I have known my boyfriend since I was a junior in high school. We started working together and hit it off right away. The only problem was at the time he was dating someone and I was as well. We never messed around with each other because we didn’t believe in cheating on the other person. Both of our relationships at the time were horrible I was being abused my boyfriend and he was going through the same with his girlfriend by her cheating on him all the time. I ended up going off to college and we didn’t talk to one another at all during my first year being away at school. I could never seem to get him off my mind and still thought about him always. I came back home last May and ended up finding out he had broken up with his girlfriend and I had broken up with my boyfriend as well. I ended up sending him a text message and I heard back from him immediately. At the end of his first message that he sent back it ended up by saying “I have missed you”. We talked on the phone that night and it seemed that neither of our feelings had changed toward one another. We hit it off immediately and ended up starting to date one another officially in July. Our relationship was like a fairy tale all through out summer. He was the one that said “I love you” to me first and the first time we kissed he was shaking. He said he had never been so nervous and he was so scared to lose me, because he had never felt this way about someone before. Summer ended and I ended up going back to school. Were 100 miles away from each other but in the beginning of this year I was going home every weekend to spend time with him. Every thing was perfect. He came up on some weekends as well to spend time with me. As school started to get more intense I see him starting to drift away from me. He is in his second to last year of the PT program and school for him is extremely intense. He has told me he has never been so stressed out in his life before, and he is not being himself at all. Besides school he is working 40-50 hours a week, and is trying to make his car and house payments as well. He told me 2 weeks ago he needs his space because I am being too demanding and my wants and needs are something that he can’t give me right now. I don’t understand because we have made plans for our future of us moving in together, I’m transferring schools to be with him, he wanted to get engaged this summer, and we recently had a pregnancy scare that he was upset that came back negative. All those right there are pretty intense things to say to anyone especially a girl, because we take things to heart. We got together once over my break when I was home for Thanksgiving and he said he still loved me and wanted this to work out, but yet the thing he said that scared me was I asked him how he feels, and he said he doesn’t feel the same anymore. I asked him if he meant with me or with everything and he said he didn’t know. I asked him if he wanted to be with me still and he said yea. Now, I haven’t heard his voice for 8 days and he sent me a text message 5 days ago. I haven’t heard anything from him since. I’m trying to give him the space he needs. I have tried calling him or sending him a text for 4 days now. I don’t understand how someone can shut off to someone they supposedly love just like that. I want to know if his heart is still in this relationship anymore, because right now I feel its not. I talked to him mom and dad and they said he told them that he is so consumed in school right now and he is so afraid of failure. I feel though that as days go on this space, is starting to turn into a break and I can’t imagine my life without him. I don’t understand how hard it is to pick up the phone while your in the car to just said a text saying I love you or a quick call saying I’m really busy right now but I just wanted to call and say I love you and that I’m thinking about you. He use to do that all the time and multiple times a day but now it’s like I don’t even know who he is anymore. Do you think this is all stress and I should give him space and he will come back to me? Or do you think he has just fallen out of love with me, because he only wants to concentrate on school?

Give him all the space he needs, since he's the one who asked for it. When he is ready, he will come to you. Calling him will only serve to push him farther away. Respect his wishes and let him be for a while.

Give him space like blaze has said. Do not contact him, e-mail call him or send any letters, nothing.

This will only push him further away because he will be under more pressure.

It sounds as if he is concerned at the moment about his studies from what you say and it is understandable that he is concerned about the possibility of failure. This relationship could be putting pressure on him that he is just not ready for at this stage in his life.

I know you must be hurting but it won't do you any good searching for answers from him or his parents right now and you are unlikely to get then answers you really want.

Take a deep breath and take some steps back.. You are consumed with intense emotions which is understandable which is why you need to back off and give himself and yourself some time alone..

Stick around on here if you need to, there will be a huge amount of advice and support if you need it from a variety of people from all walks of life!

Yea don't contact him. It'll push him away. If he doesn't hear from you in a few days maybe he'll get scared of losing you and come around. In the meantime, go out. You're young, you're away at school go out and have fun. Keep your mind off him. He's doing his thing and you should do yours too. That doesn't mean go find someone else but don't sit around worrying about it all the time either because that does you no good and actually makes it harder on yourself. I know you love him but you have your life to live too.

Its extremely likely that its all in your head, just sit tight and don't smother him with all the emails, texts and phone calls. He will come back soon enough

If your boyfriend needs some time to figure things out in his life, I think you should respect that and give him the time he needs. He is probably going through some things right now that he needs to work out on his own. if you pester him to get back with you, he may end up resenting you in the future.

If he wants his space, I suggest that you give it to him. Let him work on his issues because even if you stay with him, these issues he has to deal with, may eventually cause problems in your relationship because he isn’t confronting his problems. I know you love him and you want to be with him and it hurts you but if you truly love him, you will allow him to work out his problems.

You want him to be happy while he is with you and if you don’t allow him the proper time to work out his issues, he may be with you but he won’t be happy. Do the right thing and give him his space, even though it will be very hard on you. If you truly love him, the right thing for you to do is to let him go right now. Let him straighten out his life and in the meantime, take some time to yourself and explore life outside of your relationship with him.

Life has no guarantees - there's always a possibility that this will end up as an official "break", but you have to back off to find out.