Hey, 5 ain't so bad.
Try looking back on 14 years of auditioning without landing the part !

DOH !

Milk,

The rest of my story is pretty weird.

The old BF stalked me off and on after I was married.
He showed up at my work one time with a single red rose.
"Can I take you to lunch?"
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO


We went to highschool together.
On the 20th reunion, he comes to where I am sitting (once I am alone) he sits and says to me:

"I should have married you when I had the chance."

I was FURIOUS !

I unleashed some atypical rage on him right there

" You had your chance. I am grateful to God that we never married. You would cheat on me like you did when we dated. We would be divorced."

I got up and left.

I knew he wanted to date me while I was married.
Because, marriage held no real value to him.
He dated many married women during those 14 years I wasted trying to audition.

He died a few years ago.
I felt nothing for him.
I felt badly for his elderly mother.
But him?
Nada.

Your BF does not value marriage.
It's a fact.

But you can't MAKE him do anything. That's where your relationship stalls. The sad fact is that he doesn't WANT to make it work.

These are the words of a lazy person. Wouldn't you rather be with a man who says "I love you so much that I want to work with you to make the greatest marriage ever!" They ARE out there.

I am always amazed at the people who get married and think they can just kick back and relax without having to do anything else. The wedding is just the beginning.

You have gone through some experience Pep. I am glad you did not waste your 15th year with him and married your husband You made it sound like it was a piece of cake, but I am sure cutting your old BF out completely from your life was difficult as hell...after 14 years!!! You guys essentially grew up together since high school.... Hat off to you for your courage Pep.

I know this reverse psychology where once you feel you have lost something, you want it very badly..., my XH was so adamant on divorcing, he blamed me for his stress from work, drug use, sex addiction, arrest, etc., even though his own family and counselor have told him they were his own issues. But when he approached me by saying "maybe I can consider reconciliation" (yes, it was like that, very arrogant, he assumed I was still there waiting for him), I told him it was too late..., he started calling every day, sometimes like 15 times a day, crying over the phone. I felt so sad that he did not feel bad about destroying our family sooner. What a waste.

I don't want to do the same with my BF..., if my dragging the whole thing would only make things worse, meaning he just wants to hang out without committment, I do not want to. I don�t want to waste time anymore. But at the same time, I want to recognize some differences here � my BF never cheated on me like your old BF or my XH. He has never used drugs or anything, and he also wants to be married and have his own kids.

So I think our problem is, yes, he is chickened out about getting married, that is true and same as your BF, but that's not because he just wants to be a freeloader and date without commitment. I think he is concerned that the marriage will not work out. He has told me that he is concerned that I might get bored if I marry him, as he is not so social, he is more introvert, and I have many friends, I may like doing things he does not care about. He is concerned that I may find the way he spends weekend boring once we starts living together.

He may be selfish when it comes to his 'wishes'...., he wants to choose the place to live, the type of house, what kind of 'hobby' we as a family should be engaged in, and vacation spots...., but I've noticed sometimes he realizes that he might be pushing something I may not be so crazy about, and asks "what do YOU want to do?", so I want to believe that he is at least trying to be reasonable.

My problem is that we like each other, we are attracted to each other, I respect his intelligence and hard-working nature, and he respects my intelligence and being a good mother. But he has many concerns about marriage, and as a result cannot commit to marriage.

Given all of the above, would you still say "cut him out" of my life?

Oops, I cross posted with maritalbliss.

Yes, if he says he does not want to 'work' on it, then I am at the dead end. But I see some signs that he is willing to change a bit - he gives an impression of being cold, and I have pointed it out in the past (for example when my basement got flooded, all I wanted to hear was "it is going to be okay", but I heard "well there is nothing you can do"), and the other day when I called him regarding the humidifier, I could tell he was trying to be more sympathetic by asking me questions, etc. Also, he was never good at just 'talking' on the phone so he would not call or if he calls, he talks about whatever he needed to say (what time should we meet, where do you want to go, there is xxx event going on, etc.), and that is it. He never does sweet talk, never have chit-chat with me, but since we are 'taking a break', I can tell he is making an effort to try to hold longer conversation.

I sound desperate, don't I? Yikes.

Like I said ....


Do not marry him under any circumstances.
Do not live with him under any circumstances.
If you continue to date him, you must accept his behavior 'as is' and not hope for anything better.
No complaining once you accept him 'as is'.

He has not asked you to marry him. After 5 years.
He has failed his marriage material audition.

