A Bolder Boulder FA
Fallout
Hi all,
I've been a long-time visitor to the Dimensions forums, coming here ever since I was around 15 or so and the boards looked very different.
Recently, my life has undergone some huge changes, and I needed to talk about them somewhere, anywhere and get some feedback on them. I'm really confused, lonely, and full of heartache.
TL;DR Version: I split up with my fiancee because she wanted to live with her parents for the next 2 years instead of moving out and take care of her sister's 3 year old son, while her sister moved away. Was I wrong for leaving?
When I met my fiancee 4 years ago, I was a freshman in college and completely new to college life, but we hit it off immediately. She was very attracted to me, and though it took me a bit longer, I realized I was to her as well. Unfortunately, over the next year, she was forced to return home to Texas from Colorado - where we went to school - due to failing grades and her family's inability to support her further. I was devastated, but because I loved her, I was willing to try a long-distance relationship and continue to make it work.
For the next 2 years, I would only get to see my fiancee once every 2-3 months for about a week at a time, coinciding with breaks from school/work. In the summers, I would move down to be with her (and her family) and work for her parents, who owned a small local paper delivery company in San Antonio, Texas. As far as how the work was, let me just put it this way - I was a delivery truck driver in a truck with no A/C, in the South Texas heat, taking goods out of a warehouse with a tin metal roof and one small rotating fan.
That was how much I wanted to be with her. I once rode a Greyhound bus from Denver to San Antonio because I couldn't afford a plane ticket. In the fall, I would return to college and keep going, confident that once I graduated things would be different.
As everyone knows, LDRs are hugely difficult to keep working. There's a ton of stress put on a relationship when the only contact one has is through the telephone and email. But we made it happen, somehow.
Fast forward to this summer. I graduated from college with a BA in Political Science. I put 4 hard years of work into going to school for a graduate degree and also took the LSAT (scored well) to go to Law School in South Texas. I would gather all my things from my house and the place where I had lived for the past 11 years, say goodbye to my family, friends and after saving up $2,000.00 for an apartment that we could move into once I got down there. I was also signed up for loans for school that would help me pay for any additional expenses that I might have because I was completely on my own, making my own car payments, cell payments, food, etc. The only support I had from my parents following my graduation was car insurance to the tune of about $80 a month. I couldn't even afford health insurance.
Before I left, we talked about what would happen. Each of us was confident that when we got back to Texas, we'd find an apartment and move out of her house so we wouldn't be living with her family. We drove to Vegas - as part of a summer vacation and celebration of my graduation and the beginning of our new life together - before we made it to San Antonio.
And that's when everything started falling apart.
When we got to San Antonio, I unpacked my belongings and crammed what I could of my stuff into her room, where I envisioned only living for a month, maybe two at the most. It wasn't a big deal for me, as I had been dealing with a similar situation for the past 2 1/2 years over the summers.
However, one big issue for me that contributed to our splitting apart was also present: my fiancee's sister, who was 19, had a 2 year old son. She was a completely, utterly irresponsible mother who lived in her own squalor - picture your worst college roommate and multiply him by 5 - and did virtually nothing to indicate that she would be capable of taking care of a child. She had a GED, no desire to return to college (after failing two courses at the local community college, Speech and Drama - I kid you not) and was constantly out very late, even during nights when the baby would awaken and be screaming for someone to come hold him. Frequently, it would be me, my fiancee or her parents who would wake up from 2-4am and rock with him until he went back to sleep. Meanwhile, my fiancee's sister was out drinking/partying and nowhere to be found.
So, the responsibility of caring for the baby fell on her parents - and us. One thing about my fiancee is that she was a very loving and caring individual, and seeing as how her sister was incapable, took on much of the responsibility of caring for the baby. Again, though he was a wonderful child, I was not ready for the responsibility of being a father figure to a baby that wasn't mine at 22 years old and said as much to her.
