Can love conquer all?

[Peppin]

Do you believe that if 2 people love each other, they can work anything out? Or do you think sometimes you have to accept that even though you both love each other, you simply can't make your relationship work?

Have been with DP for 2.5 years. He's not bothered about having his own kids but is brilliant with mine. We're both in our mid-30s, and live about an hour apart. I have my own home and he currently lives in a shared house. My kids love him and he is an important part of their lives: every weekend he arrives on Friday night and stays until Monday morning.

For a long time, I have wanted us to move in together. He's always said he does too, but there has always been a reason why it couldn't be quite yet.

I've felt that this constant delaying is insincere, i.e. that the real issue isn't the logistics/timing, but that he is not sure about the relationship. He has admitted that he does have doubts - these are to do with the fact that I have a very strong personality and he is quite gentle and feels I can be abrasive when I should be soothing and sympathetic. There is truth in this. I am just not as "nice" a person as he is.

This weekend, it came to a head over the most trivial thing on Friday night - a comment that he took exception to, and stormed out with all his stuff, declaring the relationship over. I was devastated. I saw him yesterday (he'd left behind some things he needed for work) and he looked miserable and said he'd never loved anyone as much as me and didn't want our relationship to be over but felt he could not commit to me without some "security" for himself first.

I don't know what to do now because I love him, I think he loves me, and I feel that if I tell him I want us to make it work, he will probably agree to move in and give it a go. But nothing has actually changed overnight, and so the reservations he has had up to now would still be there, albeit he would be repressing them to "give it another go". I can't believe that overnight, the relationship I have hoped would be "the one" for 2.5 years can just end. But maybe if it is never going to work, I should just accept that now?

What should I do?

at least he only has himself to consider - this woman had a child whose future she needed to safeguard also.

ok my question at this point would be if you are happy why not continue as you are? and by the sounds of it you have some doubts about him anyway so it would give you more time to know him.

I honestly think hes being sensible. He doesnt want to move in yet if at all. Youre pressurising him and hes telling you loud and clear with his stalling, if not his words (he should be more honest. I wonder why he isnt being). He wants his own security and his own house with his brother. Doesnt mean he doesnt want a relationship with you.
Its not unreasonable for you to want to live with someone, but only if he wants to too. I think you need to back off about the issue and decide whether its him as he is that you want, or someone to move in with you, even though youre not 100% sure either because of the cohabitation agreement

Regading my previous post - just to make it clear that we were going to have a pre-nup to protect both mine and my son's interests, I wasn't going to hand over everything I'd worked hard for, at the drop of a hat

better to not get married then surely?

Dinah Was that comment in reply to my post? If so, what would you have done if the situation was reversed? I was quite happy to have the house valued at the time of the pre-nup and then draw up the pre-nup from there. My son was from a previous relationship. What would have happned had I died and my OH had decided that my son was to be out on his ear? "Just supposing", "worst case scenario"?

The idea of a pre-nup was to try to protect everybody and give everybody some security. Nothing more sinister than that.

Nope. Love doesn't always conquer all.

Sometimes you love each other, but just aren't compatible and never will be.

Sometimes you're incredibly compatible but don't love each other in the right way.

I put "Love Conquers All" in the same category as "Everyone Has A Soulmate Somewhere" and similar lovely-sounding but unrealistic ideas.

CalamityKate - I think you're right..... Sometimes you just have to be pragmatic....

Prenup very smart idea.

I agree CalamityKate.

'I may not be the right person for him, or he for me'

f you are questioning your compatibility already there is not really a commitment. You say you get along so well - so what's the problem? I wonder if perhaps you get on well but your abrasiveness and his kindness has created a mutual co-dependency. If so, that is very unhealthy and you should back away from each other now and both get some counselling.

It could also be that what he perceives as your abrasiveness is in fact the way you, a mother of two and homeowner, go about your daily life because that sort of approach is how women who are single mothers must do things. You are independent. You make your own decisions. You run your house and your family. Is that what he sees as abrasive? Does he find the necessary manner in which you get through your busy days a threat? Does he have some vision of what the role of men is and what the role of women is? Are you falling short of some ideal he has in his mind?

Is he looking for someone who is willing to defer to him more, or someone who is not really in the driver's seat in her own life? Abrasive is a loaded word and it doesn't always mean what you may think it means. It can be in the eye of the beholder; it can say much more about the expectations of the beholder than about you.