I’m unhappy & want to leave, I feel stuck

Hi everyone,

Here’s the situation, and I know I’m going to seem like an awful person. It’s also a really long story and I don’t even know if anyone can help I just need to get it out.

I’ve been with my partner for almost 5 years, we’ve lived together for 4 years and have a dog.

I moved to where we live on my own, and in a group of friends I joined I eventually started seeing my now partner who is 10 years older than me. He is divorced, and always tells me how much he loves me and how happy he is to have me. We live in a house that he owns.

We have a dog, which he originally didn’t want but I bought and pay all bills for. He loves the dog now.

Over the past year, I’ve grown increasingly unhappy with where I live and the route my life is taking. A lot of this has turned to my relationship and causes me to avoid any intimacy with my partner, he’s told me he knows I’m hurting with something and tells me he’s here for me and puts no pressure on me.. it just makes me feel worse.

I don’t like where I live anymore and how cut off I feel from everyone else in my life, my partner loves it here and doesn’t ever want to leave.

I feel like I’ve changed over the course of our relationship and sometimes feel like it’s holding me back from growing. The more I push my partner away, the more he holds me tighter.

I’ve discussed moving, even as a temporary thing for a couple of years but he made it clear it’s not up for debate, he won’t do it. I’ve told him I want to leave and his response is that I’m free to. My problem is, if I leave him I know it will devastate him and leave him without my dog that he loves.

I’ve looked up jobs in my field and can get something great, I don’t care where I live and have found that in the long run it would be affordable. But I am so financially tied to my partner it could leave one or both of us worse off.

I just don’t know what to do. If I leave, I will be up routing my life I’ve build and would lose all my friends, as they’ve been friends with him longer. I feel so stuck here.

I recently went away for work, I felt like I only missed my dog. When I returned, my partner told me how much he’d missed me and how awful it felt without me. It’s hurting me so much knowing that if I leave, I’ll devastate him. It doesn’t help that his ex-wife left him to move away too.

It’s causing my so much stress and anxiety, I barely leave the house anymore other than for work. I just feel so torn about what to do, I can see the positives in leaving but I also might throw away my life and things be worse far away.

Im so stuck.

Sorry to hear of the despair you are feeling at this time. When we get ourselves caught up in this sort of internal turmoil and debate about a major life decision, it is hard to be rational and objective. This can lead us to a place where we are feeling caught up more by the indecision than anything else in life, this is the core of anxiety. People get to this place because they have lost confidence in their own ability to know what is best for them, they have no faith that they can and will make the right decision and so they make no decision at all and that is no solution either. It sounds to me like you are at this place, paralyzed by indecision.

You probably will need the intervention of a professional therapist to help you bring the important issues into focus so that you can consider them deliberately and think it all through. Right now, you are reacting emotionally and unable to do this.

To me, what is obvious from your post:

- long term loving relationships have their ups and downs, sometimes the downs make us feel like we don't belong in the relationship, that the person is not the best choice for us. This comes from the fact that no person can be the all and everything to another person, there are always needs that go unmet, characteristics we wish our partner had but doesn't, when we make the decision to partner up we accept this, but that doesn't mean that there will not be days ahead when we say "dang I wish he/she was this or was that and I didn't have to accept this". Mature commitment requires us to overcome this and focus on the strengths our partner does bring to the relationship and not dwell on the "doesn't haves".

- good, decent people that will love and support you during tough times are rare and wonderful people, it sounds like he is that sort of guy, think twice about pushing a partner like that out of your life. Ask yourself, is he a good person? What makes him a good person? If so, why do you want to cut a good person who loves you out of your life? This last question is a very important one. Is there any chance that you are more comfortable and find intimacy easier with a partner who does not treat you as well as this guy does?

-is it really something lacking in the place you are living? Is it really something lacking in the partner you are sharing life with? Or is it something missing deep within yourself that you don't want to see or acknowledge that is awry?

The dog has two loving owners, so it will be fine.

And most importantly of all, I'd like to point out that stuck is a choice.

You have the power to get unstuck by changing up your life and accepting all the losses that will incur for yourself and others as a result of your decision.

You have the power to recommit to the life you have, happiness is a choice, not a by-product of a perfect situation.

You also have the power to resolve to dig deep into yourself to understand why you do not find your current situation fulfilling.

Good luck!

I know you're 10 years younger than your partner, but what age are you, specifically? You both may simply be at different stages of life and if the gap can't be narrowed it's only going to lead to problems.

You haven't mentioned that you love your partner, have you ever been in love with him? If so, like the previous poster says, what did attract you to him initially? Can you get those feelings back, or were they even there in the first place (not judging you, just trying to get some background to things)?

I think the issue about where you live currently is a big one, it sounds like he's set in his ways and you're not going to change him. Was he up front about where he wanted to live right at the beginning? And why don't you like where you live, out of interest?

Sounds to me like you've made up your mind to leave him but need reassurance that it's OK. Nobody should be 'stuck' in a relationship they're unhappy in, but again to agree with the previous poster, men who love and care even when things are tough are a rare breed - so think carefully about why you're so unhappy but by all means cut loose if it ultimately will make you happy. Life is too short to be miserable.

The dog will be fine, by the way!

Best of luck!

OP,

This is a powerful post. Note the root of your unhappiness is within you, not your partner per se. May I suggest you start with change in smaller increments? Some internal, and some lifestyle.

1. Put on your own air mask first: Meet your needs. Nothing else is sustainable if your needs aren't met. Your needs are your responsibility.

2. Invest in your local friends, make new ones, and pursue your interests.

3. Arrange for some weekends away to visit your friends from before you moved.

4. Practice saying to yourself three things for which you are grateful.

5. Read up about intimacy avoidance; you and your partner are in a classic dance of the mutually unavailable. We all want security, love, etc. We fear losing it, and for some of us, that fear is so grat we resist having it. Yet we want it. So we hold too tight, and withdraw. Try to express your fears. Reconnect with your personal power. Practice letting people know when you are hurting, fearful, or uncertain. Practice letting people help you, and practice helping them.

Moving will solve this problem. But then, you'll have a whole set of new challenges. Learn to find a solution without disrupting your life and the lives around you. Make that your goal. When you achieve it, you will have earned the opportunity to assess whether you want to move, while starting from a strong foundation.

My problem is, if I leave him I know it will devastate him

Naaah. You can't live your life around this. People break up all the time. We all survive it.

Make your plans, acquire your new job, go live near your new job, and credit your partner with the ability to decide whether he'll want to move to where you go or otherwise pursue a long distance relationship with you.

As for finances, every change we make has costs. If your quality of life would be improved by the change, then work a second job or otherwise do what it takes to invest in making your life better.

Head high, adopt resilience as a life skill, and credit the people around your for doing the same.

OP,

Own your choices. If you stay, for a day a month a year, that is your choice. If he stays, that is his choice.

However, I still feel you are running away from something within you, and/or running to something that may not exist.

Others' lives have moved on since you lived there before, and your life will be different than it was before. Be thoughtful and try to make a plan from a place of peacefulness.