Fast forward to midway through this summer. There's a lot of strain on our relationship, we're not having sex with one another as often as we used to (going as long as 3 weeks without being intimate), we hardly talk, and one night it comes to a head. We have a long conversation about everything that'd been bothering us, so I laid it out for her:
- I had saved up $2,000.00 and was willing to take loans out to move out into an apartment. She was still $1,200.00 in debt from a speeding ticket that she neglected to pay off and did not tell me about, but was starting to pay it off finally.
- We hardly talked. It felt often like we were two people living in separate rooms and only sharing the same bed, frequently because she would devote much of her energy to spending time with the baby and then be too tired to do anything else.
- Our sex life was virtually nonexistant while we lived in the house. Though she was a BBW and I always praised her on how beautiful she was - she even modelled, for a time, on one of the paysites on this board - she still suffered from self-esteem issues and didn't like the way she looked even after years of my support. Sometimes, when we were intimate, I like to fantasize/roleplay about her being fatter, and had done so for about 2 years, when she told me during this conversation that it was a big turn-off and that she felt that losing weight would make her feel prettier. That was a huge kick in the gut, the first time she had ever mentioned it to me, but I never brought it up again. Not only that, but the room that we were in was directly above her parent's bedroom, which made her very unwilling to do anything, even foreplay. When I brought this up, she said "Well, I guess sex is more important to you than it is to me. I don't keep track." Ouch.
- Finally, and perhaps what tipped me over the edge, was when she told me that she wanted to stay at home for another two years while she finished Nursing school so she wouldn't have to incur any debt.
I was crushed. I had moved my whole life to South Texas from Colorado, saved up $2,000.00, maintained a long distance relationship for 2 1/2 years, lived with her family for the same time off and on, been a father figure for her sister's baby (her sister did not know who the father was, and he never contacted her), was willing to adopt a new RELIGION for her (she was Jewish, I am atheistic but I would convert before we married) and left the place that I had come to love for the past 11 years behind.
During the whole period when I had been socking away money just so we could leave so we didn't have to deal with "living at home" any more, she was constantly being overdrawn and facing overdraft charges at the bank, had a $1,200 speeding ticket unpaid and not only that -
Her car, insurance, cell phone bill and tuition at school was being paid for completely by her parents. Even with zero expenses, she couldn't commit herself to saving money for a place for the both of us. I was also told that her sister, the mother of the the baby, would be leaving the state to work in Colorado (natch) and her parents would retain custody. So not only would we be living at home, but the mother of the baby would be gone, and the responsibility for his care would fall on me, my fiancee, her parents and her younger sister who was still in high school while the mother got to go live somewhere else. My fiancee's parents even paid for her sister's plane ticket. Why they continue to bail her out after putting them through so much is mind-boggling to me. :doh: If anything, it was the sign of a completely dysfunctional family. I was happy that she'd be gone and take her mess with her, but at the same time, it was equivalent to abandoning her child - supported by her parents - and dropping a ton of responsibility on two engaged 22 year olds.
At that point, something in me changed. I felt like I had sacrificed so much for her and completely changed my life, for her alone, and she wasn't willing to do something, now that I was living in Texas, that we had planned on for months. She wanted me to stay in an environment that was completely unbearable for me (her house, with her family) and be a role model/father figure for her sister's baby, which she had essentially co-opted - for the next 2 years.
So, two days ago, I had had enough. Rather than just split, I sat down with her father, whom I was working for, and told him the truth. I said to him that I was moving back to Colorado, and I needed to figure out where I was going. I had already withdrawn my loans and application for law school, and had some of my belongings already packed in the trunk of my car. He nodded, solemnly, but he told me that I needed to pack my things up, tell my fiancee that day, and go. He hoped I "Found my path" and walked out of the restaurant that we were at.
I told my fiancee to meet me at a Starbucks after work and told her that I was moving back to Colorado because I couldn't take living at home any more.
Our last, paraphrased conversation, shortened:
- I can't live at home anymore. I'm moving home to Colorado.
- What are you going to do about school and loans?
- I already withdrew my application and cancelled my loans. I can't live at home with your parents anymore.
- So are we breaking up? Are we calling off the engagement?
