for you.
I kind of feel like if you know what you want, then full speed ahead. And the fact that this woman is feeling so much doubt towards the relationship probably means she already knows in her heart he’s not the one. And I agree with everything you said though, Gala!
Oh man – this sounds exactly like my first big relationship! We enjoyed each other for almost a year, but there were just too many differences in how we saw our relationship evolving.
I broke it off – and it was the best thing I could have possibly done!
I had to grieve the “what ifs” – what if we could have made it work, what if he was “the one”? But it didn’t take long to realize that I was better off being happy & single, rather than forcing him to commit and settle down sooner than he wanted.
I totally know how you must feel – just finished a 2yr long relationship with my ex boyfriend who simply couldn’t deal with having a relationship in university. I was/still am distraught but sometimes it’s better to move on, rather than stay with someone who doesn’t see a future with you, if you really want to have a future with them…Gala’s advice is spot on, as per usual though :D !!
i recently started something with someone that doesnt have a job, isnt in school, and as pretty much no motivation to do anything. i can accept that it might not be for forever, but its fun and works for me right now since i just started school and im only home on the weekends. having a great time with no seriousness is a wonderful thing.
I am in the same situation right now. It took me over a year, but I’ve more or less come to the decision that we are just at different points in our lives.
When we started dating I was 21…now I’m 25. Things that were not as important to me then have become more important and I just don’t think that we have the same outlook or goals for life.
I tell myself it will just a break, because who knows, maybe we’ll end up back together in the future?
You’ve given such sound advice here, Gala. I was in a similar situation myself several years ago: I was in a long-term relationship with a guy from the time I was 17 until I turned 21—about 3+ years. In the end we just evolved into different people and we grew apart. We ended things because it felt like the right thing to do. Although ending the relationship now might hurt because one person still has feelings for the other, in the long run it’s the smarter, less painful thing to do.
Oh Gala, you had to write this now, just as I am going through something similar, and I am having great difficulty making my decision. My finacee and I have been together for 7.5 years, have shared so much of our life together, and yet I feel like there’s something missing. He loves me, that I know, but he doesn’t pay me quality attention. He doesn’t instigate quality/intimate time together unless he feels ‘in the mood’ and I feel like he puts he’s hobbies (role playing, and collector card games) ahead of me. Over the years I’ve tried and tried and tried to tell him. Now I’m just tired. I don’t want to end this, but I think in my heart, I have to. I’m his first lover, and his first long-term girlfriend. I’ve had all that and a bag of chips before. So experience in relationships he lacks. He’s an accountant, and very analytical. I’m an early childhood teacher, and empathy and anticipation of needs is my life. Rock=hard place. I know you can’t answer this for me, but do I try talking to him again, do I leave him? I think I know the answer, but it’s a bloody scary one.
Reading the initial email, I thought straight away that the writer knows the answer herself. To me it seemed clear that she really wants to change her life, and splitting up with her boyfriend may very well be part of that. I can also sympathise with her focus on her age and her future. For example, plenty of young women want to have kids (lord knows I did, SO BAD), and age is not ‘just a number’ when it comes to family and fertility. I think if you know what you want, you need to take all reasonable steps towards getting it – life’s too short to wait around.
Wow. I was in that relationship. As some others already pointed out I think she already knows what she wants to do but it can be so scary to move on from someone when things are only ‘kinda not right’ rather than totally wrong.
My ex and I had been together 5 years and had a lot of shared memories but my future was definitely pulling at me and dragging him along was draining. We compromised and had a break for a while – both took off traveling, him with his mates and me with my sister and it was the best thing we could have done.
We have since moved on to other people and are both more satisfied in that area of our lives though he will always hold a special place in my heart.
It is simple.
When it is right you just know.
You dont have to ask, you dont have to be told.
And when you know, you will know what I mean and understand.
The fact that you are asking means it is not right.
