Help... please.

[Taboo]

It may be that he wants to be able to pin something wrong on you, so that he can justify being mad at you now and get over you faster. Happens sometimes in breakups. I don't know if he necessarily even *really* means it.

It's good that you're giving him a place to stay for a while, but I hope he's moving out soon, because it'll make it easier for both of you to move on and try to have some sort of healthy friendship again. Seeing you every day is probably not easy for him.

[Antisocial_Worker]

Well... again... He told me he hates me yesterday, which broke my heart.

I wish him nothing but the utmost best and I want him to be happy, and he told me point-blank that he hates that. Apparently I'm supposed to wish a disease on him or something.

At work last night, I kept thinking about the stages of grief. At some point in there, there's anger. I hope that's all this is.

[smileyeagle1021]

And the pale/dark? Meh. The qualities I mentioned above are important. Once you find the right person, you'll discover that you LOVE his particular skin colour, eye colour, and that weird mole right on the edge of his eyebrow.

I'm going to repeat something that I've mentioned on fratching, something a guy once told me, and hauntedhead, you might want to take this to heart. (I'm going to do the somewhat shorter, somewhat edited for less TMI, version)
"Hot guys who can make me cream my pants without even trying are a dime a dozen. There are plenty of people out there better looking, more confident, and more skilled than you out there, but none of them are you. You saw me as a person rather than an object, someone like that is truly unique and not easily found, don't ever lose that"

When it comes down to it, he's right, guys you find physically attractive are no doubt very numerous, but finding one who sees who you really are and has a compatible spirit... when you find that truly rare man, don't miss him because he isn't tall, dark, and handsome... he may not be there next time you look.

*ftr, that wasn't my boyfriend who said it oddly enough

[Antisocial_Worker]

I appreciate all the help and advice I've been offered and given here. Thank you all.

[Seshat]

That sounds like it might be healthier. Okay. So: what have you learned from all this?

* Maintaining physical health is important to you, both in yourself and your partner.

What is going to happen if you find a healthy partner who later develops something that prevents them from continuing to be healthy? Work on that, think about it. The chances are very good that everyone will develop at least one serious illness in their lives.

What will you need to do to be able to support them? What will you need them to do? It's fair to need them to be working on their health - my family has decided that my primary job for the household is looking after my health. If I neglected it, they'd be validly upset with me. But I couldn't do it without their love and support.


You want a partner who values their well-being. So look for that in a partner.


* You had trouble this time coping with a partner who is grieving to the point of depression. You probably will have trouble coping with a partner who has depression. You may have trouble coping with other mental illnesses in a partner.

Not surprising. Most people do. Study up on the natural and healthy grieving process, and find resources for support for mental illness and carers of those who are mentally ill.

Everyone who has friends or family will go through grief, everyone who loses a significant portion of their health goes through grief, some people go through grief when losing a job, or moving house. You will at least need to support a partner through grief.

You may need to support a partner through depression or some other mental illness. You currently lack the skills. Hit your local library and learn.


At present, you value mental health in a partner. Consider whether you actually value someone 'technically sane', or would be willing to go with someone who bears a label like 'schizoaffective' or 'depressive' but has the tools and techniques to live with it in a healthy way. Either way, study enough about mental health to make an informed decision, and to be able to get help when it's needed.


* You want a partner who makes an effort to support themselves.

This is pretty damn realistic. Maybe instead, you want a partner who makes an effort to contribute to the family - think about that. Some people are happy to be the financial support while their partner keeps house, grows organic veg, maintains chickens, sews the wardrobe, and otherwise does six kazillion things that amount to a full-time job in and of itself.

Figure it out. You're the only one who can.


* You want a partner who's also HIV positive.

I honestly think that for you, this one is non-negotiable. All the others, you can probably work around. But this one, I don't think so.

With an HIV+ partner, you can just go ahead and kiss without fretting about whether one of you bit your tongue eating dinner.



Now here's some of my own


* You need a partner you can disagree with, without it becoming a fight

This requires that you develop disagreement-management skills yourself. They're usually available in books about communication skills. It's all that stuff you've probably heard about never saying "you always" and saying phrases like "when you do X, I feel Y'.

And don't expect to get it in the first few months of a relationship. You both have to learn how the other communicates, and you both have to learn what annoys and upsets the other, and come to some sort of balance. This can take many months, even many years.

