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5 year realtionship ending
Hi everyone,
I am 23 years old female and i have been in a realtionship with the same person for 5 years. We have had our ups and downs like every other couple and i have been there for my boyfriend over and beyond. We don't live together because my parents wont let me move out and it was easier to save money. He has lived on his own for 4 years. I am over his house all the time and we have dinner together every night i stay over probably 4 nights. I went on vacation about two weeks ago for the weeekend and he was not able to come due to work. I came home and saw him all week and he was distant and we werent talking that much and i was being stubborn because he seemed miserable. The Friday came and i called him and he didnt answer me (we hang out every weekend) he ignored me all weekend and i was devistated. Sunday came around and he asked if we could talk. I went over after work on sunday and was there around 9. We sat down but he wasnt saying much he told me he was depressed and miserable and not only in his realtionship but in general. He hates his job, he has to pay rent on his own the struggles hes going through i understand. He told me that i didn't act like i wanted to be with him and i told him i was hurt that i felt like he didnt want to be near me. I asked him if he met someone new and thats why he was distant but he told me he was crazy and that he still loves me. I told him i would work more on my part trying to understand his depression and be there for him when he needed me. I stayed that night, Didnt talk to him monday or tuesday he ended up asking if i would see him wednesday to have dinner and i did it was fine, i saw him thursday it was fine. I still felt him distant but not as bad but i tried telling myself that its the depression and its not me. Friday came and his phone was shut off by not paying his bill he told me he would call me if it was turnt back on. Never called me and i saw on snapchat he was out with friends on friday because i saw him on my friends snapchat. I was really hurt by this because normally he would have texted me on his friends phone telling me to come hang out. Saturday i didnt talk to him. Sunday i texted him and he told me he had a bad night saturday and he wasnt ignoring me he just wanted to sleep the day away (sunday) and he told me "i love you and we will talk tomorrow" which is today. I am so sad i am waiting for this break up, i cant stop crying at work. All i think about is killing myself, i feel so depressed and i need someone to talk to. Im sorry if i am not making any sense but i just want to cut myself, or just take a lot of pills and die. I don't know what i did wrong and i don't know how i am going to get myself through this. I don't expect anyone to understand this all of my friends and family don't understand and i just feel completely sad. thank you
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Lets first start with you and the fact that you are 23. For the past 5 years you have been a legal adult in the eyes of the law. Your parents no longer had any say over you legally. Yes at 18 it is hard to move out of your parents home and cut the apron strings but it is your decision not theirs if you wish to do so. At 21 you no longer needed co-signers to sign legal contracts such as bank loans or rental agreements. At 23 the only way your parents can hold you at home is if they are paying for college and use that tot control you. In which case your option is to take out a student loan and not have them hold anything over you. Not moving in with your boyfriend because your parents won't let you is more of a convenient excuse then a valid reason. Still it is a choice you made.
Now as to your BF. True depression is a horrible thing, I know for I have suffered with Clinical Depression. You are allowing yourself to become depressed by thinking your boyfriend wants to break up with you. You don't know this, even if it turns out that he does say something to that affect it may not be exactly what he wants as it is the depression talking.
I am very lucky that I am married to a very strong woman as my depression almost cost me my marriage. You have to be strong for him while you find out just what type of depression he is suffering from. "He hates his job, he has to pay rent on his own the struggles hes going through i understand." Stress is the number 1 cause of clinical depression and what you wrote about is stressful.
You need to get him to see a doctor and be screened for depression. It is a painless exam which is him answering a number of questions the doctor will ask him while performing a complete physical to rule out an organic reason for him feeling as he is. Once the doctor makes a diagnoses follow the doctors instructions.
Do not take whatever bad may come this evening. IT is the depression talking. Remind him of that and this is when you ask him to let you take him to a doctor. This is when, whether he realizes it or not he needs you the most. So be strong and hang in there with him and help him through this.
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You became an adult at 18. about the time you began seeing your boyfriend. I understand these are hard times we live in financially but something is very wrong on your end dear and I know you don't see it.
You said your parents won't let you move out. Unless, they have chained you to a piece of furniture, that statement is false. They may protest and argue with you, but arguments have never held people back from doing what they want to, especially if they are adults. What you have done without realizing it hon, is to give your will and your choice and all your rights over to your parents.