If YOU don't want to get married, then date him.

Please, please, please, go read at www.baggagereclaim.com for a while and, then, come back and try and convince us you should stay with this loser. You are trying to turn a sow's ear into a silk purse and it isn't going to happen. You have an emotionally unavailable man on your hands and he's not going to change - at all.

BTW, the sixth paragraph of your second to last post, above, starts out, "My problem is we like each other...." That's what YOU said...."like". You did not say love, you said "like." Freudian slip?

Yes.

I'm sorry.

Wow, overwhelming votes for "NO". No one is playing a devil's advocate eh.......

I cannot open the link for www.baggagereclaim.com now, but will check it out later.

Thanks for your feedback Pepperband, markos, Brits_Brat, and kerala. I may appear to be �not� getting your points, but I do, it�s just that my heart is rejecting to accept them�..

I think the devil's advocate would say "sure, keep dating him, maybe in another 5 years he'll stop yelling at you and disappearing every weekend. Wouldn't life be grand then?"

Seriously, you already know my answer, but you seem intent to keep trying with him, so I hope it works out for you.

I'll try to avoid posting to you in the future on this particular guy, because you appear to only want us to agree with your course of action, and I cannot do that in good faith.

AGG

Thanks AGG. I appreciate your honesty. I am not only searching for views that support mine, I just want to try to see this from many different perspectives, as everyone is different, each case has some unique factors, and I did not want to conclude there are only "yay" or "nay", two categories. I wanted to see if there is gray zone which was experienced by others, and how they have responded to such situation.

I read the articles on www.baggagereclaim.com, very very interesting. They sure make you think. I need to read more on this...

milkshake --

All the time you are spending "hoping" for him to change is wasted. You are passing up the time you could be using to find the RIGHT person.

Time is precious.

Thanks Lexxxy, it is so true. I started to see things in a right mind. I was in denial, trying to NOT see things that have been obvious, just because I am getting older and just because we have invested 5 long years.

I studied investor behavior science while at graduate school - how many rational people have hard time letting go 'money losing securities', as they do not want to admit that they made a mistake. So rather they try to hold on to the loss, hoping one day the investment will be in gain again. It's like that - I do not want to admit that I was stupid enough to continue this for 5 long years, so I have been trying to turn this investment to 'black'...

If I continue, I will end up losing more of my precious time, yes������ as all of you have told me.

You asked what we would do...
Knowing what I know now, I would go no contact and not look back. I would rather be alone than in a bad relationship. All a bad relationship does is cut your options and make you miserable. I am alone now and it's not so bad!

You mentioned sounding desperate. Yes, you do. Change that. Needy and desperate is a turnoff for most people. Learn to value yourself more. Enjoy the time with your son. You are teaching him...the question is, "What are you teaching him?" Try teaching him that a good relationship is worth waiting for. Teach him it's okay to be alone. Teach him to value himself. Teach him his mother is a strong person that will make it with or without someone in her life. Teach him to be choosey. Teach him it's not okay for a man to yell at a woman and her little boy. Teach him you'll place him and how he's treated ahead of some abusive man. Expand your world, join something, meet parents of your child, go to church, volunteer somewhere, have a block party, make friends. Then you won't feel so alone.

I totally get this as it is a large part of the reason I stayed married to my now XH. I just didn't want to admit it was a mistake. One of my biggest regrets is staying as long as I did.

And I agree with Kay below....stop sitting around waiting for him. Get out and live with your son.

It's been a while, it feels a lot longer since last time I posted. To be honest, it has not been that easy, although sometimes it does not feel all that hard. I am here just to thank you all, you guys were so right, my BF just did not have intention to have the lifetime commitment. Who knows, maybe that's why he has never been married before. Thanks for trying to put some sence in my hard head

((milkshake))

It will get better - promise.

We want you to be happy...he is not the way. I've been there, it took me way too long to learn those painful lessons. It seems with the wrong guy, the harder you try and more you give/do for them, the more they view you as needy and desperate. You're not, you need to know that and keep in mind what a wonderful woman you are and all of the great qualities you have. You'll make it fine with or without a man in your life. When you view yourself in a healthy way, they will treat you better and you'll attract a better quality guy.

Oddly enough, though, when my late husband and I were together, we couldn't do enough for each other! It's just how we both were, we love and cared for each other so much and it was very mutual, we couldn't out give each other. But I guess that's cuz we went together so well.