Ldr

[amlr2014]

Well... I've been in a relationship for about a year and a half. We're long distance (cross-country) and only see one another once every 1-3 months... He and I have progressively argued more, and it's gotten to the point where his only answer is to keep leaving me. And I just really need advice for myself, and things I can say and do to help him realize our relationship problems aren't all my fault, ect. When we first got together, we were unofficially seeing solely one another for about 4 months. Months later, I found out that he had been having sexual relations with his neighbor before we were official, never afterwards though. See, we'd had an agreement to delete our sexual past friends (we both had them) from our lives as it made us both uncomfortable. Well, she saw that he was no longer associating with her so she confessed to me about everything. He owned up to his mistakes, and although we were not official, this created so much trust and insecurity in the relationship because I felt lied to and hurt. I didn't know how to properly say or express how I was feeling, and it resulted in me being cold and guarded for a few weeks. Well, he broke as he couldn't take being the enemy. Essentially he gave me the ultimatum to get over it, or lose him. So I chose to internalize my problems. We were good for a while, however trust issues have been an issue since then. And for me, this is what set our relationship up to be where it currently is. There's another problem which he says caused his trust issues with me... So had three girl friends which he'd never been sexual with. I have two male friends of the same nature... Or well had, but I will get to that. One was very suspicious to me as she seemed slutty, she talked too much to him, and called him pet names. She also completely ignored me when I tried to reach out to her. One day while I was with him, I went on a run using an old phone of his connected still to wi-fi. Well, there was a lot of notifications from facebook, and I swiped to get rid of them but instead it logged onto facebook. As her profile was hidden from me, I was curious about the type of person she was so I looked. I didn't like what I saw. Nothing about her relationship, only her kids. And a lot of slutty pictures, and pictures with him. I wanted to know how they interacted - as him telling me they were just friends was something that never stuck with me as true. And I saw their messages, in which in the past they confessed their love to one another, called pet names, was very cutesy (before we dated). Well, I was furious and confronted him about it. I told him I was not purposely invading his privacy and it all happened unintentionally... But I found something wrong with the friendship and he really needed to get it taken care of, Ever since then he has felt like I invaded his privacy and didn't trust him... That this act showed I was snooping. I understand his views, but to doubt my trust when he was the one hiding things is something I've never been able to process. Needless to say, he told her she needed to stop being the way they were. She acted as if they were breaking up, and this showed him that she felt much more than a friend to him. But he's always resented this action. He blames this (me snooping) as when his trust issues and insecurities blew up. Another thing we have fought on, is the couple of times we've fought and he's gone out... There were three occasions where inappropriate interactions happened with females at bars. He gave his number to one, added another on social media, and another time he spent all night drinking with two and a buddy of his, and almost got kissed by her in the back of the girls' friend's car. Neither of these instances were something he came clean with. It was always me feeling like something was off, confronting him, and hearing what happened. He's never lied, and every time I have confronted him he has been very sorry. But his excuse is that "I (me) made him feel so done like we weren't getting back together so it didn't matter"... I try to understand, but this isn't reasoning that makes what he did okay. Okay so back to the opposite sex friends. The two I have, I've had for 8 years. One time I promised a date to one, an old roommate, whom I only text/facebook message every once in a while for the past 4 years due to him being out of state. The other, we tried to be a "thing" in highschool when we first met, but after kissing and holding hands we realized we were really better off as friends. Ever since then we have gone through spurts of hanging out and talking a lot to kind of drifting apart. Well, being as I have a sort of "past" with both of these people, although they've never said or done anything disrespectful to the relationship as the girl friend that my boyfriend said goodbye to, he has always hated them. He's called them mean names, and said that they have ill intentions. He became especially insecure when I started seeing the one guy more, and told him about my relationship problems. I'd apologized and said I would distance him - and I did. For the past 3 months, I only saw him once to give him a ride and texted him a couple times. I understood that he needed to be put at a distance to comfort him. Meanwhile, my boyfriend's two female friends have became closer to him. I realized he was mentioning one of them talking an awful lot, and I'd asked him to look at how many times he'd texted her. I looked on my phone bill to see how many times I'd talked to my male friend which he said he was uncomfortable with, and I told him how many messages we'd talked over the course of a few months. The one female friend, once I persuaded him to look and stop guessing numbers, we discovered he'd been talking to her literally 10 messages less than he talks to me. That sent huge red flags up, To him, he felt like I made him do this. That I forced him to count texts, when in my eyes I wanted him to see he was talking to her too much. He did see my side, and did distance her... But since then we have taken 2 "breaks" from one another, and both times they start talking more. He's even gone to her house and comforted her during a fight her and her very off sometimes on relationship. She knows my insecurities about