How did we go from planning to get married to breaking up? Was it all my fault?

[HereIamagain]

My gf (possibly/most likely ex gf by now) and I (we're both women)

had been dating for 3 years, living together for two. It was just a solid and really good relationship. We both had a lot of dating and life experience (She's in her late 30's I'm in my early 30's) and we were always agreeing that ours was the best relationship we’d both ever had. All my family and friends loved her, and she got along very well with everyone. We’d been through a lot of stressful life situations together, and she really helped me when one of my parents passed away. We were always telling each other how lucky we were to be with one another.

 

We are from two different countries living in a third country that neither of us are from, but she is from a bordering country which is like a 1 hour flight away. She’s pretty close to her family and we were always flying there to see them for birthdays, anniversaries, holidays ect, and I liked them and thought they approved of our relationship.

 

About 6 months into our relationship, we had a talk about potential future plans if we did stay together long term, because I'm from a different continent/country and I knew I would have to go back there someday, for various reasons, the most important being to help out my Mom as she ages. We are incredibly close, she’s single, and I'm her only child, so it wasn’t really an option for me to have her be really old and pass away all alone, even though I know she would never ask me to come back. My gf also really loved my Mom, and referred to her as her second mother, so was open to this idea when/if it occurred.

 

Realistically, for immigration reasons this also meant that we would have to get married at some point, and she also knew this was important to me because it’s how I see commitment. I wanted to get this all out there somewhat soon into the relationship, cause if they were going to be deal breakers, which I would have totally understood, I thought it would be better to know only 6 months in, instead of 6 years in. She said she could see both those things happening and the relationship progressed naturally and got stronger and stronger. Moving to my country would actually be great for her career, and she speaks the language on a native level. It wouldn’t be that much of a culture shock for her either. The main thing was that it would be difficult being away from her family, but they all had the money and resources to visit one another, and I’ve been away from my Mom for almost 6 years, so I know itÂs still possible to keep up family relationships. She seemed open to all of this.

 

Together we came up with a tentative timeline of what we wanted our lives and futures to look like. I didn’t want to pressure her into anything, so I actually let her take the lead on most of the timeline and have always wanted to give her the space to make the first move in the relationship. I thought we were both on board with this and communication was good.

 

When it became time to actually follow through on plans we discussed, I could see her being reluctant to actually discuss when we should start organizing things. We had a lot of discussions where I tried to make it clear as possible, as I didn’t have any desire to pressure her into anything, that if she was feeling unsure, or had changed her mind, that was cool, but I would at least like an answer about whether she saw this going anywhere into the future like we’d previously discussed.

 

This went on for several months, when finally she did say that she could see getting married, and started taking the actual steps to make it happen, including buying a ring. She was the one who started telling family and friends we were discussing getting married, and told her parents they should plan a vacation to also meet my Mom before we were actually married. It came out that her Mom actually disapproved of us getting married for a variety of reasons, which was shocking to both of us I think since we all had a good relationship. She basically told her mom to get a grip, that we were solid and this is what we were planning on doing. She's never had a problem standing up to her mother before.

 

Then I had to go out of town for two days to attend a funeral, and also found out my Mom had a progressive heart disease. My gf picked me up at the airport as a surprise and we went to dinner, which is where she told me that now she was unsure and she was thinking about what her Mom said and it really seemed like she was slamming on the breaks and doing a 180*.

 

Here is the part that is all my fault and which I deeply regret. I got really upset and super emotional instead of trying to hear about her feelings of being unsure and questioning things. If I were more rational we could have had a talk about it, but the first thing that came to my mind was, "We've had several months where there was multitudes of opportunities for us to talk about this, and it’s fallen apart in two days” not to mention her referencing her mother’s interference. I could have handled it a lot better and I apologized for that.

 

I thought that if I gave her some space in a day or two maybe sheÂd come back around and we could work on things, but it escalated into her being unsure if she even wants to stay in the relationship and asking me to leave our apartment so she can decide if she wants to stay together or not. She says in the two days I was gone she felt more like herself and less pressured even though we hadn’t even discussed anything marriage related lately and I hadn’t brought it up again. She just keeps saying I was pressuring her into everything and even if she decides she wants to stay together she’ll never allow herself to be pressured again, so essentially she would be calling the progress of our relationship indefinitely.

 

It was never my intention to pressure her, I just wanted to know if she intended to follow through on the future that we had both planned together. I probably should have been checking in with her more about her apprehensions, but I did ask her several times if she was sure, and she always said yes, so I’m not really sure what else I should have done other than either never initiate the topic or not believe her when she said she was sure, and she was going around telling people our plans, so I also took that as a sign she was sure enough to want our friends/family to know.

 

I don’t even so much mind the marriage thing being off the table now, I would just hate to think I wasn’t being an untrustworthy partner and feel completely horrible and that this break up is all my fault.

 

TLDR: Went from planning on getting married to basically broken up within 4 days. Feel like it's all my fault.

Edited February 18, 2019 by HereIamagain
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[d0nnivain]

Your EX's mother had more sway over her then you did. Mom expressed disapproval & that had an effect on your GF. It eroded things. When prewedding fissures surfaced in her confused state she took the opportunity to bolt. There were also a lot of practical considerations -- immigration & such -- that drove your coupledom rather than good old fashioned love / I can't live without you in my life. When you can't weather the easy stuff, it's a sign that you might not be cut out for a lifetime commitment.

[HereIamagain]

Thank you for your insight. I think what you said is probably correct, I was just shocked cause at my age I'm definitely no stranger to breakups, it's just never gone from being that serious to disappearing in such a short amount of time. I'd never even seriously discussed the idea of marriage in any of my previous relationships, and here we are. We'd been through a lot of serious issues together (the death of one of my parents, health issues in her family, her and my career problems ect) so I thought are communication was such that we could weather this. She'd also never has an issue standing up to her mother, she did initially, and she's an incredibly reliable person, so while I know you can never really tell with people I guess you never really think it will happen to "you" but I guess at my age I really shouldn't be surprised anymore.