cathosaurus
Dec 27, 2007, 08:56 AM
Seeking Advice:
I have been with my boyfriend for one year this new years and we will have lived together for six months at that point. I am deeply concerned about the state of our relationship as we fight almost daily and frequently talk about breaking up. We were, at one point, deeply and passionately in love. We still get along great as friends, but absolutely not as lovers.
The first six months we were together was absolutely perfect. I had friends tell me that our relationship gave them hope that they too would someday find someone so perfectly matched. When we met I already had plans to move to California (from the midwest) and because we had such an amazing first 6 months (we were already talking about marriage) he decided to move with me to Cali. After we moved we basically stopped having sex immediately (before we moved it ranged from multiple times a week to multiple times a day) and began to fight consistently (maybe once a week?).
He told me that this has happened with every single girlfriend he has. He stops desiring sex after a certain amount of time and the girl gets angry/frustrated. Is this common?
We did not have a good experience in California. Our housing situation was expensive and unstable, it took him a few months to find a job(which of course caused tension), I was miserable at my job, he hated the people on the west coast, etc... I assumed that these stressors were the possible cause of his disinterest in sex.. . And I still think we were both extremely depressed during this time.
Things really started to fall apart when I discovered he had been looking at pornography multiple times a week during this time. I have no issues with pornography IF we have a healthy sexual relationship - something we did not and continue to not have. It hurts me that despite knowing that I am physically and emotionally frustrated and struggling due to the lack of intimacy in our relationship that he would look at other women... This made me start to think it was ME he was unhappy with and not our living situation.
I spoke with him about it, he was, of course, very embarrassed, but the conversation lead in a direction I never would have expected. He mentioned the death of his father (he passed when my boyfriend was 10 years old). He was never put in counseling about it or had anyone to talk to. He thinks it has effected his ability to feel emotion and has impended on his ability to live in the "real" life because as a mourning child, he drowned himself in video games, movies, music, and the internet. He told me that it is easier for him to look at porn than have sex and that is it easier for him to play video games than interact with people he doesn't know. Could this be legitimate?
So mid November we decided to move back to the midwest. It was not my first choice, but I was ready to do just about anything to save our relationship. We've probably had more sex this month and a half than we did the entire time in California, but we fight CONSTANTLY and I am still not sexually fulfilled. (I think we've had sex 5-6 times since moving home compared to 3-4 times during the entirety of our stay in CA).
Then Last week we were at a friends and he dissappeared for quite a while. When I checked the back porch where people usually smoke ciggerettes and checked the bathroom and no one else had seen him, I left out the back door, walked around the house, and low and behold found him smoking a ciggerette with a girl that had been hitting on him/hanging on him all night. This was VERY unlike him. I said hi and walked off. When he came inside he approached me already defensive, as if he knew he was doing something out of the ordinary. I told him I was upset but didn't want to fight cause we had both been drinking and we were in public. So I went home. He texted me a few times and then nothing. Silence. He didn't come home that night. He says nothing happened, and I believe him, but still...
So just a few days later we went to a concert and had a blast. This was on a Friday, his birthday was on Saturday. Because we are both still unemployed, we had gone out about 4 nights that week. I told him I wanted to go home to rest up for his birthday celebration and recoup from the party-full week and somehow it turned into a huge fight. He went out with some of our friends, yelled at me on the phone in front of them, refused to come home to even talk about anything until I got a phone call at 5a.m. with him trying to walk home trashed in the snow. During this time I had packed up my suitcase, put the dogs in the car and spent 3 hours listening to the radio in a grocery store parking lot cause I couldn't think where else to go at 1am when the fight started.
Long story short I never imagined myself staying in a relationship where I was miserable. I feel trapped. I feel like I am in hell. Granted, he doesn't typically stay out all night - these are all new developments in the past 2 weeks. But I feel so undesired, so worthless. I feel like I am his roommate, not his lover, not his love. I was trying to be empathetic, trying to be understanding and work with these issues - but I feel like these past few weeks have gone to a whole new lever. He didn't come home. Twice.
He has promised he would call a counselor and yet has not. He has done little to nothing to find a job and I am panicking about finances. I thought moving home would fix things and it has not. Now we are stuck in a year long lease together and I, in my impulsiveness, have already mentioned us breaking up multiple times. I feel like he doesn't want to talk about us or our relationship. I feel like I am constantly nagging. I feel like he doesn't want to put any effort into LIFE - just getting him to fill out a job application causes a huge fight. I know I am probably not communicating in a constructive way, but I am feeling hurt and angry and I'm tired of feeling like I have to beg for sex or walk on egg shells to keep him from being angry.
