Lynn10 Posted September 7, 2012 Posted September 7, 2012 Well first of all let me start by saying thank you for listening to my story. For starters I am currently engaged and have been dating the guy for a little over two years. I am relatively young. Most people think I am too young to think about marriage. Plus I am going to school to become a doctor and still have a lengthy road ahead of me. I do love my fiance and we get along great for the most part. However, I have been contemplating breaking it off for multiple reasons. First of all, my family and him don't really mesh well. They tolerate eachother but don't exactly interact how I thought my future husband would. Secondly, we both have different outside interests. Yeah we get along while sitting at home watching tv and whatnot but when it comes to socializing, hanging out with friends, and going out doing stuff we have different interests so a lot of the time we're doing stuff by ourselves or with other friends. This upsets me because I want to experience the stuff I enjoy with the one i'm with and that just isn't an option. Also I am 21 and want to go out an experience the whole bar scene where he is 26 and is kind of over it. So anytime I want to go out he gives me conflict because he doesn't want me to. I have never given him a reason to not trust me nor do I go out looking to engage in conversation with other males. I just want to go out with my friends and have a couple drinks. Another thing is I'm a full time student and I work part-time. I don't really have a lot of time to devote to him and this is problem because he complains while I'm doing my homework that I'm not paying attention to him. I'm only in my undergrad and it is going to be exceptionally worse when I go to graduate school. I don't think he'll understand the amount of time I have to put into my schooling and I'm worried I'll do bad in school because I'll constantly have to assure him that I'm not spending time with him because of school not because I don't want to and that'll be exhausting. I just don't know what to do. I love him and care about him but I don't see a forever kind of thing based on all my reasons but I don't know if these are good enough reasons to break up with someone. I feel like I can find someone else who I'll get along great with and can fulfil these aspects I'm looking for. Help!?
Jono85 Posted September 7, 2012 Posted September 7, 2012 Well first of all let me start by saying thank you for listening to my story. For starters I am currently engaged and have been dating the guy for a little over two years. I am relatively young. Most people think I am too young to think about marriage. Plus I am going to school to become a doctor and still have a lengthy road ahead of me. I do love my fiance and we get along great for the most part. However, I have been contemplating breaking it off for multiple reasons. First of all, my family and him don't really mesh well. They tolerate eachother but don't exactly interact how I thought my future husband would. Secondly, we both have different outside interests. Yeah we get along while sitting at home watching tv and whatnot but when it comes to socializing, hanging out with friends, and going out doing stuff we have different interests so a lot of the time we're doing stuff by ourselves or with other friends. This upsets me because I want to experience the stuff I enjoy with the one i'm with and that just isn't an option. Also I am 21 and want to go out an experience the whole bar scene where he is 26 and is kind of over it. So anytime I want to go out he gives me conflict because he doesn't want me to. I have never given him a reason to not trust me nor do I go out looking to engage in conversation with other males. I just want to go out with my friends and have a couple drinks. Another thing is I'm a full time student and I work part-time. I don't really have a lot of time to devote to him and this is problem because he complains while I'm doing my homework that I'm not paying attention to him. I'm only in my undergrad and it is going to be exceptionally worse when I go to graduate school. I don't think he'll understand the amount of time I have to put into my schooling and I'm worried I'll do bad in school because I'll constantly have to assure him that I'm not spending time with him because of school not because I don't want to and that'll be exhausting. I just don't know what to do. I love him and care about him but I don't see a forever kind of thing based on all my reasons but I don't know if these are good enough reasons to break up with someone. I feel like I can find someone else who I'll get along great with and can fulfil these aspects I'm looking for. Help!? u don't really need any help. ur post is crystal clear. u need to have the respect for him, if u truly care about him, to break it off, imo. ur just not 100% into this, and that's not fair to him.
MW93i Posted September 7, 2012 Posted September 7, 2012 You sound a whole lot like my ex, she had 0 time for me and eventually stopped loving me because of it. If you feel like there is a slight feeling that you'll stop loving which I think there is because 'I feel like I can find someone else who I'll get along great with and can fulfil these aspects I'm looking for.' Which isnt a nice thing to even think never mind put down in text. If you think there is even a chance this could happen break it off now, dont drag it on you'll only hurt him even more and if you truly care for him you wont do that.
Sebastian76 Posted September 7, 2012 Posted September 7, 2012 Thanks for sharing your story. Usually on LS we get the story from your guy once it all over, you'll have left and he'll be in agonizing pain. He wont be able to understand how you could just give up on all you had so easily. He'll complain how you started going out more and more and eventually met somebody else to jump onto to make the breakup less painful for yourself. If you have any love left for your fiance, you should give him the chance to change and see if that is good enough for you. Don't make up your mind to leave without him being able to do anything about it. You should be crystal clear in your communication, not dropping hints here and there. If it stays the same, you at least gave it a fair shot and he got a fair chance to make it work before it being too late. Tbh I'm sceptic about it working out, you are very young and havent experienced your youth fully, so it is only natural that you want to see what the clubbing life is like. Just be prepared that you probably enjoy it and you will meet loads of attractive funny guys that will hit on you. It will get increasingly tough to resist the temptation and not fall for somebody else! Maybe it's because you are from the states where people settle down pretty young, but in Copenhagen where I live, going out and partying doesn't stop just because we reach 26! Sounds bloody boring! You should make him come out and party together with you. I'm 36 and my ex is 24. We'd always go out together and party with both of our friends, everybody getting along and having fun together. That worked out great (well until it didn't, but for different reasons). Best of luck !
