Fully committed relationship

[sl34]

What is your definition of a fully committed relationship?

[Scattylatte]

for me its about being exclusively with someone. But I have been accused of being non committed in the past because I like to do my own thing as well, see my friends, do my hobbies. For the person i was with committed meant doing things he saw as traditionally couple things. For me that wasnt relevant. I was in my mind committed to the relationship though!

[paula900]

What about if you only see eachother once a week after 4 months?

[milkteef]

Being monogamous, comitting to being together through thick and thin, honesty, having alone time but plenty of time together and earned trust.

To me it's very much about building your lives around your relationship. Have jobs and friends and hobbies that are separate but also friends and hobbies together. It's about working as a partnership and being open, honest and faithful and not stray/leave when life throws a handful of shit at you.

[FateLovesTheFearless]

Being exclusive. Making decisions together for a mutually happy future. Not walking out when the going gets tough.

[NikkiNicks]

It's hard to know when one type of relationship progresses onto another type isn't it? I'm at that place now were I'm wondering if we're still just two people going on dates together or if we're actually "an item". He talks like we are - but it's only been a month.

[QuacksForDoughnuts]

Paula900 it depends if the couple in question live near each other. Before I lived with OH we were three hours apart on the train, he worked full time and I had two or three part-time jobs, neither of us had a huge amount of time or money. We were very much committed, stuck together through some crappy and stressful times, but generally saw each other in person every other week at most. In termtime this was just for a long weekend, it was sometimes for longer in vacations but this could also mean longer gaps between visits.

[OhEmGee24]

Agree with milkteef

[HotTinRoof]

Why exclusive? What about committed couples in an open relationship?

[OhEmGee24]

Can you be committed in an open relationship?!

[solidgoldbrass]

Something most women are actually better off without.

[OhEmGee24]

Really sgb?

[Almostfifty]

I don't think so sgb. There are a lot of lovely men out there. My relationship has been committed for the past 25 years and is great. We've had times with DH commuting, times when he's been away for months at a time, but we're a team and extremely happy.

We make sure we have time for each other, kissing goodbye every morning we can and kissing hello every evening. When DH is away I'm the last person he speaks to every night as he's going to sleep.

I'm not saying it's always been perfect, but we've always known that we're happy together and nothing can hurt that.

[NotReadyForAutumn]

For us, being fully committed means being exclusive, enjoying the good bits and working through the bad bits.

[solidgoldbrass]

OK, slightly taking the piss but the way women are generally encouraged and even pressured to prioritize The Perfect Relationship over everything else is not healthy. There is more to life than couplehood, and couplehood still, for far too many women, means putting up with a lot of crap, whether that's having to do 85% of the domestic work and then suck cock, or whether it's actual abuse.

There's a whole industry telling women how to 'work at' relationships, which generally boils down to 'Eat shit, or you'll be single'. Men are not advised, encouraged or pressured to change their behaviour in order to achieve couplehood, because the cultural myth is that men get to choose and control couple-relationships while women need them and have to be 'given' them.

And yeah yeah, blah blah, Not Your Nigel - of course some people have lovely, life-enhancing, equal-partner relationships and good luck to them. But it's better to be single than to be in a crap relationship, and even if you really really want a couple-relationship, you shouldn't settle for a rubbish one just because it's the only offer you've had.

[Lovingfreedom]

Agree with a lot you're saying sgb. A lot of pressure on women to work on their relationships. Stand by your man. Not all a bed of roses. Ups and downs. Keeping the family together for the sake of the kids. Celebrating long marriages as if some kind of achievement. Don't let yourself go. Aahh can't imagine many guys going through all this. But you're right...prob some good ones.

[garlicnuts]

What SGB said. I would like to think my view is tainted by my long history of truly awful relationships, in which I was fully committed. I certainly 'worked' hard at them: read "sacrificed myself to them". Then I see zillions of threads in Chat and AIBU; I hear the women down the shops; I realise that the majority of women are making disproportionate sacrifices to their relationship commitment.

Being single isn't so bad. I agree that 'commitment' is oversold to women. Being in an equal, balanced, happy, mutually supportive relationship is ideal - but singledom is a better alternative than commitment to an unequal partnership.

From a more distant perspective: I was a fan of Helen Gurley-Brown (inventor of Cosmopolitan) overall. On reading her obituaries and memorials, I am reminded that, when she advocated "Having it all", she never meant this for women with children. She meant, simply, the Cosmo life of a satisfying career, good friends and plenty of great sex. She assumed that a Cosmo life was so good for women, they would only give "it all" up for the ideal relationship, with children. Sadly it didn't work out that way and her magazine is now little better than a "How To Get A Man" manual.

She wasn't wrong, though. It's usual for men to focus their energies on career, friends and great sex. If they decide they want kids, it's usual for them to seek a woman who will make an efficient family partnership. The business of "full commitment" is less consuming, to most men, than it is to women. In my opinion, this actually leads women to sacrifice themselves on the altar of The Relationship, unasked and often unprompted.

In short, sl34, a fully committed relationship would be one where mutual respect is complete and equal; where goals and labour sharing are clearly set out on equal terms; where both parties are equally flexible and considerate, and where the commitment has been openly discussed and honestly made. I don't see too many of those tbh.

[garlicnuts]

Gawd, soap-box or what!

[Lovingfreedom]

....blimey....bet OP wishes she never asked now! lol.

[sandy167]

Would you class a committed relationship as when you only see eachother once a week after 3 months and only live 6 miles down the road?

[Conflugenglugen]

sandy167 - I think it was you whose post I read yesterday. I think the only person who can answer that question is you. What does 'commitment' feel like for you? Once you know that, do you feel committed? Do you feel your partner is committed?

[sandy167]

When someone wants to see you a lot and feel like you are very special to them. Once a week does not feel like committment to me and he and i are only 6 miles away so i don't feel he is that into me as i am into him. I have discussed all this with him but he doesn't seem to understand that i want to see more of him. How can you ever get to know someone properly if you hardly see them. 3 times a week would be enough and once at the weekend or weekends together. That gives us both time to spend together and time apart to do our individual interests. This is the first 'relationship' i have had after 6 years of singledom. At the age of 30 i have NEVER had a long term relationship.

[Conflugenglugen]

What does he say when you tell him, "OH, I want to see more of you. Three times a week would be enough and once at the weekend, or weekends together. How can I ever get to know you properly if I feel like I'm hardly seeing you?"

[sandy167]

He says that he likes his own space a lot!!! I have to mention that he is 17 years older than me though i don't think the age is an issue but i am beginning to feel it is.

[Conflugenglugen]

Come on Sandy, love - I've read your other threads. Last month you were resolute about the fact that you were dumping him, and now you're here asking this question.

You are in denial -that's the long and the short of it. He is never - repeat never - going to be the person you want in a partner. Don't stay somewhere just because you'd rather be in a relationship than not be in one, and fgs, don't stay in a relationship for the sex (because I'm sure that's a large part of it), when that's all there seems to be and yet you want more.

My feeling is that you're posting left, right, and centre about this wanting someone to tell you that you that you're making the right decision staying with him, that he will indeed change, when clearly he will not. He. Will. Not.

Go and find someone who is worth your time, and maybe invest some of that time in working out why it is that you have such little self-belief that you'd tolerate this.

[HotDAMNlifeisgood]

what SGB and garlic said.

Although I wish it weren't so.