(Closed) Breaking up for a few months with my long term partner

• Tatum
• 2 weeks ago

• Wedding: October 2010

@katiejane20:   I know. It is a complete break up and we’ve now agreed to no contact and to live our own lives. He still wants a future with me down the line he says 

 

He can’t know this. He might think it, but he can’t know this. He has no idea how the next 3 months living like a single man are going to impact his feelings on what he wants in the future. He also can’t know that you will be there in 3 months after he’s had his fun, nor can he know how your future relationship will be impacted by these next 3 months, even if you are waiting for him and he does come back.

 

If the only way you are dealing with your pain right now is to remain hopeful that he will be back in 3 months and your relationship will seamlessly revert back to where it was when things were good between you two…I think the probability of that is near 0. I don’t think he will be back, honestly, and if he does come back, I think you will be plagued with anger and resentment, and I think your relationship will still suffer even if you aren’t, because you are fundamentally not compatible and the issues that broke you up will still be there.

 

ETA: sometimes relationships just run their course. It doesn’t mean either of you were bad people, or that you didn’t really love each other at one time. But some things just come to an end. It sounds like this one has.

• mrsaime
• 2 weeks ago

@L606:  Exactly!!! I have a good friend that hasn’t seen her SO in 1.5 years (in different countries), and they’re still as strong as ever. 

OP, the pandemic can’t be blamed for the destruction of your relationship. It’s clear there were issues before that just got magnified by the pandemic. Count it as a blessing and leave this jerk in the dust.

• dianaj17
• 2 weeks ago

• Wedding: August 2019

@katiejane20:  I’m skipping ahead, but Will and Kate (as pretty as her clothes may be and as funny as he may be and as cute as their kids may be) ARE NOT people to aspire to! I’m an avid royal gossip follower, and he’s cheated on her regularly for the entirety of their relationship. He married her because nobody else acceptable, who he liked well enough, would have him. I’m sure they have their arrangement and they both seem relatively happy with their lives, but please, unless this dude is super loaded and some sort of minor royalty, NOT WORTH IT. 

Editing now that I’ve caught up. Hon, you deserve better. You’re not going to get it without therapy and loving yourself. This dude has fed you a line of bullshit. Normal people have long distance relationships and do fine. Normal people struggle with mental illness, and their partners don’t leave them to figure it out alone. I don’t necessarily buy into the idea that, once you meet your person, you’re never sexually attracted to anyone ever again (there’s a whole non-monogamous population who manages to have wonderful, secure, healthy relationships after all), but for monogamous people who have found their person, there’s a HUGE difference between thinking “hm that lifeguard is sexy” and actively wanting to fuck the lifeguard. People in healthy, monogamous relationships with the right person don’t ACTUALLY want to fuck the lifeguard and blow up their lives. 

• Tatum
• 2 weeks ago

• Wedding: October 2010

@dianaj17:  really?? Wow, I had no idea. I guess it doesn’t really surprise me though.

 

Do you know who he wanted that wouldn’t have him? Sorry to threadjack OP. I’m just super nosy.

• missmollybee
• 2 weeks ago

• Wedding: USA

@katiejane20:  Are you REALLY okay with this “temporary breakup” thing? It’s obviously killing you. I would frankly be insulted that he’d even suggest to break up, but to leave the door open in case his side piece doesn’t work out in AUS. That in itself would not make me want to be with this kind of person. If he really wanted to be with you, he would have found a way to make it work. Sure, you both didn’t handle your issues well- but two people that love each other and want to be together seek counseling and get help figure their shit out- TOGETHER.

I would tell him straight up, “Hey, this “temporary breakup” thing doesn’t work for me. If you don’t want to be with me now, you never will. You need to make a choice here, because if you REALLY want to end this, I’m not going to be waiting for you when you get back.” 

If he is prepared to walk away, you need to be prepared to walk away as well. For good. 

• Mary Ellen1
• 2 weeks ago

Real committed couples DO NOT TAKE A BREAK FROM EACH OTHER. You’ve been together for 5 years and living together for more than 2 years. You both thought Austrailia would be a good thing and it wasn’t. It appears you became increasingly depressed being there.(Not your fault). You seem guilty about that so you are giving him a PASS on his behavior? When you got on the plane to leave, he should have been on the plane with you. Or you should have stayed with him. Lets be honest. He choose Australia and adventure over you. If you get back together, he will do something like this again in the future. Maybe not this same thing but something similiar. Not saying he doesn’t love you but HE LOVES HIMSELF AND HIS OWN PLANS MORE. Don’t plan a future with a man like this. You will regret it. You are still attached to him and grieving but in time you will see HIS FLAWS. He is not the prince you thought he was.