If you've made it this far - here is my question. Does this sound like something that is solvable? Is there a chance it really has nothing to do with me and my getting upset has caused this downward spiral? Does this sound like a man that is disinterested but not ready to cut things loose? Do you think we moved in together too soon? Do you think living in California caused depression for us both and our fighting just made it worse? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
I have been with my boyfriend for one year this new years and we will have lived together for six months at that point. I am deeply concerned about the state of our relationship as we fight almost daily and frequently talk about breaking up. We were, at one point, deeply and passionately in love. We still get along great as friends, but absolutely not as lovers.
The first six months we were together was absolutely perfect. I had friends tell me that our relationship gave them hope that they too would someday find someone so perfectly matched. When we met I already had plans to move to California (from the midwest) and because we had such an amazing first 6 months (we were already talking about marriage) he decided to move with me to Cali. After we moved we basically stopped having sex immediately (before we moved it ranged from multiple times a week to multiple times a day) and began to fight consistently (maybe once a week?).
He told me that this has happened with every single girlfriend he has. He stops desiring sex after a certain amount of time and the girl gets angry/frustrated. Is this common?
We did not have a good experience in California. Our housing situation was expensive and unstable, it took him a few months to find a job(which of course caused tension), I was miserable at my job, he hated the people on the west coast, etc... I assumed that these stressors were the possible cause of his disinterest in sex.. . And I still think we were both extremely depressed during this time.
Things really started to fall apart when I discovered he had been looking at pornography multiple times a week during this time. I have no issues with pornography IF we have a healthy sexual relationship - something we did not and continue to not have. It hurts me that despite knowing that I am physically and emotionally frustrated and struggling due to the lack of intimacy in our relationship that he would look at other women... This made me start to think it was ME he was unhappy with and not our living situation.
I spoke with him about it, he was, of course, very embarrassed, but the conversation lead in a direction I never would have expected. He mentioned the death of his father (he passed when my boyfriend was 10 years old). He was never put in counseling about it or had anyone to talk to. He thinks it has effected his ability to feel emotion and has impended on his ability to live in the "real" life because as a mourning child, he drowned himself in video games, movies, music, and the internet. He told me that it is easier for him to look at porn than have sex and that is it easier for him to play video games than interact with people he doesn't know. Could this be legitimate?
So mid November we decided to move back to the midwest. It was not my first choice, but I was ready to do just about anything to save our relationship. We've probably had more sex this month and a half than we did the entire time in California, but we fight CONSTANTLY and I am still not sexually fulfilled. (I think we've had sex 5-6 times since moving home compared to 3-4 times during the entirety of our stay in CA).
Then Last week we were at a friends and he dissappeared for quite a while. When I checked the back porch where people usually smoke ciggerettes and checked the bathroom and no one else had seen him, I left out the back door, walked around the house, and low and behold found him smoking a ciggerette with a girl that had been hitting on him/hanging on him all night. This was VERY unlike him. I said hi and walked off. When he came inside he approached me already defensive, as if he knew he was doing something out of the ordinary. I told him I was upset but didn't want to fight cause we had both been drinking and we were in public. So I went home. He texted me a few times and then nothing. Silence. He didn't come home that night. He says nothing happened, and I believe him, but still...
So just a few days later we went to a concert and had a blast. This was on a Friday, his birthday was on Saturday. Because we are both still unemployed, we had gone out about 4 nights that week. I told him I wanted to go home to rest up for his birthday celebration and recoup from the party-full week and somehow it turned into a huge fight. He went out with some of our friends, yelled at me on the phone in front of them, refused to come home to even talk about anything until I got a phone call at 5a.m. with him trying to walk home trashed in the snow. During this time I had packed up my suitcase, put the dogs in the car and spent 3 hours listening to the radio in a grocery store parking lot cause I couldn't think where else to go at 1am when the fight started.
Long story short I never imagined myself staying in a relationship where I was miserable. I feel trapped. I feel like I am in hell. Granted, he doesn't typically stay out all night - these are all new developments in the past 2 weeks. But I feel so undesired, so worthless. I feel like I am his roommate, not his lover, not his love. I was trying to be empathetic, trying to be understanding and work with these issues - but I feel like these past few weeks have gone to a whole new lever. He didn't come home. Twice.
He has promised he would call a counselor and yet has not. He has done little to nothing to find a job and I am panicking about finances. I thought moving home would fix things and it has not. Now we are stuck in a year long lease together and I, in my impulsiveness, have already mentioned us breaking up multiple times. I feel like he doesn't want to talk about us or our relationship. I feel like I am constantly nagging. I feel like he doesn't want to put any effort into LIFE - just getting him to fill out a job application causes a huge fight. I know I am probably not communicating in a constructive way, but I am feeling hurt and angry and I'm tired of feeling like I have to beg for sex or walk on egg shells to keep him from being angry.
If you've made it this far - here is my question. Does this sound like something that is solvable? Is there a chance it really has nothing to do with me and my getting upset has caused this downward spiral? Does this sound like a man that is disinterested but not ready to cut things loose? Do you think we moved in together too soon? Do you think living in California caused depression for us both and our fighting just made it worse? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.