Okay so here it goes. My boyfriend and I have been together for almost 4 years. We really love each other and you can tell that from miles away. However, my boyfriend has a higher sex drive than me and I deal with past sexual abuse trauma. He doesn’t try to pressure me and he tries his best to make me as comfortable as possible but sometimes that just isn’t enough and I won’t want to have sex and this can go on for months. Because we’ve been together for so long, I feel like we got way too involved in each other’s life. We’re practically married. I feel like i lost myself in him and i’m trying to find myself and i feel that he may feel the same way and doesn’t know it yet. Recently, I spoke about taking a break with him. One where we can explore other love interest and so forth. At first he didn’t like the idea but then he warmed up to it. We never went through with the break just lots of talk about it. In that time, that we were talking about taking a break, I was talking to an old friend for a little while. I thought we were just friends until he admitted his feelings for me and then I started to feel like i was hurting my boyfriend (even though he didn’t know) so i stopped communication. However, now i recently looked through his phone recently and saw that he was thinking of texting his ex for her birthday because of our sexual problems and didn’t wanna do so until we talked about going on a real break again. However I saw that and now i’m furious. I cant believe he would want to text her. Now i’m curious if they have, I didn’t see anything besides a birthday text but i’m on the look out. and now i don’t know what to do because i’m just so angry about that. I don’t wanna go on a break because i feel like i’ll lose him and i love him so much and i know i wanna marry him. I’m super conflicted.
HELP YOURSELF
- You’ve come to the right place; when you’re conflicted we hope that we at Teen Central may be able to help guide you to what you feel in your heart is right for you. There are a lot of questions looming in this post, and we hope that you are able to find some useful resources here!
- It sounds as though you want to trust your boyfriend, but it is difficult for you. Relationships can be confusing, which is why we have some resources under the LEARN tab. It may help to take a look at the “8 signs of a healthy/unhealthy relationship” list under the RELATIONSHIPS section, and reflect on those bullet points. Keep an open mind, it is easy to stay in an unhealthy partnership when we don’t want to believe that is the case. Only you can decide what is best for you!
- If you are feeling hurt or threatened in any way by your boyfriend or another partner, know that there are resources to support you. There are over a dozen helplines, textlines, and websites under the HELP tab that may help you to discuss your current situation, your past sexual trauma, or any other personal issue with other professionals who are trained to help you.
CONSIDER THIS
- The way you are writing makes it seem that you haven’t been able to speak aloud and process all of your thoughts in an organized way. I find that writing things down each day, or speaking to a trusted friend or adult is useful. If possible, take some time to yourself and really write, type, or speak about all of these questions that you ask, and make a pro and con list for each possible decision. This may seem tedious, but it is a very organized and structured way to work through thoughts that are confusing and, as you mentioned, conflicting.
- One of your statements really sticks out to me. You say “I feel like I lost myself in him and I’m trying to find myself.” The process of “finding yourself” is a difficult task that many people go through several times, so my question to you is this: What parts of yourself do you feel that you have lost? Here are a few journal prompts to work with: If you look at yourself now, and yourself four years ago before you began dating your boyfriend, what differences do you see? If you asked your friends and family what they have noticed in the last four years, what would they say? If you ask and answer these questions honestly and with an open mind, it is possible that you may come to a conclusion about your relationship as a whole.
- While you wrestle with these big questions and important life decisions, it is important that you find support and take care of yourself. What can you do each day to ensure you are properly addressing your own emotional needs first? Self-care is different for everyone, if you need help with some ideas our LEARN, HELP, and WHAT’S NEW tabs all have valuable ideas that you may not have considered before. Are you able to engage in self-care with a family member as well? It is important that you do not feel alone in these questions, so do your best to identify someone, anyone, around you who may be open to listening to you without judgement. You may be surprised at how good it feels to open up to someone!
