Which one of us is the problem?

[Batya33]

"Finally, I think your relationship is past the honeymoon stage. Yet, you love him very much. He's doing enough right and not too much bad, he owns your heart. You are not going anywhere."

My sense is there never was a honeymoon stage. OP watch the season of Sex and the City when Carrie is with Aidan and talks about the "za za za zoom"

[MissCanuck]

How much/often do you guys think you should feel the spark with the person you plan to marry?

This depends entirely on what sort of marriage you seek, OP.

Based on your description of the type of guy you would like, you are not going to have that type of marriage with your current boyfriend. You are currently not that happy, even though you respect him as a person. He is who he is. You want something that is out of line with the person he truly is.

[Hollyj]

There are many women who freak out when they meet Mr. perfect. Instead of enjoying him, they look for imperfections. Part of the reason they seek imperfections is because they obsess about their own imperfections. Ultimately, they may be afraid Mr. perfect will discover her imperfections and leave. As a result, she has to find something wrong with him. That’s the behavior of a saboteur.

Secondly, have you ever asked him about his needs? I have not heard you once mention what he needs. You assume the things you do are fulfilling for him. One of the toughest things for women is to sit down and ask a man if he is fulfilled in the relationship. Ask him what he needs. You have to do that without interrupting him. Nor can you be defensive. Just listen. If you don’t understand something, ask questions. Then shut up and listen. You don’t get to tell him what he should want or need.

Third, the most successful relationships are built on mutual values. Integrity is number one. Do the 2 of you value integrity the same way? If not, the relationship will have many problems. Once you understand if integrity is mutual, you need to see if the way you value communication is similar. How do you want to raise and educate your children? Where do you want to live? How transparent are you? What are your philosophies about mental and physical health? How do you value personal development? Do you value personal development? What about travel? Are you interested in the things he thinks about? Are you capable of having conversations about those things?

If you understand there are things you will be better at, like walking up to strangers, you can leverage one another’s strengths. Aside from that, instead of you complaining about him touching you, why aren’t you giving him what you want? That means you touch and kiss him and give the affection you want. What’s wrong with you initiating sex? Sex is a human desire. Both are responsible for it. You are making yourself a victim when you are just as responsible for getting what you want. If you can’t give what you want, you don’t deserve it.

Also, it’s unhealthy to buy into things that are not true, like the person you are with will drive you up the wall. Believing that will only create a self fulfilling prophecy. It sounds like you have no idea how to have a relationship. You believe what you see in movies is a relationship. That will cause you to miss the enjoyment you have in your relationship.

Perhaps you are seeking excitement to avoid looking at yourself. Have you considered doing some kind of transformational workshop? You may need to discover why you believe you have so many flaws.

She said he is robotic, never initiates sex and is not affectionate. This would not work for me, nor the majority of women.. Relationships do require passion to work.

[Wiseman2]

Parent-child relationships like this invariable kill the romance. Read up on that. No one is right or wrong. He's simply not that attracted to you and you need more attention/affection that he volunteers.

[reinventmyself]

Taxes for the business I own, not normal taxes. He basically manages my business. My dependency on him isn't a giant concern though, I know I could learn how to do whatever is necessary. I was more complaining than giving that as a real reason not to leave - I am NOT staying with him because of that at all. I'm not using him, I'm staying because I care DEEPLY for him - all that other stuff is just me being scared. For the most part, I truly do want to stay because he's so wonderful in so many ways. I've even told him I would trade everything he does for me to have more affection and energy in the relationship, which is true.

I can't help but wonder, if you were to close your eyes and imagine that you had employment that compensated you well, you were savvy with finances and trusted that you could stand on your two feet, alone, if you would still feel the same way.

AND you can have all of the above and still care DEEPLY for this man and at the same time recognize that it's possible you two are not an ideal match for each other. Life experiences will teach you that you can love someone and at the same time know that you aren't meant to be together. You don't have to wait long enough to despise someone to have permission to leave them.

