DancingFool

OP, you've been in a committed relationship with him for a year, so no, he doesn't have commitment issues as such. He can commit and has been committed to you.

What is happening is actually quite normal for relationships - after a certain time you evaluate how you feel and whether you wish to continue or not. He is at the "not continue" place, which is fine. What is not so fine is that you are both really young and are making this break up way way more difficult and dramatic than it needs to be.

Harsh reality is that he is just not that into you and it really is that simple. You are not his "the one". That doesn't make him damaged, broken, in need of therapy, etc. This is just normal stuff in life. Learning how to let go gracefully is a critical life skill. Let him go and heal. He is also not your one. Your one will not need to go to therapy in order to convince himself to stay with you - are you seeing how messed up that is? I hope so. Step back, cool down and think.

Yikes....this creep is literally actively working on destroying your self esteem. It's what the beginnings of abusive/controlling relationships look like.

He is feeding you this toxic drip that you are not attractive and that you are sooo lucky he is willing to be with you. RUUUUN!!!! Dump this loser today. Immediately. Like just tell him you are not into him and block and delete him and don't respond to any strange numbers or contacts you don't recognize. Danger danger danger......

You are beautiful and you deserve someone who sees that and appreciates that and values you as you are.

What you are describing is binge drinking - long dry or dry'ish spells followed by falling down, black out drunk. It's just a less common form of alcoholism.

The mood swings you are describing, the jekyll/hyde personality change, are also consistent with a seasoned alcoholic. Meaning he has been going at it long enough to start experiencing chemical reactions to alcohol, thus the moodiness and seemingly changing personality. Simply put, if he is belligerent now, he is going to get worse and eventually become violent as well. He is already half way there.

So the question is, do you think you can do better than an alcoholic?

1 minute ago, abykann said:

I truly appreciate everybody's input and suggestions. As much as I hate to see it this way, I may have to give up on making the relationship work. We're meeting to discuss these problems and I want to make it clear that his support is an expectation for me, I don't think I'm asking for very much. If he can't provide that, it looks like we're at the end.

Why do you continue to put it on him and make it his decision, when in fact, it should be yours.  YOU need to make a decision on whether his behavior and the way he has treated you is good enough. Speaking for myself, I would have dumped him long ago. Don't play second fiddle and don't place your agency into others. Decide for yourself if this is acceptable or not and if not, boot him. Stop negotiating.

I think it's healthy for men and women to be friends. However, that friendship, by definition, has to be mutually platonic. What bonds you to an opposite sex friend is really no different than what bonds you to the same sex friend - shared interests and values without any romantic interest whatsoever. You see each other as human beings rather than as sexual objects.

So, if your bf is keeping around women who are into him as "friends", then that is not a genuine friendship. He is actually showing you that he is a low character loser who is happy to use and manipulate others to stroke his own ego. When you see that, you run.

Same goes for anyone who has a long string of ex's turned "friends". Again, you are looking at an individual who is quite toxic, trying to cloak his toxicity as something positive. There is nothing positive about that unless they are co-parenting.

On the flip side, healthy friendship is when the woman he is friends with is above board with you. She is happy to meet you, she is respectful of you and your relationship and she will actively avoid doing anything that might so much as give an appearance of impropriety. There has never ever been any romantic interest on either her end or his, and she actually puts the health of your relationship above their friendship.

If you want to know who the man really is, take a good look at the company he keeps.

Your bf, sadly, values the company and approval of this harpy over you. Does it sting? For sure. Should you continue to make the mistake of fighting for this relationship and for his approval? Heck NO! Stop it, just stop it. Dump this loser because he IS a loser. Raise your standards above gutter level.

OP, the longer you stay, the more you argue and fight over him, the lower your self worth and self esteem drop. Value yourself more than this. When a dude shows you so clearly that you are just the good for now chick, DUMP HIM! Yes, I'm yelling because this is a frustrating thread to read. Do not ever stoop so low as to get into a fight over some sausage. It should be beneath you. Do not sit there and fight for his approval and attention or argue about how he should stand up for you. IF he actually cared about you, IF he respected you, you would not have this argument at all. His friends would not dare say a word wrong about you. They are literally sh$tting on you because behind your back, that's what he is doing as well. His friends are reflecting like a mirror what he thinks of you.

