On and off relationships: CAN they end up working??

[dgiirl]

Counseling????? Okay first, I'm 21 and he's 23 and we're not married. Second, I'm not dishing out that kind of money. Third, he was supposed to go to counseling on his own for his outstanding issues regarding his guilt about his mother who passed away and just generally being depressed... and he never did for whatever reason...

 

Gotcha. So the relationship is not that much of a priority for you. In that case, yes, I think you should leave the relationship.

 

Sorry to tell you, but this is a very immature response to relationship problems. 1) I'm too young. 2) It's not worth the money. 3) I wont go cos he wont go.

[princessa]

You know, you guys are both very young. You both still have a lot of growing and maturing ahead of you. I know I didn't have it all figured out when I was 21.

 

You know this is so very true. I was thinking about this earlier also.. Recently I found myself in a totally different situation outside of the relationship, that made me question the efficacity of my own communication skills. And it made me realize that I can be really critical and harsh.. and get upset about the bad things instead of praising the good things... this made me think back about my relationship and how this attitude affects it.... My guy has talked to me about this before, but it never really sank in until I was faced with this in the real world with people I didn't know. Thing is, there are probably so many life's lessons just like this one that are ahead of me, I definitely don't have it all figured out at 21...

 

But then on the other hand you have people like BG who tell me that they've wasted 9 years on a relationship like this and they thought just like me that it was the real thing but it wasnt... I mean.. It's hard to decide..

[princessa]

Gotcha. So the relationship is not that much of a priority for you. In that case, yes, I think you should leave the relationship.

 

Sorry to tell you, but this is a very immature response to relationship problems. 1) I'm too young. 2) It's not worth the money. 3) I wont go cos he wont go.

 

Hahah this made me LOL! Stop it you're starting to sound like my mom!!

 

It is a priority for me.. but I'm saying that I doubt that I can convince him to go anyway because he won't go even for his own issues..

[princessa]

Do you mean after an argument, he takes time to cool off where he doesn't contact you?

 

Or do you mean at any point in time, even if things are fine between you, he doesn't contact you for 3 days?

 

Yeah only after arguments.. most of the time he calls me almost every day..

 

In both cases, I don't necessarily see a problem. Sometimes a week goes by before my SO and I get together and we don't necessarily talk during that time. Neither of us considers it disrespectful, because it's not intended that way.

 

On the other hand, if he intends to upset you by withdrawing, then you have a problem.

 

In that Mars/Venus book, the author explains guys need to go into their caves every now and then. Unless he's always in the cave and rarely comes out, it's just how men are...

 

Or am I missing something? I'm not getting what's the issue.

 

I've read about how it can be "typical" for a man to withdraw.. and he also told me that he can't stand conflict or criticism and tends to run away from it... and this is why I said that he has 3 days to do his thing.. but I ca'nt bare more than that because I just can't stand being ignored and it makes me hysterical and hurts my feelings.. So I said that as soon as he passes the 3-day mark I will consider that as disrespectful towards my feelings.

[dgiirl]

Hahah this made me LOL! Stop it you're starting to sound like my mom!!

 

Yikes, dont be laughing at your elders ;P But your mom sounds like a smart lady lol

 

It is a priority for me.. but I'm saying that I doubt that I can convince him to go anyway because he won't go even for his own issues..

 

You cant say it's a priority for you. You just made a bunch of excuses why you wont go.

 

Why cant you go to counselling alone? You CAN make a difference in a relationship with just one partner. It doesnt sound like you have the greatest communication skills. You might learn something. You might even learn why you're in the situation you currently are in.

 

See, for a relationship to work, both parties have to take 100% responsibility for their own actions, not 50/50.

[princessa]

Do you know if counseling is covered in Canada?? How much do you think it would cost me?? It might be interesting, for my own interest if not anything else..

 

But like I said, I'm 21 with a serious makeup addiction and I have to watch my expenses so I don't guarantee anything...

[norajane]

but I ca'nt bare more than that because I just can't stand being ignored and it makes me hysterical and hurts my feelings.. So I said that as soon as he passes the 3-day mark I will consider that as disrespectful towards my feelings.

 

Well, that's an arbitrary thing. You can CHOOSE not to feel ignored and hysterical and hurt about something that is a 'typical' action by your boyfriend. You KNOW it doesn't mean anything when he withdraws for a while, so why let it bother you so much? Why do you NEED him to talk to you within three days or you become hysterical?

 

You don't have to think of it as him ignoring you. You are choosing to think of it that way, and making it a negative thing. And because you paint it so darkly, he then gets the message that you are once again thinking negatively of him and he can't please you, and that just creates a circle of negativity.

 

You can change that by changing your perspective.

