Social/Cultural Clash and its ripping Us apart

[Lostin_love]

I'm a very controlling and ambitious person. I like for everything to be planned out. As a result I have excelled through high school and college. I'm now prepping for medical school which is about 2 years away. My boyfriend of a year and a few months is the complete opposite of me, he's a laid back artist, who didn't finish high school.

I live on my own, volunteer in a hospital, work, and go to school fulltime. My boyfriend lives 6 hours away with his mom. He's unemployed and trying to get his high school diploma. He comes to visit often enough and our relationship is wonderful outside of 2 interconnected problems: his lack of ambition and him not having a job.

If we go on dates I have to pick up the tab or he has to ask his mom for money. It's been hard for him to find a job, he has a weird name, is a drop out, with no work experience.

As for his lack of ambition he really doesn't have a plan for his life that he can count on. He sees us together, as he's brought up marriage and children very frequently. But as for a career, he's counting on some big break to become a famous musician and that's just not realistic to me. I feel like the career path Im headed towards just doesn't mesh with the life he wants. As a surgeon I'll be on call for the first couple years most likely, I need someone with a stable job, set hours, that sort. If he's a musician there will be tours, promo, studio time who the hell will raise our children?! Like in what does a RAPPER date a DOCTOR?!?!

I'm trying to get him to be realistic, become an audio engineer to at least keep some aspect of the dream alive, go to community college, transfer in to my school to get his bachelors (we have a great program), join ROTC to pay for school so he can have his schooling paid for since he can't get the scholarships I did. I feel like he doesn't want to do that, but is willing to, to make me happy. I want him to do it for himself not me. We're a the point where I'm considering ending things and he thinks I'm ashamed of him. I'm from a cultural background where you're not successful if you're not a doctor, or a lawyer, or an engineer of some sort and I feel like he has the American Dream culture where anyone can be anything and do what makes you happy. It's a culture CLASH. And it's destroying our almost perfect relationship! HELP ME PLEASE!!

[d0nnivain]

He apparently was a great person for you to date. But he's not the person you are supposed to marry. Accept that. Go forward with your plans & wish him well with his but this is where your paths diverge.

[Lostin_love]

He apparently was a great person for you to date. But he's not the person you are supposed to marry. Accept that. Go forward with your plans & wish him well with his but this is where your paths diverge.

 

 

 

He refuses to let us go. He says he won't allow it, because he willing to do whatever it takes as long as he doesn't lose me. He insists that he wants to go to college and do the engineering thing, and the fact that I'm not believing him, or giving him the chance to make me happy isn't fair, which is true. My father did something like this before. He told me to go vacuum his car on a summer day, instead of letting me go outside. When I returned he asked me if I had fun, when I said no he told me to go clean his car again until I enjoyed doing it. Same thing here. I want him to do what I said (for the sake of our future) and be content with the career path I chose for him.

 

He believes that he will be happy doing whatever, as long as he still has me. I never would have come to this decision on my own, it's rather the influence of other people's opinions, (family especially, and friends) that have driven me to this conclusion. We are still pretty young, both 19.

[d0nnivain]

I didn't realize you were 19.

 

 

At this point you need to focus on school & medical school. He's peripheral, nothing more. Most likely when your studies get more intense & you have less time for him, he will self select out of your life.

[Diezel]

So everything is perfect other than him having no ambition nor a job... pretty much, pretty essential character flaws that do not match up with your requirements for a person you are with.

 

Yeah, this would end up excellently later on when he still has no ambition and has a job... barely.

[Lostin_love]

So everything is perfect other than him having no ambition nor a job... pretty much, pretty essential character flaws that do not match up with your requirements for a person you are with.

 

Yeah, this would end up excellently later on when he still has no ambition and has a job... barely.

 

We have gone job searching it's just that so many places have online applications that request resumes and his is rather bare. Even with my help, (I've gotten every job I've ever applied for) he has no previous work experience, incomplete education, and a rather eccentric name. His predicament really seems like a result of circumstances, surrounding his life. He didn't graduate because he moved his senior year, and none of the credits from our high school transferred out. So he was told he would have to spend an additional two years in high school. He gave up on himself and I think that's why he doesn't have ambition, because he feels like he's in quicksand, the more he tries to save himself the more he sinks. Even if he were to get a job the length and frequency of his visits to my city would surely have him fired. I figured if I help him out this pickle everything would be smooth sailing

[Lostin_love]

I didn't realize you were 19.

 

 

At this point you need to focus on school & medical school. He's peripheral, nothing more. Most likely when your studies get more intense & you have less time for him, he will self select out of your life.