Please for the love of....find your self worth and dump this loser with extreme prejudice.

Choosing to isolate yourself from people is a very common response to abuse related trauma. You are obviously very capable of connecting with people, and being a good partner, as well as wanting that connection. So yes, please get help, but specifically, help from a therapist who specializes in handling the victims of abuse and the associated trauma that comes with that. You do not need to stay alone and isolated. This can be fixed.

You've made a mistake that many people make - thinking that if you treat someone like you want to be treated, things will work out. The trouble with that belief is that some people out there are not like you. Your ex is not like you. Think of it like this - you would not steal, but there are people who do steal and they don't feel bad about it. They are different from you, they think differently, feel different, act differently. The point about relationships is to find a person who is actually like you in fundamental ways - meaning morals and values. If you are kind, you want a partner who is kind.

To answer your question, yes there are natural timelines where people stop to evaluate the relationship and decide whether to continue or quit. Typically, those are after first date, after three dates, then after 3-4 months, then again, after 6 months, after 8 months, after one year, after 1.5 years. What are you evaluating? What character traits and behaviors you've seen of the person that you are dating and whether they truly match you and your own character, values, and expectations. If the don't, if you've seen bad behaviors that trouble you - you let them go, aka dump them. Dating is not about hanging on, it's about weeding out bad matches.

The biggest challenge for you is that you need to change your thinking drastically - life is not over at 30, you have plenty of time to find a healthy partner (but you do need to work on you for bit to deal with the trauma and damage you just went through), you do need to find the courage to end relationships with those who do not match your values and do not reciprocate, you need to learn to value yourself and what you have to offer and understand that there is a nice person out there who will value you.

Different point of view.

There is nothing wrong with being in a relationship and playing the proverbial wing man to your single friend. The real heart of the issue is why don't you trust your wife and immediately presume that she must have been cheating? Also, why do you two socialize separately instead of going out as a couple and integrating your respective friends and social life? Why you do immediately assume that your wife would act on some goofy fantasy that she shared with you and why do you feel it's OK to hold something that she shared with you against her?

You have much bigger issues in your marriage than what she did the other night. Make fewer assumptions and maybe work on your connection as a couple.

3 minutes ago, Naddie101 said:

@Blue_Skirt When he isn't moody, he can be great.  He has supported me during rough times, mostly during deaths of people I loved. He can be a good listener and has made me laugh, think, ect. We have traveled together both in & out of the US. He always gets back to me when we text..dosen't leave me "on read". 

Do you know what every abused woman says? He treats me really well when he is not beating me.... He might not be abusive as such, but the parallel is identical, especially your own thinking and low expectations.

OP, you seriously need to raise your standards and expectations. Healthy relationships are healthy all of the time, not just sometimes. 

What you are experiencing is exactly what a relationship looks like with a mentally unstable individual - a roller coaster ride that leaves you empty and exhausted. To make matters worse - people like him target exactly  people like you - empathetic to the point of complete disregard to yourself, your own health and well being, willing to sacrifice everything and easy to manipulate/guilt trip into doing so.

Please dump him. Do not stay friends, do not keep in contact. Quit cold turkey. Then spend some time with yourself figuring out what attracts you to a toxic dynamic and learn what healthy boundaries look like. You can be a kind and empathetic person, but also in a healthy way = with strong boundaries.

18 minutes ago, Savannah13_12 said:

Yeah, i know it was a mistake for me to sext with him before actual sex but he lives around 3 hours away from me. We talk everyday so i think that created a fake feeling of intimacy and then we planed this 3 days holiday and i was ready to have sex with him because for some stupid reason i felt comfortable enough to do it.

Chalk this up to a lesson learned that no matter how someone seems online, they are likely to be quite different in real life. While he seemed all flirtatious and forward online, in reality he is more quiet, shy, and probably not that experienced. The persona online doesn't match who he is in real life. It doesn't make him a bad person, just not who you imagined him to be and not how he comes across online.

So next time, avoid chatting online so much that you feel like you have this intimacy and connection when in reality, you really don't know what the person is like. Remember that relationships only happen in real life, face to face. So seek to meet sooner rather than later. Make those meet ups and dates more light, short, and easy and see if you are actually clicking in real life or not.

