Babygirl, unpack yr sweaters and get FABULOUS in FALL gay homo queer &c 2012

idk lex "how do you find the time" is kind of a moot question when you live together

i've known him two months, any and all talk of living together is itself a moot point

Well, you know what chefs say about a watched pot...

it's safe from burglary?

it produces dank shit?

not to totally stomp all over the domestic happiness of the thread, but how many near-breakup arguments/dicussions/tearfests can one have in a six-day span before an insistence on both of your parts that you don't actually want to break up becomes kind of futile?

because we're at three. sigh.

and if that's not too many, does anyone have advice on the appropriate balance between recognizing that someone you care about is going through a rough patch and supporting them vs. ignoring your own needs, emotional and otherwise? is letting inconsiderate behaviour etc. fly because of context acceptable?

i feel like we're past the worst of it - the epicentre was saturday night, when he did something that really upset me, which he hasn't fully acknowledged as wrong - but four days out, we're still having these mini get-our-backs-up bickerings that are tricky to de-escalate. at this point, i just feel exhausted. i want to be happy and with him, and i want him to be happy, but he's not? and his unhappiness has to do with a lot of other things, many of which he's started to really address/change/etc. and he's been visibly feeling a lot better this week, but the good mood of new friends/new things/job applications/etc. turns into interspersed contentment/frustration/moodiness at the end of the day when i show up, and i want to ride it out, but i don't want it to be the new normal. and i don't want to be bringing him down. \(o0)/

plus, no matter how often he insists it isn't the case, it's really striking when your bf had the most incredible day until seeing you, at which point every other sentence becomes a potential source of tension/misinterpretation/etc.

also, i got a rejection letter re: second round interviews from one of the three jobs i did first-round interviews for two weeks ago. and after finally doing laundry at the boy's place last night, i was walking twenty minutes back to my place with it and it started raining.

it's that sort of day.

Oh jeez I want to come to MTL w some cookies and give you a hug

i mean - maybe we will be ok?

I do hope ao

so, even

aw Alex. I raise a glass in your honor. Wish I could be there.

i dunno. things are too complicated to talk about on a messageboard. lol

honestly, half of me wants to figure out how to make us perfect and wonderful and having lots of sex and being awesome and half of me wants us to just be stable/drama-free/happy enough for me to not make relationship drama the primary focus of my brain and feelings until i have a little more time/space to breathe.

anyway, gonna go ignore work in favour of noms because food is important.

don't be a doormat. you can be supportive but there's a fine line, and no matter what the situation, you need to back yourself up.

also fights do not mean you should give. imo the best things almost break like fifty times before you find the right balance. generally speaking i think structural solutions are best, finding out what the fight's really about.

*fights do not mean you should give up

Alex I'm heading you-know-where if you wanna come
Your relationship is young, be cool and don't sweat it

Also surm is smarts

Alex, I forget: do you live together?

Oh god no. We do not live together. Last year we lived a block away from each other and saw each other ALL the time and this year he lives with two girl/friends and two kittens and finding the healthy space/not seeing each other enough balance is kind of happening?

Although he is oddly reticent to come to my place and I really need to be at my place more often/often enough to have structure and functionality etc.

I am very happy having my own (+ my roommate's) space. We did the super domestic thing and I like it especially the cooking together and cuddling but if we ever live together I will require an Alex-room where I can be disorganized and nerdy and read etc.

i mean . . . . it sounds like he is really playing this alpha dog card

making you adjust to him

better watch that

O - I texted you! On my way now although I might do a bit of absent-minded work while eating for a bit before things get going. Also I have some friends who were possibly going so they might show up fair warning although they are generally chill people

yeah, montrealers!

It's not an alpha dog card so much as very severe OCD which is diagnosed and being treated as of may-ish but is still a thing. It is miles ahead of the first year and a bit when it was not at all diagnosed but it is something to navigate.

