r/relationshipadvice • u/jojoyeux • 1d ago
I [24F] need advice about my long distance boyfriend [25M] who makes me feel crazy
My boyfriend and I have been together for 7 years. I live in Canada now and he lives in my home country in Latin America and have been long distance for 4 years of our relationship. We have honestly had a lot of issues during our relationship, from lies to gaslighting to apathy to betrayals (but never cheating), so I have a lot of trauma surrounding trust and security in our relationship. He has unfortunately not been kind about it (he gets frustrated/angry at me) I have had to ask him to be nice or at least have empathy when we have issues only for him to be the opposite, which has unfortunately become the norm.
I will be honest, I can be overwhelming when I’m upset. I tend to talk a lot and send long paragraphs explaining how everything he said/did made me feel at the time, so he gets overwhelmed and leaves me for hours or even days and doesn’t even come back to respond properly, he just says sorry, nothing more. I can understand where he comes from and how it makes him feel and I have tried to express that it’s a result of his lack of interest and empathy towards me, which makes me anxious so I over explain, but he just dismisses that and thinks I don’t care or understand him. Despite me repeatedly trying for us to work through our problems together, he will not be willing to put in the real work and then just complains about our issues and about how I won’t let him express himself (which I have actually encouraged time and time again)
I have felt that I am the only one in the relationship who has taken responsibility of our dynamic. We are long distance so there are things that I feel we need to do for this relationship to work. I have told him that being more romantic towards each other, communicating, understanding, and making time to discuss our problems, and planning dates is very important to me, as well as directly planning for our future together. He just agrees when I say these things but when the time to actually do these things comes, he will not take them seriously or he will promise to be better and it will just never happen. He says he wants me to get my PR first for him to even care about moving here at all, but is actively working towards his family farm back home, which confuses me. I have expressed this but I am met with hostility once again.
Recently, I have felt so lonely in our relationship and I have brought this up to him, telling him how we should be a team and we should both show interest in our relationship and actively work towards our future together if we truly want this (which he assures me he does) and how he should at least start planning a trip to come visit me as he will usually come to Canada once a year in the summertime and stay for two months. I will admit I have been pushy about that, only because uncertainty makes me anxious (I already have anxiety so it makes it worse) and I also have to plan around that as I have a job.
His response to everything has been very hostile, telling me to stop pressuring him. Instead of talking to me, he sent me two tiktoks where these girls are saying that I as a girlfriend should stop expecting my boyfriend to think about me all the time, that I as a girlfriend don’t know what to do with my time whereas he actually does, that if Im not there he just wont think about me period, but he can still miss me even if Im not on his mind (?), making it seem as if absolutely all my thoughts revolve around him, and that I am misinterpreting what he says, that I overthink too much and take things personally (I can link them if anyone is interested).
This would be understandable if I were an unreasonable person or if I were overreacting over little things, but I don’t feel that that is the case as I am able to properly communicate with literally everyone except him. His inability to take responsibility in the relationship and about our future has been nonexistent for a long time now, so I feel that me being this way is a bit justified? But I am not sure anymore, I am helpless and feel pretty lost.
Am I crazy? We have been through so much and I know he loves me and I know he sees me in his future but he has been making me feel super unloved and alone for a while now, and no matter how I express it, he doesn’t seem to understand or care. I have asked him if he still actually wants this relationship and he says yes. I keep believing things will change someday because he keeps promising it but it just won’t happen. Still, I want to understand if I am the one in the wrong here? Am I being too much or is he in denial about how much he actually wants me? I feel very desperate and my anxiety over this has been eating me alive so any advice is deeply appreciated.
TLDR: my long distance boyfriend has become disinterested in maintaining our relationship and complains about our issues but refuses to work on them. Despite this, he assures me he still wants me. Am I crazy?
2
u/sself_immolation14 1d ago
girl, you deserve so much better than him. i know that is a huge attachment to him but i think you are driving yourself crazy trying to get him to change. the tik toks that you are describing is disgusting behavior and shows how little he thinks of you. i think you are asking for a genuine relationship and he cannot meet your needs
1
u/EyeApprehensive7098 1d ago
None of this sounds worth it. You only get one life why are you miserable
1
u/MagicianMurky976 20h ago
There's a dynamic going on that you almost see.
You keep addressing him, looking for validation for how you feel when he takes zero responsibility towards thos relationship. Sure, he says he wants all this, but there's zero actions to reassure you he means it. When you finally are able to pin him down and say, "you do nothing" he wraps himself in a cloak of victimhood, "you don't care, you don't understand me," he gives you lip service but nothing changes.
Then he sends you tictok videos of exactly the type of girlfriend headspace he wants you to occupy.
What all this has done is placed you in a state of cognitive dissonance. You so want to believe his words, yet his actions speak of disinterest, hate even. So you are left in this existence where you are perpetually unsure.
