I have gone out with my girlfriend for just over two years. The last several months have been flat, we have been drifting apart literally. She has an alcohol problem that always resulted in a fight whenever i brought it up. It is only recently when I mentioned breaking up that she admitted to it and even promised to get help. She didn’t. Of course I am not a saint either.

Lately we have been fighting over all sorts of issues, and she has even started being disrespectful and almost verbally abusive, especially when drunk. The more I think about it, the more I feel that the chance for long-term happiness in this relationship is too small to invest further. I therefore want out and I have brought it up with her, but she insisted on giving it a final chance but we never even got started on the actions we had agreed on.

The issue I have is that she moved in almost a year ago. She cannot afford the rent by herself so she would have to move out. In addition to the break up she would have to deal with looking for a house and moving. What would be a sensitive way to handle this? Is there a ’sensitive’ way? I was thinking about moving out for about a week to help her gather her thoughts and plans together. Is this good enough?

Exchanges take place between people’s characteristics, don’t they? Some people with high age and lots passion still enjoy every new thing in their life, while some young people just are the diehard and refuse to change their mind to accept the new things.
Believe it or not, one young man I know lists all the exciting things on the forbidden list. He doesn’t drink, doesn’t smoke, and even doesn’t take part in the crazy party. All he likes to do is reading or taking part in some normal conferences. He even collects things he brought back from conferences. There are thirty rubber wristbands, twelve ID cards and even some strange hats used in the conference—- Jesus, what kind of conferences they are? —- in his collection. He is kind of bookish. But unfortunately, he is my boyfriend. Besides the old diehard things, he is a nice man. He cares about the family, cares about his friends, and the most important thing is we love each other. For the love’s sake, I could bear all the things for him. But when I am tired, I think may be I should give up him.
He is a nice guy, he could cook meals and he is a good cook. But he refuses all the new style of dishes; he only cooks what he wants to eat. He could be a good athlete, but he plays football only and considers the basketball game as the one for giant nuts. For showing his attitude, he forbids me to take part in the cheer leader audition. He even does not like me to wear the short skirts or short dresses. With the consideration of these actions as the proof of love, I keep myself staying beside him. But this insisting made me crazy and tired, should I leave?

Great article. Thanks. Will keep the link for reference.

My son is twenty six and has been with the same woman for eight years, they married two years ago. A month ago she left him for a well to do couple, yes, a man and a woman!
He is devastated. He has been making himself sick, making all of us worry, he speaks of ending his life. He loves this woman very much and feels that these people have bought her. Sometimes she will tell him she is coming over and then he is walking on air, but when she shines him on it starts all over again.
This woman is my daughter in law and I love her too. I don’t understand why she has done this and if its over between them then why make him suffer with maybes?

I have a bf of 4 years. We are both in school and trying to accomplish our goals. He is unemployed and all he does is play video games am frustrated. I have to wait to hang out until his game is over. Am about to dump his ass he is 26 years old my gosh!! Video games are for kids.

I have decided to end nearly a 2 year relationship with my partner who works in the same work place as I do. How should I approach this? I know that things need to be kept professional but I’m not sure what ground rules I need to set

I have been with my boyfriend for 3.5 years. We are seniors in college and are on our second year living together in our apartment. I have been having serious doubts about our relationship over the past year. Our first year living together he was so lazy and never got a job. His parents paid for his rent and I paid for food and my rent. I pay for everything I have and take out loans for college. He has played video games ever since we met and has quit on and off, but only for weeks at a time. Every time we have a serious talk about him quitting he says he will and only does for a week. This is a huge issue in our relationship. We also haven’t had sex much for the past month. I feel like he is not interested and he always says he is too tired. But he is boring in bed and I finally realized that he is. The only reason I enjoy having sex with him is because I have an imagination. He is unwilling to try anything new and fun. He is so self conscious. We usually have great communication about everything in our relationship, but he doesn’t want to communicate lately. I have threatened to break up with him if he doesn’t try to change and compromise for our relationship. When I threatened to break up he was so scared and just kept telling me how much me loves me and how he will change and I don’t believe he will change. I have given him many chances. 3.5 years of chances. I don’t want to waste anymore time and I have my whole life ahead of me. It am not sure i am even ready to break up. We are so different and i wonder if we are too different to be together. I almost wish he would cheat on me so it would be easy to break it off and I would have a good reason to do so with out any regrets. I don’t want to feel like he was the one who got away. He is so nice and sweet, but lacks the passion that I have for romance, life and love. He is so serious and judgemental. He won’t go out because he is to insecure and anti social. He would rather play video games.