- If that's what you want to do, then we will. I still love you, but I can't be somewhere that will make me resent you and be completely unhappy. I can't be a father figure for your sister's son at 22 years old.
- Get the fuck out of my car, right now. Get the fuck out. I hate you so much right now.
And she drove off. I drove to Abilene for the night, rested, and arrived in Colorado yesterday.
I feel absolutely terrible. I still love her, a lot, and after nearly 4 years of a relationship my heart aches for doing what I did. She was heartbroken, and I could tell.
But I couldn't be a dad to a baby that wasn't mine and stay in that house for another 2 years, because I knew what would eventually happen is that she and I would become responsible for the child as her parents are nearing their 60s. In 10 years, I could easily see us having sole custody of the baby.
So now I'm at a huge crossroads in my life. I'm no longer engaged to a girl that I still love but can't be with, no longer in school (at least for now, I can always return - my score on the LSAT was good enough), have returned home to live with MY parents until I can figure out an apartment, have to find a full-time job with little professional experience and don't know what I will be doing. I'm now single for the first time in 4 years and have the most uncomfortable, strange mix of hope, guilt, fear, excitement, remorse and determination running through my body.
Everyone I've talked to - my whole family included - believes I made the right choice, even if I feel absolutely terrible about breaking her heart. Even one of HER good friends, a guy I had come to know, understands and supports my decision, and called me to tell me so. He said that he couldn't stand being around her family either.
In the end, it came down to me bending over backward to make our relationship work - maintaining a LDR, moving from my home state away from my family, friends and home, restricting my finances so I could explicitly save for our own living space, being willing to convert to a different religion and pushing myself into graduate school when I wasn't sure that's what I wanted to do immediately after college - and she didn't want to follow through on the one thing I really wanted from her, that being her "leaving the nest" and living with me in our own place, even if it meant she would have to incur some debt.
So I ask you, if you've made it this far, what would you have done in my situation, given all the above details? Was I wrong? Should I have waited longer to see if I could have "stuck it out"? How would you have approached the situation?
Where do I go from here?
With love to the community -
Bolder
I've been a long-time visitor to the Dimensions forums, coming here ever since I was around 15 or so and the boards looked very different.
Recently, my life has undergone some huge changes, and I needed to talk about them somewhere, anywhere and get some feedback on them. I'm really confused, lonely, and full of heartache.
TL;DR Version: I split up with my fiancee because she wanted to live with her parents for the next 2 years instead of moving out and take care of her sister's 3 year old son, while her sister moved away. Was I wrong for leaving?
When I met my fiancee 4 years ago, I was a freshman in college and completely new to college life, but we hit it off immediately. She was very attracted to me, and though it took me a bit longer, I realized I was to her as well. Unfortunately, over the next year, she was forced to return home to Texas from Colorado - where we went to school - due to failing grades and her family's inability to support her further. I was devastated, but because I loved her, I was willing to try a long-distance relationship and continue to make it work.
For the next 2 years, I would only get to see my fiancee once every 2-3 months for about a week at a time, coinciding with breaks from school/work. In the summers, I would move down to be with her (and her family) and work for her parents, who owned a small local paper delivery company in San Antonio, Texas. As far as how the work was, let me just put it this way - I was a delivery truck driver in a truck with no A/C, in the South Texas heat, taking goods out of a warehouse with a tin metal roof and one small rotating fan.
That was how much I wanted to be with her. I once rode a Greyhound bus from Denver to San Antonio because I couldn't afford a plane ticket. In the fall, I would return to college and keep going, confident that once I graduated things would be different.
As everyone knows, LDRs are hugely difficult to keep working. There's a ton of stress put on a relationship when the only contact one has is through the telephone and email. But we made it happen, somehow.
Fast forward to this summer. I graduated from college with a BA in Political Science. I put 4 hard years of work into going to school for a graduate degree and also took the LSAT (scored well) to go to Law School in South Texas. I would gather all my things from my house and the place where I had lived for the past 11 years, say goodbye to my family, friends and after saving up $2,000.00 for an apartment that we could move into once I got down there. I was also signed up for loans for school that would help me pay for any additional expenses that I might have because I was completely on my own, making my own car payments, cell payments, food, etc. The only support I had from my parents following my graduation was car insurance to the tune of about $80 a month. I couldn't even afford health insurance.