[amaysngrace]

. And it made me realize that I can be really critical and harsh.. and get upset about the bad things instead of praising the good things... this made me think back about my relationship and how this attitude affects it....

 

A small change in what you do can really make a huge difference overall.

 

If you are wise enough to see where you're to blame for the break-up pattern that's occurred, you can work to try to change your behaviours a bit. And see if that doesn't help.

 

I wouldn't worry about wasting your life with this guy just yet. Afterall, you are both dating and not living together. You know if he's good for you to be around or not.

 

Do you enjoy his company? Does he treat you well? Would the thought of letting go of him forever truly break your heart?

 

Only you know the answers.

[princessa]

You KNOW it doesn't mean anything when he withdraws for a while, so why let it bother you so much? Why do you NEED him to talk to you within three days or you become hysterical?

 

 

What if it's a control thing and what if he does that just to piss me off?? I know he told me that it's typical of him to do that.. but I also know that he can get vindictive... I think that's what I'm scared of and cannot tolerate.. I guess this means that I don't trust him not to be vindictive towards me... which I admit I kinda don't sometimes....

[SmoochieFace]

Do you know if counseling is covered in Canada?? How much do you think it would cost me?? It might be interesting, for my own interest if not anything else..

 

But like I said, I'm 21 with a serious makeup addiction and I have to watch my expenses so I don't guarantee anything...

 

...

 

DINGDINGDINGDINGDING!

 

Well, there it is. You just said that you put your vanity above your relationship.

 

Do your BF a favour and just let him go. Please.

[norajane]

What if it's a control thing and what if he does that just to piss me off?? I know he told me that it's typical of him to do that.. but I also know that he can get vindictive... I think that's what I'm scared of and cannot tolerate.. I guess this means that I don't trust him not to be vindictive towards me... which I admit I kinda don't sometimes....

 

Is he being vindictive, or is he being immature and hasn't learned ot deal with his anger in a productive way...like a child? Or is he passive-aggressive in general and does things to irritate you but won't address the real issue that's bothering him?

 

You can totally take the control thing away from him by not letting it bother you. If he KNOWS it's going to bother you (like a kid throwing a tantrum in public), then he will keep doing it to get a rise out of you. But if you just shrug it off, then he sees that his tactic is completely ineffective and doing it doesn't get him anything, and he will eventually stop.

[princessa]

Is he being vindictive, or is he being immature and hasn't learned ot deal with his anger in a productive way...like a child? Or is he passive-aggressive in general and does things to irritate you but won't address the real issue that's bothering him?

 

You can totally take the control thing away from him by not letting it bother you. If he KNOWS it's going to bother you (like a kid throwing a tantrum in public), then he will keep doing it to get a rise out of you. But if you just shrug it off, then he sees that his tactic is completely ineffective and doing it doesn't get him anything, and he will eventually stop.

 

I think he's passive-aggressive in general (yeah, I know cause I even bought a book about this hahaha).. and like I said before it's hard to get him to talk about what's bothering him.. but once a blue moon it happens...

 

But he's also immature and doesn't know how to deal with his anger, which is pretty much a trait of being passive-aggressive.. he's even said himself that he's immature....

 

I'm aware thought that I can just shrug it off and stop the cycle.. but WHY do I always have to be the bigger person?? I mean I'm pretty immature myself, so this is very hard for me to do. My first reaction most of the time is to fight back..

[dgiirl]

Do you know if counseling is covered in Canada?? How much do you think it would cost me?? It might be interesting, for my own interest if not anything else..

 

But like I said, I'm 21 with a serious makeup addiction and I have to watch my expenses so I don't guarantee anything...

 

Do you have any health insurance? Are you covered under your parents health plan with work? Usually a percentage is covered up to a certain amount of visits. When I had health insurance, they covered 80% of the session for 4 sessions, and my therapist charged me about 100$ per hour. She did work on a sliding scale tho, so you might want to call a few therapists/counsellors and tell them you're a student(?) and want to know how much they charge per session and how long the session is. If you go to university, you might be able to see if there's any programs on campus. And you are usually forced to have some kind of health plan to attend university anyways.

 

Quit the makeup and go to counselling. Counselling might even help you learn to quit your makeup addiction

[princessa]

Do you have any health insurance? Are you covered under your parents health plan with work? Usually a percentage is covered up to a certain amount of visits. When I had health insurance, they covered 80% of the session for 4 sessions, and my therapist charged me about 100$ per hour. She did work on a sliding scale tho, so you might want to call a few therapists/counsellors and tell them you're a student(?) and want to know how much they charge per session and how long the session is. If you go to university, you might be able to see if there's any programs on campus. And you are usually forced to have some kind of health plan to attend university anyways.