One of the early skills to try to develop in a healthy relationship is the skill of discovering 'oh. shit. we disagree on this, and it's important. Okay, let's sort it out' and then sorting it out without going into fury level anger.
Without any anger is the ideal, but keeping things to a dull roar is acceptable.

Oh, and 'hang on to that thought, I'm going to the punching bag for ten minutes' is also an acceptable interruption to the discussion. Emotions HAPPEN. Taking it out on the punching bag can be just what's needed to clear both peoples' minds.


* You need someone with compatible life goals

Not 'the same' life goals. 'Compatible' life goals.

I could never be the wife of someone who wanted to be a major political or business force. That sort of power-politics life just isn't one I could be happy in, and it's pretty much compulsory for 'the wife' in those careers.

But I could be the wife of someone who wanted to do stuff like climb Everest, or sail solo around the world, and so forth. As long as he didn't mind me staying home.

I couldn't marry someone who wanted children. I can't cope with living in that level of close proximity, and it would be emotionally harmful to the children for an adult in their family to basically ignore them. "Wants children" is incompatible with "doesn't want children".

Discuss life goals. Discuss how they impact on each other. If there's a compromise that makes you both happy, yay. If it's not going to be possible to compromise, hug each other, wish each other the best in life, and limit the relationship to a strong friendship.

* You have to be able to be friends

Romantic love passes. A solid kind of deep love takes its place, but the romantic gloss passes. And when it does, you see all the flaws it was hiding.

You need a solid friendship to get you through that stage. And to get you through the rough times, when one of you loses the plot to grief, or you lose a job during a recession, or one of you gets a crippling but temporary (thank god) disability.



So .. yeah. Uncle Jester gave you the hard word. Now Auntie Seshat's tossed you a big bundle of advice on who to look for.

You'll notice I said nothing about skin colour or weight. DO look at fat, pale guys as well as skinny dark guys. The fat guy may be hypothyroid, have been struggling to get a diagnosis, and just starting treatment. And that DOES quality as 'looking after his physical health'.

And the pale/dark? Meh. The qualities I mentioned above are important. Once you find the right person, you'll discover that you LOVE his particular skin colour, eye colour, and that weird mole right on the edge of his eyebrow.

[AccountingDrone]

Wonderful. I have a feeling that it will work out even just staying friends and splitting the flat. I stayed friends with my exhusband, and I have remained friends with most of my ex boyfriends[exfiancees are another matter for me =(]

[HYHYBT]

That's a remarkably agreeable ending; sounds like he was having thoughts along similar lines to yours.

[ArcticChicken]

That......went a lot better than I was expecting, honestly. I very glad you got this worked out amicably. His family and friends will get over it when they see that he is happy.

[BookstoreEscapee]

I feel good.

Good.

..........

[Antisocial_Worker]

Well... The deed is done. My boyfriend and I are no longer together, although it seems to have gone as well as a breakup could possibly go.

Here's how it went down. The other day he had to go to the local college, where he'll be attending classes this fall, to see an adviser. He found a bad one and she gave him the runaround. He came out in a furious mood and told me he hated this place (meaning the school but I took it to mean my city), and we fought all the way into downtown, where we had planned to get some lunch and pray at a church that's special to us both. Why did we fight? Because he wanted to give up, and I wanted him to go back to the school and see a different adviser, one who was actually helpful.

The day passed, we did go back to the school and he did see a helpful adviser. However, later that evening as we were heading out to this really great used bookstore... somehow the conversation turned to breaking up and he asked me if I just wanted to be friends.

I don't know what made me pause, but my silence was his answer. It was like a weight lifted off me and immediately we were acting like best of friends again. Since then, our time has been spent navigating our friends' reactions. I explained how stressed out I'd been, and how we moved WAY too fast. In the end, it was one of those rare breakups where there isn't a bad guy, although his friends and family think I'm a monster.

So, here we are... I'm much happier. The plan is for him to move across the hall into the spare bedroom in this apartment, while we see if we can rebuild at a saner pace. If not, there are options for us both.

I feel good.

[Jester]

To make a long story short, I have been supporting this man for the past couple of months because in a fit of pique, he walked out of his job down there in Florida.

And because of this, I supported him, which meant draining my bank account and my credit card, and overdrafting on them both. I paid his bills and sent him money to eat with.

I'm still supporting him on my paycheck. We're down to one meal a day to save money.

Ah, the real reason surfaces. They say that the majority of divorces are caused by financial issues. Whether you realize it or not, this is something that is bothering you. In your original post you tried to hide it, whether consciously or not, but as you said in this post, those other three reasons were merely symptoms of a larger stressor: money.

