Is my LDR falling apart?

[BWFMT]

I have been in a relationship for the last 4 years; 2 of which we lived together and then due to unforeseen circumstances my partner had to move 200 miles away to the other end of the country, so the past 2 years have been LDR.

 

I should expand on the story some more; his reason for moving was that he could no longer afford to live in London. He is terrible with money and has a 5 figure debt over various credit cards and overdrafts, while I am financially stable. Whilst I paid as much as I could to help us live together, ultimately he sunk and could not afford to stay. I offered him the opportunity to live rent free with me while he save some money but he declined (he is very independent)

 

When he first moved, we split up as we did not want to be apart, but we still saw each other practically every week - eventually, we decided being apart was silly and that we would make long distance work as it was clearly what we both wanted. Everything was great; we would speak daily (if not more!), he would send sweet text messages and tell me he loves me at least one day.

 

Up until recently everything has been fine. I saved up and paid for us to spend the winter backpacking around South America, and since we have been back he seems quite cold and uncaring. In the past month I have only seen him for four nights (as opposed to previously, when we would easily spend half of each month together) If I text to say 'I miss you', or 'I love' you, it goes completely ignored the vast majority of the time.

 

Literally,I sent a text yesterday evening saying "Times like this I think about getting a dog for when you're not here, I really miss you" his response; "You should never visit China, they eat dogs there". Smooth.

 

I don't know what is going on; he still has the massive debt pile and I know he is working lots to clear it, and I can appreciate that we may need to spend less time together in order to achieve that; he knows I am happy to travel to him at any time, and if it means seeing him every week I will gladly travel to him! But when I suggest this he responds with 'what is the point if I am working?'

 

I occasionally come across as preachy; I am guilty of lecturing him about his spending sometimes (but then I am of the persuasion that if you cannot afford to pay your debt you probably shouldn't go clubbing twice a weekend)he has often told me he doesn't need me lecturing him, when all I am trying to do is help him!

 

When we do get together everything is fine; like we have never been apart. But once he is gone it is like I am not a part of his life any more.

 

When we returned to England a few weeks back he out and out said that our relationship could not be the top of his priority list at the moment, and I get that, but that surely doesn't mean he needs to be so cold toward me?

 

I am scared he is holding onto me because he is scared to let go. And I guess, I am the same. I love him, we are both in the latter half of our twenties and have had relationships that have not worked previously; we were good friends for a while before we got together and know each other better than anyone else. I guess that is why this is so hard.

 

As well as being my lover he is my best friend; I don't want to lose both!

[TAV]

He is displaying some pretty careless behaviour to be called your best friend. And you call him independent? He has a major debt, has had it for years, it was the reason for him to break up with you 'because his pride would not allow it', he still wastes money on clubbing, does not feel bad about you paying for an extensive holiday and he thanks you by treating you like a stranger afterwards. That does not sound to me like he is a proud and independent man.

 

You are always there for him. Even when he left you, you were still there. And you are accused of being preachy, because you tell him off like a mother would. Something in your relationship is disbalanced, that is clear from what I read in your post.

 

Use the space he is giving you to take a good look at your relationship. Yes, you are in your late twenties now, but ask yourself if you want to be living like this in your late thirties too.

[d0nnivain]

Why are you holding on to him? What do you get out of it other than the comfort of the familiar? He moved to fix his debt but hasn't done that. Now he's being cold to you & you are so lonely you want a pet to keep you company. If you aren't his priority, what is in this for you?

[BWFMT]

I know; my closest friend says very much the same thing as you guys; she was appalled when I told her that I had loaned him money again in the last fortnight. He has a way of flipping things to make me feel bad, even if he is in the wrong. For example; I loaned him money to pay for festival tickets as he couldn't afford them; it turned out he could afford them but his best friend couldn't, so he asked me to pay for him so his friend could come too. I questioned him over this and he went mad at me, saying he knew that money would come between us as long as we at completely different ends of the financial scale and that he would be accused of using me as a cash cow.

 

Don't get me wrong, I am not loaded - I work hard running my own business, I manage my money effectively and I save, which he never seems to have got the hang of. He used to accuse me of being the reason he was haemorrhaging money when we lived together, his debt was four figures then. Since he has moved away to apparently clear it it has more than DOUBLED.

 

I just cannot imagine my life without him now, it has been such a long time and I have had various problems over the years - I suffer with bipolar disorder, and experience extreme mood swings and he really helped me out through all the therapy back when we were living together. I've never had a partner who understood me like he does, which I guess is why it hurts now to almost be pushed aside and rejected.

 

I have not seen him in over a week now, which is kind of my own doing - I was meant to be out of the country so he booked a full week of work with the promo agency he works for, but now he is saying he is unsure if we can see each other next week; he is so blasé about the fact that it could potentially be a month passed by the next time we get to see each other.

 

I don't want my friends to be right; we were so close before we went away, and just now I cannot understand what has happened; 3 months of travelling takes its toll on anyone, but we got on just fine on our trip! People used to ask us how we did it - how we maintained such closeness despite distance. Now I fear people are looking at us and observing our breakdown