 

Quit the makeup and go to counselling. Counselling might even help you learn to quit your makeup addiction

 

Oh wow, I have a grand per year of coverage for a phsycologist with my job.. but that's not the same as a counsellor and I'd need a prescription for that.. and even then at 100$ the hour with 80% coverage it's still 20 bucks a pop..... Meehh

[norajane]

I'm aware thought that I can just shrug it off and stop the cycle.. but WHY do I always have to be the bigger person?? I mean I'm pretty immature myself, so this is very hard for me to do. My first reaction most of the time is to fight back..

 

It's not about you being the bigger person.

 

It's about you taking control over your reactions and over his actions. It's about you not caring when he has a tantrum, seeing the humor in his little boy ways, and about you not feeling hurt and hysterical.

 

Basically, I'm saying that you already know that what you're doing isn't working - you get upset and keeps doing what he's doing. In order to change the cycle, you have to do something different.

 

The bottom line is, if you don't allow his behavior to bother you, you won't be bothered. It just won't matter. You won't feel the hurt and anger. Poof. YOU feel better. It has nothing to do with being the bigger person, and everything to do with you asserting control for your own well-being.

 

Personally, I don't date passive-aggressive people. I did that once in a long term relationship when I was your age, and I ended up wanting to - as a4a says - stab him with a fork repeatedly. Totally lost all respect for him, and totally fell out of love with him. Since then, as soon as I get a whiff of passive-aggressive, I walk away.

[SmoochieFace]

Oh wow, I have a grand per year of coverage for a phsycologist with my job.. but that's not the same as a counsellor and I'd need a prescription for that.. and even then at 100$ the hour with 80% coverage it's still 20 bucks a pop..... Meehh

 

Then give up the makeup as dgiirl suggested.

 

Everything in life is a CHOICE. You choose to be in the situations you're in and you choose whether to change them or not. again

[princessa]

Personally, I don't date passive-aggressive people. I did that once in a long term relationship when I was your age, and I ended up wanting to - as a4a says - stab him with a fork repeatedly. Totally lost all respect for him, and totally fell out of love with him. Since then, as soon as I get a whiff of passive-aggressive, I walk away.

 

Sorry for being nosy but what happend with that guy?

[norajane]

Sorry for being nosy but what happend with that guy?

 

I met him while I was in college, we dated for 4 years (half of that long distance), then we got engaged, we moved in together, and a year and half later, I moved out and ended things.

 

We weren't right for each other, but during college and while I was in grad school, I didn't really see that. It was after we moved in together that I saw we were incompatible on many fronts. I had never especially considered myself a chirpy optimist, but compared to Mr. Gloom and Doom, I was Pollyanna about the future. He had no confidence in the future. He didn't think he was good enough for me. I made more money than him and he couldn't stand it - and prevented me from enjoying things like going on vacation with him or even going out to dinner together!

 

But it was the passive-aggressive crap I couldn't deal with. I had sort-of seen him behave that way to his mother, but it didn't really hit home until he were living together and he would do stupid **** to bug me instead of dealing with anything up-front.

 

For example, our schedules were a bit different, so there were a lot of times he'd come home from work when I was already in bed (he worked in a lab). He'd stay up for a while before going to bed, and (he says) to avoid waking me up by walking back and forth to the kitchen all the time, he'd throw food away in the bathroom garbage can. Well, sorry, but he knew we had an ant problem that I was battling to the death, so those frickin' ants would be all lined up from the bathroom window all across the floor directly in and out of the garbage can in the morning when I got up for work. He KNEW this, and he would keep doing it.

 

Or he would "forget" to leave a note on weekends telling me around the time he expected to be back, so I'd have no idea if I should wait to have dinner with him, or if I should just go out with my friends or whatever (pre-cell phone days, lol). I would carefully explain to him that I didn't care what he was doing or how long he would be out, I just wanted to know if I should make my own plans or not. But he kept "forgetting". So I started just doing my own thing, and that meant we spent very little time together, and then he'd get upset, and do something else to bug me, and so on.

[princessa]

Thanks for sharing.. I can kinda relate about the "forgetting" stuff... but then again we've never lived together so it's really hard to see whether it's about changing attitudes and being more mature or whether it's just that we're plain incompatible..

[dgiirl]

Oh wow, I have a grand per year of coverage for a phsycologist with my job.. but that's not the same as a counsellor and I'd need a prescription for that.. and even then at 100$ the hour with 80% coverage it's still 20 bucks a pop..... Meehh

 

Just go to a doctor and tell them you're having a rough time with life and think you should see a phsycologist but you need a prescription.

 

I cannot believe you are not even willing to spend $20 on counselling, something that could benefit your life greatly. Again, where are your priorities? How much do you spend on makeup a month? Do you go out with friends? Go to the movies? Go out and eat? It seems to me, you're just looking for the easy answer. You want someone to wave a magic wand and poof your boy will act the exact way you want. I dont care if you are 21, it's an extremely shallow immature way to act. You need to grow up.

