A
female
age
41-50,
anonymous
writes:helloi have been in a relationship with a man who is older than me by 8yrs, he is 40yrs old and i am 32yrs old. Originally when we first got together, over 2yrs ago i felt he was a breath of fresh air, compared to all my friends, and previous men i had dated. He wasn't my type initially, however i fell in love with him at an early stage in the relationship. We have had our ups and downs, but in the past i always felt he was the only one for me. Over the past 6 months i have had increasing doubts surrounding how well suited we are and have begun to dislike and resent the qualities i first noticed in him. For exanple he is well educated and even though he comes from a similar comprehensive education as me, he has educated himself, and has a very active and unique intellect. He comes from a bad home life that was negelectful emotionally, and physically abusive, to this day he has next to no contact or positive support from his family. I have also experienced an emotionally impoverished and isolated childhood, and the similarities in our backgrounds made me feel i wasn't the only lame duck (emotionally speaking) out there. However, i feel our relationship ebbs and flows between intense and lukewarm. He is very loving and affectionate, and from him i feel i have learnt to express real affection, wherein the past i would opt for emotionally distant partners. I feel his influence in my life has been good. But I can't help but feel frustrated by his unconventional approach to life. He is waiting to be recognised as an artist, and this unfulfillled ambition has plagued him throughout his adult life. I want to and have tried to respect that, but at the cost of him being able to generate any concrete future for himself, let alone for the idea of a future together. He has all these grand plans that never come off due to his chronic lack of money, due to a constant stream of insecure jobs, and dead ends, resulting in is bankruptcy. I have tried to understand and be supportive, and except that our relationship will never be conventional. However, i am coming up to my 32nd birthday and have this all pervading dread that i am wasting my life with someone whom i love but will not be able to provide the conventional and secure future i seek. as a result i feel quite trapped between my head telling me to leave, and my heart telling me to give him just a little more time to sort himself out. my other doubts stem from the fact that he doesn't get on with my friends, he is a kind and thoughful and engaging person, but he tends to present himself as a withdrawn, and aloof character around people whom he doesn't know, or doesn't have time for, it is this judgemental and snobbish, arrogant aspect of his character that my friends see. Consequently i have to divide my time between seeing him, and my friends, which is increasingly hard work and makes me feel my life and who i am is compartmentalised. I tried to break things off the other week because the stress of it all was making me unhappy, i have consequently been left feeling i am the one with the problem, not including him with my friends, and have ended up crippled with guilt, while he tries doubly hard to please me in a very obvious way, it has created an impression of happiness, but in private I feel at the end of my tether and close to tears, please help x
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ambition, bankrupt, fell in love, insecure, money, trapped Reply to this Question
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reader, anonymous, writes (11 April 2007): This is verified as being by the original poster of the question
To ChiRaven
Thanks for your honest and upfront reply. I appreciate you taking the time to consider my dilemma. And in all honesty I guess my text does present a rather obvious cliche. I think what you have said is very valid, and has been useful in enabling me to see what I already know but don't want to see. If I'm a 100% honest with myself, I know I will not be able to settle for my present becoming my long-term future. All I can do is face the facts and decide, like you said I need to figure out what I need, rather than trying to rescue someone who possibly can't be rescued unless they decide, and I don't think that is gonna happen any time soon. There is a saying I think is useful at times of stress, that says: life never gives anyone anything more than they can bare. Thankyou for acknowledging that what I have been baring has been difficult. Wishing you all the very best x
A
male
reader, ChiRaven  +, writes (11 April 2007):
 A starving artist .. what a cliché.
Unless he really does get "discovered" (a really,really long shot), you're always going to be the one who holds "the day job", brings in the money and provides the financial security for the couple. Can you deal with that? Honestly. now ... it's your own future and your own happiness at stake here.
With that comes the artistic temperament ... moody, aloof, and all that goes with it. A fiction writer couldn't have done a better job of writing a prototypical character than you did in describing your real guy. Once again, he's not going to change, and you are the one who has to deal with the fact that as a couple you will be socially isolated. YOU may have friends, but the TWO of you will not. Can you deal with that?
Yes, he comes from an emotionally crippled environment; but yours was not much better. Take a really hard and honest look at your future. It looks remarkably like your present. Can you deal with sort of life from now on? If so, stay with it and bless you for what you are choosing to do to yourself.
If you can't, YOU are going to have to "declare emotional bankruptcy" and pull away from this man. It will hurt you terribly. And it will hurt you doubly again because of what it will do to him, because you know that you provide much that he really needs for his life. He depends on you.
But ultimately YOU have to depend on YOU. And you will be no good to you or him if you break down under the strain of the load you are being asked to carry.
I do not envy your position. Good luck whatever your decision may be.
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