A
female
age
36-40,
anonymous
writes:I'm 23, he's almost 22. We are both in college. We have been dating for over a year now, though we did break up in October and got back together the end of December. We broke up because he had completely shut down on me. It got to the point that I was the only one who ever tried to make plans to hang out, and he rejected me repeatedly. Finally I decided it was enough when he took me out for breakfast on my birthday but then neglected to contact me the rest of the day.It was he who begged ME to take him back. He said he wanted to work on his emotional unavailability, and I see that he has been making an effort to spend more time with me and open up. That being said, we are both very busy with our last semester of school, and our schedules are rather opposite. We will try to fit in an hour or two a day during the week, but sometimes we can go awhile without much contact. And if I do see him, it is after 10pm (he has late classes and frisbee four nights per week), always a night before one of us has to get up early.No part of me is upset that he's busy with class or homework or anything like that, but I get really upset with him when he decides to go out with his friends on Friday night or Saturday without inviting me. Generally I get about one weekend night, but shouldn't he be wanting to spend time with me if he hasn't seen me much all week?For instance, this last week I saw him between classes on Monday for Valentine's Day, and on Tuesday he cooked me dinner. I didn't see him at all on Wednesday, and on Thursday, even though I was tired and wanted to go to bed at seven, I let him come over around 11pm. On Friday morning, I asked him if he had plans for the evening. He said no, so I asked if he wanted to do something, but then he told me that he wanted to make plans with other people. Do I have any right to be upset about that?When I asked him to explain why, he said that he hasn't been seeing much of his friends lately because he's been giving me a lot of his free time. And while I totally see that as a valid point, I'm also his girlfriend and want to spend time with him too. What's worst is that I offered to go out with him and his friends on Friday, as he said they were probably just going to a campus party. But he didn't seem interested in inviting me, and when I invited myself, he said he would text me late later that night if that's what they ended up doing.Now I'm telling him that I need to be a part of his whole life, not just the girl he spends the crazy school-week with alone while he spends his homework-free nights with other people. He's telling me that now he wants to see me even less during the week so that maybe he might invite me out more during the weekend. I don't believe him, though, and he's offended by that.Is this normal boyfriend/girlfriend behavior, or is this just hopeless?
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female
reader, CindyCares  +, writes (22 February 2011):
 It's not really relevant whether you have "the right " to be upset or not.
Someone could tell you , " no you don't have the right- you are both young college students that have been dating on and off ,you are not engaged , this is most probably a transitional relationship, you both have very busy schedules and you both are at a stage where friendship and social life are super important, anyway you saw him 3 times in a week, etc. etc ". And this person could even convince you that no, you don't have " the right " to be upset. So ? The fact is, that you ARE upset.
You clearly want more from him than you are getting now -
more attention, more affection, more closeness , being made more of a priority. What can you do ?... Perhaps explain him clearly and calmly one more time what you want from him, and remind him that when there's a will there's a way : somehow people always manage to balance things that really matter to them. Then , give him time to implement the changes he has promised, or will promise, he will make , accentuating the positive ( a lot of positive feedback and appreciation when he does make an effort ) over the negative ( no desperation scenes for an occasional relapse ). But, if after a while, say, maybe 3 months, you don't see significant changes - let him go. People never really change unless they WANT to, and maybe this relationship does not mean enough to him to justify in his view a higher level of " maintenance " Which could be for you a sad,yet necessary , eye opener.
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