Would really love you opinion

[Isabella-b]

Aside from reading quite a bit online, I really feel the need to talk to someone about the things that are troubling me. I would really appreciate some outside perspective and advise. Unfortunately there are few people in my life that I am able to talk to. My partner included.

I believe this perhaps to be my main concern, the communication between myself and my partner is nothing like what I’d have it be.
We have been together about a year, thought we had been quite close for a year before that. Our relationship has had a lot of upsets and things holding it back, and it has really only been a few months ago that we (more especially he) have gotten past a lot of those problems.
However, I don’t think we really ever discussed them properly, not in a way that I feel I have been able to let it go completely and move on. At times I have a lot of left over anxiety, trust issues and low self esteem.

Our lack of communication makes me feel very isolated. I have tried desperately to talk to him, and I am willing to accept that I am not handling it as best I could. I know men can listen and understand things in a different way, I have been trying to understand this better.
I would like to plan a discussion with him, where I am prepared with what I need to say and the best way to say it.
But he never feels available to me. We both work 40hrs a week, and he is often too tired or preoccupied for a deep discussion. Or for much discussion at all.
As loving and affectionate as he can be, he has also always been very closed off, private and guarded with his real thoughts and feelings.

As much as I dislike it, I have often read some of his txts and fb msgs; the only reason for this is because he has always been so overly guarded about his msgs, deleting the immediately and now having a lock on his phone. While I respect his privacy and don’t read everything, I however have in the past found things that confirm him keeping things from me and such things as keeping up an inappropriate dialogue with and ex –when I confronted him about it, he insisted that he was only trying to ease the gilt he felt for how things work out with her, and that he felt in debt, and wished to repair their friendship. I believe he has let it go, and now ready to be happy in this relationship.

I am not an overly jealous or clingy gf, in fact I strive to be the opposite, however when he tells me that he doesn’t have any real close friends bar one male friend. None that he really see’s, it bothers me that he won’t share more with me who his friends are. While he may not be overly close with them, a friend from his old work for instance, they exchange msgs that I find offensive to our relationship. I may be wrong, but I feel there is certain language you reserve for you partner (or only my close girlfriends), such as ‘babe’, ‘lover’, ‘babycakes’, ‘beautiful’ ‘ILY’ and xxxxxx.
I don’t believe he would cheat on me. But his this hurts my feelings. Especially when if I sent msgs like this to my male friends (which I never have, to avoid sending the wrong signals) I know he would be upset.
We don’t spend much quality time together, especially lately as he has been working on a project at home in the evenings. And yet every night while he is shut away in the computer room ‘working’ he has time to chat on fb to another of his ‘not really friends’ girlfriend, when he can barely hold a conversation with me.

Our sex life/ intimacy is also disappointing, I crave closeness, passion and affection from him. We make love maybe once a week to two weeks, and I am almost always the one trying to initiate it. He is not romantic, and sex is -while affectionate- physically unsatisfying for me, I have not been able to finish for well over a month. He is happy to cuddle but I feel the need for more sometimes.

I am becoming quite edgy and stressed, I am a lot more testy around him than I normally would be.
This is my first serious relationship, we are living together and I don’t know how to make things better. I love him very much and would spend the rest of my life with him, but these things are making me doubt our relationship, I hate feeling this way, especially being the one to see them.

Sorry for the essay, but I could really use some help

[smackie9]

Since this is your first serious relationship I have some things to tell you. Relationship come and go. Relationships at the beginning seem like it will last forever....but in reality, no they don`t. If he is still secretive, uses babe, love to other women, he has not moved on and is happy top be in a relationship. If a guy still shows interest in other women that means your relationship isn`t as committed as you think it is. It boils down to that he enjoys your company and the steady supply of sex and what this is, is temporary. The signs are all there, you see them, but don`t want to believe it. You are in denial, just like other that post on here. I have been in your shoes.....my remedy to it is ending the relationship.

You can`t make things better if this is how he sees this relationship. You cant force someone to love you more wholly, or be absolutely committed to you. Talk to him. Ask him how he sees your relationship, if there is any future or is this just a situation where he needs someone to share the rent and have sex with when he feels like it.

Since things are dying of in the romance dept as well as sex and he seems to be paying special attention to other women......he has another interest.

[smackie9]

So how old are you? and how long did you date before moving in with each other?

[Isabella-b]

I appreciate your reply. I need more outside perspecive.
It is difficult to relate everything about a relationship, especially without going on forever. It is important that I also say that I have written the things that are troubling me, without regard to how they sound because I need to know what other people think about them. But I would not be in this relationship if there was nothing good about it or I didn't believe he loved me.

I understand fully that relationships come and go, so forgive me for not being too willing to give up on it too soon. I know that you lean a lot of lessons and and how to function better in a relationship in time. I am just trying to figure out as much as I can now, without loosing someone I love in the process.

Of course I could be wrong, but I know him and I know the love he has for me. He may find his actions not a problem and not see the harm in them. But I haven't been able to tell him how they make me feel. I know we need to get everything out on the table, how else can we understand eachothers needs.

I am 21, he is 25. We have been living together as a couple for 3 months, and together for 1 and a half yrs or so.

[Isabella-b]

Also, from what I can tell these other women are involved in other relationships, or interested in somone, so even if there frienship is nothing more, should this language concern me so?