He says he loves me, but doesn't put much effort in, saved photos from female friend

[blueblueworld]

Me [28/F] and my boyfriend [30/M] have been together 18 months, living together 6 months. We are going through some issues where since the beginning of our relationship I have been the primary driver of the relationship, and he has been happy to be co-pilot. I put this down to him being an inexperienced introvert, and thought that with patience and time he would open up more.. but it hasn't happened. I moved in with him thinking that this would help, but it hasn't. He puts minimal effort in (we only go on dates if I organise them, and even then it feels like a chore for him, but he is happy to go on double dates with his friends, he never organises anything for us to do and just prefers to be on the computer or watch netflix).

 

I spoke to him twice in the last two months, telling him exactly how I felt and what I needed to be happy, and asking him if this is something he could do and he agreed. We grabbed a coffee once and had some small talk, and then went to the cinema another night (no talking). I'm happy to be patient, but I feel deflated because of the history of things. To make things worse, I found photos of another girl on his phone.. and now I don't know what to do. More info follows.

 

On the weekend I asked him if I could copy some photos off his phone from a birthday we went to, which he was ok with. As I was copying those photos, I thought I'd copy some other photos from a trip we went on.. And I stumbled across two selfie photos (screenshots from Snapchat) of one of his female friends. These were selfies, but not sexual.

 

Some background: he is a gamer and met this girl through a game, and has known her for a few years now. She lives a 10 hour flight away so they have only met a few times and primarily chat online/through games. When we first started dating, I noticed that she would send him a lot of snapchats and that he would like all of her posts and photos online. At the time, I asked him what the history was between them and he said that she is just part of his online group of friends. I didn't have a good feeling about this (my last ex of four years cheated on me with a so called friend from snapchat) given the frequency of snapchats, that she has a netflix profile on his account.. and I told him that I was a bit insecure because of my history. He reassured me it was nothing, and that was that. I ignored the snapchat's and life continued.

 

Fast forward to now, I asked him why he saved the photos, and his response was "I don't know". I didn't think that that was a good enough response, so he said that he thought she looked cute in the photos. He didn't seem to think that it wasn't an ok thing to do and was very nonchalant about the whole thing. He says he saved those photos a year ago (can't confirm and have to take his word for it) and it isn't a big deal. He then proceeded to say that he has cut all contact with her since the issues we had at the start, but when I asked him when he last spoke to her, he said last Thursday.. And I know for a fact that she is his top friend on snapchat.. which I told him that it did not sound like cutting contact (I never asked him to cut contact). He said that "if you focus on one person you will see them everywhere..." but he only has the photos of her on his phone. I asked him how many times they met, and he failed to mention that she stayed with him for a week before we dated (I saw it on Facebook when we first met). He talks to other girls online and there is no issues there. It's just this one girl and he just doesn't seem to see it.

 

I really don't know what to think or do. I feel hurt by what he did, especially that we were together at the time, and it sometimes felt like he wasn't interested in me, didn't put any effort it, which has made me insecure. We are going through the same issues now where he is not putting any effort into the relationship and he seemed willing to fix it, because he said that "he was unhappy and bored too". After speaking to him about the photo issue, he said to me "if this is not enough (the way things are) then maybe you should leave..Why would you stick around if you are unhappy".

 

Because I wanted to work on things, and thought he wanted to as well. I am stuck in my own feelings/thoughts and I don't know what to do. I have given it my all, and truly love him for who he is as a person, but it's like he just can't give me the basics.. I just want intimacy and attention and not feel like a roommate. There is no intimacy between us and he doesn't understand that you need to put time and effort into a relationship, build and maintain an emotional/intimate connection because 'I love you' is not enough and you can't just go from not being intimate to being intimate very quickly.

 

Am I being inconsiderate/overreacting over the photo issue? I feel like the issues are just piling up and my mind says that I should cut my losses and go, but I just don't know. Sorry if the post is a bit all over the place.

[healing light]

I would not focus on this other girl so much. You've already told him what you need--twice--and he's unwilling to step up. It sounds like this is more one-sided and that you guys are not a match. My guess would be that he probably does like this other woman, but you have bigger fish to fry.

[Downanddown]

You went thru his phone behind his back?

[blueblueworld]

No, he gave me his phone to send the photos, he was sitting next to me. And when I said that I wanted to send photos from our trip to myself, and was scrolling through and stumbled across the photos of the girl. They are all in one general folder so it's not like I was snooping .

[ExpatInItaly]

You have two separate issues here, that are colliding to make the situation even more unpleasant.

 

Honestly, it sounds like he is losing interest in your relationship. He told you he is unhappy and bored, yet he doesn't appear motivated to help resolve that.

 

He's also not been honest about his level of contact with this online friend.

 

I am not sure I would continue dating him, OP. You've only lived together 6 months and he's already gotten far too complacent and indifferent.

[PegNosePete]

Yeah I wouldn't worry too much about the other woman. It seems fairly innocent to me. Maybe you're making more of it than you should because in the back of your mind you know the relationship isn't good, and it would be much easier to break up if you could blame something so concrete as another woman?

 

However I agree you certainly have bigger issues in your relationship. You are not happy, you have talked to him twice and he has promised to change multiple times. But he has proved that his words are just that, and he will not actually change. Talking to him again would seem pointless at this stage. He has shown you his cards, now you need to decide what to do about it.

 

So you need to decide if you want to stay in a relationship with him exactly how he is forever, or not. Personally I would say "not". You're clearly not happy and your needs are not being fulfilled. That is no way to live, and you're wasting your time staying with someone who is not a good match for you.

 

I am reminded of the quote which is famously not by Einstein:

"Men marry women with the hope they will never change. Women marry men with the hope they will change. Invariably they are both disappointed."

 

In future relationships never stay with someone or move in with them hoping they will change! They won't!

Edited March 26, 2018 by PegNosePete