He made me cry for the first time yesterday

[nerdy_guy]

Either:
1.Chivalry is really dead.
2. He's been drinking/eating from a BPA-laden container all his life.

You don't need to talk to him laila, you need to get him a boob job. He's letting you cry for all the wrong pathetic reasons. But then again, I might be expecting too much from her(not a typo)

[nerdy_guy]

i will greatly encourage this. i will be starting a new thread and taking bets how long it will take before you make her cry.

You accept paypal?

[lahnnabell]

Laila, I gotta say I expected this. The first issue you had with this guy kinda set the tone for this relationship, in my opinion.

And yes, you both are at fault here. He acted like a complete and utter dick. And you were being the passive aggressive bitch.

I definitely agree that you need to just suck it up and leave the situation alone next time you have mixed feelings on doing something like camping. Half-hearted campers are the worst kind of company because they tend to bitch and whine about every little thing. I'm not saying this is always you, but your bad attitude definitely poisoned some of the trip. You need to work on better ways to self-soothe so that you can work past issues faster than this.

Your guy needs to be more sensitive to your feelings as well. I do think part of the reason you ended up in tears was thanks to your own passive aggressive behavior. That combined with your boyfriend's obvious deficit of emotional maturity put you both at stalemate for the whole weekend. I bet part of him wanted a guys-only weekend too, and you kinda screwed up the equilibrium by asking to come along (Am I wrong to assume there were no other females present?). However, instead of letting you tag-a-long, he should've asked you for the space he wanted.

And just because you haven't argued doesn't mean that problems don't exist in a relationship. It sounds like he's very bored and is just going through the motions at this point. I'm curious as to what kind of quality time you guys spend together? Besides sucky camping trips of course

[Indignant]

^^^ I'm not a crier. I'm not an emotional b*tch. This is the first time I've cried over a dude in over 4 years. There's no need to be mean.

sorry, it sounded like crying is a usual thing for you.

[doppelgaenger]

Actually, I'd make ya pretty happy.

[lahnnabell]

So, Laila, tips on self-soothing 'cause you sound a lot like me. When I get so frustrated that I'm at the point of tears, I have to walk away. A lot of how I feel and how I am physically affected by my emotions comes from the energy around me. I know this sounds corny, but bear with me. Because I've been dealing with how I am for so long now I've developed ways to prevent and cope when situations get to be too much.

1. I drive myself almost everywhere. I like to have my car handy in the event that I need to leave. I hate carpooling because sometimes if I'm having a bad day and I have to get out and just get home, I can. I'm not held up waiting for someone else while my frustration grows.

2. Be honest with yourself. If you're feeling shitty and anticipating having a bad time somewhere, you probably will have a bad time. Your mental state sets the tone for how you will choose to interact with the world. If you're already pissy, the next little screw up will feel a lot worse than it really is, which may result in you venting unexpectedly (in this case crying).

3. Pay attention to your body. It will give you a lot of hints and clues. It's very difficult to do this because when we become frustrated, our higher brain functions begin to shut down and we go into flight mode, which is our body's instinctive way of protecting ourselves when we feel an issue is insurmountable. In your case, you shut down completely because you couldn't find another way to deal with this issue. This will not help you solve issues, especially ones that require communication.

I had to practice this a lot. Now when an issue crops up, I stop and focus on my body. If there is tightness in my chest or stomach, or my skin feels flushed, that means I'm anxious. I then know that I have to calm myself down in order to handle the problem effectively. If I fail to do this, I will most likely throw up anxiety and stress all over the person next to me.

What do you think?

[LailaK]

That's good advice. You'd better believe that I'm gonna take it.

I never should have gone on the trip, but I'm still glad the fight happened. When he told me this morning that "We had more fun 3 months ago than we do now" that shocked the hell out of me. I hate to think that we could have gone on with our relationship for who knows how many more months with him feeling the way he does and my dumb ass just falling more in love with him. I'm glad it's ending now.

I think he's bored as well. If I'm honest with myself I've been mentioning things to my friends about his quiet behavior, and the fact that we never talk about anything serious. They all said that it was probably just his personality but I knew in my gut it was something else. We hang out a lot. 2-3 times a week, sometimes with his friends and sometimes just the two of us. We usually go to the movies or chill at home. He's right. It's comfortable now. The infatuation is gone but to me that always happens in a relationship. The difference is that after the infatuation was gone I still liked him but he felt differently.