Fourth, I don't think he's serious about working on his weight and health.

I want to exercise and the answer is always... later. Let's do it later. I want to take a nap. After this show. And then he falls asleep. He's asleep now.

This raises the very pertinent question: are you serious about this? Because if you were, you wouldn't need to wait for him to join you in exercising. You would just do it yourself, with or without him. And maybe he would eventually join you after seeing your example. After all, while you can blame him for not working on his own health, you can hardly blame him for you not working on yours.

Fifth, one of the two men interested in me -- the man most interested in me, actually -- is a personal trainer, which proves his commitment to health. He's also my physical ideal, dark and handsome and all the rest.

None of which proves that he isn't a douchebag.

Look, I've said it before, to you and others, and I'll say it again: don't be looking elsewhere while you have a relationship at home that you say you are working on. If you are working on it, work on it, and don't be looking outside your home for something new. If you're not working on it, admit it, be honest with your boyfriend, break it off as best you can, and move on....but out of respect for him, do not start something up with someone new until after your boyfriend has found a new place to live, if that's the direction you choose to take.

Bottom line, the spark that was there is gone. Stress and bad moods killed it. I'm trying to get it back, but at this point I'm not even sure I want it back.

So, is the bottom line that the spark is gone, or are you trying to get it back? You seem to contradict yourself here. It sounds to me like you've given up even trying, to be honest.

I don't need someone like an anchor chained to my ankle.

This, for example, does not sound like someone who is trying to get an old spark back. This sounds like someone who has written off the relationship and is already looking to the horizon for someone new.

There's someone else in the picture who walks the walk and who I wouldn't have to worry about killing with my poisoned blood.

As does this.

Look. Enough of this. Seriously, enough. Even if your relationship is over, have at least enough respect for your boyfriend, and enough self-respect for yourself, to wait a little bit before jumping back into the saddle with someone else. Whether or not you work through the problems with your boyfriend, the personal trainer is not going to be the answer, either for the problems you are going through now, or your own personal demons. Despite what you said about online dating and fantasies, you are attaching your own fantasies to this guy without anything to back it up, other than your personal belief that your current relationship has gone to shit.

...please don't cheat. If you break up, break up, with a reasonable time for him to find someplace else to live, but in the meantime, don't cheat... and don't assume Fitness Trainer will still be interested once you're single.

Quoted for truth, wisdom, and added emphasis to my above points.

[Green_Fairy]

Well THAT certainly tells a different story than it sounded in the original post....

Have to think on this one... but please don't cheat. If you break up, break up, with a reasonable time for him to find someplace else to live, but in the meantime, don't cheat... and don't assume Fitness Trainer will still be interested once you're single.

i agree. with all of that. cheating is never good, even if you know the relationship is over. my advice? (and please feel free to throw it out the window)
break up with him as soon as you feel ready. tell him you care about him, but you don't think it's going to work out between you. don't kick him out, but end the sexual and romantic relationship. sleep in separate beds (take the couch or whatever), no kissing, ect. help him find a new place to live. do not start dating someone seriously until either he moves out, or a month or so later if it takes him a while to find a place to live. but don't bring the new guy over if he's there. he sounds emotionally fragile, so tread lightly.

just be careful. and keep us posted!

[HYHYBT]

Well THAT certainly tells a different story than it sounded in the original post....

Have to think on this one... but please don't cheat. If you break up, break up, with a reasonable time for him to find someplace else to live, but in the meantime, don't cheat... and don't assume Fitness Trainer will still be interested once you're single.

[Antisocial_Worker]

Okay... Finally it would seem I have a bit of privacy.

I don't think I can address everyone's individual pieces of advice one by one, so I'll just say that I think I may have nailed down what it is that sent me off the deep end. First off, let me also say that I do understand that my "big 3" complaints -- he's too fat, he's too light-skinned, he's bad in bed -- are shallow concerns. Weight and sexual performance can be worked on, I know. Him being light-skinned is something I can get over.

However, you know how millions of individual bacteria boil up into a single nasty zit? That's what's happened here. A lot of stress and a lot of other issues boiled up into three zits with deceivingly simple heads. My big 3 were just the simple issues that all the other stress attached itself to.

