A
male
age
30-35,
*obert H.
writes:My girlfriend and I have been together for about 10 months now, the latter 3 spent living 7 hours apart. Because of the length of the trip, we have seen each other once since the beginning of September, on Thanksgiving weekend, and the next scheduled time to visit is Christmas, where I will be in town for about 2 and a half weeks. This leads me to my current problem.Our latest squabble is relatively settled now, but I feel like it is an indicator of a larger issue. In attempt to make it short, here goes. We were planning things for my visit, when it came time to talk about spending time with family for Christmas. As her culture does not celebrate Christmas seriously for more than say 20 minutes on Christmas day, the bulk of the time was with spending time with my family. My parents have been divorced for the majority of my life, and I have always spent Christmas day with my mother, while one of the surrounding days with my father, based on his schedule. My father suggested to my girlfriend (yes he was talking to her about it, not me:P)we spend Boxing Day together, with myself, my girlfriend, and my siblings. After informing me of this, my girlfriend immediately indicated that she was not keen on the idea because she would like to go shopping on Boxing Day. Without even leaving time for my response to my Dad's request, I felt offended, because it appeared she cared more about shopping, and getting a deal, more than my family. We ended up arguing, with feeling flying all over the place, until the point that I hung up the phone on her. I realized this was an immature thing to do, but I have always preferred to have a dispute after I have taken time to cool off, because I have a short temper and argue unfairly when angry. I apologized for hanging up on her, and I suggested we both talk about the issue calmly; she agreed. At this point, neither of us were truly aware of why either of us were angry because of the unconstructive..?.. arguing. I let her know that I feel she was unfair by being unwilling to sacrifice a day of shopping to visit my Dad. I felt she was acting selfish. Unkindly reacting to my thoughts, she continued with a mocking tone, o great, now I'm selfish. (as a side question, was saying she was acting selfish a bad idea?) I told her that unless she was willing to have an actual conversation, I would hang up again, because I find it difficult to control my temper when meaningless comments are thrown around; I have told her this numerous times in the past, but still makes said comments when arguing. She denied being selfish, because she claimed that boxing day shopping was a practice she was used to doing every year. Furthermore, she was upset by the fact that I did not want to go shopping with her, despite knowing that I am not fond of shopping in the first place, as mindless shopping, corporations posting huge "deals" to maximize profits, and materialistic obsessions are all against my ethics and beliefs. Although perhaps a bit extreme, I was still not pleased by her begging. She is a believer of the, if you love me you'd do it for me, philosophy, but I believe the, if you love me you wouldn't make me feel obligated to do something I don't enjoy, especially if there is no harm in sitting out.After all said and done, she sort of, passively agreed to take my idea of a compromise: shop for an hour or two in the morning, and spend the afternoon and evening with my Dad, after refusing the offer to go shopping the next day, because "there might not be as good of a selection or as good of deals." She seemed satisfied as far as solving the dispute, but I felt that she agreed just to end the argument, and I still felt that the underlying issue has not made any progress, which leads to my larger concern.Perhaps because of being caught up in the ignorance and bliss of an emerging love, I am just realizing recently that this selfish attitude she carries has always been present, even before I moved away. There have been times when she got angry with me for hanging out with my friends instead of her, although I have actually cut wayyyy back in the amount of time I spend with them. Although it is not at the point where I feel the need to ask to hang out with friends, I still get a feeling of guilt from her during and after hanging out with them, which somewhat ruins the whole experience of seeing them anyway. She also got annoyed by the fact that I was planning on seeing my friends during Christmas break, even though there is ample time to see her, my friends, and family (over 2 weeks). She even got annoyed that I wanted to spend about half the break at my house (mother's house) instead of spending the entire break at her house. I understand she would like to spend as much time possible with me, but I still feel it is unfair. Unfortunately, these are just a few examples of selfish acts that I can think of. The last 'escapade' has actually caused me to doubt the future of our relationship. I have never accused her of being selfish before this, but many times I indicated that I did not appreciate how she acted in these situations, and she replied by saying, "Well I'm not going to feel guilty for wanting to be with you as much as possible." I realize that this response, in essence, is due to love, but is also selfish in itself and makes no effort to address my problem. After arguments, I always have a sense of emptiness, that little to nothing has been solved while she regularly thinks it has been solved. I have mentioned most, if not all of these feelings in this post, with the exception of doubting our relationship, to her, and I have observed little effort on her part; I feel I am always compromising. Overall, I have not seen any progress to my concern, feel that she is quite oblivious to my feelings, and I worry that there is no future for us, because my career path lined up is in the outdoor guiding industry, where I would like to travel, and likely be on expeditions for days or weeks at a time, with no communication with her. She says since she loves me she would be willing to move wherever I go, but I feel that is not fair to her and she ultimately would be unhappy. Have I been unreasonable with anything? Am I overreacting or over-worrying about these issues, or is there justice in my concerns? What should I do/say to her about these feelings? I feel that mentioning that I am doubting a future for us may ultimately jeopardize our relationship, and I am still unsure about these feelings and whether or not it is worth risking telling her. I love her immensely, and strongly agree with the honesty policy, but is this any kind of exception? I realize there is hope, and will always be, but does the risk of her or me being seriously hurt in the future outweigh the hope?I realize there may have been a lot of rambling and some generalized questions, but I would greatly appreciate any advice. Thanks :)
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female
reader, 1littleduck  +, writes (3 December 2008):
Hi, you have not stated how old you both are and at a guess you are either in college or university.After reading through your question, it is my opinion that you are not really happy together, you want to continue to see your family and friends and so you should and your girlfriend seem to think that she has the intitlement to all of your time regardless of your feelings. Your relationship is not a lasting and happy one and therefore I would suggest that you look for a far less possesive girlfirend and she look for a very placid boyfriend.Christmas time is family time and shopping on boxing day can be very stressful and best done on one's own. If she miss's you that much, surley spending the time you have together intermatly is what she should be considering...love is far more important than the latest fashion!Start the new year off with a clean slate and look for a more suitable partner as your relationship is filled with arguments and selfishness ans will not last.
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