Regardless of what he says when I get back from Germany I know that this is the end. If he doesn't end it, I will. I want to be with someone who wants to be with me without hesitation. I want to be with someone who wants to take care of me just as much as I want to take care of him. He is not that guy. At least now I know that.

Too bad I have to see him at work everyday.

[lahnnabell]

Guys take a lot longer to process their emotions than women do. They need more time to think things through and come up with possible reasons and/or solutions to whatever is nagging away at them. This happened with my guy a couple of months ago. After he returned from 4 months in Mexico, things were off. I felt it too, but I assumed that the distance had screwed things up a bit. I remember one night he seemed restless and I felt rather unwelcome in his home. I asked him what was bothering him, and he said, "Nothing." I knew he was stalling, but I let it go. I trusted that he'd come out with it eventually 'cause he usually does.

Sure enough, a week later we sat down and talked about how he was feeling. He said that he wanted to spend less time together, but that he still loved me. He also asked that the time we do spend together was spent doing more than just lazing around. We agreed to work together to get things back on track and make it fun again. I started by honoring his desire for space and didn't call him for several days and continued calling him once every few days, or whenever I had something relevant to say. No chit-chat, no I just called to say "I love you". Barely 2 weeks later he was calling me and telling me he missed me.

It can be a dangerous game to play. And none of this works if the guy has no idea what he wants. This guy you've been seeing sounds like he has no idea what he wants, and is just kind of picking new toys up every now and then to play with for a while, then discard. A very childish mentality.

And I have to say, only movies and chilling out at home 3 months into your relationship? Sounds like you got kind of bored too.

[vashti]

I have to admit, laila, I am surprised you found it necessary to wake him up just because you had to pee. If I were him, I'd be grouchy, too. He's probably wondering why you can't handle something as basic as toileting on your own, and is worried about your level of neediness.

[Mish]

We went camping on Friday and the bottom line is that we (or at least I) had a pretty miserable time. I will admit that I started out the trip acting like a bitch. I didn't want to go. I went anyway because I'm leaving the country for a week on Monday and I figured this would be the last time I would get to see him before then. I've also had a cold all week and I told him that I didn't think I'd be much fun camping with a cold. He didn't say anything back to me when I mentioned that.

I was mostly upset because I'd been asking him for details on the trip all week. He didn't give me any.

This for me would have been a deal breaker for going off to camping^ If I were you I would just not go.

[Mish]

And I have to say, only movies and chilling out at home 3 months into your relationship? Sounds like you got kind of bored too.

Depends on who you talk to. I did that for years and it was the best time I ever had.

[nerdy_guy]

I never should have gone on the trip, but I'm still glad the fight happened. When he told me this morning that "We had more fun 3 months ago than we do now" that shocked the hell out of me. I hate to think that we could have gone on with our relationship for who knows how many more months with him feeling the way he does and my dumb ass just falling more in love with him. I'm glad it's ending now.

Sometimes, you need to have a crisis just to know how far your partner will go for you. For me its just not about camping. Who knows, maybe if it was just a walk home and someone decided to put both your lives at risk? what would he have done? Run and scream like a little girl, leaving you to fend for yourself? At least you've seen his true colors before both of you had been deep-rooted into the relationship.

Maybe its just me, but personally, Laila's faults are not enough to warrant such treatment.

[LailaK]

We were in his car. It was pitch dark. I couldn't see anything and I needed to get his keys to open the hatch of the trunk and get out so I wouldn't pee myself in his car.

I'm not a needy chick. He was being an as*.

Even my abusive ex-boyfriend would have been protective enough to show me where the actual bathrooms were. I can take care of myself but I like it when the man I'm with is protective enough to not send me off in the dark without a flashlight on the side of a mountain. I'm a girl, I like to be treated like a girl. Most guys don't mind that. I cook for him and all that stuff and he acts protective and all that stuff. That's how I like my relationships.

Hell, most of my girlfriends would have went with me in search of a bathroom. It would have been an adventure.

I'll admit that I was acting like a bitch earlier in the night. But I won't admit to being cowardly or needy. I think he should have at least gotten off his ass and helped me find his keys and phone at the instead of lying there while I almost pissed myself trying to feel around for them.

[lahnnabell]

Depends on who you talk to. I did that for years and it was the best time I ever had.

What happened then?

[Mish]

What happened then?

I'm still doing it with my gf and it's awesome! I wouldn't change a thing.