Well, here sounds something similar to what I have been through. I have been dating my amazing boyfriend for almost 3 years now. Last fall, we experianced a rough patch. I felt that he would be happier without me. After many fights (one popular topic was why he hadn’t proposed yet). We broke up for about a month, and things are now better than before (I attribute part of this to gala because I seem to be a happier person after being exposed to this blog. The point I am trying to make is that, no matter where you are in your personal development, a break might be all you need. Hope it helps!
Mag~Elicious
agree 100% with che — I thought you had to try and work and everything would be ok eventually — then i met The Person and everything is just. Right. It’s magical and amazing and if you have doubts, it isn’t right. I wish I’d learned that lesson many moons ago and saved myself wasted time!
Oh, wow. Boy, do I know how hard it is to love someone who doesn’t have the amount of drive as you! My ex-boyfriend was ten years older than me but acted like he was five years younger than I was at the time, which placed him at about fourteen. It was ridiculous to try to get him to do anything. I loved him and wanted a future with him; unfortunately, the more I matured and moved forward, the more he dug into his heels until he became abusive with me.
I’m definitely not saying this guy is going to be abusive with the OP. That’s just what happened in my life.
Eventually the abuse got to me. I remember when we broke up (I broke up with him, something I am very proud of even if it took a few months to gather the strength) and I admitted that I had stopped planning my future with him. He acted hurt, but I had to remind him of the fact that he would straight-up tell me NOT to plan a future with him! This guy wouldn’t commit to a single thing and was living with his parents at the time of our break-up! Sad times. I feel bad for him and his apparent arrested development; at the same time, he is not my responsibility. I could not be his mother, especially not when he was abusing me. I hadn’t signed up for any of that!
My situation was a lot more extreme than the OPs but I just want to say: if you hold yourself back because of him, will you be disappointed in the long run? If so, move on! Keep going! There will only be a loss of love in your life if you believe there will be; if you do end up breaking up with him because he would be keeping you from living your dreams, know that it is for the best and in the end, all of the gears will click together. I don’t think you’re being ridiculous at all in the desire to have him have his S together.
I met my (now ex) boyfriend of two years while studying in Germany but soon thereafter we both moved away – he to Virginia, I to Finland. In the beginning I was completely bedazzled by him and wandered through the world in a pink haze. I spent all my time and energy keeping contact with him, talking on skype, writing him letters and arranging to meet, sometimes in the States, sometimes in Germany, sometimes here in Finland. Every time we parted I was devastated, but the plans of our future living together comforted me.
After some time things began settling, and we grew into an everyday routine, even with all the distance. Our conversations became repetitive or endless lists of events and I began taking notice of habits in him which really bothered me. It might have been his bad grammar, the jeans he wore or his naively positive way of looking at life, especially in regards to our future. He was enthusiastic about moving to Finland to live with me, I was beginning to feel caved in. However, I easily dismissed these things when we were apart – after all it was easy as I had a whole other life and didn’t see him on a daily basis. But when we were together it drove me up the walls. I began trying to change him, talking him into buying clothes I liked and trying to hammer my philosophies of life into his head. All the while I wouldn’t admit any of it to myself, though.
Then, just before our holiday to New York, I was in Austria and shared a hostel room with the most beautiful male specimen I’ve ever seen. He was exactly my type of guy: intelligent, dreamy and artistic. And he looked like a sexy lizard (that being beside the point…) We spent a week together, discovering the city, seeing museums, talking over coffee for whole afternoons and drinking cheap wine at night. Nothing more ever happened with him, but it didn’t matter because thats when I had the epiphany: My boyfriend wasn’t right for me!
The whole time I had told myself that the reason I felt dodgy about him was because of the distance, but now I realized how it had really been. I had tried to manipulate him and led him on into believing I was content with our relationship. I felt like I had betrayed him and, moreover, myself.
Over that holiday in New York I broke up with my boyfriend. It felt really shitty, he was heart broken and I felt sorry for him. But looking back I know it was the right thing to do. I feel like it was more fair of me to break up and go our separate ways than to keep pretending that I wanted to spend the rest of my days with him. For a long time things were sore between us, but I’m happy to say that we are friends now.
