A
female
age
41-50,
anonymous
writes:After 7 years of living together my boyfriend and I split up and he moved out. We had been fighting all the time, I was very unhappy mostly due to his underemployment and lack of motivation. Three weeks after he found a good job we had another big blow out and he packed up his things and moved out(we had been fighting for a year regularly). I think to some degree i was unhappy because we were not moving forward in our relationship and he was stalling. We didn't see each other for almost 3 months then when I asked him to get the rest of his things because i was moving on he became upset and asked me how i could move on so quickly? I asked him what he wanted and he said "to work things out "sooner rather then later" were his exact words. We have now been "dating" for about a month .I have let him know that I expect our relationship to move forward into marriage. He tells me he misses me everyday, and that he has been doing a lot of thinking yet when i ask him whats on his mind he wont say. He just keeps saying he doesn't want things to go back to the way they "were" yet he doesn't want to discuss that either and flees the topic every time. I asked him why he still hasn't found his own place yet (hes been staying with a friend) and he says the place is not ready. Yet while having dinner with some friends he openly said he was saving his money for a new place. I told him that it was not acceptable to me to have a few romps in the sack and sleepovers twice a week. There is not a doubt in my mind that he loves me yet it seems like he is still not ready to open up to me, get back together or move on...after over seven years with this man and being very deeply in love with him I want to give him the chance to make things right between us, but I also need a solid commitment from him! How can I go about making this clear to him? Should I start seeing other guys? Should I give him an ultimatum? "make a decision now or Im outta here? Give him a time line? Any advice, anyone else with a similar situation?
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female
reader, OhGetReal +, writes (8 February 2011):
 Wow, in four days of writing this post and saying that you had fought for a whole year and after 7 years of being together, he finally had enough and packed his things and moved in on a friend's couch and announced to them he is saving for his own place, and the man is not able to support himself as of yet....you have miracously moved in the right direction because you are willing to take the blame for your side of the relationship. Well, well done.
Are you missing something? Your relationship has been going on for 7 long years, you tried living together and you fought constantly and he moved out and you split up for three months. It doesn't matter what the issues were that split you up. Relationships, life are full of issues that come up. You two have proven that you are incompatible, that you lack trust and can't communicate.
This isn't going to be fixed by you just hanging in there and sticking it out and taking your part of the responsibility.
I think you need therapy...
A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (27 January 2011): Just to clarify a few things. He was underemployed meaning he was not getting enough work to make him happy and pay the bills also, he was saving for an apartment, not a house. Now I have some clarification on why he left in the first place and realized that I have some things to work on. So before you all go calling me a nagging, bitchy mother like girlfriend I just want to say by no means was I putting all of the blame of our problems on him. I just wanted other's opinions on why he could be stalling so much... I also did not clarify that he is always good to me and treating me well, other then the lack of communication and trust between us. Both of us. I also failed to communicate properly in our relationship. I would like to let you know that we have since talked and things are looking like they are be going in the right direction because we both love each other deeply and only want to be with each other. I have never in my life met a perfect couple...I guess what I was failing to realize is that it takes two in all aspects. I was really quick to post his faults and not my own...MY BAD! Also I gave a description of past issues and asked questions like how do I go about, and should I and so on and so forth. I would just like to say that reading your posts really opened my eyes to how quick I am to only focus on the negative aspects of our relationship and on his negative behavior without posting my own as well! REALLY HUGE EYE OPENER!!! thanks for the advice and next time I post a question, I will try to be a little more specific and less one sided. I think I'm really seeing things in a new light and taking steps necessary to work on my own issues! I know for sure that as long as we continue to work on ourselves (growing and changing), communicate and begin to trust each other again we will work out and live our happily ever after! In the meantime we are setting goals and making plans, thanks so much for the advice good and bad both helped!
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A
female
reader, OhGetReal +, writes (23 January 2011):
I don't think it takes a man 7 years to decide if you are the ONE he wants to be married to.He doesn't sound like he is at a place in his life where he thinks he can be married to anyone, you mention you've been on him about his "underemployment", who are you to say he is underemployed? In this economy he is doing well to have a job.You mention he is saving for his own place, and you are on him about getting his own place, but you want him to marry you, how does it make economic sense for you two to have seperate quarters if the plan is to live together and marry?I see some problems on both sides, in my honest opinion I think this relationship has probably run it's course and you both are hanging onto each other out of habit and a sense of security, although you may be deeply in love with him, you may still realize that you have spent WAAAAY too much time in a waiting game and you would be right.Your goal should not be to force him into a committment. Your goal should be to focus on your dream for a happily ever after and to go after that on your own.Yes it is time to date other men, no it is not time to give him an ultimatum, it isn't time to be a bitch either.It is time to take your own power back and make a STATEMENT of intent to him."I love you and want to be with you forever and want to get married to you, but I can no longer agree to put my very love life on hold while you are undecided. Of course you have every right to take as long as you want to decide, but while you are doing that you can't have me all to yourself. I don't think it is fair to sleep with you and date other men, I don't plan on having sex with any men, but I am going to keep my heart open to the possibility of love with another man who is willing to step up and claim me. I will be dating other men if I have the opportunity. That said if you start dating other women, then I know you have made your decision about me, about us and I will end this relationship with you. That may not seem fair to you, but that's the situation as I see it. You're trying to decide and after 7 years you expect me to wait. I can't do that anymore because I want to have my happily ever after, I deserve that and so do you."Then do it, follow through with your plan. That is the ONLY way you will ever know what he truly is capable of doing, which is stepping up to the plate. You haven't made a demand, you've simply stated honestly what you want, that it is time to shit or get off the pot and you are living your OWN life.
