Need Help:my smothering girlfriend

First off a little background: I am a 20 year old college student and my girlfriend is 19 and entering college soon. We have been dating for about a year now and everything has been awesome with our relationship until recently. i feel like i'm being smothered. she says i'm allowed to hang out with my friends but i can tell she doesn't want me to. She is constantly cutting everyone of my friends down and tells me how stupid they are. if i would like to do something that doesn't involve her she tried to make me feel bad about doing it, and i end up not doing it. i haven't minded being under her "control" because i kind of liked it in the beginning because she is my first girlfriend.

I know if i try to talk to her about giving me a little space she will take it completely the wrong way and we will both end up crying our eyes out because she will end up hurt. i dont know if i have a communication problem or if its just that she knows where i'm going when i try to talk abou things like this and gets defensive to maintain control.......

basically i need to know the best way to go about communicating with her and letting her know how i feel and that i will always be there for her and continue to love her with all of my heart......i also know that this relationship will continue to go downhill of i do not fix this problem because it kind of makes me resent her when she controls me....any help will be appreciated.

do you spend a fair amount of time together now? i mean like enough quality time? that may be the reason she's hesitant for you to go with your friends. my bf & i NEVER get time together because we're either working or he's got something else going on...so sometimes i get like that with him because i feel like he's choosing all these other things over me or maybe that i'm not worth spending time with. what i can tell you is that when he is gonna go out & do something & it doesn't involve me it always makes me feel better if he says something like..baby, i want to be with you really bad, but i also want to spend time with my guy friends. we'll make time together on such and such a date. that usually makes it better. let her know that she is important to you, but you need some "alone" time too. she should understand

Yea you need to just tell her that first off you love her and are gonna be there for her but that it will help your relationship if your not always "joined together" so to speak..just tell her look there are times when I want to hangout with my friends and you would want to hangout with your friends and still we'll have time where it is just me and you..say that and see what happens..

Phillip

i understand what yall are saying, but to me it seems like it's just not that simple, i know this kind of thing is'nt just going to change overnight or anything, its just that we do everything together, i mean everything. before i met her, i always hung out with my friends, my friends and i always seemed to have a good time, i miss that.

if i try to talk to her about it, she just doesn't seem to understand what i'm trying to say. i feel like she's not respecting my feelings and what i want. she somehow seems to always turn things around and make it seem like i'm being selfish.

maybe this example will explain it: say i wanted to go do something with just my friends, i will tell her and she will say, "can i go too", she never seems to think that maybe i might want it to be just me and my friends, in my book thats kind of inconsiderate

if i could somehow communicate to her in a way that she would just understand without getting defensive or hurt.

2Bhappy, if you're telling her what you just told us, and she doesn't get it, then she is way more dependent on you than is healthy. Has she been abandoned in her life (mother, father, previous boyfriend)? That could be part of why she clings to you like a barnacle.

People need time to be themselves away from their s.o.'s. One person will never meet all of the other person's needs. Since you're already feeling smothered, this is your wake up call.

Tell her firmly that you'd like to have guy friends and that you want her to have girl friends. Talk with her about who she might like to get to know better, then arrange for a night when you'll spend time apart with your respective friends. She sounds like she needs to be eased through this. If you have the patience, take it slowly, but be firm. Good luck.

thanks k8tie, i feel like she is too dependent on me also. I feel like she doesn't have the greatest of parents, they're divorced and the mother drinks, father is remarried, and yes, guys have mistreated her in the past.....i love this girl more than she will ever know, all i want is for her to know that, me breaking up with her is not an option, i know this problem can be fixed, its just a matter of communicating to her so she understands.

she's prolly just wanting as much attention from you as possible and that's prolly what makes her seem "needy". all you can really do is keep at her with the "i care, i love you, i need some time by myself" stuff if it's not getting through. eventually she'll realize that this is just something that everyone needs...suggest she get a hobby or spend time with her friends or something to get her mind off the fact that you guys will be apart for a bit...tell her it's not like it's gonna be forever before you get back or that it's not punishment for anything she's done, but that you just need some time to be with the guys

maybe if it's not coming from me, she'll understand better, like if someone else talks to her about all of this.

sometimes that helps, sometimes it's hard to listen to the people you love. sometimes it's just stubbornness. perhaps you should look into that

thanks for the help and advice, i'm sure all this will get better, still looking for more advice if anyone has it