• yassim
• 2 weeks ago

I want to say, him saying things like it could work out later etc is like him putting you in his back pocket and saving you for later- if he even needs you. You’re kept on the back burner. When he tells you this, he goes back to his bachelor life and you do whatever. He also must know you’ll hang aroun on his word. It’s an insult, not a love story of separating and growing and getting back together. The getting back together will come from boredom and convenience, if it even happens. And then what happens to the hurt from this event? It doesn’t disappear.

• dianaj17
• 2 weeks ago

• Wedding: August 2019

@Tatum:  it’s pretty well established that Jecca Craig was the one who got away in the gossip circles. In fact, he skipped Charlotte’s first Easter to go to her wedding in Africa! There’s a long list of daughters of various aristocrats he was rumored to be linked to, but never confirmed, but the bigger gossip is more that none of them would seriously consider dating him because they had no interest in royal life. Which makes total sense, in my book. If you’re filthy rich and surrounded by dukes and earls and the like, of course you prefer to marry within that group…all of the access, all of the money, none of the restrictions/scrutiny! 

Also, rereading my original post, I was probably a bit harsh. I think that Will and Kate care for each other. She knew what she was getting into, and it wouldn’t shock me in the slightest if they had an understanding (meaning all of those “cheating” incidents wouldn’t have been cheating). But…definitely not the fairytale romance we’ve been sold!

• Tatum
• 2 weeks ago

• Wedding: October 2010

@dianaj17:  Interesting. Also, looking at her pictures…I’d say Will has a type.

 

• strawberrysakura
• 2 weeks ago

Bee, I think what you need to understand is that you aren’t getting back together in the future. 

He may say he hopes down the line that you’ll be together. My ex said the same thing. We were dating for 6 years and actually we broke up when I was 28. I was SO SURE this was my person. I thought there was so much love and I couldn’t understand why he would do this. Well, it was simple: I loved him, but he didn’t love me. He was afraid to be on his own after 6 years but he also told me not to wait and that many guys would be interested. Is there some sort of pamphlet on how to dump an emotional girlfriend these guys are reading???

Look, he’s just saying things to make you feel better which makes this easier for him. He thinks that if he tells you there’s a light at the end of the tunnel it will be easier for you, and that in the meanwhile he can extricate himself from you and when you realize he’s not coming back he won’t have to deal with your emotions. In fact, that’s what this is all about, from you being depressed to trying to break up with you, he’s just avoiding dealing with your emotions and not communicating honestly with you. 

He is not coming back. You are not getting back together. He is probably going to marry someone and settle down in Australia. Most importantly, he took a look at your 5 years together, all the ups and downs, took a look at his heart and what the future could be and he decided he didn’t want you. He made that choice. I know that’s a horrible, horrible reality, but here’s the silver lining: someone out there WILL choose you every. single. time., and now you are free to find that person who will ultimately make you happier than your ex ever could. 

• missmollybee
• 2 weeks ago

• Wedding: USA

@strawberrysakura:  Yes, OP needs to call him on his BS and force him to admit that he just wants to end this. Because that’s what this really is, he was the one that wanted to breakup, not her 

• TwilightRarity
• 2 weeks ago

• Wedding: September 2016

@katiejane20: I haven’t read all of the updates so I might reivisit something that has already been covered but I wanted to take the time to respond.

I do think it’s possible to be in an in between place in your relationship. The challenge of it, though, is when the “less attached” partner is the one asking for it and also wanting to be able to connect sexually with others during your down time. You run the risk of waiting for him and not doing the personal work and healing and growth you need to do during this time. You need to think of this as a break up break up- not a break or a pause. A break up. And you need to behave accordingly. That way, you will do your part to heal and you will also be able to know, with more clarity than you have now, if you even want to get back with him sometime down the line when things open back up and you reconnect (if you reconnect).

In my relationship, I tend to be the one who has had periods of needing “space” (or time to myself) and I have to tell you, I absolutely understand your partner’s perspective, based on what you initially shared. If I was on a great new (once in a lifetime) adventure and invited my SO to come along with me and they spent a full year of what was supposed to be our two year adventure struggling and depressed, I would want a break from them, too. In fact, I would get to a point where I demanded a break from them and I would be happy for them to go home. Your SO was not responsible for your mental health or your ability to adapt to change. You are. He was not responsible for how you handled the shut downs and missing your family. You are. Your mental health and well being are your responsibility, no matter whether you are single, dating, or married. It was wise of you to recognize that you needed to go home. Under those circumstances, I would not be sure if I still wanted to be with my partner, but I wouldn’t necessarily want to completely end it, either. Emotions are high, everything is wonky and discombobulated. It’s hard to have clarity and make perfect choices that you won’t regret in that situation. However, if I felt that a full year of my two year adventure had been taken up with my SO’s emotional struggles, I would ABSOLUTELY want to have fun and enjoy myself and be free during my final year of that adventure.

