I still felt angry and upset!
Hello Caroline
I am 24 years old. My boyfriend is also 24. We met two months ago on holiday, and it turned out that he had just moved to a flat on the opposite side of town. After our whirlwind holiday fling, we decided to keep things going back home. Problem is, he only split up with his previous girlfriend six weeks before we met - and only moved out of their shared flat two weeks before our holiday!
New Year's Eve was the night it all went wrong. I got horribly drunk, and behaved badly - but worst amongst us was my boyfriend, who ended up kissing another girl. He confessed to me a few days later, and I instantly forgave him. I still felt angry and upset, but he had explained that this was a reaction to his feeling 'trapped' by the speed at which our new relationship was developing, and I couldn't see any point in ending our relationship over this. He was right - it has been too intense. We have hardly spent a moment apart since we met, and have stifled each other. After talking things over, I thought we had reached an agreement that we would see each other a bit less often - to 'date' each other.
Our first date was tonight - a cinema trip. We watched a brilliant film but went to a pub afterwards for a quiet drink. Here, my boyfriend explained that he was being pursued by the girl he met at the party, and felt very confused. I have known this girl for a long time, and know her to be a very emotionally damaged girl. I tried to make it clear that it wasn't just out of jealousy that I was warning him to be on his guard as far as she was concerned. He said that he liked me - possibly even loved me - but was terrified of hurting my feelings, and wasn't sure that the revised 'dating' plan would work. I told him not to worry about hurting me - he already has done and inevitably will - so ought to aim instead for honesty to himself and honesty to me. As he kept 'umming and ahhhing' over whether we should continue to see each other, I began to feel belittled, that he wasn't taking my feelings into account. I eventually exploded, accusing him of being emotionally immature and cowardly. I apologised for my behaviour - but made it clear that my patience was wearing thin.
At the end of the evening, we appeared to agree to keep on seeing each other. This boiled down to the fact that we were both too enamoured with each other to really want to call things off. My boyfriend continued to express grave doubts about the relationship working out long-term. I asked him to stop thinking about tomorrow - that my being Miss Right Now was more important than my being the mythical Miss Right. He admitted that this was a rebound relationship, but told me that I was very precious to him and that he 'didn't want to let me go'.
All in all, we are both in the situation where we know that things are probably not going to work out long-term, but want to know whether they are going to work out short-term. A part of me is saying that I should call things off to give him breathing space. Another part of me is saying, 'It's a rebound - so what? Is there a hard-and-fast-rule saying that a rebound relationship can never work?' I know that it would take a lot of patience and self-control to 'turn the clock back' and give each other space. He knows that as well. The question is - can we manage this, or are we heading for disaster?
Please help
Hi,
At 24 I would have thought that most men and women know and have a strategy on what and where their future is going, who they want to be with and where they intend to settle down. It's very clear to me that you are very level-headed, patient, and mature enough to realise that you want a long term commitment and romance with your now partner, however you're still ready to settle for a short term romance with him and live on a day to day basis with your relationship knowing how he's treated you and how he's deceived you and by the way he's been telling you that you have no long term future together. Why put up with something you simply are not happy with? you both seem to want different things from this romance, you're looking for a long term relationship and he's desperately trying to fob you off with uums and ahhs about it!
A good relationship stems from BOTH of you wanting to spend time together, wanting to be with each other liking time with each other and not wishing you were somewhere else instead, or even going with someone else instead.
If you feel that this relationship is worth keeping then you're both going to have to work at at very hard indeed because your not on the same path, you really owe it to yourself to be happy and secure in a relationship, and are you right now? if the answer is yes then work it through and keep forgiving his silly little misdemeanours, live from day to day with your relationship, its going to be hard and insecure. Can you carry on feeling this way? if you can, Good luck, grit your teeth and make it work, but remember unrequited love can never be happy.
If the answer is no, then have clean break from him for a few weeks to start with, try to get back in control of your life live it how you want to, be free and single for a while you may like it!!! If he really misses you then you'll find out because hell come and find you, and you'll know he wants to make it work, but by then you may have met the man you are really looking for and you'll know you made the right decision. Its up to you let your instincts lead the way.....
All the best
Regards
Caroline