I also think you might be leaning too much on the possibility you are far too obsessive and dramatic and that might be the only problem here. It's pretty typical when not wanting to face some hard truths, we tend to think we are just a little crazy instead. I mean, you'd have to be crazy to want to leave such a great guy, right? Especially when everyone is in your ear telling you the same thing. Am I close?

It's a great way to avoid acting on it and doing the hard thing.

[Batya33]

I can't help but wonder, if you were to close your eyes and imagine that you had employment that compensated you well, you were savvy with finances and trusted that you could stand on your two feet, alone, if you would still feel the same way.

AND you can have all of the above and still care DEEPLY for this man and at the same time recognize that it's possible you two are not an ideal match for each other. Life experiences will teach you that you can love someone and at the same time know that you aren't meant to be together. You don't have to wait long enough to despise someone to have permission to leave them.

I also think you might be leaning too much on the possibility you are far too obsessive and dramatic and that might be the only problem here. It's pretty typical when not wanting to face some hard truths, we tend to think we are just a little crazy instead. I mean, you'd have to be crazy to want to leave such a great guy, right? Especially when everyone is in your ear telling you the same thing. Am I close?

It's a great way to avoid acting on it and doing the hard thing.

The late Dr. Joy Browne used to ask the people who called into her radio program with issues like this : "if you won the lottery tomorrow would you stay or would you go." I agree with reinvent - you build up this whole straw man argument "anyone would be crazy to leave such a great guy" - because certain friends feel like "good men" are scarce and are trying to keep you from touching the hot stove by leaving a "good man". And for those who settle for each other it can work just fine -if both people settle and want marriage for reasons other than wanting a relationship that involves chemistry and passion as well as all the other good stuff. I really don't know couples who each settle -usually one settles and the other accepts that to win the prize of their partner they have to accept that they love their partner much more and in the way one should than vice versa. Those types often will try to convince the settling partner why they are so right together, etc and paint pictures of suburbia, barbecues, kids on the swing set in the backyard. They're not wrong just .... settling.

And the reverse is not true -you don't have to get a "bad boy" who excites you to fall in love with you and propose. Once you become the right person you will find a person who is a good person, a person of integrity and character who will keep you on your toes in all the good ways, the fun ways, who you will want to kiss and hold hands with and who will know when you're pacing around the house while on the phone seemingly looking for something that it's your hair scrunchie you're missing and he will silently hand it to you so as not to disturb your call and save your hair (true story).

[Kira L]

Secondly, have you ever asked him about his needs? I have not heard you once mention what he needs.

Aside from that, instead of you complaining about him touching you, why aren’t you giving him what you want? That means you touch and kiss him and give the affection you want. What’s wrong with you initiating sex? Sex is a human desire. Both are responsible for it. You are making yourself a victim when you are just as responsible for getting what you want. If you can’t give what you want, you don’t deserve it.

Lots of good points, thank you :) Just to address these - I do ask him what he wants from me pretty often, he always insists he's really happy and believes I think too negatively of myself. He's a simple guy without many needs, haha since he's not super emotional he's also happy with pretty little in a relationship. And of COURSE I initiate sex lol, I initiate it every few nights, basically as often as I know he's open to it. That's just how it works, initiation of that is one of my responsibilities in the relationship. He enjoys it, he's just not dying for it all the time like me x) He's probably way better at it than I am though, haha.

[Kira L]

reinventmyself and Batya33, I think what you guys are saying must be right because it makes me feel sick to read it, haha. It does feel like, "How could I possibly leave such a great guy". I just saw him for lunch though, and something interesting happened - the reason I'm going back and forth back and forth back and forth into oblivion is because it's extreme in each direction, how I react to his behavior. For stretches of time, he'd be in that sleepy mood, not very affectionate or fun. And I'd get in recurring crying fits, feeling like I was in a dead end relationship. He'd usually be "blah" on weekdays when he was tired, then come alive on weekends (throwing me into constant emotional torment, haha). But recently he's been in the longest/most consistent stretch of the opposite behavior. He's been much more attentive, happy, and silly, which is what makes me slam the breaks and say "Hey I think I'm totally in it now!" I asked him about his change of mood over the past few weeks, and he said he's been less stressed out lately, that work has been going well, etc. He just reflects how he feels 100%, so he sinks low when his professional life isn't going the way he wants. He's been in a bad financial spot for a few months (he actually owes me about $6,000 lol), but now things are much better. Maybe my problem with him isn't that he's robot-y, maybe it's that he takes life more seriously than I do - gets upset easily.