Oh and please don't take this so personally as a rejection of yourself. His issues, like probably feeling embarrassed that he got over excited and didn't "perform", and who knows what else is going through his head - none of that is about you or anything to do with you. It honestly sounds like despite all the talk, he lacks real life experience and got shy/embarrassed about it.

I don't know what you tell you. It sounds like you are giving him plenty of time and alone time at that. I kind of have to echo the first poster in whether this time argument is really about much more than that. Either you are not compatible, he is bored and so fixated on you entertaining him more, or he wants something else that he is not articulating, etc.

My advice is try to explore more on what it is that he needs specifically. What's his dissatisfaction and can he articulate it better than "I want more of your time". Does he not have friends and a life outside of you? What's driving this need? At some point, you might need to consider that you and him just aren't that compatible if he simply has to fixate on you  and take up every shred of your time or else be upset and leave you feeling guilty and exhausted. 

What I've personally learned early on is that I can only date men who are just as driven and busy as I am. That way, yes, we value quality time and can enjoy that, rather than quantity time. Neither one of us has quantity time and so neither person feels slighted and upset that their partner can't give more time. In fact, I've never had these types of issues that you are experiencing. Instead, we understood each other and were able to flex as needed and find time as needed to mutual satisfaction.

To find a good connection you have to be open to it. Right now, you are not because you are still so hung up on your ex. It's impossible for you to be open to someone new when you are so stuck and not over the past. So in that respect, trying to date right now is going to backfire and feel disappointing because you are actively pining for what you had. It's a vicious circle of sorts where you are not open to new experiences and keep getting disappointed that new guys aren't exactly like your ex, so that keeps pushing you toward being stuck on your ex. Nobody can measure up. So maybe, take a break and focus on other aspects of your life for awhile, at least until your ex isn't such a huge factor in your mind.

What you've learned here is that you aren't who you thought, you've grown, you've changed, but you also have a lot more growing to do.

No, you will never have exactly what you had with your ex with someone else because every connection is unique. However, you need to reach a point where that doesn't sound tragic. Instead you can appreciate the fact that there are many others out there with whom you can have an even better, albeit a different connection. Once you reach a point where you are more at peace and more open to that possibility, then start dating again.

11 hours ago, Jane1230 said:

She never said anything about falling out of love or something, only " Please, I don't want you to wait for me, don't want to be an anchor, I want you to be happy, to move on, maybe we will talk in a year but before that I'm not ready to get in contact. I need to understand who I am and what I need"

She may not be spelling it out for you in those specific words, but she is telling you quite directly that she is completely checked out of the relationship for good. People who are still on the fence or maybe thinking about getting back together do not tell you to move on and be happy. The maybe we'll talk in a year is just softening the blow and even so, putting that off for so long that it might as well be never. It's a very clear message from her that there is no going back.

Of course, she had a choice to be kinder, to talk to you, to tell you what's going through her mind or her doubts. She could have told you she wants to end things instead of just sneaking away. Again, that choice to sneak away was entirely selfish.

OP, you didn't break her heart. Her ego got hurt. Big difference. She dumped you and she has zero regrets about that.

Her tantrum over you seeing someone else is 100% about her ego - how dare someone she deemed less than and discarded, aka YOU, move on and be with someone else before her greatness did the same. So now she has to punish you for daring to be desirable and not wallowing in a helpless and lonely puddle of tears because she left you. Toxic attitude beyond words. This alone should actually wake you up to the idea that you actually dodged a bullet when she left you.

You actually did dodge a bullet. Be careful about who you give your heart to and maybe don't be so blindly loyal and committed to someone who was never really committed to you. Healthy relationships are not this difficult and I doubt you'll have any trouble finding a good partner provided that you adjust your picker and learn to walk away from the "I am not sure about/scared of/don't want labels for commitment" types. If you want commitment and a certain life, then seek someone who is certain she wants the same. Life is too short to waste time on less.

I'm sorry you are dealing with this. While I haven't experienced something like this myself, I've seen it happen more than once and there are plenty of similar experiences here on these boards.