I guess what I’m meaning to say is that it’s OK to be different from your partner and that we all have to realize there is no such thing as a knight in shining armor. But what isn’t alright is going through a life together without having the same ideas about the quality of your relationship or where you want it to go. So stop for a minute, be honest to yourself and don’t shy away from making changes in your relationships. Just remember to do it with respect.
when i dated my first boyfriend I was a very different person; I actually convinced him to sign up for college, and he completed one quarter before deciding it wasn’t for him. I regret, to this day, the money he wasted on that experience simply because I didn’t want a boyfriend with a dead end job.
As it is now, that non-committed boyfriend and I are on exactly the same page.
just to repeat the same thing somebody else said – i was in a similar situation. now i’m with someone else. back then, i had doubts – i assumed this was sort of a natural thing and something quite inherent to my personality but now, with this other dude, everything feels right. everything. there is no doubt in my mind. it’s been a year and fuck, i’m so happy to be with this person. it’s insane.
if you have doubts.. he ain’t the one. i think maybe we all have several possible “the ones” in the world really, but certainly, he isn’t it.
judging by your recent posts, that holiday was an awesome and much-needed thing to do.
love xo
It’s a very hard thing but at 26 you still have plenty of time.
For one thing, marriage isn’t the end of the dating road. It’s only the beginning! It’s not easy but it can be great if both people get to it in their own time.
I was going out with the same guy for years. He was a real badboy (not to me, just a partier). But that was part of why I loved him. Then as we went on a couple of things became clear to me a) I wanted our partying to slow down and b) I wanted to get married and eventually have kids.
But, no matter how much I reiterated this, it never happened. A few times I felt in my gut that we should break up. But we didn’t and I’m glad.
He slowed down. We had an unplanned son which guided him to slow down (nothing to do with my encouragement … I was too busy). With the baby I forgot all about wanting to get married (seriously, don’t have babies unless you are ready to surrender yourself to another little person, chicks!) and one day, my man proposed!
There were times my instinct told me to run and it could have all gone the other way but the 2 things that are clear to me were 1) he was always devoted to me even when he wasn’t doing it all my way and that’s probably why it was smart to stay with him 2) he had to come to the point where he wanted the things I wanted on his own or not at all
No easy answers!
Yup, when I was fourteen, there was this really awesome guy, and we were really good friends. Then we started going out, and he started acting really immaturely. I think he felt weird, cause at fourteen I was 5’9”, pretty curvy and not afraid to flaunt it, and he was still around 5’2” and under devellopped.
Wow, Gala, you really have perfect timing. My boyfriend and I had a HUGE fight last night because I’m feeling frustrated with how little time he’s been making for me lately. I love him a lot and, like the original writer, want to spend the rest of my life with him, but I know that I can’t if we don’t start working towards a compromise in certain areas. The thing is, what he chooses to do is completely out of my control; all I can do is work on my own problems and hope that he’ll do the same with his. And I really think he will. I often leave him notes and letters to tell him how I’m feeling, whether good, bad, hurt, angry, happy, in love, whatever, because I express myself more clearly through writing. He’s kind of a closed book when it comes to his feelings, but when I got back from my parents’ house last night, I found a letter from him on my bed. It was angry, insulting, and basically a stream of consciousness, whereas I try to make my letters less inflammatory and more rational and clear than when I’m talking. But what I realized was that it wasn’t what was in the letter that mattered this time around. It was the fact that he took the time to sit down and write two pages about what he was feeling. That, in and of itself, was a huge leap forward for him. So will we end up working out? Maybe, maybe not. We’re both young, and it’s pretty early to tell. But the point is that he’s the one making the decision to try to get through to me and to help me bridge the gap. He’s deciding that our relationship is worth working on, in his own small ways. And I’m trying to see how he’s succeeding in making these little changes, rather than focusing on how he’s failing at making some of the big ones as quickly as I’d like.
So, to the original poster: if your man isn’t willing to take any steps towards helping your relationship continue to grow, he isn’t worth it. Alternately, if you’re not able to see the good things he does and the ways in which he does put effort into your relationship, maybe it’s time to walk away, at least for a little while. A relationship that doesn’t meet your needs isn’t healthy, and sometimes it’s good to let go, even if letting go hurts. Only you are able to take a close look at the situation and see what’s really going on, though, so good luck to you!