A major problem is that we live together and have a pet bird together. Living together and having an pet bird makes things so much harder. We are in an apartment and i can’t afford rent by myself and wouldn’t be able to find a room mate. He would want me to take our bird and If i moved out i would need a pet friendly apartment. I am 21 and don’t have my drivers licence and am scared of being alone. I also reciently quit my job and now am relying on financial aid. I have no family support because I came from an abusive family and choose to exclude them from my life. I am terrified to be alone.

I love my boyfriend very much still, but it is difficult to be with him at times because I wonder what I am missing in my life. I want more passion and excitement. He obviously doesn’t want to live live because he just plays video games, has no friends, and doesn’t like to go out and do things. I am opposite and I want much more out of life. I feel like things could work out if he decides to change, but I have given him so many opportunities. I feel stuck and scared. I also feel like I have no one. I have invested so much time into this relationship that I don’t have many close friends. I am so scared. I wish there was an answer or someone to help me through this difficult time, but I have no one.

Belive me, I have tried to work things out and we have had many conversations about these things, but I don’t know what to do. I am willing to compromise and do anything to change this relationship for the better, but I don’t feel like he is.

Sorry this is so long.

PLEASE HELP!!!! Please

Get a bus pass, then a drivers license but first get out! When you say you share a bird let me say be glad it is NOT a child! You are staying because abuse is something you know but let me tell you with every confidence that not being used is the best of all feelings. You sound ready to go so make the plans necessary find a room to rent if you must but get out on your own and make yourself a great new life you earned it!!!!!

My boyfriend and I are comin up on two years this jan, i have been thinking aboutusbreakin upfor a long time. It seems all we do is have problems. i am not happy with how things are between us and i’m sure he isnteither. but we keep insisting that things will get better and we can work it out. I’ve tried and tried and frankly i cant even see how we even spent this much time together. he dooesnt like me, i know he doesnt, we are not of the same religion, we dont have to same goals in life, we definately dont have the same drive to achieve those goals. There toomany areas where we dont see eye to eye. The biggest problem for me is that i always have to change for him, he doesnt like anything i do nor how i do it. I also dont appreaciate our financial problems. It doesnt make sense to me how everything was good for thefirst year and just took a complete 360 turn for the worst. I also dont feel attracted to him any more. I find myself thinkin about other people and talking to alot of other people. He is very overprotective and i cant have any male friends that he doesnt think i like. i dont like his friends he doesnt like mine. we never seem to appreciate or care about each other unless time has come between us.then we are like i missed you and i coudlt wait to see you and blah blah blah. it still just seems as thuogh we arent right for each other but we dont want to see the other with someone else. i think i’m afraid of breaking up with him because i dont know what i’m doing. I’m only 20 years old, i’m supposed to be having the time of my life right now, and yet i’m not. i wonder if we became to serious to quick or what.it seemed as if we could have spent forever together butit is all changed now. WHAT DO I DO, I”M SO CONFUSED!!!

@cathy –

Girl i feel like I am reading my life story to myself, and i cant even answer you i can only say i know exactly how u feel. Will someone please help us????????

Help,

I have been seing a younger guy for about 7 months now and things are all spicy and good so so. I dont go out with him with my friends and keep that “relationship” separate from my others. No one knows of him nor do they realise ive been with someone. I wanna break up and i dont want to im sooo confused. His a sweet guy n seems to do all the write things but the fact that i am 8 yrs older than him bothers me to no end … ive tried twice to break it off and then his like we agreed we just friends to get me to stay. In reality its become more than that im afraid to hurt him but …argh i hate being on the fence and i doubt ill ever be ok with people more especially my family knowing that im with someone sooo much younger.