Unfortunately, some types of personality disorders are prone to this type of behavior - discard and run. All I can tell you is that this has nothing to do with you, your relationship, anything you have or haven't done. Also, there is nothing you could have done to stop her or change her behavior.

Her actions are not about you and have nothing to do with you. They are all about herself. She may have abandoned her life because she felt like it, or she may have cut loose because she ran off with someone else (that you don't know about). Either way, she is acting solely in her own selfish interest with zero regard for how it affects anyone else, especially you, her long term partner.

Painful and shocking as this is, it's best that you close that door firmly shut and focus on healing and moving on with your own life. You've been a part of a couple since you were teens. Time to figure out who you are as an adult woman of your own accord.

At some point, you've got to be honest with yourself - you are not over her and desperately want her back.

The whole NC thing and jumping in to support her while her mother was sick were both attempts by you to get her back. NC was meant to make her miss you. Support was an attempt to show her how awesome you are and what she is missing. Yet, despite all your efforts, she remains steadfast and brutally honest with you that she does not want a relationship.

So this time, NC is for you and only you. Time for you to heal emotionally and actually move on. You'll know you've really moved on when you no longer care if she reaches out or wants to get back together. In the meantime, if you are afraid that she'll reach out again because she wants to use you and you'll fall for that, then block her. You have to start letting go of the idea of you and her being together again. If you can't block her just in case.....you aren't healed.

What you should do is find a new bf who is naturally more affectionate as a person and overall more compatible to you.

You are not wrong to want what you want and he isn't wrong in staying true to himself. All it means is that you and him are not compatible and that's causing conflict where you are trying to change him and he is resisting.

The point of dating is to figure these things out. Once you realize that the person you are dating can't/won't meet your needs, you end it and move on.

Just now, FraniMar22 said:

There's one other thing I wanted to mention.  We met on the Plenty of Fish dating app.  After we decided to be exclusive, we both supposedly deleted our profiles.  The other thing I saw in his email were tons of emails from this dating site with new matches for him.  He swears he's not on there, hasn't been in a very long time.  He showed me his phone and showed me the apps on it.  I'm thinking there's a way that people hide apps on their phone.  Does anyone know if this is possible?  Just me digging deeper into this wool that's been pulled over my eyes.

Oh for the love of.....STOP playing detective and face reality - you are dating a cheating, lying pos. What more do you need to dump him?

Stop fixating on how he is effing you around and start focusing on what will actually improve your life - finding your own place and removing this loser from your life.

Like seriously....what are you clinging on to here? How many years have you wasted in this pattern of he lies, you catch him, he gives you a hug and tells you he cares, you demand answers, he stonewalls you, and you ....well...you back off and stay. Rinse and repeat. How much more of your precious life are you wanting to waste on this?

Look, you need to pull up your big girl panties and make a decision - either you are so desperate to be with a man that you will turn a blind eye to what a lying, cheating pos he is, in which case you stop policing him and start smiling and pretending all is amazing with you two OR you dump him and move on with your life. Realize that you can be just fine without a man. Decide and live accordingly.

.....If this is the most mature woman you've ever dated.....you might want to consider raising your standards at least above gutter level....

On a more serious note, there seems to be something that attracts you to drama queens, aka high maintenance, manipulative women. You are correct that she cornered you to where no answer was going to work in your favor. Keeping in mind that her demands on your wallet were not justified to begin with and she literally had no right to ask you to pay more for the upgraded seats. A mature woman would have either accepted flying coach OR paid for the both of you to upgrade out of her own pocket if it was that important to her.

You actually offered a reasonable compromise that she can pay for and sit in the better seats by herself, however, you got attacked for that because....princess wanted something else. It's about as immature as it gets and completely absurd. No, OP, most women are not like that. If this is your norm, you are the common denominator and need to fix your picker when it comes to choosing partners.

9 minutes ago, Sam975 said:

I get where your coming from. You are right. A lot of things went sideways since the breakup. Figured we were on the same page and later when he ended communication I get where he was coming from and yes I should of done it. I was blinded at the time. I want to look at the past and be happy Even if its All over andI have no regret for sending it, I just can't believe someone who was supposed to be a person who cared for you for so long cannot extend the curtesy to respond. But whatever.