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A
male
reader, Universe Man +, writes (23 January 2011):
You've been fighting regularly for a year, and you're just dying to marry this guy? Can you blame him for being hesitant? I'll never understand women.
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A
female
reader, angelDlite  +, writes (23 January 2011):
 hi
no, the worse thing you can do to jog him along into marriage is to see other guys or give him the ultimatum. that sort of behaviour makes it look like you want the wedding more than you actually want him.
why are you putting an importance on getting married at the moment anyway? you have only just got back with him after all the problems and arguing. do you think a wedding ring is like a magic charm that will make all the relationship problems vanish? do you feel as if it has been seven years and he still hasn't proposed so you mustn't mean enough to him? i do not agree with that, i think generally men are not interested in weddings as much as women are. its not that he is not committed to spending the rest of his life with you. is he has not been working there is not the money for a wedding also.
i think you should be more patient, stop measuring your relationship against the length of time you continue with no proposal. see how things develop naturally. if you think he is too immature to get his life in order (getting a decent job and home, making a lasting commitment to you and generally growing up) then why would you want to marry him anyway??
xx
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A
female
reader, birdynumnums  +, writes (23 January 2011):
 Sounds like he went from his Mothers house to Your house and never grew up. You probably made the first mistake by moving in with him before you were married; now he just thinks it't the status quo and he doesn't accept any of his responsibilities as a man. It took him 7 years to 'get' that he needed to be gainfully employed? Really? And all of a sudden NOW he is saving for a place (wile he squats at a friends home)?
Why does a grown man need all these babysitters?
Well -
He doesn't sound like marriage material to me.
No more sex or sleepovers. Start dating other guys and no sex until you see an engagement ring or signs of commitment. And no living together first. There's no reason for a guy to GET married once you already are doing everything that a wife is doing for free.
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (23 January 2011): If your fighting is this dramatic and you don't feel he communicates enough, then it doesn't sound like you two should get married.
I would advise against giving him any ultimatums. Marriage is a life time agreement, not a task you can hold over someones head that is completed and gone the next day. If he were pressured into marriage, then I suspect he would be resentful of you long after the fact and the fighting would continue.
It sounds like he loves you and wants to be with you when the relationship has been going well, but he isn't ready to be married. I'm a believer that marriage is not the sort of decision you can force with any positive outcome.
Regarding the way you communicate, it just sounds as if you've slipped into the role of Commander & Nag. It sounds very much like you think of him as someone to discipline.
First it was his job.
Then doesn't answer your Q&A sufficiently to your liking.
Then it's that the "dating" isn't enough and you reduce it to just having sex.
Then you seem to be suggesting he is lying about his intentions for where he wants to live? Why can't his place of future residence "not be ready" if in fact he is saving for it and he plans to buy his own place?
In all honesty, you sound like a disciplinarian mother, not a potential wife.
Perhaps he is not as articulate as you like, but him saying he doesn't want to go back to the way things were before pretty much means, he doesn't want to be micromanaged, disciplined, and accused of falling short in every aspect of his life.
But evidently you guys still love each other. I just think you have HUGE communication issues on both sides. I think if you were to get married, it would only intensify. That's probably what he's afraid of.
If your end goal is a solid open(in the communicative sense) relationship with him, I would suggest leaving him. Don't date other people just to flaunt it in his face. And don't check up on him via friends either. Give both of yourselves some space and time, perhaps even a year.
It might give him some time to imagine what he's missing beyond the nagging. It might give you something else to think about rather than counting his perceived failures.
I think that's the only way you can communicate better, because right now you seem to be at each other's throats.
If you guys can't resolve it at this point, marriage is not the answer.
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A
male
reader, eddie85 +, writes (23 January 2011):
 Well, first off, I'd let the dust settle a bit. It sounds like you've had some turmoil over things and rushing into marriage could be disastrous. You really don't mention what you were fighting about, but I think now is the time to make sure this guy is really for you.
I know you've invested 7 years into this guy, but if you were fighting a lot, perhaps the writing was on the wall? Maybe you guys aren't truly compatible and no one is brave enough to say it. You state he is underemployed and under motivated... is this the type of man you want should you being to raise a family? Has this been a trend or something new?
Finally, after 7 years, he's had plenty of time to "sample the goods". After things melo out, I'd certainly set a time limit. The goal should be that you should have an engagement ring on your finger and, most importantly, a marriage date set. It is up to you on how much more time you want to give him, but just make sure that the drama between the two of has had a chance to settle. There is more to marriage than love and it takes compatibility -- make sure that part is truly there.
Good luck
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