A
female
age
36-40,
*1sha
writes:I've been in cross-cultural, cross-religious, cross-everything relationship for the past 2 years! I'm 27, my boyfriend is 33. We live 80 miles apart and have been seeing each other about every 2 weeks lately. Our relationship has been tough with 'crises' every few months from my end about where our realtionship is heading. My family are not involved much in my life and don't care who I marry. His family are Egyptian Muslim and are very close knit. His father died about 10 years ago and his mother has brought them up. She hates white British girls and I've never met her. He says he loves me and that he doesn't want to find anyone else. He says that his whole family are arguing because his mother is against all of her children (there are 4 of them- 2 girls and 2 boys) relationships for one reason or another. She knows about me apparently but is constantly arguing with him about our relationship via phone, text, email etc. She has pretty much moved into his house this year (he says that this is to block me visiting as I always used to) and as a result we have been meeting either at my place or going on 'dates' or trips away for most of this year. To me these meetings seem empty - I just want to spend time together relaxing and not worrying about him having to get home or texts/emails etc that he is receiving!Earlier this year he said that we should not be dating for much longer as we need to get married and start a family etc. We agreed about this. He said that I would meet his mum in May and we would marry in August with or without her blessings. We haven't really discussed this again since March but lately all of my friends and colleagues have been getting engaged and I got really stressed about it because he hadn't mentioned it at all except to tell me that the whole family were arguing non-stop.It was our annual leave last week and just before it I felt really angry and upset with him that he hadn't even mentioned it - more angry and upset than I've felt about anything for a long time. He does try to visit me often but makes me drop him off at the end of his road so that hos family don't catch a glimpse of me. He calls me (but it's always on his way home or in the shops etc when his mum isn't there). Anyway I got really angry when he arrived on Sunday and basically gave him the silent treatment. I wasn't trying to hurt him or punish him but I just didn't want to 'chat' to him because I just felt like crying all the time. This continued until Wednesday and I felt terrible and so did he. We eventually talked about my worries that he could break up with me at any time to appease his mum and marry an Egyptian girl. I told him that I felt really angry, unhappy and extremely upset and that I feel like I'm being dragged along. I told him that I think about our relationship a lot and it really bothers me that we don't seem to have any plans since the May/Aug things didn't happen. I told him that part of me didn't want to have a nice time with him because they are memories that will stay with me and make me upset when he leaves me (which I told him that I think is the most likely outcome of all of this). He replied that my silent treatment had really hurt him and that he had 'seen a different side to me'. He told me that he has a lot of stress at home with his family and he hates having to relive it to relay it to me and that my silent treatment had compounded his stress by a million times on our annual leave week, making it unbearable. He said that he couldn't marry me if he thought I would treat him like that when I was upset. He told me that it will be at least another year before his mum will come round and then we will have to re-think our situation. I'm not even sure if I want a woman who hates me without even meeting me just based on the colour of my skin to be involved in my life but he insists that we need her to help us since my family are not in close contact with me.I feel terrible for how I dealt with this stressful situation by giving him the silent treatment. I just have no idea what to do now. I have apologised and told him that I won't behave like that again. I have tried to start exercising this week to prevent getting so extremely stressed again and I will try to talk through my problems with him early on in future before it gets out of control. Is this enough of an apology or should I do more to show him I was just really stresseda and upset last week? Do I wait another year and see how it goes (even though I'm sure I'll keep having these stressful panics) or do I walk away and possibly regret losing him forever? How can I sort out this mess? Please please help me with any advice. Sorry for this long post but I feel that this has gotten out of control.
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Fancy yourself as an agony aunt? Add your answer to this question! A
male
reader, Danielepew  +, writes (28 June 2011):
 Cindy: No problem with what the poster is now. I just wouldn't recommend any woman to live in such submission as Muslims demand from their women. I don't think any lover is worth it.
A
female
reader, CindyCares  +, writes (27 June 2011):
 @Danielepew : I understand what you say and, believe me or not, I would not change MY religion for the best lover in the world.
But, let's face it- not everybody in Europe feels strongly about the religion they supposedly belong to. It's more of a bureaucratic formality, I know tons of people who got christened and that was more or less the last time they set foot in a church. I had a Swedish au pair that , asked what was her affiliation, scratched her head in perplexity and come out with " Christian, I guess ? "- she honestly did not know.
It's quite possible that our OP is a Christian just for the statistics, or an agnostic, or an atheist.
In which case, I think it's possible / justifiable that she'd care more about her feelings than about a formal affiliation to a Church. Therefore, I recognize that my advice sounds cynical- but , perhaps, no more that being a once-a- year Christian.
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A
female
reader, desirewhitefire  +, writes (27 June 2011):
 I was married to an Indian man. I'm white. We have a son.
His family made my life completely miserable until after I had the sought after boy child. Even after I gave them a grandson they still talked badly about me to my husband and to each other.
We got married at a JP because no one on my side was happy with a Hindu wedding and no one on his side was happy with a Christian one. Our cultural differences got in the way of everything. Naming our child, to live with his parents, to convert me to Hinduism...it was a mess. Our whole marriage was a mess.
It felt like at the end of our marriage that the only reason why we married was to prove his parents that he can do whatever the hell he wanted to. That's never a good reason to marry someone. I loved him very much and I was very hurt in the end. We came from different backgrounds and we valued different aspects in a relationship.