I understand saving up money is a perfectly valid excuse. And for a time, your boyfriend saw that as a perfectly valid reason too. But its been 5 years as you stated. How long exactly did you plan to live with your parents since becoming an adult, ten years, more? It makes sense when going to college near by.
You are only fooling yourself. (actually, I call it lying to oneself, as I have caught myself saying things that were not true to appease my conscience when I wasn't willing to move forward with something I knew i needed to make a yes or no decision on in life.) What you are doing sounds suspiciosly like that to me, as you stated that you sleep over nights out of the week and spend every weekend with him. He has made a break from the parents and it is hard for one single person to make ends meet all on their own. It practically takes two incomes if not more to pay for rent these days. He is being an adult, making his own choices. He's been willing to wait for youo to join him officially as in no more overnight cases and bringing all your clothes and belongings over, joining with him to run a household together and really be together, carving out a life for yourselfs, and it includes helping out with the bills you both incur together. This poor guy is feeling depressed because he loves you and wants to start a life together with you it seems, and you would prefer to allow your parents to continue to make choices for you instead of telling them you are now an adult and enough is enough, that they may be your parents but they no longer should be trying to raise you and influence you, that time is over. Then you tell them that you love them but you also love "Boyfriend" and are now going to move out and begin your life in earnest with him. He is heartbroken it would seem, feeling rejected by you because after all this time, you are still choosing your parents wishes over his. If I had a boyfriend doing the same thing to me, I'd be questioning whether he really loved me.
So you need to be honeset with yourself. What is it you want? What are you afraid of? I dont know but I can guess that perhaps it might include a fear of being an adult. Yes its scary but you'll learn how to handle adulthood. Maybe it a mistaken belief that the only way to lover and honor your parents is to let them dictate and run your life, making all decisions for you. That is not true. As parents, they need to let you go, to live your own life as you wish, to even make your own mistakes. They are doing you a great disservice and holding you back from gaining experience as an adult because they aren't allowing you to learn. Sometimes an only child or last one to leave the nest, a parent will clutch on to unwilling to let go because they believe they won't have a life without you there. They still will have one andd in fact, with all the time you spend away from home, the only thing they really have of you is your belongings in their home. So if letting you go is their problem, they are just lying to themselves too...because you did in a way leave them quite some time ago. When two ppeople meet and fall in love, they make a commitment to each other, with marriage license or not. They do not continue to keep a commitment to remain with their parents and just pretend to 'play house' like a young child with toy stove and dolls. You are an adult now dear. I am sure you never meant to send such a message to your boyfriend, nor to allow your parents to run your life, but I do hope you see that this is exactly what you have done without meaning to. So if you want to have boyfriend in yoour life long term, or maybe life long, then you have some important decisions to make and a much needed talk to have with the boyfriend about the real issue here and let him know if you are choosing him or your parents. I don't mean this to be that you lock your parents out of your life. Just that your relationship changes, from beign their young charge, to being their adult child and that means you take control of all your own decisions and do not cater to or enable them to remain stuck as parents, unable to view you now as not just their child but an adult.
My younger daughter is your age and I have had to face the difficulty of keeping my mouth shut and not offering advice or trying to correct them if I felt I saw they weren't making the right decisions. Having more life experience, a parant is always going to know a little more than their kids in many areas except for technology sometimes. It is too easy to end up advising when no advice has been requested. Kids usually dont think to or want to go to their parents for advice, and I wish mine did, but I know my place. I am mom but my kids are adults and I need to allow them to live their adult life and suffer making mistakes. What I can do is hold them and console them when they are hurting from a bad decision and need my hugs and support. So unless you asked your parents in the beginning whether they thought it was a good idea if you moved out with boyfriend or stayed with them at home, they had no business interfering in your life and making that choice for you. You also cant place full blame on them as you by choice gave away your rights to them by caving in to them on that and I am guessing many other little things. Time to take back your rights, and since you love the boyfriend, which you must since you are hurt by the lack of contact and response from him....apologize to him, let him know you now realize your mistake and are fixing that immediately by having a talk with him as you did with your parents and you are ready to officially move in with him, not just pretend to, and help support your and his household together.
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