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Planning on breaking up: Should I move home or get a roommate?
26/f
Please read this thoroughly before responding.
I have been in a three-year relationship that has not been working for longer than a year. I struggled with being in a rut in the relationship and spoke to my boyfriend about it. By the time he was willing to change, my feelings were no longer the same. But because we live together, I stayed in the relationship for another year.
I got a new job and it does not pay AS NEARLY as I used to, I am struggling living where I am now. Living in a place with someone who I no longer love is not ideal, either. But I love my new job and I am back in graduate school. So, I need time, space, and money to do what I need to do.
I have two choices:
1) Move back home and save money. Pros are I can be closer with my sister (since she lives at home), be back at my favorite yoga studio, and I can save money. The Cons? I will be back with my domineering parents (my mom is extremely negative and it drains my mentality). Overall, it is a stressful environment and it is also a 30-minute, NOT in traffic drive, to my work and back.
2) Get a roommate. I would not be saving more than I am now, but at least I'm not in a negative household or living with someone I no longer love.
I told my boyfriend that I needed to save money and thought about getting a roommate. He did not understand why I would do that and told me he can lower my part of rent. He said it only makes sense that I would move back home so I wouldn't have to pay for anything. So I told him I was moving back home.
I can't be helped but be tempted/want to stay because our apartment is 10 minutes away from my work, he helps out with my pets, we never argue (I just don't want to be with him anymore), we travel together all the time, and my apartment is my safe-haven. But knowing myself, I don't want to be stuck in another relationship for ANOTHER year due to comfort and fear.
Yes, part of it is because I need to save money, but really I just can't be there anymore.
So here are my two questions:
1) What do you think I should do? Should I get a roommate or move back home?
2) What do you think my exit strategy should be when it comes to wanting to end a relationship (it's not a bad relationship)?
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Maybe give some free advice about: Love Life?
It hard to leave someone that you been with for so long but, you have to be happy and the fact that your boyfriend do not want to change that's his lost. It's like this: once the love is going it's gone. Tell him how you feel that you want more and that you cant live like this again, you can do bad by yourself. continue to work, finished school and make your mark if if he cant be with you too the very end then whats the reason he is there.
the saying is if it's meant for you, you will get back together. If you love a person you can love them enough to let go and be Happy.
Dont make yourself unhappy you have plenty of time to find that special one.
Good Luck
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I can think of another option. There are too many pro's to you staying at the apartment and having him as a roommate. But first you have to stop calling him your boyfriend and think of him as simply your roommate. A Friend who is a roommate. The only difference between a friend and a lover is that 'more than friends chemistry' which must be gone since you no longer have feelings.
So what if you told him about how you no longer have feelings for him. You only see him as a friend and roommate. If he doesn't believe this is possible, you can always have him write to me and ask if a person once loved someone, can they fall out of love. The answer is yes. The things needed on a daily basis that are loving gestures are dropped into your heart which is the bank account of his love. If he wasn't making 'love' deposits by how he treated you, but kept thinking he could make withdrawals, which are your responses to his love, if there is nothing in your account, for him to make a withdrawal on, then he will find you are no longer wanting intimacy with him. Its not a matter of finally realizing his mistake and starting to try to do the right things and make love deposits. It might work for some. But for many like myself, it did not. My ex never put anything into my account so Though I went through the motions after a few years, any love I had for him in my heart and run dry and that account was closed. This is where you are at, bank account of love is closed. So then he would think, its just a matter of reopening the account or more truthfully, opening a totally new one. The account that was there originally is gone. I stayed with the ex because of kids and left him after 30 years of which most were not having any love for him anymore. It didn't matter what he said or did, and in his case, there were other issues that prevented him from improving.
If you want to explain to him and I know you know its over, but having a good way to explain it will get across the point. So you could just tell him the following or write it in a note card to him: Love is like a fragile flower that is hard to grow from seed and needs specific things for nourishment and the sunlight, not scorching heat that might make it wither. It needs such tender care that not just anyone can grow it. The seed of this flower is very rare so if you end up killing the flower, it's gone and there is nothing you can do to bring it back, even if you have learned how to be a master gardener. You could find an entirely different seed, (new female) and try to do the right things to nurture this new flower but it won't be the old one.
