UmbrellaBoy Posted July 9, 2013 Posted July 9, 2013 (edited) I'm just venting. This doesn't really need a response from anyone, it's just some ideas I'm throwing out there. Maybe it will help some other people gain clarity about their own situation. Basically, I'm in limbo with a guy, my boyfriend in a long-distance relationship (though the official relationship lasted much shorter than the total "involvement" that for a long time existed but which he refused, for a variety of reasons including another relationship he was extracting himself from, to grant the official title until a few months ago). He's agreed to postpone the "official" break-up until after we see each other in early August, but basically right now he says it's over and we're just sort of waiting for our visit, being amicable but knowing the end is near. I will consider the relationship officially over and change my status after that trip, but he might consider himself already free of it, I don't know. My frustration is this: I feel like we never really tried a relationship, by which I mean actually just sitting back and acting like a couple, giving it space to explore what we'd be like in that context, whether we had chemistry when interacting in that loving couple-ish sort of way. For two or three years we danced around the idea, he stood at the edge of the pool dipping his toe in, angsting about whether to jump, pouring an incredible amount of stress and emotional energy into the idea of it, but never actually just taking the plunge to try it out for a while, so there was always this strange dance of unspoken tension and affection expressed in underhanded ways that maintained a sort of winking "plausible deniability" but which was basically a relationship that couldn't express itself openly. And then when he finally did agree to the title recently, there was so much negative energy that (especially at a long distance) we never really got to just enjoy it and see what it would be like because, at that point, the relationship had become a "meta-relationship revolving around the terms of the relationship itself" rather than just trying a non-self-conscious romantic interaction. Of course, I know, sunk costs are sunk costs, and I have no right to demand that anyone "try" a relationship with me. But he led me along for three years, there were so many teases and false starts, so many moments when (even he admits) things could have gotten "rolling" in terms of feelings and chemistry if only circumstances had allowed him to let his guard down, if only we had been free to just be romantic and physical with each other. And now he says he doesn't want to try, that there's no spark. I protest to him, "But you've said you know it's there under the surface, and would emerge if we just tried things, that's why you circled around the idea for so long instead of just walking away" But he says he's in a sort of circular motivation problem: to be motivated to try in such a way as would access that spark again...he'd have to already have the spark (or else be forced). Hence the Catch-22. It's like someone who says they would be willing to go into a cave only if they have the lantern, but the lantern is already in the cave. He admits that our relationship on the rational level is pretty good, but he also has doubts and hesitancy. IF he had the spark already, then the combination of the spark plus the pretty good interpersonal dynamic...would outweigh the hesitancy and doubts. But, since he doesn't have the spark "yet," the doubts and hesitancy mean that the "pretty good" dynamic isn't enough to motivate him to do the sort of "trying" that would be required to "get" the spark, even though he admits it is "get-able" theoretically between us, and that if our dynamic were perfect rather than just "pretty good" he would probably be willing to do what was necessary to access that spark. And I realized that whenever we have argued about this now, I basically wind up just arguing that he should resign himself to settling for the status quo since it is safe and comfortable and has the de facto inertia. It's like I've stopped even trying to get him to jump into the pool, and am stuck just arguing that he should stand there at least considering it a while longer rather than walking away. It's a big difference between arguing for someone to make a particular choice, and finding yourself merely arguing that they should keep an open mind and not make any choice yet, merely because that preserves the hope that in the future maybe something will change and they'll walk through the door rather the finality of having them choose to close it. (But of course, if something in the future really does change in them, they could always open the door again...) I realized the latter is just postponing, if all my arguing does is keep him standing there in limbo, but is never going to convince him to jump in the pool, to walk through the door...then I might as well let him close it. If we're in that Catch-22 where the only information, the only experience, that could convince him that he'd enjoy coming in fully...is actually just going ahead and coming in fully...then nothing I can say or argue will convince him, because it's that circular motivation situation of needing to have the experience already in order to be motivated to try the experience. And yet, oddly, he has now agreed to try, at least for a few days on our visit, to behave romantically in the way I've always begged him to just try. He doesn't think it will change his mind, and I can't get my hopes up either, and yet you never know...if you have an experience and find out you like it, that could cause you to reconsider. And yet I also know things shouldn't have to be forced this way. Edited July 9, 2013 by UmbrellaBoy
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