After break ups people are done caring...... He is no longer responsible for you and your emotions and same goes for you. Time to let this go and move on. He doesn't owe you anything and you don't owe him anything anymore.

To answer your main question - not he isn't just doing it you and being some kind of a magically wonderful bf to someone else. A person who will manipulate you, lie to you, and play with your emotions will do the exact same to everyone else too. They are good to only one person in their life - themselves.

For whatever reason, you were vulnerable and got caught up in an online fantasy. Unfortunately, you are learning the hard way that the emotions, feelings that you develop, and the pain are all 100% real.

Big internet hugs and please step away from him and anything that connects you to him. Block, delete and focus on real life. Get out of the house, lean on family or friends, take care of yourself, immerse in work, find things to do that you like. The pain does go away and having other things to focus on helps a lot.

Going forward, if you are not able to meet quickly for a coffee in real life and take things into real life dating, do not carry on. No amount of chatting online replaces real life. If he hasn't met you, he cannot love you in any real sense. Love takes time and face to face presence to develop.

Also, learn to pay attention more to your family. If you have to hide what your relationship is really like or how your partner treats you from your family because they won't approve or be happy with that - that is THE biggest sign that you are in a toxic relationship. Ditto for if you share with your family how you are being treated or they witness how you are being treated and get upset on your behalf - LISTEN to them.  They are correct. Don't be in a relationship where you have to defend the behaviors of your SO to your friends and family.

33 minutes ago, Yostina said:

I'll follow my dreams and goal and create the life I've always wanted and then maybe I can think of getting into a new relationship, although I kinda lost hope in meeting someone good.

How can you lose hope in meeting someone good when you wasted 8 years on someone bad? You haven't even experienced what good is.

OP, healthy relationships are not this difficult. They are not built around strife, hardships, and the whole "what we've been through" or "fighting for" ideas. When you meet an actual good man who is right for you it will be and feel easy. Literally easy.

You will see mostly eye to eye on things because you share values and you get each other intuitively. It will be easy because the relationship is reciprocal - he will support you as much as you support him. A two way street. It will be easy because even when you disagree about something, you can sit down and discuss things and come up with an easy compromise that you are both happy with. Keep in mind that it's not a compromise when you give all and he gives little to nothing.

Again, with heavy emphasis - you have a very toxic understanding of what relationships should be like and what your role in the relationship is and really need to work on that and figure out what healthy looks like.

OP, you get closure and a clean break when YOU accept that the relationship is over and that this person is not and should not be a part of your life anymore - that you and him were not a good fit. As such, you remove them from your life, regardless of what they want, claim, say, beg, etc. - you are literally learning the hard way why.

He demanded to stay friends, but he wasn't honest. His agenda was to try and get you back and break up your current relationship by being obnoxious to your bf. (Your bf is a saint for sticking around, btw, as most people would have walked away from this mess.) The reason why people are admonishing you a bit is that you allowed this mess to carry on instead of telling your ex that he needs to be gone.

Ironically, once your ex got over you and found someone new, he did exactly what you should have done yourself - distance himself and drop you so that he can focus on his new relationship and be respectful to it by not carrying on with an ex.

What's going really sideways here is that after a year of silence, you feel compelled to reach out to your ex yet again and would continue on with him if he was responsive. Thing is - he has moved on and it's time you let go and move on too.

Accepting that a relationship is over comes from you, from within.

Honestly, ending this has been the best decision you've made in the past 8 years. It's a bit shocking to read what you've put up with.

Your blind commitment to this man has lead you down a path of a very toxic, on/off relationship with a person who is controlling, dishonest, whose family is dishonest, and you don't really truly know the whole extent of it. If you  were to get married, you could well end up in jail yourself as a spouse or end up fighting for dear life to avoid that. You have no idea what his uncle has really done, how soon the government will catch on, and what else these people might be up to.

Stay far away from this man and anyone connected with him. In fact block and delete all contact so he cannot come back, since you already have this on/off dynamic.

Also, please sit down with yourself and figure out what healthy normal relationships actually look like. What you believe in and the type of blind commitment you've engaged in too often lands women in dangerous abusive relationships. You need to learn how to judge and how to determine what is and is not OK and when to walk away.