My boyfriend and I have been together for 2 years, and we’re seniors in high school. In the past, he’s been an unintentionally emotionally abusive boyfriend, and his love for me back then bordered on obsession and controlling my wants. It’s not until recently that I’ve found my strength by finally confiding in my friends, and they agreed with me to give him a small break. It wasn’t until that moment that he realized that he was taking me for granted and completely took a 180 degree turn around.

After about 3 months of an essential stalemate, I’ve asked for a week all to myself so that I can balance out my life better. While he’s extremely worried about the outcome– whether or not I break up with him– he understands and gives me my space. However, I am completely unsure as to what I want.

In the last three days, we both understand each other better, there is more honesty in the relationship, and we both respect each other’s lives and dreams and goals. He is hardworking, knows how to joke around, makes me laugh, and very generous with his love. He still feels terrible about the things he’s forced me to do and still loves me the same as ever. He still feels as if he owes me a debt, and he’s doing all that he can to make it up to me. It’s my first relationship.

In this week, I’ve been having such a great time just with my girlfriends and my family again. I feel renewed. I feel each day is a happy day. But I’m tempted by the light relationship that we both truly want: just exercising together, spending some time outside of school, little physical contact at school, and once in a while, go out for dinner or a movie. It sounds completely reasonable, and this is my ideal relationship. I know this is what he truly wants because I believe his warm honesty and logic when he was telling me all of this. Back then, I believe I was his first true love and he was so afraid of losing me that he unintentionally became controlling.

I am a forgiving person, and I know I have the capacity to forgive him and reenter a lighter, healthier relationship with him if I had the incentive to. But what is my incentive? Balancing my life is a challenging enough. I’m often uncomfortable with his reactive, negative way of thinking. It feels awkward and uncomfortable when he is joking and swearing in front of his friends, and then turns around to kiss me and say something in his typical, uncomfortable brusque way. I’m not sure if I love him anymore. The pain I had to go through with him in the past is still slightly haunting me when I’m with him. Should I be strong enough to make the effort to forgive him, or just move on? Am I so young that it doesn’t matter at this point? I’m not sure I’m willing to make the change and be back in a relationship, or just break it off it with him.

Truth to be told, I am perfectly happy, and in fact, freer and happier without him in my life. However, we’ve never been completely honest with each other and truly understood that what we both truly want now is a light relationship. He is a honest, intelligent guy. Now, the problem is if I’m willing to take the risk in being back in a relationship again.

What do you think?

Hi, I am having problems with my boyfriend. He is a nice guy but I think I don’t really like him. The problem is that my last boyfriend never really talked to me, and we never got to hang out. So when I broke it off with him,(explaining to him that I liked him a lot but I could not deal with never seeing one another.) This other guy was sorta there to comfort me. Long story short he asked me out too my schools winter formal and I said yes. We then began to date each other and Have been going out for over 3 weeks.

I am starting to feel bad about accepting this relationship. My friends don’t really know what I see in him, and we don’t have anything in common. Also he is a year ahead of me and will be going to a different school next year. I have started to make excuses to why I couldn’t hangout with him. And every morning I dread seeing his face. I never thought that I would hate dating someone! I get scared everytime he calls/texts me and I’m afraid to reply to them.

What I don’t like about him is that he often lets people make fun of him and doesn’t stand up for himself. Then when people make fun of me for going out with them I end up defending him for his sake! I have enough problems on my plate I don’t need someone else’s too. He also Is an advid sports fan, I like to read. He loves math, I love drama. He watches the sports channel I watch tbs.

My parents are going through a really bad period in their marrage and have decided to scream at each other every night. Because of this reason I don’t really believe in love anymore. In fact I don’t want to get in a another relationship for awhile. I know this sounds cheese but my heart hurts all the time now.

Please, someone give me advice on how to handle this situation carefully.

