*this is going to be a long post, cliff notes are at the end for the lazy*
About 2 years ago I started dating someone. At the time I didn’t think much of it, she was nice and down to earth, cute and seemingly not any kind of head-case. Maybe a month or 2 passes and after getting to know her more, I don’t think she’s the right person for me at the time. I had just moved into town ~6-7 months previously and I was thinking I needed to date around more.
I ended it of course, and she takes it badly, but after all the tears we stay friendly and actually become pretty good friends. Not too long afterwards, she tells me that our breakup kind of opened her eyes and made her realize that she needed to give her life some major CPR – she told me that she really admired me for going for and doing what I wanted (career, lifestyle and such) and how much in control of my life I was, compared to all her ‘friends’, which she described to me as some pretty god-awful people. She took some sort of inspiration from that and turned the breakup into a positive force, thinking that why should she look solely to another person for happiness, feeling bad about herself when it ended, when the force for positive change should come from within her, etc. So she moved into a cheaper place to save some money and enrolled herself back into college and kept working part time as well.
When she told me this, I’ll admit I was relieved that she wasn’t holding a grudge and was happily surprised that she took a not-so-great situation and turned it around for herself. We stayed good friends and communicated a lot over emails, and hung out every now and then for dinner or a movie, etc. For maybe 6-9(?) months we continued our friendship, I see some other women, but none of them develop into anything serious. I don’t relate any of this to this girl I dated before, because I don’t think she would necessarily want to hear it (jealousy?) or it might have some negative impact on our friendship which I wanted to keep going – so I omit any of the sordid details outright. What did it honestly have to do with me and hers friendship anyway?
After those 6-9 months, I see a definite change in this girl. She is different from when I first met/dated her. She’s not at the same dead-end job, is saving $$$ on rent, and is back in school pursuing a degree in something she feels passionate about. She’s working out, losing weight and looking good! She’s turned her life around while mine is sort of stagnating. I’ve been let go from work and having terrible luck finding a new job. She is really supportive to me during this time, as I was supportive for her when she transitioned into the new person she became.
Xmas 2006 rolls around, and I head out of town to visit family. During the holidays I find myself thinking of her and her transformation and begin to miss her, and feel myself being attracted to her more than before. We end up spending New Years Eve together, and a little tipsy, get back together that night. She is not resistant to this, because she’s still had strong feelings for me all along.
So we’re back together and things seem really great between us. A few months pass and I’ve finally found and accepted a job that I’ll have to relocate for about 500 miles away. I ask her off-hand if she’ll move with me…this might have been a major F-up because I kind of blurted it out. I just did not feel like ending things all over again because things between us were much better than before and really working out great...I wanted her to be a part of my life. Long-term girlfriend material here.
Long story short, she decides that yes, she does not want to be apart from me either and thus begins the hellish process of moving/shacking up. I made obligations to start working soon, so I move into our new place a month or so before her, because she has to finish up her semester, quit work, pack, etc. back home. For the month plus we’re apart, we talk on the phone a LOT. She tells me she has major cold feet about uprooting herself because to her it seems that I don’t really care if she’s with me or not…and we start arguing over the phone quite a bit. I reassure her that that is not the case, blah blah calm down - and phone conversations can’t do face-to-face communication any justice and once she’s here she’ll see that everything will be ok. After a month and a half of these pain in the arse phone calls, she finally moves in. She’s excited to start a new chapter of her life and happy to be with me.
We’ve been living together for a month now. I have never, EVER lived with a girlfriend before, let alone lived with a roommate for a good 10 years. It’s been an adjustment to say the least. She’s an awesome roommate, clean, she can cook, really really thoughtful about almost everything. I am sweet and thoughtful right back at her. So far she’s had a couple of job interviews, but nothing solid, and not having an income and basically nothing much to do most of the day is making her really stressed. We’ve had a couple of fights about communication, expectations and such – typical relationship things – but we’ve managed to work them out most of the time.
Last night I get an earful about how she wants to be more sexual with me/intimate with me, how she comes on to me and flirts with me….and that apparently I am not noticing it or I am shutting her down because “I obviously don’t feel that way about her, but you feel that way about everyone else you’ve been with.” I love this girl and to tell you the truth, have been perfectly content without the sex…I know my sex drive isn’t what it used to be, but WTF. I work really hard and am F-ing tired sometimes. Another issue at hand is that she is taking medication along with birth control pills that is making her bleed a bit more that normal, and that is making her uncomfortable when we are intimate, so I kind of feel like I need to hold back so that she doesn’t feel worried about staining the sheets, or me being turned off (I assure her that it is perfectly ok) – I just want her to feel happy.
We’re still fighting about this. I am being pretty quiet and letting her do all the talking, I have no idea what to say…and feel I cannot form the words to explain myself and she’s taking that as an affirmation that I don’t desire her. Fecking hell.
JESUS. H. CHRIST.
So have I totally f’d up this woman’s life because I’m a selfish mo-fo and should I just kill my AFC self?
**CLIFF NOTES**
1) dated girl
2) i ended it
3) we stayed good friends
4) she took the end of the relationship as a sign she needed to get her life straight and in order, then proceeds to go back to school + working part time - she succeeds, is a new person i find attractive again
5) we get back together
6) 3 months later i have to relocate 500 miles away for work, and ask her to move with me and live with me
7) she moves in - will find work here and transfer to a new school come fall
8) there is not enough sex/intimacy and she is EXTREMELY mad/pissed because she does not feel sexually desired, otherwise, the relationship has been positive
About 2 years ago I started dating someone. At the time I didn’t think much of it, she was nice and down to earth, cute and seemingly not any kind of head-case. Maybe a month or 2 passes and after getting to know her more, I don’t think she’s the right person for me at the time. I had just moved into town ~6-7 months previously and I was thinking I needed to date around more.