oldshirt Posted September 7, 2012 Posted September 7, 2012 You two are at completely different life stages and are on two different planes of reality. You shouldn't have gotten engaged in the first place. I think you just wanted to wear a ring and tell your friends that you are engaged but that is niether here nor there. What is at issue here isn't really you dating him or how you view him as a human being. It's that you really have no business being committed to each other in a legally-binding contract (ie marriage) I think ending the engagement and cancelling any wedding plans (if any have even been made at this point) is very prudent and wise. As a 21 year old premed student you are very much under contruction at the moment where as he is quickly become a self-sustaining and self-aware adult. He needs a full-grown adult that is capable of making long term committments and you need to learn and grow and experience the real world (and yes, blowing and banging guys in the bathrooms and parking lots is part of the real world) Your life will be completely and utterly different in 5 years than what it is now. It is not fair to either one of you to seal your fates and lock yourselves into any kind of legal, social and moral commitments while you two are in such different life-stages and lifestyles. If you can end the engagement amicably and without any unnecessary pain, anguish and bitterness, there is nothing to say that you can't keep things civil between you and who knows? in 10 years when you are established professionally and are a mature and stable adult, if your paths cross again perhaps the flames can be rekindled and you can have a stable and mutually supportive relationship. 1
oldshirt Posted September 7, 2012 Posted September 7, 2012 I love him and care about him but I don't see a forever kind of thing based on all my reasons but I don't know if these are good enough reasons to break up with someone. I feel like I can find someone else who I'll get along great with and can fulfil these aspects I'm looking for. Those are the perfect reasons. In fact it really doesn't get any more clear. Dating is an interview and try-out process where people spend time together and do things together to get to know each other and learn about what the other person is like in an effort to determine if this is the person that you want to enter into a legally-binding commitment with for the purposes of making a home and raising children together. You have spent time with him and done things with him and you have gotten to know him and knows how he acts and reacts around the things you hold dear to you in your life. He has had his interview and did his try-out. It is pretty much chrystal clear to me that he is not the candidate that you want to go with. Dissolving the engagement and moving on with your life is the right thing to do. This does not mean that you do not have deep feelings and compassion for him. It does not mean that you do not respect and honor him as a good human being. It does not mean that he has done anything wrong or anything bad. IT DOES NOT MEAN THAT HE HAS TO CHANGE. It just means that you two had some attraction and liked being around each other but as you came to know him on a deeper level and as you matured and gained greater knowledge about yourself and became more in touch with your own values and the things you want in a permanant mate, you realized this is not him. Breaking up is always hard and always heartwrenching for both parties. I agree with the other posters that in the long run he will deal with it better and will have less pain and less bitterness and resentment towards you if you just level with him and explain things to him like you did to us and end things compassionately and respectfully. This is opposed to remaining engaged and telling him you are still his GF/fiance' but going out more and more without him and giving him less and less time and attention and picking up guys in bars and cheating on him and then dumping him once you have some other guy on your arm. He will have a lot more resentment and bitterness towards you in you do that.....and for just reason.
oldshirt Posted September 7, 2012 Posted September 7, 2012 . If you have any love left for your fiance, you should give him the chance to change and see if that is good enough for you. Don't make up your mind to leave without him being able to do anything about it. You should be crystal clear in your communication, not dropping hints here and there. If it stays the same, you at least gave it a fair shot and he got a fair chance to make it work before it being too late. I disagree with this. If these were full grown adults with a mortgage and car payments and minor children to support I would say yes, find a way to live together and make it work untill the kids are old enough to deal with a divorce. But this is a 21 year old and a 26 year old. She is still maturing and growing and developing and is still "under construction." she is developing and evolving every day, she doesn't have the right to ask him to change his being for her. She has the right to say that this isn't the person or the relationship she wants to commit to and the right to move on. He has the right to find a mature, stable and established adult that his persona clicks with better. She doesn't have the right to ask him to change fundamental facets of his character for her, nor does he have the right to ask her to not grow or develop or to pursue her preferences in a mate.
Chi townD Posted September 7, 2012 Posted September 7, 2012 Well, you guys are definately not communicating on the same wave length. You know what? It's okay to have different interests than your SO and it's healthy to spend a little time apart to enjoy doing the things that you enjoy doing and vice versa. And sometimes, we participate in the interest of our SO even if it's not our thing. And the reason why is we may not enjoy it, but at least we can show that we can respect it. (if that makes any sense). So, the question is. If you can't come to a happy median; if you can't figure out a way to enjoy your time together as well as your time apart, are you willing to throw your relationship away and NEVER see him again? Because, lets face it. You're engaged to him. You can't go from an engagement to taking steps back and having him be nothing more than a "really good friend" That's not being fair to you and certainly not fair to him. So, if you decide to end it. You have to be prepared to cut him out of your life for good. Never seeing him again. (or at least until a long enough peroid of time has gone by that the both of you have healed up to the point where you two can look at each other with nothing more than indifference.) Look, I'm not trying to come across as mean. I just want you to look at the reality of the situation. You are really going to hurt this guy. No getting around that. And from your last sentence, " I feel like I can find someone else who I'll get along great with and can fulfil these aspects I'm looking for." I speculate that you already have a guy that you have an interest in, but you don't want to cheat. Therefore, you want to see if the grass is greener somewhere else. I could be wrong, but that sentence got my spidey senses tingling.
Recommended Posts