Anyway. Fun now. :)

ah. i too have very severe ocd. it's not cute.

but then again i also have OPD so it's hard to keep them straight

My trouble, which I explained to Stevie last night: I'm more comfortable with this particular chap as a Friend With Benefits rather than a boyfriend. His sexual history and certain inclinations have made me wary to the point that I mistrust his health.

it's hard to keep them straight

interesting metaphor

meow

I want a friend with benefits like I want to me made out of broccoli.

be

alex, sympathies

i don't think i'd see any reason to stay in a relationship if there were three emotionally draining shouting matches within a week. i don't need relationship drama in my life.

the time thing i was complain about is exactly what's happening today, it's really very ordinary but annoying: he's coming over tonight (we haven't seen each other this week yet), i won't have finished the reviews i need to have finished by the time he gets here, and then when he gets here won't have any chance to finish them off. it's annoying because the stuff i've left unfinished will be on my mind and stressing me out all the time he's here, and i don't seem to be able to get to the optimal place of being able to wholly enjoy actually seeing him because there's always something fucking else i haven't managed to do.

why haven't i finished them already? that's a GOOD FUCKING QUESTION and one that i seem to ask myself every day of my life, in or out of a relationship

The point of staying in a relationship w relationship drama is usu that the high are so high that it outweighs the lows, even when they're p low lows.

Well, theoretically no, re: shouting matches,

My relationship with bf developed at the same time as a couple of close friends of ours who are super vanilla, lovely guys, always turned out with hands held etc. etc. They got married pretty early on. Bf and I would fight fight fight a lot lot lot, once every two weeks there'd be shouting and angst and anger. We'd always look at vanilla couple and say, "why can't we be more like those guys?"

The watershed moment for us-- as I told Alex last night-- was when we committed to not let 'breaking up' be a poker chip, like, a mental one. Because it had been. Every fight we'd been in, there was that nagging feeling, like, "omg I can't believe this is so difficult and I want to walk away", exactly what lex is saying: "i don't need relationship drama in my life"

So as cheesecake as it sounds, we admitted that we wanted to be together and that we wouldn't let a fight break us up

And then the fights stopped immediately

i think with me it's that i actually dislike confrontation a lot - or that's not entirely accurate, if i'm up for confrontation it's because i've already made up my mind that i don't care about or respect the person i'm confronting. i've almost never had a shouting match with a friend, and the times i have, it was usually the death of the friendship right there. i kind of figure it's the kind of thing you can't go back from.

a lot of it, with friends and boys, is that: i like this person and enjoy their company, so why would i shout at them over a little thing if i can keep that annoyance suppressed? and if it's a not-so-little thing, well, do i like them that much then?

Oh totally. Thing is that I'm not describing "fights" as being a result of actual personal differences, but-- in my case, and possibly Alex's-- a manifestation of a desire for stability.

Eight years ago, for example, if bf went out with our friends but didn't call me and let me know, and I'd be working at home instead of being informed that there was 'something happening', there would be a "why didn't you call me" + "did you not want me there" + "do you not want to be with me" flow chart that would turn into an argument.

Now, bf will literally tell me he's going away w/friends for a week (to Istanbul, as I mentioned!) and he'll actually tell me the night before he leaves, like, "surprise! you're not coming! stay here and get some work done!"

Before we agreed to commit, I probably would've had a meltdown but now I'm mostly just charmed.

That said there are other long term relationships I know where that same pushing of boundaries has resulted in one-sided drug use and extra-relationship affairs under the guise of "who cares? we're committed!" and that can get dark indeed

it would literally never occur to me to turn that scenario into a fight. at the very most if i was feeling particularly whiny i would maybe sulk for a minute

Ha yes well this was eight years ago, age 24 or thereabouts, a more dramatic age

whenever i'm feeling hurt or annoyed or whatever it helps me to remember the reason my bf and i decided to stay together in the first place, which is that we admire each other and our respective life goals and that we want to mutually help each other achieve those goals.

right now ph1l is kind of in the supporter mode as i'm not working, which i'm aware could cause tension if one isn't considerate, so i try to be perspicuous in letting him know i'm doing as much as i can to help and that our relationship is one of equals

FBTI, forgive me for this, but have you previously posted here with another handle for awhile? I can't remember and feel bad about it.

er, FGTI :)

I was going to ask too.

Fgti = 0w3n p.

Who was really awesome and wonderful last night and lifted my spirits greatly with a bunch of trivia and hangouts.

Ah, OK! Sorry about that.

Alex, sorry things are more fighty than righty.