Gala you returned! You disappeared for so long I was nervous. You also seemed very harsh but probably because I was recently in a situation lining this one.
To the writer of that story
I just got the broke up news from my former and I cannot let go so easily! Oh the sadness. Trying to change someone will not help (experience) and waiting around doesn’t help either.
It hurts to wait around, to hope, to be disappointed. I kept waiting, and this man-child decides to be friends with me days after. Talk about frustration. I feel messed up too.
There is so, so much out there and it may seem like Hell, heart wrenching, lonely Hell (sorry, I’m feeling it now), but it will be better. Everything will be tip top shape soon; watch.
I agree with you 100% Gala. People are who they are. Smokers don’t quit smoking successfully for anyone but themselves, and the same principle applies to everything else. People change if they want to, or if the value in such a change would outweigh (for them) the value in what they already are. I’m guilty of trying to change people, more times than I can count. But people need to be loved for who they are, flaws and all, and we all need to compromise, and if that’s not going to cut it for you, it’s time to break it off. But good luck making any relationship last if you keep up the same habits. We all need to be accepting of people, life, and our circumstances. When we’re not, we need to rethink them.
Wow, Gala… I went through something quite similar to this. My ex was stuck in his habits, and didn’t want to evolve and push limits in life as much as I wanted. Because I was so needy, it took me almost two years and some therapy time to realize what to do. And it was EXACTLY what you just wrote to the girl!
I think it’s all a matter of getting to know yourself. And to know what’s good for you RIGHT NOW. Maybe if she gets to know herself more, who knows… maybe settling down isn’t quite the real deal. I know I really wanted to settle down with my guy… until I decided to break up. Now it’s up to destiny. And boy, that makes me so damn glad :)
I think your advice was spot on, Gala. People can’t be made to change, it just doesn’t work. It sounds to me like the girl in question already knows what’s right for her, and is just waiting for someone else to tell her to do it. I think people tend to be one or the other – they either think that they can change “undesirable” qualities in their SO, or that if a relationship is with “the one” it will always be smooth sailing. Neither one is true. Changing someone for a relationship is never a good idea, they’ll resent you for it – and I’m currently very happily married, but sometimes it takes work. When we’re both stressed out and end up sniping at each other, we have to sit down and figure out what’s wrong and how to fix it, while staying calm and levelheaded – no easy feat!
Anyways, I wish the question-sender luck & fortune!
i just ended a relationship that had been going for 5 years, very happily in most respects until fairly recently. the gears started to grind when a couple of years ago he started having to spend 50-75% of his time in another country working. fast-forward to earlier this year, we had just gone overseas for his brothers wedding and he had gone onto the country he worked in for another 3-4 month stint and I’d travelled home. in that time that followed, i really spiralled being away from him. the relationship finally reached a point where the foundation of awesomeness that our relationship had been built on had eroded so much that all the little niggly problems i’d ever thought about PLUS the long stretches apart (which were hard as they caused a lack of emotional intimacy and togetherness and as we were in a monogomous relationship, a complete lack of sex for aages at a time).
so I break up with him in April while he is away, then go over and spend a few days with him there and its back on track (albeit with all the same difficulties, just having had the bliss of some time together and sex etc). Then we come to July, he has just come home for 2 weeks, spent the whole time at the office or in front of the computer again and goes back overseas. I break it off again at the start of August. Then I crumble within a week and we are back together, he comes back around 2 weeks later for a month. That brings us up to last week, the day before he leaves again for another 3-4 months away. I basically laid all my cards out on the table, everything I had been trying to say in conversations about it that had not ever been finished (he isn’t a big talker). The end result was I said I need X, Y, Z to keep this going. He said I can’t/wont’t give it to you. At that point I new I HAD to be strong. I am not a huge drama fan, and this year had been so crazy. So we ended it, and I am really firm about it. All the things that really niggled at me in the past I now see for what I think they always were; things I was trying to ignore that were warning signs for the future. And by that I mean in a few years from now even, do I want to be going through this shit, but magnified x 100 or so, or do I want to be open to new possibilities. Knowing what I now know about what I want from a partner, how I want myself to be etc.
