I feel neglected by my boyfriend, what should I do?
Hi everyone,
I’m new here but I would like some advice from you. I apologize in advance for this long post.
So here goes:
I met this guy about five months ago. In the beginning, everything was great. We talked pretty much every day and saw each other almost every day even if just for an hour. We would video chat, constantly text, hang out after work… We couldn’t take our hands off of each other.
After about two months, things have started to change. He got a sort of promotion and became busier at work so we have had to cut down on seeing each other during the week, which is understandable. We still texted regularly, hung out during lunch hours a couple times a week.
But for about two months now, he’s been so busy at work that not only do we not get to see each other, he has almost stopped texting me. When we do get to talk, it’s just small talk, asking what we each had for lunch or dinner… I forgot to mention that there is sort of a language barrier between us. We speak the same language, but having grown up and lived abroad all my life, I often find it hard to tell him exactly what I feel or share my opinions about different things. It wasn’t much of an issue in the beginning, though. We communicated quite well given the circumstances and he was very open and shared a lot of things with me.
Now however, it feels like I don’t know what is going on in his life and in his head anymore. He has stopped telling me things. I get that he’s 90% preoccupied with work. He has to work overtime every day and I get it that he’s exhausted by the time he gets home. So I try not to take it personally when we don’t talk in the evenings anymore, but how much of it can I take? When I bring this stuff up, he says how he really wants to be with me, but that I need to understand that this is his first real job and he needs to be at his best behavior and show what a hard worker he is. I mean, I get that but at the same time I don’t think it’s a good enough excuse to go on for a day or two just exchanging a few text messages with each other. He says that he doesn’t call or text after work anymore because he’s just so tired that he doesn’t have the capacity to think about stuff like that. This hurts. It makes me feel like I’m not important to him anymore. How much of an effort can it possibly take to talk to your girlfriend for five minutes? I don’t know, maybe I’m being unreasonable and expect too much.
He keeps saying how his work situation won’t be like this forever, how after this project is over, things will go back to normal. He’s said that a couple of times already. But when one project is over, another one starts and it’s just a vicious circle. I try to be understanding, but I don’t know how long I can go on like this. I’m the kind of person who needs affection and closeness. It’s great that he’s aware that he’s been neglecting our relationship and that he wants to change that and be there for me more, but I need more than just words. I knew our ‘honeymoon phase’ wasn’t going to last. I knew that after some time, we would settle down as we got more familiar with each other, but I didn’t think it would be such a drastic change.
I’m not sure what to do anymore. Do I just wait for him, give him space and not push for more us time? Or do I tell him that this is not working out?
Thanks!