To make a long story short, I have been supporting this man for the past couple of months because in a fit of pique, he walked out of his job down there in Florida. He did this without another job in place to go to, and without any other source of income at all. Granted, he did this because on the day he found out his father was coming home from the hospital specifically to die at home, his boss at that job did something despicable -- but still. And because of this, I supported him, which meant draining my bank account and my credit card, and overdrafting on them both. I paid his bills and sent him money to eat with.

In addition to this, it always seemed for these past couple of months that nothing I did was enough. Yes, I know his father was dying, but most of the time on the phone nothing I could do or say was enough to make the pain go away at all. That might have been when what I felt for him before began to die.

Secondly, he arrived on a Tuesday and that Friday when we were out enjoying some nightlife, he received a phone call telling him that his father died. That was more stress on top of all the rest. I can't blame him for that, but I don't have to like the stress either. My parents are dying also, and I'm still supporting him on my paycheck. We're down to one meal a day to save money.

Thirdly, he's moody. And touchy. Little things set him off and send him into a deep black mope. He always snaps out of it, but that drags me down. I can ride high upon a deep depression without the help. I don't need someone like an anchor chained to my ankle. We snipe at each other constantly and bicker all the time.

Fourth, I don't think he's serious about working on his weight and health. Yes, because of the money situation, we're not eating as healthily as we should. Yes, he's found a job and perhaps when his paychecks start coming in, we'll eat better. However, in the meantime, it's hard to hear someone say they want to exercise and get fit when they're ordering burgers and large soft drinks and then lying around watching TV for up to six or seven hours at a stretch. I want to exercise and the answer is always... later. Let's do it later. I want to take a nap. After this show. And then he falls asleep. He's asleep now.

Fifth, one of the two men interested in me -- the man most interested in me, actually -- is a personal trainer, which proves his commitment to health. He's also my physical ideal, dark and handsome and all the rest. (Note: Believe it or not, I put a lot more stock in personality than I do looks. From what I've found out about this man, I appreciate his personality much more than his looks.) However, perhaps most importantly, he's HIV positive, just like me. The guy from Florida is not, and at the start of our relationship that caused some stress for him. I've dated plenty of other HIV-negative men and this didn't bother me at first, but now it's beginning to. I get very nervous if he says he's feeling sick. Also, the other night we brushed our teeth and we both bled a little. We didn't think about it until just a little later when we realized we couldn't even kiss goodnight.

Sixth, that personal trainer lived here in my town, moved away, but is planning to move back in the fall. If I just can't rekindle the spark with my boyfriend, it would be so wonderful to date a person like normal people do. None of this online crap. Long-distance dating forces you to fill in the gaps with your fantasies and you inevitably end up disappointed when reality comes calling.

Bottom line, the spark that was there is gone. Stress and bad moods killed it. I'm trying to get it back, but at this point I'm not even sure I want it back. There's someone else in the picture who walks the walk and who I wouldn't have to worry about killing with my poisoned blood.

Does that about sum it up? Writing this out has been a fairly depressing exercise and I don't feel like rereading it. If anyone has a question about any of this, go nuts and ask, and I'll answer it.

Edit: I just realized I forgot to mention two other things. The first is that in the last week before he was due to move up here, he had a major breakdown and thus I had to spend literally every spare minute I had at work that night on the phone with him. During this breakdown, he wept and told me he was no good for me and that I should find someone else. Then he implied that he couldn't deal with everything going on and planned to kill himself. It caused me no small amount of distress when, later in the night, he stopped answering his phone. By morning, I was planning to contact his friends via facebook and ask them to check on him, or else call the police where lived in Florida and ask them to do a welfare check. He was better by morning though.

The second is that for the longest time, his mother hated me sight unseen because I'm white. This is ironic considering that if he was any lighter-skinned, he'd be Swedish. However, over the course of one of my rants about this, I mentioned the fact that I had emptied both my bank account and my credit card for his sake. Him being a very proud sort of person, this made him very upset, to the point that he told me later that night that for a moment there he was sure our relationship was over because I had dared to "throw in his face" the fact that I was supporting him.

I think everything began to go into a tailspin with these two incidents. The rest followed in an avalanche so that by the time time it came time for me to go down there, I was in full-out screaming freak out mode, which was where I was when I posted this thread originally so long ago.

[Antisocial_Worker]

First let me say that I appreciate everyone's time and the effort taken to weigh in on this. I appreciate it very much, and I want to thank you all.

That being said, as soon as I have the privacy to respond to all of this, I will. At the moment, unfortunately I don't. I may have some time on Wednesday or Thursday though.

Thanks again.