This is a throwaway because I’m certain bf knows my reddit username. Also re-posting because the throwaway I made specifically for this post was glitching and had some weird bug :/ **\*\*Please don’t use this in any tiktok video or youtube thing or whatever, I am a private person and don’t want my life to be made entertainment for others. I have made other posts asking for advice before and then saw one was on tiktok because a FRIEND reposted it with 500k+ views and like 100 comments and it was deeply embarrassing.\*\***My boyfriend and I have been together for about 2.5 years. I met him a month after a traumatic experience that I still have PTSD from to this day. I don’t really want to get into what happened specifically because I don’t feel it pertains to the relationship, but I do think the traumatic experience made me fall into a codependency quickly.
Our relationship was great at the beginning, and very loving, and kind of sexually charged (no actual sex though, just fooling around). We were together most days. A few months into the relationship, I lost a family member who took their own life and I felt like it broke my brain even more. I stopped wanting to have any kind of sexual relationship. Around this time, he started to bring up marriage a lot and it scared me because we both have two very different outlooks on life. I was raised by two very non-religious parents (only went to church for funerals, weddings, or on family vacations when the rest of the family was going type of thing) and my boyfriend is from a different faith with strict and very religious parents. I thought at the beginning us coming from different faiths and different levels of beliefs wouldn’t matter, but now I feel like it does. He started mentioning how he wanted to have kids and getting married in 2 years but I told him I didn’t really want kids for a minimum ten years, and sometimes I wonder if I ever really want them… I’m also really, really not into marriage. Maybe because I could see me wanting to leave him. It also just gives me anxiety to be bound in a contract with someone like that. I’ve had several family members divorce and it’s always messy. Thing is though, in his religion, he MUST get married. Technically he isn’t even supposed to have a girlfriend. It’s wife or no wife. This makes me incredibly anxious.
Anyways, our relationship was good for a while, and he was understanding while I grieved my family member’s sudden and terrible death, until suddenly he threatened to take his own life w/ me in the car with him and tried to crash the car. He then sped home, dropped me off, and broke up with me. He didn’t speak to me for 2 months and during these 2 months lied about me several times and caught a few criminal charges. I wanted him back so badly during that time I cried most days. I ended up taking a leave from my job because the breakup, his behavior right before & during the breakup, family member dying, and the traumatic event from almost a year ago were all too much to bear. I really felt at my lowest. About 2 months after that, he came back and said he had a mental breakdown and he was deeply sorry. Around 6 to 7 months ago, he built our relationship back up and I feel like we haven’t been the same since. He hasn’t done anything remotely suspicious or given me any red flags, but I think about what happened when we broke up and feel like I just can’t trust him again. He gets disappointed because he wants to cuddle, or kiss, have sex, etc. and I just don’t really want to. I even get annoyed when he puts his hand on my leg. I don’t even know why because he’s an attractive man and very loving and sweet.
It makes me feel sad because he’s proven himself to be a better boyfriend and I DO still love him, but I feel like now we’re just friends with this romantic label. It’s so obvious to me when we hang around our friends and their bf/gf’s and they are actually very affectionate and my boyfriend and I just seem like best buds.
I visited my step-dad’s sister in another state 2 months ago and hung out a lot with her son (26m) and we got along really well and we have a lot of things in common. We went to hiking, to the beach, shopping, museums, restaurants, etc. We showed each other different tv shows and movies, music, etc. and figured out we have the same taste. I noticed that I LOVE doing these things, and I did before my boyfriend and I got together. But all my boyfriend wants to do is drive around, smoke an excessive amount of weed, and play video games. I started to think that if my step-cousin could do these things with me, why couldn’t my boyfriend? I told him this point blank and he said we would go out more and do different stuff but none of it has changed. He doesn’t get my humor, doesn’t like my music or tv, and I don’t like his. I feel like none of our conversations are intellectually stimulating for me at all anymore, at least for a romantic relationship, especially considering his recent liking of alpha male content.
I just feel like a terrible person, because he is so incredibly sweet to me but I don’t feel compatible right now to him. How do I figure out if I am just deep in depression and/or an angsty phase and can win back my attraction to him? If I do break up with him, how would I even go about it?! I’ve tried making a pros and cons list but that didn’t seem to help. I’ve never ever even broken up with someone, and I especially can’t imagine breaking up with someone I love. Please help.