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Age issues... He says he likes me but I am just so young and...
I've been seeing this guy for a month now. I'm 21 and he is 28. I'm in college and he is just getting started with a new job out of state. He likes the qualities I have, like school and that he thinks that I am a good person. But he keeps telling me I am just so young and that I have so much more to experience. I don't understand why our age difference is such a big issue. Someone, please enlighten me.
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Age is not just a number. It's a loose gauge of life experience and self-awareness. It also impacts our own expectations from relationships and the expectations others have of us.
When he says "You are too young" what he means saying is "You are in a completely different place in your life than I am, and I'm not sure I can reconcile our different expectations and lifestyles."
You are in school. You live the life of a student. He is in early career. It’s an entirely different way of being and thinking about everything in life. It can’t be helped. You might enjoy each other’s company, but in any long term planning, you are currently divided by huge differences of perspective.
What he is calling ‘experience’ is really more like ‘timing’. The timing of your experience is completely out of sync with his, and there is no way for either of you to get in sync, without one of your comprising yourself terribly. He can’t be a student again, and you can’t be a working young adult. The differences might seem minor to you, but they are not.
I don’t have a problem with age differences because the long term test of a relationship isn’t the age of the people involved: its how their goals and expectations match up and compliment. It’s extremely unlikely that you and this guy can have the similar goals and expectations right now. You live such drastically different lives with completely different pressing concerns.
Does that mean you are doomed? Of course not.
But he’s concerned and wary, and you need to respect that. His emotions and worries are very valid. These concerns of his are a sign that he takes his relationships seriously, and that is a good thing.
Talking to him a bit about goals and expectations, about the future, might help him see the timing is not so off as he feels it could be, or, it might convince him that you two really aren’t compatible right now.
Either way, your best bet is to talk to him, not about your ‘experiences’ but about your lives.
--- Just an FYI, I'm in a great long-term relationship with a guy nine years older than me. These sorts of things absolutely do work, but my boyfriend and I were at similar places in life, having both just finished school and getting established in our careers (he did a hell of a lot more school than I did...). And that is a large part of what made us possible. If we had drastically different lifestyles and goals at this moment in our lives, we would have had a much harder time making it work.
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Age is just a number, You are an adult. It could be maybe he has never been with someone as young as you. I really don't know, You would need to ask him. However, If he wants to keep you around it may be a good idea on his part to stop treating you like a child. Implying you are too young for him is sort of insulting, I would understand if you were under the age of 18 or something but for heavens sake you are both adults. If you want to be together then what is preventing it? If he is dwelling so much on the fact there is a 7 year age difference then he's got other issues he needs to deal with.
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