 

Yeah I flew through high school and college so I'm a lot younger than my peers. My major now is rather difficult, neuroscience, pre-Med track and I've been balancing it pretty well with the long distance relationship. He's looking to move back to my city this summer, which I figured would make things easier, but as of junior year, the hardest year, he's not complaining.

[Diezel]

We have gone job searching it's just that so many places have online applications that request resumes and his is rather bare. Even with my help, (I've gotten every job I've ever applied for) he has no previous work experience, incomplete education, and a rather eccentric name. His predicament really seems like a result of circumstances, surrounding his life. He didn't graduate because he moved his senior year, and none of the credits from our high school transferred out. So he was told he would have to spend an additional two years in high school. He gave up on himself and I think that's why he doesn't have ambition, because he feels like he's in quicksand, the more he tries to save himself the more he sinks. Even if he were to get a job the length and frequency of his visits to my city would surely have him fired. I figured if I help him out this pickle everything would be smooth sailing

 

All this read: I have to fix his problems for him.

 

That's it. There's nothing more to it. So he couldn't finish high school, so he just gave up? Result of circumstances? Lack of resume experience.

 

In the adult world, we call those: EXCUSES.

 

Stop making them for him too.

[Els]

The 'who will raise our children thing'... is a bit too far in the future to worry about at 19 IMO. You will likely be able to give birth to healthy children for the next 15 years or more, and plenty of things will change between now and then. Also considering your career, most female doctors don't have kids til they are 30+ for practical reasons.

 

If you want to stay, keep things light between you and your boyfriend, stop paying his way, and let him know that he should just do whatever he wants. Nobody, and I mean NOBODY, should be altering their career path for a bf/gf at 19. Be sure not to alter yours for him either. If you are convinced that there is an insurmountable cultural incompatibility then you should probably leave.

 

But, as a (slightly) older person from the same culture as you, I have an important piece of advice for you - life is not so black-and-white, and if you try to pigeonhole your life to fit completely into what your family/culture expects, you will likely end up miserable and in a much more difficult situation to break out of. Think about what YOU want in life, then make your decisions based on that. If what you want happens to align with what your family wants, then that's okay, but at the end of the day you and only you have the sole right and power to decide what happens in your life, and you and only you will face the consequences of the choices you make.

 

I am not telling you whether to stay with him or leave, just that whatever your decision is, in any aspect of your life, it should be about what you truly want, not what your family or friends want.

Edited April 7, 2015 by Elswyth

[acrosstheuniverse]

I hate to say it but you guys just don't sound compatible. You'll have plenty of time to meet people in med school who share your drive and ambition, it's not looking realistic or likely atm that you and this guy will have a long and happy future together. I was the exact same at your age (I'm 27 now), ambitious and driven trying to make it work with a guy who didn't have a career plan, earned minimum wage, did nothing with his degree and stayed at home into his twenties. It didn't work.

 

The last relationship I was in was with a guy who was similar to yours, horizontally laid back, musician, no real career plans, took life day by day. I was studying hard to qualify doing what I do now, working 70 hours per week, volunteering and generally going at life full on. He dumped me after five months and I was devastated but looking back it was one of the best things that could happen as once I started to apply for my graduate jobs and realised i had to move, we would have been totally incompatible. He wouldn't have left his friends, or been willing to step up and get a career of his own, and it'd have been a messy split after a year instead of the five months it was. But I figured at the time it'd all work out somehow.

 

I wound up with a guy who was similar to ex but once he saw what I was aiming for realised he wanted it too and wanted to be an equal partner, he happily uprooted himself and moved to a new town with me for my work, got enrolled in college again and got himself an awesome job, there was no hesitation. I'm so happy with him now it's crazy.

 

Once you're in med school you will meet so many guys similar to you, who will contribute to your relationship just as much as you can, and whose dedication you admire. Your boyfriend is in no way a bad person, he's just different in his own way and probably would fit better with a more chilled non-career girl too. Just at the minute you're trying to force a square peg into a round hole and you're trying to rescue and fix him to mould him into what you need, and that never works. I was very careful not to influence my current boyfriend in any way, but of his own volition he said he wanted to move with me, got a great job, and threw himself into being what he feels is the partner I deserve, even though I was crazy about him from the start. But if I had tried to persuade him he'd onky have reverted to type sooner or later.

 

You sound smart and have your life ahead of you and at 19, achieving what you already have, it's going to be a fantastic life. You have so many doubts and are aware you're fundamentally compatible, better to end it kindly now and focus on your schooling.