[flash33]

Hi, I'm 18 soon and have been dating my girlfriend for over a year now. We love each other and this is no kind of puppy love. I will start by telling you how our relationship progressed throughout the year.

When we first started dating, everything was fine, casual and at about 3 months into the relationship, it started to get really serious and everything has been fine, with very little fights until about late October.

One day, late October, my girlfriend and I are in a text fight and she tells me I don't have the time that she would like for herself anymore and that this is not going to work etc so I reevaluate and reluctantly agree with her, because who am I to go against her opinion right? So the next day I met her and started talking to her and told her that she was probably right and that I am not going to have as much time as she would lke for her the following year (final year of highschool) and as she has been saying for the past 6 months "once year 12 starts, we are prob going to break up, because nobody makes it through year 12 (the hsc - Australian higher school examination for university entrees), I guess I saw some truth in what she was saying so I thought we should break up now than go through this next year, better now than later. But when I did give in, and tell her we should break up she really started fighting for us. I was under the assumption that it would be a mutual decision, but it was not? Anyway... a month passed where we weren't as strong as before when we had our next big fight... basically I told her not to worry and that we will come through.
Things were fine for a couple of weeks but for the next month and a half things seemed rather half hearted on both our parts until we had about 4 serious fights. In our final fight I really dug deep and decided that this is the girl that I would want to spend the rest of my life with so I told her I would do whatever it took and really have been... Ive been seeing her more, even if it goes out of my way by hours, or I am busy, ditching my friends constantly (leaving me friendless) just ensuring that she is my number 1 and making sure she knows that she is.

Prior, at around 4 months into our relationship she told me she had an eating disorder years ago where she didn't like her body.. but has come to accept it for the way it is recently. And since October she has mentioned that she has been depressed but I could not believe it to be a mental condition, rather just an excuse for somethingas she pops it in whenever we fought.. but last month she told me again and this time it really sunk in and I believed her and I felt like absolute **** as before she told me it was because of me that she became like this and I started believing that again so for a week I was a zombie and I was emotionally drained. She told me that we should prob go on a break for me because I am not happy anymore as I told her that my happiness heavily relied on her happiness and as I really believed she was happy before, and only depressed whenever we fought, I made sure for the past couple of months that we did not fight whatsoever, when she then told me she was depressed. I did not know what to do when she asked for a break for me but I refused and told her that was silly and after that week I got a little better. Last night however she told me she wanted to go on a break but I don't know if she wants me to fight for us this time... I am so emotionally drained and I do not feel anything anymore and have not felt anything in a long time. What should I do?

(also when she told me she was depressed I really told her to go see someone but she refused to do so)

-F

[southamerica]

First of all, you are not her therapist. If she is truly depressed she should seek professional help. No relationship should leave you feeling "emotionally drained"--in fact that feeling is the number one red flag for toxic relationships.

I understand that you love her and want to help her, but sometimes other people's problems are out of our control and you have to back away if she refuses to get help for herself. She also seems to be playing tug-of-war with you: "come here, go away, come here, go away" and it's a really unhealthy game.

You are young and had the intent of focusing on school during year 12, maybe you should reconsider that. Let her figure her mess out and let the future happen how it will. For yourself I would say back away.

Good luck.

[Fr_Chuck]

If you want to help her, drive her to therapy. If she will not go, she really does not want help yet

[Aprilshowers44]

It seems to me like this relationship is not working out for either of you, at least not right now. You 2 need to sit down and talk (not when you're mad and fighting) but when things are calm and decide how this will play out. If she really does have all these disorders (depression and previous eating disorder)then she needs professional help because (try as you might) you can not help her in this area. Maybe ask her if she wants to take a short break to evaluate how you both feel when you are apart, this will give her an easy out if she doesn't want to be with you and she won't be expecting you to fight for the relationship. Let her know that if she doesn't want a break then she needs to seek counseling because this behavior of on/off will only keep repeating itself. You need to offer her options but let her know that you will be there if she needs you as you two work through these issues. I wish you the best!