I have been with my boyfriend for about 15 mos. and everything was fine the first year, we got matching tattoos with each other names on our backs we were love birds. We talked about marriage and how we really love each other then one day he started acting distant out of nowhere, he changed we stop having all the good romance we use to have and he started having a dont give a fu** attitude and start saying relationships are overrated and women are dogs and bla bla bla. This hurts me so much because a few months earlier he was just telling me to be patient he will make me the happiest woman in the world. And we live together now he started telling me he think we should move out. Please someone give me some advice I love this man and iam very scared to lose him this way.we had plans to be with each other for a long ride!

@Ms. Barbie –
Ms. Barbie,
Reading your comment made me wonder why you are hanging on. You are like most women, we hang on to the dream and refuse to face the reality. His present is the reality not the past and certainly not the future. I waited far too many years for a man I knew was a liar. Guess what all that love and faithfulness rewarded me with…..another set of lies.
Having wasted far too much time and energy on a man that showed me by action that he was a liar I decided to end the realtionship and he refused to go away. I listened to the I love you’s and watching TV the other day I heard a quote from Maya Angelou, “When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time” . I heard that and realized I never gave him the credit he deserved from the begining of the relationship. He showed me who he was A LIAR and I refused to believe him the first second third….thousandth time but the last two days I decided to believe him…he is a liar he will always be a liar and everything he says to me is a liar’s words. Listen to this man he changed his mind and only absence makes the heart grow fonder so instead of hanging on leave and let him be.

I have been with my boyfriend for almost 9 years now, off and on. In the beginning it was great, we did everything together. Then I guess I matured and he hasn’t. He was more involved in “college life”, for lack of a better term. He partied a lot, went out a lot, while I kept my nose in books trying to better my life. Then I ended up pregnant and we moved in together. Things got better at first, he was always there, stopped partying, etc. But after our son was born, he started to lapse back into those ways. I don’t get help around the house. I do the cleaning, laundry, practically everything. I go to school full-time to get my PhD, and he does stay home to watch our son so we don’t have to worry about daycare. But, am I wrong to expect a little help? Everytime I bring it up he says he wants help from me too. But I clean up everytime. After our son goes to sleep he goes out with his friends, whom Im not all too thrilled about. My boyfriend used to have ambitions in life, go to college and get a degree to be a teacher. Then he lost all that. I’ve come to realize that I’ve grown up and he hasn’t, and I can’t stay in a relationship where I take care of two children, when one doesnt have to be a child. However, I dont know what to do? We are very far from any family, and I am concerned about my son and what will happen to him. I go to school full-time and its hard to afford much on student loans. My schedule really doesn’t allow me to work. But I don’t want to stay in a relationship just for free childcare. I know that isn’t fair. I need some suggestion and some help. I dont know what to do or how to go about it. Everything’s harder when a child is involved.

@Laura – It doesn’t sound like you boyfriends heart is in the relationship. I’m sorry for your situation, but only you can really answer the question of if you want to continue living this way or not. The blame game is a comman one, you say he doesn’t do enough, he says you don’t do enough, been there done that.. I would suggest cutting back on college courses and perhaps getting a part time job to pay for child care, as he’s the father he would also need to help support the child, as long as he didn’t try/get them as custodial parent in court, as mine did with lies… another option is that the father still babysits but you don’t live together.

This statement in the article Im sure is true in some cases, but after my 19 year abusive relationship it wasn’t. “But the fact that it is also very difficult to be the one who actually leaves is something you only know if you have experienced it.” It was the happiest day of my life, that I was actually strong enough to leave, finances were an issue, but I had hope and strength to leave. I often think back to being with him, and even in my mind can’t stand it and run away as fast as possible. The mental abuse was horrific. I’d rather starve to death then be near him again.

@Jaelyn – Personally, it sounds like you’re not ready to share your life with any particular person. You like the “single” life.

i think its really hard to break up with someone you really love according to me i feel that have to break up with the guy i love because i feel that he only wants me to have sex and feel good …
so im gona make him choose between me and those things to see if he really loves me..
so what do u think about it i see that its a big problem!!!