Do I stay or give up?

[Leavemealonepls]

I'm in my late forties, divorced, one dd in her teens.

Ive been seeing someone for two years now. He's significantly younger than me but we get on well.

However when we talk about our future I'm not sure I can envisage spending the rest of my life with him. He wants to know that I will and I've been saying I do because I love him, but the truth is it's not easy.

It's very difficult to explain. He's very quiet, doesn't really show enthusiasm or passion. He doesn't like to go out so we spend all our evenings in watching TV.

I don't mind mostly, I don't really like pubs or clubs. I do like to go shopping or out for a meal and on days out though. I feel sad we can't do that together.

However I also feel there's something missing. I want someone to look after me .. he says he does, but I guess I mean in a different way .. hard to explain really. I miss passion, wild kissing, I miss going on outings or on holiday. I can do this alone or with dd, but then he feels sad that I'm doing things without him.

When he's here I often look forward to time alone, but the few times we've split up (I've finished with him a few times over trival things, although they didn't seem it at the time) I feel lonely and miss him and we make up again.

Sorry, this all sounds clumsy .. it's difficult to explain. I don't know what to do.

I've tried to explain but then he feels very hurt and says he can't change.

He is a really lovely gentle man and I will never find someone so lovely again. He loves me very much. I love him too, but I'm not sure it's enough.

I don't really know what I'm asking for, just advice I guess. I don't want to hurt him and I do love him.

[Leavemealonepls]

Thanks whitehandled , I wondered if that was where you were heading. I'll have a look.

[Zaphodsotherhead]

I had a similar problem with my OH (we don't live together and only see each other once a week or so). He was content to sit down and watch TV whenever we saw each other - I wanted to go out and about and 'do' things!

He doesn't have anxiety, but is very 'old before his time', feels like, at 50, all he should have to do is sit down with a beer in the evenings. So I sat him down and told him that, despite my being older than him, I felt like there was still too much life out there to see, and he was going to lose me because I wanted to 'do' stuff. Not all the time, I reassured him, I didn't need an action packed life, but I did need more.

And he stepped up. Took it to heart and now arranges things. It took the threat of me walking away to make him see how dull his life had become. With the anxiety of your man your situation is more complicated, but maybe the threat of losing you (if you truly are the love of his life) might be the impetus he needs to get help and get doing.

[HmmOkay]

Thank goodness you don't live together.

The relationship works for him because you do things for him and swallow down your frustration because you don't want to hurt hm.

But the relationship isn't working for you. The things you want to do - the odd lunch out, a trip to the cinema, a walk in the park, being cared for are all perfectly reasonable things to want to do occasionally.

He has to sort his own life out. That sounds harsh but he really does. And maybe being on his own for a while will give him the impetus to change things.

[DragonFire99]

Sounds like you want different things out of life. I'd hate to have someonen who wanted to sit and watch tv all the time and never wanted to go out!! So boring! There's a whole world out there...

Ah - just seen your second post about anxiety.

OP, this is a fairly new relationship. It's not up to you to save him - he has to want to change for himself, and do something to make it happen.

How on earth can he be anxious about everything? And what's with the no cooking and not being able to do tasks? If he can hold down a job, surely he can cook? It doesn't sound as though that has anything to do with anxiety.

It sound like he's not meeting your needs. You do NOT have to stay and look after him.

[category12]

Op, "He says I'm the love of his life, he doesn't want anyone else if he can't have me and that I'd break his heart. I can't bear to do that." This is definitely emotional blackmail: making you responsible for his happiness/future. (Plus it's nonsense) .

[Leavemealonepls]

Thanks everyone, I think I knew deep down that it's not right for me. I just don't want to hurt him .. and also I don't want to go running back to him the day after finishing with him. It's not fair to him at all. I just always bloody miss him so much then. I guess that's why I can't work out if I love him enough to try and make it work.

[PreemptiveSalvageEngineer]

I've tried to explain but then he feels very hurt and says he can't change.

Soooo, you have to do all the changing? You're clearly not happy in this relationship. He doesn't go out. He doesn't want you to go out. He doesn't function as well as you need him to do. And somehow you're meant to be happy about your life becoming so limited. And for a loving relationship to descend into just being a carer for somebody who, it seems, doesn't want to change.

And BTW, I say this as somebody whose depression and anxiety is at probably the lowest ebb of my life so far. My "functionality" is rather diminished these days, but I do what I can and try my damnedest to keep the burden from my loved ones. If I can't go out I don't begrudge them. If it takes me twice as long to do dinner, I start earlier or do something simpler.

What I'm saying is, its not like I don't geddit. But if he truly loves you, he'd out your happiness above his own needs, at least a lot of the time, not never, like we're seeing from tour posts

I also don't think of my condition as being irretrievably downhil. I'm not getting the impression he wants to do anything about it. And why should he, when you're there to pick up the sksck and change everything on your side?

Look out for you and DD first and foremost. What this man has to give your/DD's life is more grief than benefit.

[HmmOkay]

But it isn't working now and he doesn't want to (or isn't capable of) change.

So how can you make it work? To lower your expectations of a happy life even more?

Do you think he sees you as a bit of a mother figure whose job it is to look after him? Because that is an instant passion killer right there.

[debbs77]

Does he still live with his parents?