What you need to propose is that the two of you remain friends and roommates for now but agree that the romantic relationship is over and both of you begin to date other people. The problem is if this is a one bedroom. It could work if there are 2 bedrooms or you both simply ask management to switch to a 2 bedroom. Yes it costs more but this way, each of you can find a new love who wants to move in, share a bedroom with their sweeties and also pay some of the rent. You could always just get a female to share the bedroom with. This way, if 3 or 4 people are sharing the common areas and paying rent, it should be cheaper for all as to their part of the rent, and you'd still be close to work. Of course this all sits on his decision. You can always tell him you have second thoughts about moving back home and tell him why, same as you told me. If he has definitely changed into a decent guy, he should understand that and the fact you no longer have feelings and why that brings you to making this proposal.
parents
Lets say you move back home. Then you have to put up with the meddling and the stress from how they act. Some people think they can handle it, find some way to cope. I thought so with first marriage. But i had been fooling myself by living life one day at a time. Yes, each day was hell, but if I could handle one, surely I can handle one more, or one more whole week, or a few more months or a year maybe. This handling it, is only putting up with it and does nothing to relieve the stress as I found out. Stress, I learned, has to go somewhere and will affect you either physically or mentally and emotionally. Those two areas are where stress settles. You don't have a choice as to where it goes. For me, it was physical so I got stress related illnesses, headaches daily, migraines about 4 times a year, all over body rash that itched horribly, stomach ulcers and it can affect the heart or possibly start cancer. that saying, "what's eating you" meaning what is bugging you or stressing you out is literally what cancer is, a response to the stress in your body where cancer eats up all your good cells. It took until all the kids were out of the house before I even realized and made the connection of how he treated me was affecting my health. Since cancer and heart disease ran in the family, I wasn't taking any more chances and finally left. But it also took being truthful with myself and asking if I could handle more of the same, which you would be asking yourself regarding living with your parents. I asked myself if I could put up with 5 more years with no improvement in how i was treated and that scared me, When I ask myself if I could do this for 10 more years or a lifetime, I broke down crying. Of course you would not end up that long with the parents but you might be trading a place to live for stress that makes you ill physically or mentally. On the mental side, from observing women I've known with abusive husbands, they become paranoid, their thinking becomes distorted, they have phobias they never ever had, and anxieties and depression, loss of self esteem and so on. They become a mental basket-case. It took about 5 to 7 years with him before I got the daily stress headaches. Some peoples bodies are different and may cave in to the illness producing stress a lot sooner. You have already had stress simply with your male friend roommate. So you have 1 year stress from there or perhaps a little more, go back to parents and add on another 2 years. You'd be at 3 years of stress. If you're like me, its approximately 2 more years til the stress begins affecting your health. But it can happen sooner in which case you'd be having to put up with not being your optimum of health. Long term stress though can lead to a disease that can kill you. So I am saying, if you can do everything in your power to work out anything other than moving back home, for the stress reason alone, then do it.
If you want to find a gal who will be a roommate and the two of you get into an entirely different apartment together near where you work, that is indeed an option, however, keep in mind having the funds saved up for security deposit, pet deposit if you can find another place that takes pets and 1st and last months rent. That is a big chunk of money you probably don't have or would have to save up a long time to have. If you want to move out from sharing apartment with him, maybe you could but you would have to live with a guy who thinks you are still his girlfriend and keep up the charade for however long that would end up being. This is why if you can find a way to make the co habitating tolerable for yourself, and no more expectations from him for your love, kisses, cuddles and more, I think this would be ideal. But the choice is ultimately yours.
As for exit strategy, you either keep silent now and share later what I said to share, the truth with him or tell him now. In the sharing now, you might want to talk about the need to save up for move in costs on another place for yourself and a new roommate and if he is still willing to help lower cost for you, great. I know this is all awkward. If your name is along with his on the rental contract or you were added later, he can't kick you out. If he is the sole person on there and he gets too upset with learning you no longer want him for a bf, he could probably kick you out. So how and when you tell him should probably depend on that. If you think he would be reasonable, counting on the improvements he seemed to make to his life, you could let him know that you no longer have feelings, that any love you had died, and you see him as a roommate and friend only. Let him know you wouldn't leave him in the lurch and you don't want to go stay with the parents, so you'd like to stay but under the mutual decision to break up as a dating couple. You could see if he likes the idea of saving more money if you both add room-mates or switch to a 2 bdrm if needed, two girls in one, two guys in the other or one of you or him starting a new relationship and the couple having their own room. In todays economy, the majority of college ages through age 30s, even if there is a kid or more, I am meeting more and more people who share either an apt or a house with another couple or with another whole family. So it would not be odd to do so. It need not be long term, only if there are new couples, that one couple stays and the other gets a new place together.
In all this you have to think about cost if your commute is by car you drive, not bus. The gas, maintenance and wear and tear on a car when money is tight and there is nothing to spare for any minor repairs, it is better to live closer to work. I moved once and didn't like the longer commute and found a new job closer to where I worked because my commute was 45 min one way and the gas was killing me.
So when you say 'end the relationship' remember there are different kinds of relationships. You have a relationship with family members, you have a relationship with girl friends, you can have friendship with a male or have a romantic relationship with a male or female depending on your sexual preferance, so its not about ending a relationship with him but the relationship changing. Also, remember it has already changed on your part, he simply doesn't know that yet. Make your best choice and it may go well, or may not. You know him better than I could ever guess so I made this long enough with plenty of scenarios to try to help you make your decision. I have merely given you more info and another option to think about. Good luck dear.
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