I ended it of course, and she takes it badly, but after all the tears we stay friendly and actually become pretty good friends. Not too long afterwards, she tells me that our breakup kind of opened her eyes and made her realize that she needed to give her life some major CPR – she told me that she really admired me for going for and doing what I wanted (career, lifestyle and such) and how much in control of my life I was, compared to all her ‘friends’, which she described to me as some pretty god-awful people. She took some sort of inspiration from that and turned the breakup into a positive force, thinking that why should she look solely to another person for happiness, feeling bad about herself when it ended, when the force for positive change should come from within her, etc. So she moved into a cheaper place to save some money and enrolled herself back into college and kept working part time as well.
When she told me this, I’ll admit I was relieved that she wasn’t holding a grudge and was happily surprised that she took a not-so-great situation and turned it around for herself. We stayed good friends and communicated a lot over emails, and hung out every now and then for dinner or a movie, etc. For maybe 6-9(?) months we continued our friendship, I see some other women, but none of them develop into anything serious. I don’t relate any of this to this girl I dated before, because I don’t think she would necessarily want to hear it (jealousy?) or it might have some negative impact on our friendship which I wanted to keep going – so I omit any of the sordid details outright. What did it honestly have to do with me and hers friendship anyway?
After those 6-9 months, I see a definite change in this girl. She is different from when I first met/dated her. She’s not at the same dead-end job, is saving $$$ on rent, and is back in school pursuing a degree in something she feels passionate about. She’s working out, losing weight and looking good! She’s turned her life around while mine is sort of stagnating. I’ve been let go from work and having terrible luck finding a new job. She is really supportive to me during this time, as I was supportive for her when she transitioned into the new person she became.
Xmas 2006 rolls around, and I head out of town to visit family. During the holidays I find myself thinking of her and her transformation and begin to miss her, and feel myself being attracted to her more than before. We end up spending New Years Eve together, and a little tipsy, get back together that night. She is not resistant to this, because she’s still had strong feelings for me all along.
So we’re back together and things seem really great between us. A few months pass and I’ve finally found and accepted a job that I’ll have to relocate for about 500 miles away. I ask her off-hand if she’ll move with me…this might have been a major F-up because I kind of blurted it out. I just did not feel like ending things all over again because things between us were much better than before and really working out great...I wanted her to be a part of my life. Long-term girlfriend material here.
Long story short, she decides that yes, she does not want to be apart from me either and thus begins the hellish process of moving/shacking up. I made obligations to start working soon, so I move into our new place a month or so before her, because she has to finish up her semester, quit work, pack, etc. back home. For the month plus we’re apart, we talk on the phone a LOT. She tells me she has major cold feet about uprooting herself because to her it seems that I don’t really care if she’s with me or not…and we start arguing over the phone quite a bit. I reassure her that that is not the case, blah blah calm down - and phone conversations can’t do face-to-face communication any justice and once she’s here she’ll see that everything will be ok. After a month and a half of these pain in the arse phone calls, she finally moves in. She’s excited to start a new chapter of her life and happy to be with me.
We’ve been living together for a month now. I have never, EVER lived with a girlfriend before, let alone lived with a roommate for a good 10 years. It’s been an adjustment to say the least. She’s an awesome roommate, clean, she can cook, really really thoughtful about almost everything. I am sweet and thoughtful right back at her. So far she’s had a couple of job interviews, but nothing solid, and not having an income and basically nothing much to do most of the day is making her really stressed. We’ve had a couple of fights about communication, expectations and such – typical relationship things – but we’ve managed to work them out most of the time.
Last night I get an earful about how she wants to be more sexual with me/intimate with me, how she comes on to me and flirts with me….and that apparently I am not noticing it or I am shutting her down because “I obviously don’t feel that way about her, but you feel that way about everyone else you’ve been with.” I love this girl and to tell you the truth, have been perfectly content without the sex…I know my sex drive isn’t what it used to be, but WTF. I work really hard and am F-ing tired sometimes. Another issue at hand is that she is taking medication along with birth control pills that is making her bleed a bit more that normal, and that is making her uncomfortable when we are intimate, so I kind of feel like I need to hold back so that she doesn’t feel worried about staining the sheets, or me being turned off (I assure her that it is perfectly ok) – I just want her to feel happy.
We’re still fighting about this. I am being pretty quiet and letting her do all the talking, I have no idea what to say…and feel I cannot form the words to explain myself and she’s taking that as an affirmation that I don’t desire her. Fecking hell.
JESUS. H. CHRIST.
So have I totally f’d up this woman’s life because I’m a selfish mo-fo and should I just kill my AFC self?
**CLIFF NOTES**
1) dated girl
2) i ended it
3) we stayed good friends
4) she took the end of the relationship as a sign she needed to get her life straight and in order, then proceeds to go back to school + working part time - she succeeds, is a new person i find attractive again
5) we get back together
6) 3 months later i have to relocate 500 miles away for work, and ask her to move with me and live with me
7) she moves in - will find work here and transfer to a new school come fall
8) there is not enough sex/intimacy and she is EXTREMELY mad/pissed because she does not feel sexually desired, otherwise, the relationship has been positive
I can hear it now... "you have to be sensitive to her feelings, you should try to understand her, you should be a douchebag pushover and realize she's always right, blah blah blah, maybe put some sea shell shaped soaps in the bathroom that you can never use..."