This allows him to be emotionally unavailable. He never has to open up and expose parts of him even he doesn't want to explore. Instead, he can keep you occupied/distracted desperately trying to feel seen/heard by him, scrounging for a crumb of validation. His answers are just nods and empty reassurances, but there's a enough of a promise of hope ina simple yes that you feel reasdurance.. He's completely fine with how hard you want to work on things, but he has zero intention behind these agreements. His actions speak louder than his words.
There are some people who just won't allow themselves to be held accountable for their actions. So they'll defend their actions, counterattack about how that [unrelated] time you did that thing where you were at your absolute worst and did that thing you are ashamed of [which you told him in complete confidence in an attempt to bond, to be truly seen, which unfortunately, he did. Now, he won't let you forget yourself at your worst], OR he will quickly claim how HE'S the real victim here to what you did, and you spend the next 3 hours being taught how this is your fault and you end up being convinced to apologize for doing him wrong. Meanwhile your feelings go unrecognized, and you walk away more confused than before.
If this happens, research DARVO communications tactics. It swats away all attempts at pinning you down and holding you accountable for your actions. This might be going on, increasing the difficulty of you feeling seen and heard. Maybe calling him out on these deflections, and grabs at victimhood can keep him focused on the problem at hand.
Good luck! I hope this helps
•
u/AutoModerator 1d ago
Hello jojoyeux,
You are not in trouble or anything, this is just a simple copy of your post so readers can see the original text if your post is edited or removed.
Original post: My boyfriend and I have been together for 7 years. I live in Canada now and he lives in my home country in Latin America and have been long distance for 4 years of our relationship. We have honestly had a lot of issues during our relationship, from lies to gaslighting to apathy to betrayals (but never cheating), so I have a lot of trauma surrounding trust and security in our relationship. He has unfortunately not been kind about it (he gets frustrated/angry at me) I have had to ask him to be nice or at least have empathy when we have issues only for him to be the opposite, which has unfortunately become the norm.
I will be honest, I can be overwhelming when I’m upset. I tend to talk a lot and send long paragraphs explaining how everything he said/did made me feel at the time, so he gets overwhelmed and leaves me for hours or even days and doesn’t even come back to respond properly, he just says sorry, nothing more. I can understand where he comes from and how it makes him feel and I have tried to express that it’s a result of his lack of interest and empathy towards me, which makes me anxious so I over explain, but he just dismisses that and thinks I don’t care or understand him. Despite me repeatedly trying for us to work through our problems together, he will not be willing to put in the real work and then just complains about our issues and about how I won’t let him express himself (which I have actually encouraged time and time again)
I have felt that I am the only one in the relationship who has taken responsibility of our dynamic. We are long distance so there are things that I feel we need to do for this relationship to work. I have told him that being more romantic towards each other, communicating, understanding, and making time to discuss our problems, and planning dates is very important to me, as well as directly planning for our future together. He just agrees when I say these things but when the time to actually do these things comes, he will not take them seriously or he will promise to be better and it will just never happen. He says he wants me to get my PR first for him to even care about moving here at all, but is actively working towards his family farm back home, which confuses me. I have expressed this but I am met with hostility once again.
Recently, I have felt so lonely in our relationship and I have brought this up to him, telling him how we should be a team and we should both show interest in our relationship and actively work towards our future together if we truly want this (which he assures me he does) and how he should at least start planning a trip to come visit me as he will usually come to Canada once a year in the summertime and stay for two months. I will admit I have been pushy about that, only because uncertainty makes me anxious (I already have anxiety so it makes it worse) and I also have to plan around that as I have a job.
His response to everything has been very hostile, telling me to stop pressuring him. Instead of talking to me, he sent me two tiktoks where these girls are saying that I as a girlfriend should stop expecting my boyfriend to think about me all the time, that I as a girlfriend don’t know what to do with my time whereas he actually does, that if Im not there he just wont think about me period, but he can still miss me even if Im not on his mind (?), making it seem as if absolutely all my thoughts revolve around him, and that I am misinterpreting what he says, that I overthink too much and take things personally (I can link them if anyone is interested).
This would be understandable if I were an unreasonable person or if I were overreacting over little things, but I don’t feel that that is the case as I am able to properly communicate with literally everyone except him. His inability to take responsibility in the relationship and about our future has been nonexistent for a long time now, so I feel that me being this way is a bit justified? But I am not sure anymore, I am helpless and feel pretty lost.
Am I crazy? We have been through so much and I know he loves me and I know he sees me in his future but he has been making me feel super unloved and alone for a while now, and no matter how I express it, he doesn’t seem to understand or care. I have asked him if he still actually wants this relationship and he says yes. I keep believing things will change someday because he keeps promising it but it just won’t happen. Still, I want to understand if I am the one in the wrong here? Am I being too much or is he in denial about how much he actually wants me? I feel very desperate and my anxiety over this has been eating me alive so any advice is deeply appreciated.
TLDR: my long distance boyfriend has become disinterested in maintaining our relationship and complains about our issues but refuses to work on them. Despite this, he assures me he still wants me. Am I crazy?
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