Before I left, we talked about what would happen. Each of us was confident that when we got back to Texas, we'd find an apartment and move out of her house so we wouldn't be living with her family. We drove to Vegas - as part of a summer vacation and celebration of my graduation and the beginning of our new life together - before we made it to San Antonio.
And that's when everything started falling apart.
When we got to San Antonio, I unpacked my belongings and crammed what I could of my stuff into her room, where I envisioned only living for a month, maybe two at the most. It wasn't a big deal for me, as I had been dealing with a similar situation for the past 2 1/2 years over the summers.
However, one big issue for me that contributed to our splitting apart was also present: my fiancee's sister, who was 19, had a 2 year old son. She was a completely, utterly irresponsible mother who lived in her own squalor - picture your worst college roommate and multiply him by 5 - and did virtually nothing to indicate that she would be capable of taking care of a child. She had a GED, no desire to return to college (after failing two courses at the local community college, Speech and Drama - I kid you not) and was constantly out very late, even during nights when the baby would awaken and be screaming for someone to come hold him. Frequently, it would be me, my fiancee or her parents who would wake up from 2-4am and rock with him until he went back to sleep. Meanwhile, my fiancee's sister was out drinking/partying and nowhere to be found.
So, the responsibility of caring for the baby fell on her parents - and us. One thing about my fiancee is that she was a very loving and caring individual, and seeing as how her sister was incapable, took on much of the responsibility of caring for the baby. Again, though he was a wonderful child, I was not ready for the responsibility of being a father figure to a baby that wasn't mine at 22 years old and said as much to her.
Fast forward to midway through this summer. There's a lot of strain on our relationship, we're not having sex with one another as often as we used to (going as long as 3 weeks without being intimate), we hardly talk, and one night it comes to a head. We have a long conversation about everything that'd been bothering us, so I laid it out for her:
- I had saved up $2,000.00 and was willing to take loans out to move out into an apartment. She was still $1,200.00 in debt from a speeding ticket that she neglected to pay off and did not tell me about, but was starting to pay it off finally.
- We hardly talked. It felt often like we were two people living in separate rooms and only sharing the same bed, frequently because she would devote much of her energy to spending time with the baby and then be too tired to do anything else.
- Our sex life was virtually nonexistant while we lived in the house. Though she was a BBW and I always praised her on how beautiful she was - she even modelled, for a time, on one of the paysites on this board - she still suffered from self-esteem issues and didn't like the way she looked even after years of my support. Sometimes, when we were intimate, I like to fantasize/roleplay about her being fatter, and had done so for about 2 years, when she told me during this conversation that it was a big turn-off and that she felt that losing weight would make her feel prettier. That was a huge kick in the gut, the first time she had ever mentioned it to me, but I never brought it up again. Not only that, but the room that we were in was directly above her parent's bedroom, which made her very unwilling to do anything, even foreplay. When I brought this up, she said "Well, I guess sex is more important to you than it is to me. I don't keep track." Ouch.
- Finally, and perhaps what tipped me over the edge, was when she told me that she wanted to stay at home for another two years while she finished Nursing school so she wouldn't have to incur any debt.
I was crushed. I had moved my whole life to South Texas from Colorado, saved up $2,000.00, maintained a long distance relationship for 2 1/2 years, lived with her family for the same time off and on, been a father figure for her sister's baby (her sister did not know who the father was, and he never contacted her), was willing to adopt a new RELIGION for her (she was Jewish, I am atheistic but I would convert before we married) and left the place that I had come to love for the past 11 years behind.