My two cents worth after all this is, know one can make the choice or decision for you, you will get there on your own one day, but speaking about it is a step in the right direction. Self honesty is always the start of change.
This is spooky timing to say the least. Today my boyfriend of almost three years and I broke up.
I gradually felt the relationship falling apart, and we were just drifting after attending different universities, making different friends. It was a surprisingly amiable break up. I think we both knew that it needed to happen.
I guess at a certain point you need to assess whether you want to be comfortable and happy forever, rather than… you know, in love.
the first few sentences i literally had to think if i had sent this in myself.
i am going through almost the EXACT scenario
i’m 26- been with the guy 2 years and i feel like i have a teenage son.
i live with him though- which complicates things.
it’s like shoe shopping. you find a beautiful pair of shoes you love, but they pinch, and they make you walk funny, and they give you blisters. love the shoes, but don’t destroy your feet for them. find a different pair, that you will love just as much but in a different way, and perhaps there will be someone out there who will be able to wear your old shoe, without the discomfort.
It’s interesting that this post comes now as just about a month ago I broke up with my boyfriend of almost three years. I was sure that he was the one and that we were going to get married in the relatively near future however I started to realise that his life (his goals, habbits, future, etc) could not be further from mine and that if the two eventually came together in marriage his “life” would not change significantly. The issue in our relationship was not a lack of planning the future it was a lack of communication on his part and completely different ambitions. I finally realised that no matter how hard I tried to change how he communicated with me it would never work. Eventually I realised that just because I loved him immensely and we could have a decently happy life together it wouldn’t be the happiest I could have. And I didn’t want to settle. I still love him and it hurts a lot to not have him in my life after so long but I know that not being together is better in the long run for both of us. My advice to the original poster would be to really figure out and be honest if this is the happiest she could be with someone even if she is happy now.
I don’t agree with the whole “if you have doubts, it isn’t right” philosophy. At some point, everyone has doubts about their relationship/career/haircut, and this is totally normal. These doubts can be a jumping off point for giving some serious consideration to the situation and deciding what is best. They are like a little signal to stop and reassess. Doubts aren’t neccessarily a bad thing, nor are they the death knell for a relationship. They are a totally normal part of life.
i just wanted to share that the idea of a “break” really can work. when my long-time boyfriend and i decided to spend 2 months on “break” when i started college – knowing that we would get back together at the end (unless something changed drastically), but allowing ourselves to feel uncommitted for a while & to date other people. especially on his end, it helped to quell a lot of doubts (in part because he tried to date this other girl and was rejected…but really, i did feel bad for him.) we did get back together and the end, and suddenly it was FABULOUS. we’ve dated about three of the last four years, but it was never as great as it has been in the year-ish since that break ended. we’ve realized just how good we are for each other and just how hard some of those qualities are to find – it put the nitty gritty details in the background. we are still young, but i am completely in love with him and happy about it.
i am not saying that this is necessarily the way to go for the original writer, but maybe some of the other commenters could consider the option with their significant others
omg… just the article i need it
now i can see clear and im over with my boyfriend
Yup yup. If there’s any doubt there is no doubt.
I’ve recently been in a very similar situation with someone I loved but who didn’t want to plan a future with me/ wasn’t going to grow up anytime soon. (I was 26 at the time also, quarter life crisis much) I went overseas and the distance made me see things clearly.. being with him everyday kind of made me doubt my intuition, he is a nice guy and I loved him, but it wasn’t right, I broke it off with him, and it was shit at first, but now I am SO SO SO SO much happier and it really didn’t take that long to get over it cos I knew it was for the best. I am so so so enjoying being single, I roll about in my bed every night thinking about how glad I am to have it to myself, you know? and I’m going to continue to enjoy it until the universe decides its time to send me someone gorgeous, and not allow myself to fall into relationships as easily as I’ve done in the past.