her, thinks I'm crazy, and talks a lot of crap about me and my relationship. I actually just found that out when I'd had a bad dream about her, and asked if they'd been talking because the dream worried me. He said they'd been talking more, and I asked what about. He said she was making sure he was okay because we'd been fighting. I asked what he said to her, and asked NOT to see the messages, but to tell me if he was telling her too much. He used to send me screen shots of their messages voluntarily though, and so I asked him why he wasn't all of the sudden, and asked if it was because he was saying too much (as we agreed when he had problems with me doing this that going to opposite sex friends isn't a comfortable situation). Instead, that fight leads him to send me screen shots of messages because he felt manipulated and forced to and that I don't trust him. Well, he and her were talking very badly about us... And I said I didn't appreciate what he was doing. Somehow, that situation is my fault though. I've also just recently had to say goodbye to my two guy friends because I've realized it's just not worth causing problems over distant friends that make him uncomfortable. Now, I'm very not okay with him having female friends, and said it seems odd that he refuses to do the same when before he was willing to. Ideally, I want it to just be us focusing on one another without outside distractions, and then re-introduce things that are currently causing us to be insecure, but he said he won't ever say goodbye to his friends when there is no past with them. To me, that makes me feel really unimportant not because he won't, but because he refuses to care how it's hurting my feelings, and blaming me for everything. Also... He was in the military but separated last december and since has wanted and is trying to be a cop, and has known I've shared the same dream since we started talking in the beginning. I applied to one place and have gotten about halfway through the process. The whole time, he has said he will leave if I accept because he can't be with or marry a cop. He doesn't want me being around other males, to depend on one to "have my back", and he doesn't want to worry about my safety... Yet I have always supported him in his career choices even though he worries me doing those dangerous careers because I love and support him unconditionally. He said he loves and supports me too but will leave if I do that, because he won't hold me back nor will he be unhappy. So I had to give up in the process because I can't lose him. He was in the military but separated last december and since has wanted and is trying to be a cop, and has known I've shared the same dream since we started talking in the beginning. I applied to one place and have gotten about halfway through the process. The whole time, he has said he will leave if I accept because he can't be with or marry a cop. He doesn't want me being around other males, to depend on one to "have my back", and he doesn't want to worry about my safety... Yet I have always supported him in his career choices even though he worries me doing those dangerous careers because I love and support him unconditionally. He said he loves and supports me too but will leave if I do that, because he won't hold me back nor will he be unhappy. So I had to give up in the process because I can't lose him. He I guess essentially sees my feelings, when they differ from his, as manipulative. He sees my views as unimportant because whenever I say my side he feels as though he's being disrespected. He says I've made him not a man. He calls my family and friends very inappropriate things because they don't like how much unhappiness our relationship has caused me... He always leaves me, hangs up on me, yells and tells me to shut up and listen... Yet he interrupts me when I try to say my side. He blames me for everything, and says I force him to leave/say what he says. I don't know how to have him see my side, to be on the same team as me, or to forgive me for the past and to stop bringing it up. I know I've made mistakes, but all I can do is improve every time and be better next time. He doesn't think he has to try because he "gave all of himself to me" already. It's like I feel like I'm working completely against him and nothing I do is enough or right. I want to be a team, I want to move past this stuff... Because we are amazing when we are good. I've been in a couple of really long term relationships and know that I have the person I want to spend my life with... But communication, trust and security in the relationship is just not existent and I don't know what to do.

[JohanD]

Questions I would ask you:

1) What would you want out of this relationship?

2) Where do you see it in a year, supposing you are still together?

3) Do you really see yourself with this guy?

 

The reason why I ask these questions is because you have reached a point in your relationship where you do not see each other that much, but spending most of your time arguing.

 

When a relationship has reached this point, it usually requires a lot of work from both sides to make it great again. That means that if he blames you for everything, he will not be ready to make an effort. If he doesn't make an effort, it means that you will give and give and feel like you are not getting anything back in return.

 

And of course he is wrong about who is to blame! It is never one sided, it is always two sided. And more accurately, both are equally to blame.

 

When he says he has given you everything and that you don't care, well he is right from his perspective because men and women don't normally perceive love the same way. You have probably given a lot of yourself as well without him understanding it.

 

Many years back, I was in the same situation where I was blaming my girlfriend for everything, but i didn't leave her. Actually I was to much of a coward simply because of habit and because I cared about her. Of course, I was as much to blame as she, just that I didn't see it then.

 

If you tell yourself that this is the guy you want to stay with and love, there are solutions, the first of course is to get closer to each other. Difficult to work on your relationship unless you are together...