[princessa]

Just go to a doctor and tell them you're having a rough time with life and think you should see a phsycologist but you need a prescription.

 

I cannot believe you are not even willing to spend $20 on counselling, something that could benefit your life greatly. Again, where are your priorities? How much do you spend on makeup a month? Do you go out with friends? Go to the movies? Go out and eat? It seems to me, you're just looking for the easy answer. You want someone to wave a magic wand and poof your boy will act the exact way you want. I dont care if you are 21, it's an extremely shallow immature way to act. You need to grow up.

 

20 bucks per week is 80 bucks per month.. I'm just trying to say that being 21 and needing to put as much money as I can into savings for my graduate studies, I'm not willing to pay this money. But if you look at it this way and ask me "what's more important, your MBA or your boyfriend?", then yes, you're right, my MBA is. At 21 I can't put 100% of my resources into this relationship, I put a lot in don't get me wrong, but it's not a marriage and frankly I think i'm way too young to put the relationship ahead of my own success. But that's another topic so let's not argue about this..

 

I mean seriously if I was willing to put any kind of money into this relationship for the sake of finding out whether we're compatible or not ASAP, I'd rent an apartment and live with him tomorrow. But no, I'm being smart and saving money by living with my parents. And i don't think that my priorities are in the wrong place for a second... Like I said maybe I'd consider counselling but only as a last resort..

[norajane]

Thanks for sharing.. I can kinda relate about the "forgetting" stuff... but then again we've never lived together so it's really hard to see whether it's about changing attitudes and being more mature or whether it's just that we're plain incompatible..

 

The easy answer is if you're unhappy and fighting most of the time, you won't make it in the long run. Regardless of whether it's communication issues, immaturity, incompatibility, whatever - if there's more bad than good, you will not make it. If you're unhappy more oftent than you are happy, there can be no "forever together".

 

Look back on the threads you've started. How many are about problems that grind away at your happiness, and how many are about positive changes in your relationship?

[princessa]

The easy answer is if you're unhappy and fighting most of the time, you won't make it in the long run. Regardless of whether it's communication issues, immaturity, incompatibility, whatever - if there's more bad than good, you will not make it. If you're unhappy more oftent than you are happy, there can be no "forever together".

 

Look back on the threads you've started. How many are about problems that grind away at your happiness, and how many are about positive changes in your relationship?

 

It's really hard to tell.. it's been hell for the past year.. his mom passed away and he was traumatized, burried in school work and was always stressed out... It's only been a month since he got a job and during that month I think I was generally happy.. but then the sex issues had to come up because they just haven't been resolved..

 

And why would I come here to post about positive changes in my relationship if it's positive and not a problem?? I'm not sure I understand what you meant by this??

[norajane]

And why would I come here to post about positive changes in my relationship if it's positive and not a problem?? I'm not sure I understand what you meant by this??

 

People do that all the time - they provide updates on their situation and how things have improved and ask for more advice on how to improve things further. "Hey, thanks for the advice, my wife and I are having more sex now, but how do we deal with the kids? We don't have as much time to have sex as we want." Stuff like that.

 

In any case, then look at your threads and consider how many of the specific issues you posted about have improved, or been resolved in a way that satisfies you and makes you happy.

[dgiirl]

20 bucks per week is 80 bucks per month.. I'm just trying to say that being 21 and needing to put as much money as I can into savings for my graduate studies, I'm not willing to pay this money. But if you look at it this way and ask me "what's more important, your MBA or your boyfriend?", then yes, you're right, my MBA is. At 21 I can't put 100% of my resources into this relationship, I put a lot in don't get me wrong, but it's not a marriage and frankly I think i'm way too young to put the relationship ahead of my own success. But that's another topic so let's not argue about this..

 

I mean seriously if I was willing to put any kind of money into this relationship for the sake of finding out whether we're compatible or not ASAP, I'd rent an apartment and live with him tomorrow. But no, I'm being smart and saving money by living with my parents. And i don't think that my priorities are in the wrong place for a second... Like I said maybe I'd consider counselling but only as a last resort..

 

First you dont have to go every week, but you havent even looked into the idea before shooting it down.

 

I agree with you 100% that your school comes first before any guy, ever, but then in another post you talk about wanting to buy makeup. Stop buying makeup and you can go to therapy. I only respond to you by the things you say and a lot of the things you say are extremely shallow. You get upset with us because we call your relationship "fake" and not on a solid foundation, you dont really like our opinions on you having to break up, and yet you dont want to put any effort into fixing the relationship. What do you expect to happen? All you are doing right now is whining.