During the whole period when I had been socking away money just so we could leave so we didn't have to deal with "living at home" any more, she was constantly being overdrawn and facing overdraft charges at the bank, had a $1,200 speeding ticket unpaid and not only that -
Her car, insurance, cell phone bill and tuition at school was being paid for completely by her parents. Even with zero expenses, she couldn't commit herself to saving money for a place for the both of us. I was also told that her sister, the mother of the the baby, would be leaving the state to work in Colorado (natch) and her parents would retain custody. So not only would we be living at home, but the mother of the baby would be gone, and the responsibility for his care would fall on me, my fiancee, her parents and her younger sister who was still in high school while the mother got to go live somewhere else. My fiancee's parents even paid for her sister's plane ticket. Why they continue to bail her out after putting them through so much is mind-boggling to me. :doh: If anything, it was the sign of a completely dysfunctional family. I was happy that she'd be gone and take her mess with her, but at the same time, it was equivalent to abandoning her child - supported by her parents - and dropping a ton of responsibility on two engaged 22 year olds.
At that point, something in me changed. I felt like I had sacrificed so much for her and completely changed my life, for her alone, and she wasn't willing to do something, now that I was living in Texas, that we had planned on for months. She wanted me to stay in an environment that was completely unbearable for me (her house, with her family) and be a role model/father figure for her sister's baby, which she had essentially co-opted - for the next 2 years.
So, two days ago, I had had enough. Rather than just split, I sat down with her father, whom I was working for, and told him the truth. I said to him that I was moving back to Colorado, and I needed to figure out where I was going. I had already withdrawn my loans and application for law school, and had some of my belongings already packed in the trunk of my car. He nodded, solemnly, but he told me that I needed to pack my things up, tell my fiancee that day, and go. He hoped I "Found my path" and walked out of the restaurant that we were at.
I told my fiancee to meet me at a Starbucks after work and told her that I was moving back to Colorado because I couldn't take living at home any more.
Our last, paraphrased conversation, shortened:
- I can't live at home anymore. I'm moving home to Colorado. - What are you going to do about school and loans? - I already withdrew my application and cancelled my loans. I can't live at home with your parents anymore. - So are we breaking up? Are we calling off the engagement? - If that's what you want to do, then we will. I still love you, but I can't be somewhere that will make me resent you and be completely unhappy. I can't be a father figure for your sister's son at 22 years old. - Get the fuck out of my car, right now. Get the fuck out. I hate you so much right now.And she drove off. I drove to Abilene for the night, rested, and arrived in Colorado yesterday.
I feel absolutely terrible. I still love her, a lot, and after nearly 4 years of a relationship my heart aches for doing what I did. She was heartbroken, and I could tell.
But I couldn't be a dad to a baby that wasn't mine and stay in that house for another 2 years, because I knew what would eventually happen is that she and I would become responsible for the child as her parents are nearing their 60s. In 10 years, I could easily see us having sole custody of the baby.
So now I'm at a huge crossroads in my life. I'm no longer engaged to a girl that I still love but can't be with, no longer in school (at least for now, I can always return - my score on the LSAT was good enough), have returned home to live with MY parents until I can figure out an apartment, have to find a full-time job with little professional experience and don't know what I will be doing. I'm now single for the first time in 4 years and have the most uncomfortable, strange mix of hope, guilt, fear, excitement, remorse and determination running through my body.
Everyone I've talked to - my whole family included - believes I made the right choice, even if I feel absolutely terrible about breaking her heart. Even one of HER good friends, a guy I had come to know, understands and supports my decision, and called me to tell me so. He said that he couldn't stand being around her family either.
In the end, it came down to me bending over backward to make our relationship work - maintaining a LDR, moving from my home state away from my family, friends and home, restricting my finances so I could explicitly save for our own living space, being willing to convert to a different religion and pushing myself into graduate school when I wasn't sure that's what I wanted to do immediately after college - and she didn't want to follow through on the one thing I really wanted from her, that being her "leaving the nest" and living with me in our own place, even if it meant she would have to incur some debt.
So I ask you, if you've made it this far, what would you have done in my situation, given all the above details? Was I wrong? Should I have waited longer to see if I could have "stuck it out"? How would you have approached the situation?
Where do I go from here?
With love to the community -
Bolder