I also don’t think that sexual exclusivity is the be all and end all of a relationship. It’s a default expectation that people have and an agreement in most relationships, but the people saying that your (ex) boyfriend’s desire to sleep with someone else while you are broken up means he doesn’t love you are over simplifying things. You are broken up. He didn’t need to tell you anything about his plans or activities while you are apart. You both may want the option of reconnecting in the future, but he is under no obligation to put his life on hold while you get yourself together and while the two of you are apart. And you can love someone and be crystal clear that you aren’t pausing your life or your momentum for them – sometimes that means that the space between you becomes too much to navigate and sometimes that means that you reconnect later than you initially foresaw.

Basically, I think you should focus on yourself right now and stop worrying about him and what he does with his dick and his time while you are apart. You need to focus on yourself and figure out what you want for your life, separate from a relationship/partner, and go work on that for a while.

• laurana1
• 2 weeks ago

• Wedding: June 2019

To me, it sounds like there is just not much you can do, at this point. You are already broken up and there is no telling what the future will bring. Perhaps he will come back and you’ll want to take him back and that will be what happens. If he did sleep with others you’ll have to deal with it.

When I was in middle school, I met my first boyfriend. We had a very dramatic relationship, especially for our ages. He had dated another girl the year before me, and they broke up the summer before we got together. We started dating that fall, and two months in, he broke up with me and went back to her. It sucked and I was blindsided. Two days after we broke up, he broke up with her and asked me if I wanted to get back together. I was young and in love and just wanted to move past it, so we began dating again. Five months after that, he told me we should break up as we’d be moving on to different schools and lived far apart, couldn’t drive, etc. He didn’t feel he could do long distance. I was really sad, but didn’t have a choice. I suggested we break up on the last day of school. He fed me a line about how that would be so sudden and he wasn’t sure he could handle just being together one day and then not having me in his life at all the next day. So we broke up. We had never really been friends before dating so I stopped talking to him and just mourned privately… he bugged me about it one day after school until I told him I was just sad and missed him, etc etc. He told me he loved me so much and would always love me and probably not get over me for a long, long time. And so on and so forth. I was really touched. The next Monday, I found out he was already back together with the other girl. Lol. So much for not getting over me for a long time!! They dated all summer until she moved away and he had the audacity to call me and tell me he made a mistake and wanted me back. I told him no thanks. He was pretty mature for his age and would say the sweetest words… it was all talk, of course. I would’ve done a lot for that boy and he just kept hopping back and forth between me and the other girl. He knew I was so crazy about him that I was willing to overlook what he did. And I learned my lesson not to put a man before myself, my needs, my feelings, and my respect for myself. 

I feel like you do love him so much, but we just worry that you’re clearly willing to accept behavior from him that will hurt you and that you’re clearly uncomfortable with for the sake of “love”. I don’t believe in all of the “we’re meant to be, I found my true soulmate” most of the time, honestly. Relationships are about love, respect, and standing by each other no matter what. Saying it’s “meant to be” takes out the fact that your love and your relationship is a choice- you choose to be with each other each and every day. Some days are harder than others, some seasons, some years. 

I don’t think about my husband in terms of we are meant to be,  instead I choose every day to love him, be there for him, and stay loyal to him. He does the same for me. We have gone through some tough times together already, but neither of us has ever been ready to say we’re done. It doesn’t make any sense to me to say “you are perfect for me and I am perfect for you but not right now, life got too shitty, it’s better for us to separate and figure this out alone because we can’t figure it out together… but obviously we are still perfect for one another and our relationship was written in the heavens”. I think you are confusing sacrificing in relationships with what is happening now. Basically saying “look how much I love and trust him, that I will allow him to sleep with other women so he can be happy” and him reassuring you that it means nothing and you will always be the only one for him and no one else could ever come close, etc etc. So it puts you in denial… you are broken up. He wants to sleep with other people. In words, you may have the most beautiful relationship. But as others have pointed out, there will be MANY trying times in life. If you were unable to navigate this together as a couple, it does not bode well for future problems- will you break up and see others every time your relationship gets rocky? This sets the precedent for that.

Also, I am really not trying to be cruel, but what will you do if one of his one night stands ends up pregnant? Though unlikely, it could happen. Will you move to Australia to help him raise his child with another woman? Will he move back to you and just ignore that child and maybe send money from time to time? Will he pressure her to take care of it?

Even if he doesn’t sleep with anyone and comes back to you, I still feel if it got bad enough for you to call it quits once, you just can’t say it will never happen again. I’m sure you guys never anticipated this, but you also can’t anticipate what the future will bring.