I'm not discouraging interracial marriage or relationships. Just be aware that you are going to go through hell and you have to be strong to make it through. If he's willing to cut himself off from his family then it might have a chance. Otherwise be prepared to be challenged.
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (27 June 2011): I think that he needs to tell his mother how he turly feel bnout you. His mother should not be that involed in his personal life. If you love him (which it sould like you do) you do maybe you should go to conseling together. NO you should not continue to put your life on hold for him. True love is hard to find to find these days. Tell him how much you love him and care about him, but let him know that you do have to draw the line somewhere
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A
female
reader, Aunty BimBim  +, writes (27 June 2011):
 I agree with those who ask if he tried to understand your feelings when you gave him the silent treatment or if he simply let you know how it affected him?
And yes, what is going to change over the next twelve months to bring his mother around? And then after the 12 months when his mother comes around there will be another "RETHINK!!" What tha? Is he stringing you along or is he a bit of a gutless whimp, either he wants to marry you and settle down or he doesn't!
You are working blind here, you cant see any light at the end of the tunnel (the 12 months period) because he switched the light off (saying there will have to be another think about it). Of course you are going to have stressful periods, we all do when kept in the dark and cannot see even a chink of light.
He says he doesn't know if he could marry you if you are going to give him the silent treatment, but are you going to be able to live the rest of your life with a man who keeps you in the dark with no way to see the view to a future?
Rethink the relationship. Decide what YOU want and what YOU need to be content ... and if his wants and needs dont match yours, as they dont at this moment, then walk away.
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A
male
reader, Danielepew +, writes (27 June 2011):
I am with the anonymous poster, word by word.
And I am CERTAINLY NOT sorry to disagree with Cindy Cares as to converting. Girl, you need to love yourself. He just isn't worth your losing everything. You're a precious human being and don't have to humiliate yourself in order to receive what you already deserve. Whatever you do, DON'T CONVERT. There is plenty of fish in the sea.
Yeah, it's his religion that does him that, but, guess what? If he would choose his religion (and his damned mother) over you, well, he can keep that!
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A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (27 June 2011): Something sounds sketchy here to me. To be honest it sounds like he is stalling. If it's purely because he can't stand up to his mum then I doubt he ever will and if he does then remember she'll probably be a big part of his life (she's already been living with him for a number of months) so be prepared to be constantly having to compromise with her and don't expect much support from your partner. This is completely ignoring the fact she's a racist. And yes I doubt she'll ever really like you. The reason he wants her near is to probably help out with any future children so have a good think about how that would work out.
Also if he is considering breaking up/not marrying you because you gave the silent treatment for a couple of days then he is either extremely over sensitve (surely he could understand how you felt about all this?) or he is looking for a reason to break up with you. I mean saying that he'd seen a 'different side of you'...well the only other times I've heard that is when there's been violence or anger involved and seems way over the top for the situation.
Out of interest did he answer you and talk about your relationship? Or he did he just go on about how it was affecting him with all the stress? Why does he think his mum will magically come around after exactly a year, what's so special about that time frame? This screams stalling tactics to me and keep in mind his mum may not come around so you will have wasted another year because it doesn't sound like he'll choose you over her.
You have have apologised and that is enough in my opinion. Personally I'd suggest you leave him and don't waste anymore time unless he's willing to fully explain himself and why he thinks his mum will come round then, compromise on the time frame etc. Also I'd suggest just having some quiet time to yourself and envisioning how a marriage to him and all the things it would bring with it would actually work out for you. Once you're married with children it will be a whole lot harder to leave. So especially as you're someone who gets very stressed, I wouldn't advise it.
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A
female
reader, CindyCares +, writes (27 June 2011):
No you have apologized more than enough, in fact , don't ask me why, I have this very vivid feeling that he is taking your display of bad mood as a convenient excuse to postpone this wedding to date unknown.
Your bf sounds as if he is under the heel of his mother and family, and in a way I don't blame him, an Egyptian matriarch is a force of nature, it's like fighting with hurricane Katrina. On the other hand, I feel he is just stringing you along, and bargaining for time, without any plan or determination. I don't think that in the meantime he is very active in pleading your cause and bringing his mother around, if he is even afraid of being caught (!) walking with you or on the phone with you. It's not that he needs one more year to "work" on his mother, it's just that he hopes that Inshallah somehow things will fix themselves up on their own.
Improbable, IMO, because I don't even think that his mother has something personal against you. Or not even against British girls, in a way. It's just that you are not Egyptian,not Muslim and not a virgin - ergo, not fit to be her son's bride.
Difficult to say what you should do in this situation. I admit a negative gut feeling ,and it comes from having seen how things go in some Arab families, and how seriously they take parental authority- , then again I don't know THIS family or your BF, so I'd be too superficial in saying , give up, it's never going to happen.
Then again, you MUST give yourself a time limit, you can't wait forever. What if you let one year go by, nothing changes, and he asks for another year ? And then one more ?...
I am not even suggesting you to give him an ultimatum, because thay rarely works, give it unilaterally to yourself. Decide : I am going to wait for X more time, and then that's it . Otherwise you really risk to wait for decades.
Did you consider the idea of converting ? That could make things better probably...
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