Can you not get along and still love someone???

[soconfused71]

I hope you can take a min. to read. My boyfriend and I have been dating for 1yr and a few months. In the beginning we got along but after a few months we started butting heads...pretty much about everything. We constantly fight and when we do its not good because we are both people with stong characters and none of us will give in..There has been so much disrespect between us..we have said horrible things to eachother and its even become physical on both ends at times. Last Sept. we relocated to His home state which is diffrent than mine. I left family and friends for him but mostly with the hope that things would get better..(I had my reasons) Our fights mellowed out a bit but when we did fight it really sucked because I had no place to go...Last weekend we had a fight and I took all my things and left to a friends house 4 hours away...Im thinking of going back home (to my hometown) He of course is sorry and is begging me to come back...I feel sad and confused...I feel like we cant get along..There is an age diffrence between us..Im 36 and he is 25..I feel that perhaps im just more mature and therefore this has become alot of the problem. He says he will change but Ive heard this before and nothing...I cant seem to let go tho..Neither can he...I feel bad for leaving but i dont want to go back to the fighting...i dont want to leave him either..What do I do??? I would like to get some feed back...Can 2 people love eachother but not get along???

Edited April 3, 2008 by soconfused71

[wareagle]

What were you fighting about? I was to in your shoes, except I am the male at 36 she the female at 25. We had the same problems with fighting, she to lived about an hour away with her mother, which she moved in with when she filed for divorce from her ex. I have spent the last year half of my life trying to make her happy, and nothing seemed to work. The age gap maturity gap is so hard to overcome, my situation is I thought that with her being married and having a child she would be well on her way to maturing.

 

Boy I was wrong. She was the most selfish, thoughtless, non compassionate person I have ever met. We argued about the dumbest ****. She could never see my side of the fence on anything, If it wasn't her way she wasn't happy. To answer your question yes you can love someone with all your heart and argue all the time, but It takes to to make a relationship work. When one is doing all the giving and the other is taking everything and not giving back it makes it tough to live with. Give us more info about what was going on in your relationship and maybe we can help you better. Hang in there don't give up yet.

[soconfused71]

EVERYTHING.....money, my sick dog, driving, jobs, what to eat..I mean you name it we fight about it...Mostly money... well and my dog who is 12 and a bit sick but over all ok...he just needs a bit of patience after all i was in the situation with the dog when he met me and she is a big part of me...Now that Ive had a couple of days to breathe I dont want to go back to that life...Im always walking on egg shells ...It seems when we try to talk about it we FIGHT...I expressed the way I was feeling and warned him I was getting fed up but I dont think he took me seriously now finally I exploded and left..

[NickP]

Hi,

I just posted this on another topic but i've copied it and pasted it here cos I think it might be relevant.

 

"

This is something I picked up (funnily enough, from army training) which I've found useful:

there re 4 stages to every relationship (with a friend/gf/etc.)

1. you get to know the person

2. you start to get closer to the person and notice their certain traits/habits

3. you start to pick at those habits, or you find those habits annoying and you feel like you want to change them and you try to do so -> causing arguments/fights

4. you accept the other person for who they are, embrace their habits and live a healty relationship of respect and acceptance of one another.

"

 

think about what stage of the relationship you might be in at the moment. differences are INEVITABLE in any relationship. it's all about accomodating and respecting those differences. getting violent about them is definitely not something that should happen at any time.

 

have you talked to him about taking things slow? maybe you don't have to shift in with one another again, but do keep that option for the future if things go well in the future once more.

[dancingshoes]

wow you have just written about my life OP. Except i am 35 and he is 28. It has been 3 years and I told him to move out 12 months ago. I had enough yet I still loved him. We couldnt stay away from each other and it was on again off again for so long that people stopped asking how we were and no one wanted to hear our sh&t anymore. This past weekend he ended it by saying that we have to stay away from each other and he doesnt want it to be this way but he decided he cant do it anymore. Also I wont let him live with me again because of the fights and lack of communication and he just wants to move back in with me. I want to take it slowly and he wants babies and marriage and houses without working "Us" out. I think that is immature. He cant communicate with me and I try to with him but he keeps repeating the same mistakes over and over and doesnt seem to learn that if he does "A" then "B" will happen. And i try to change my self for him but I give up because its a two way street. And I feel ripped off. As much as I love him I cant be with him because he wants his cake and to eat it too. I find it hard to understand because when I was his age I was nothing like that. I learned at a young age that the world doesnt owe me and that you make your own happiness. And that credit ratings do matter, bills paid on time do matter, having a car does matter, being polite to people matters, tantrums and sulking suck, lack of communication gets you nowhere and that having space from your partner once a week is great.

 

Im just wondering is it an age thing or is it an immature male thing that some guys stay like this no matter what age they are? Or do some guys just think here I am take me how I am and I aint changing for no one.....

[Prosecco]

I'm sorry, but one thing set off warning flags in my head: Fights getting physical?

 

Seriously - if you are getting to the point that you are attacking each other physically, then there are major problems. However angry you get - if you can't walk away to calm down - physical violence is a BIG problem. Even if it's on both sides. One day, one or the other of you might use too much force, or slip and do serious damage. You might push someone, them trip and fall and crack their skull. Something as silly as that can kill.

 

There is NO excuse for violence. From a male OR a female. It also is a criminal offence - if something serious happened, or someone else witnessed it - there could be all sorts of trouble.

 

If you want to try to sort things out - maybe you can - but I'd make sure you are living separately till then. You need to sort this out, pronto - fixing or giving up on the relationship comes second.

[soconfused71]

I definately agree that attacking eachother is a problem...i never acted like that before..I did not even know I had that in me...This is one of the main reasons I left...No doubt we have been lucky no one has been seriously hurt...which makes it all the more hard..how can I still love someone that can bring out that side of me??? This is what makes things so confusing. If i go home Im going to another state so I dont know if the relationship will survive...I dont want to make a wrong decision...

[Prosecco]

You want a relationship to survive that drives you to violence?

 

Think about it: look at the long term - suppose you stay together, you marry, you have kids... violence towards each other can spread. You didn't think you were capable of it - but with him you are. Even if you or him didn't involve the children in violence - they would see it or sense it.

If you can't stop yourselves now - what guarantee is there you'll manage in the future.

 

Seriously - you don't want to save this relationship. Or, you might want to- but you mustn't.

[datingmum]

I don't agree prosecco, in the sense that in my first marriage, three years in my exh and I got physical in an argument once or twice. Nothing terrible, like punching. But throwing things, wrestling, shoving, that sort of thing. I'm a real 'fighter'. When I was a child I was physically and mentally abused, so some arguments which touch on my self-worth and get very heated start to spark off a fuse in my, albeit a long fuse. Then if the shouting gets too aggressive, I have snapped. I wasn't aware of my capability or the triggers until after the incidents occurred. I don't blame him or me. It just was.

 

But after those limited incidences, we enjoyed another 8 years violence free. Who knows what can/will happen. It really depends on the people involved and how much they love one another i.e. how much they are willing to stop the madness and change their erroneous behaviour to be with one another.

[Prosecco]

Datingmum - there are always exceptions. But I guess... I'd never give advise based on the possibility that someone could be an exception, when I think that if I'm wrong, the risk of harm - emotional or otherwise - is great.

 

Also... I don't know why I got that impression, but I didn't get the feeling that this was just a once or twice off event, that they're working on preventing...

[soconfused71]

Im leaning towards going home to my home state and giving the relationship some space...but i am missing the heck out of him today...im trying to stay strong...ughhhh!!! This sucks