[FinallyHere]

Goodness, what would you say to a daughter or son, if they found themselves 'trapped' in this type of relationship. I would encourage you to 'not' be blackmailed in this way.

Goodness, life is too short to waste.

[Leavemealonepls]

He lives alone.

I think he's incapable of change

He says he doesn't see me as a mother figure but I'm not entirely convinced.

[AttilaTheMeerkat]

What do you get out of this relationship, what needs of yours are being met here?. Be brutally honest with your own self here.

What does your DD think of him?. She probably wonders why you have chosen so poorly and what you are doing with him at all. He is not your project to rescue and or save and his words strike me as being emotionally manipulative. He has not considered you in the slightest; he has made this about him. He does not feel sorry for you, probably does not love you either.

I think you are in a co-dependent relationship with this person and some of what you are writing as well smacks of the "sunken costs fallacy" which basically causes people to keep on making poor relationship decisions. If this man really is as you describe in your initial post it makes me also think your relationship bar needs raising urgently.

[Leavemealonepls]

I don't know It was very intense at first.

[PreemptiveSalvageEngineer]

That's known as future faking. Abusers employ that technique to get people reeled in fast.

Think back to the sorts of things you discussed/planned back then. I'm pretty sure most of it hasn't come to fruition by now. Alternatively, I doubt his future faking involved "... and I'm never going to want to go out, and will act all hurt if you ever try to go without me, and foreign travel? You can forget about that... Restaurants? Not a chance..."

As has been said so often on these boards, pay attention to their actions, not their words.

I've finished with him a few times over trival things, although they didn't seem it at the time

I'd bet cash money they aren't all that trivial....

[Leavemealonepls]

Thanks for all the advice. I don't know whether they were trivial .. certainly not to me at the time. No, things aren't going to change, I realise that. I guess I thought because I loved him and had made him a promise to be with him for ever I thought that should be enough and I would make it work.

I've realised I'm very unhappy and always will be unhappy in this situation. I spoke to him in the early hours of the morning and ended it once and for all and this time I'll be strong when he comes round crying because I know it's the best for both of us. I feel incredibly sad but also sure it's the right thing to do. I don't want anyone else because I'm scared I'll make the same mistakes again .. I just need to learn to live alone with my dd now.

[Leavemealonepls]

They're not trivial now either.

No, nothing we planned has happened .. all the things we'd said we'd do .. We've done none of them. Maybe he'd like to but can't .. it doesn't matter. I'm not happy and it won't change, I think I've always known that deep down.

[HermioneJeanGranger]

Good luck OP

He sounds dull as dishwater.

[Leavemealonepls]

He is. Looking back, I did all the talking, made all the decisions, all the shopping, all the cooking ... I did the right thing and was fed up but still feel sad, if that makes sense.

[Leavemealonepls]

He's a sad person and I feel very sorry for him because he'll be very lonely now. He has no friends he meets, doesn't go out. I think that's partly why I stayed - I felt sorry for him. But that's no basis for a relationship. I need to think about myself and my dd.

[Leavemealonepls]

Dd is finishing school soon. I think I'd like to move closer to my family. I moved to be closer to him two years ago. Would it be unreasonable to uproot my dd again?

[whitehandledkitchenknife]

Well done Leave. Feel sorry for yourself, don't waste your energy on him. He isn't your responsibility to fix.
Lick your wounds and be kind to yourself. You will survive. We learn something each time. You are worth more than what he was willing to give, which was not much. Time to up your value!

[Leavemealonepls]

Thanks. I will survive. I just need to make sure I don't back down again this time out of pity when he comes round sad.

I've told him I don't want to see him again, to put my key through the letter box.

I'm making plans to see the few people I know around here.

[PreemptiveSalvageEngineer]

I don't want anyone else because I'm scared I'll make the same mistakes again ..

Don't wrote yourself off just yet! By all means spend some time alone. Treat yourself well, maybe get some therapy /the Freedom programme. Read ypbon some self-help. Find out who you really are and what your boundaries are before you go "back on the market". Next time you'll see red flags faster and have stronger self-worth to avoid the guys waving them. I've seen people in their 60s, 70s, 80s find the love of their lives; at late-40s this was nothing like your last chance.

You'll be fine, and you've just taken the very important first step towards that.

You may find you have a wobble in the next few weeks. Everybody does! Please keep posting and we'll help you out.

[Adora10]

Glad you're now making yourself a priority; you miss him you say, nah, you don't, you miss having someone around but it's not him you need; he will sap the life out of you.

Who's going to feel sorry for you OP, not him anyway.

[BettySwollocksandaCrustyRack]

He's your comfort blanket, your go to person, he's just habit to you now.

I had someone like that in my life. I met him just after I left my DH and I was so lonely I took it from the friendship zone to beyond and although I loved him a great deal, there was always something missing and hard as I tried I could not fall in love with him. He was 9 years younger than me and quite immature, we just weren't suited at all. He loved me to pieces and I ended it lots of times but always missed him and went back. But, I missed him as a best friend, not as a lover so the last time I ended it hard as it was I stuck to my guns as it was the kindest thing for him. He now has a girlfriend who adores him far more than I ever did. Sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind. If you know you do not want to spend the rest of your life with him you have to set him free so he can find someone who does and you will get used to being without him in time.