That's why this is the most impossible thing ever - if he was his happy self all the time, I would actually be really excited for our future. The reason it's been pretty sparkless since the beginning, is because he's been doing this back and forth thing since then. So every time things are going well, I'm thinking about when they weren't and scared for when it'll be like that again. But over the years, the sad times are steadily lessening; he's been in longer happy moods and shorter sleepy ones. And we're finding things that get him in a fun mood, like camping and nature adventures. We both tend to stay home and watch TV by ourselves most nights, which puts his flame out pretty quick I think. It seems to me that there's a real chance he's getting older and further maturing, both of us realizing what's important in life. That just because we have a lot of work to finish doesn't mean it's a big waste of time to do something FUN, like hanging out with friends or going on a hike. We're both super easily stressed, and we both know we need to take action to correct those things. I'm just perpetually confused because right here, right now, I'm totally excited to be with him. Yet yesterday (when he was mad about something that happened at work) I aggressively resented him. Normally I'd think I shouldn't have feelings that negative towards him, but I've been building them up for all this time, it's hard not to feel like every little detail of our relationship is a HUGE FREAKING DEAL. I'm not sure what my point is, haha maybe that there are too many problems we have to fix with our own selves to be able to assess whether we work together.

I've been looking at free yoga classes by the way, I figure that's a good place to start to go look for a girl-friend or two :) However long this deliberation takes, I won't sit quietly through it anymore! Gotta take action!

[Batya33]

"That's why this is the most impossible thing ever - if he was his happy self all the time, I would actually be really excited for our future"

No that doesn't make it impossible. It makes it obvious. Not fair to only want to be with someone when they act in a particular way. It's a package deal. And that's what I mean about being solid and reasonably secure -that changes in mood do not freak you out or rock you to the core - sure, they might be annoying, disappointing, boring, etc - but the underlying love, the commitment, the solidity - those changes have no impact on that and won't trigger this extreme doubt, freak out, panic. Because when you love the person flaws and warts and all those times are just blips on the radar mostly with rare exception. Rare exception -of course a person for example can become a drug addict and become violent - and then you're entitled to say 'nope, not the person I married, either get help or I'm out of here" - but "for better or for worse" means you accept the person not just aspects of him, you love the person not just aspects of him.

I used to say to my friends when I was with Mr. Right For Now/Right on Paper "but I was so excited to be with him today!!! I was so sure!!! I would have eloped with him today had he asked!!!" but in the back of my mind I knew I didn't feel secure that this feeling of rightness had a solid foundation - I wanted it to last but knew inevitably that eventually I'd wake up out of the rightness fog and feel again strongly doubtful, shook to the core, not sure.

Do you want kids? Because kids need stability - kids need to see that when their parents argue that they still are committed to each other, still love each other - still are a team - and they sense -they know when that consistency is not there. And it's so scary and unfair to the child. When my son learned the word "divorce" he'd say, mistakenly "divide" "are you and daddy ever going to get divided?" He's right -divorce is dividing. And every time you tell yourself "right here right now I'm excited to be with him" you're also admitting "and I can't say with reasonable security that I'll feel like this tomorrow, next month, next year, at our wedding". No guarantees of course -we all know that so dont' go there -I'm talking about feeling secure that you most probably (not guaranteed) will be sure about him and the relationship now AND IN THE FUTURE. It's easy peasy to feel temporarily excited - I mean sure, he's his happy self, you've just gone to the precipice of almost ending the relationship and all of a sudden you swing back to "wait!!! I DO love him and I'm excited to be with him!". That's all well and good. It's not the stuff that long term commitment is made of.

[reinventmyself]

He's currently in the middle of the longest stretch ever of him being on the good side? Whaaat??
If that's the case and you are both happily in midst of it all, then why the troubled post?