Submitted by Sad-Sun-089 t3_ys8iwg in relationship_advice
Let this be your warning that this is gonna be a long post. I am currently trying to make sense of what my relationship has become. The past few months have shown me a side of my girlfriend that has left me dumbfounded and confused, I can’t recognize the sweet girl I fell in love with.
So here’s the backstory: My (21F) gf and me (22F) have been together for around a year and a half and have been living together for 3 months. This is the first relationship any of us has had, and during the first months of it everything was magical. We had amazing sex, deep talks, seemed to understand each other on a truly deep level, I guess the fact that we could only meet over the weekend due to distance (1 hr) helped to keep things passionate. But all this changed as soon as my gf came out to her mom and their relationship pretty much bitterly ended. Her mom is a complicated and quite frankly probably undiagnosed mentally ill person from what I have heard from my gf and her family. My gf had a pretty emotionally unstable homelife because of her mother, as she frequently had mental breakdowns and anger fits. She has become worse after my gf came out to her and says truly terrible things to her, needless to say my gf has been having a very hard time with the situation. My gf also had an ED all her pre- and teen years and was Sa’d when she was 16.
I am very understanding with my gf’s situation as I myself also deal with mental health issues (depression & anxiety) and was SA’d as well when I was 19. I have been in therapy for the last 3 years and have come to peace with my life as well as have developed some coping skills that Im able to use when my gf is having a particularly hard time. I looked for our apartment almost completely alone, I found her a therapist, I console and reassure her, I advise her. But somewhere along the way my support became carrying her and this has really damaged our relationship dynamic, because I feel more in the role of a caregiver as that of a partner. I’ve expressed this to my gf but every attempt has been dismissed, she becomes defensive and acts extremely hurt, but I can’t simply drop the topic or ignore my discomfort just because she’s been having a hard time.
Now to the situation itself: I got home after a really long day and she was pretending to be asleep in the room, so I went to the kitchen and chilled a bit. I came back to the room and woke her up and told her “hey lets watch that movie you mentioned earlier it’s not even that late (21:30)”. She told me it was too late and we watched smt else shorter. She refused to cuddle with me the whole movie and was clearly annoyed at me, so when the movie finished we were just chilling and talking a bit. Eventually she made a move to try to have sex but I ignored her because I wasn’t in the mood, I was tired and all the fighting we’ve had the past few days kinda puts me off. And that’s when it all went downhill. She asked me after some awkward silence if I found her attractive, I told her “yes of course why do you ask?” She said “well, we haven’t had sex this week (last week we had it almost every day) and you just turned me down” I calmly said that I had a long day and was tired and that she herself said that it was kinda late, I also offered to cuddle instead and just talk and chill but she turned away. I told her that she was being unreasonable and that I was offering her a compromise but she wouldn’t take it, she answered that it was really shitty for her the one always initiating things (NOT true, although yes, she has a higher sex drive) and that she felt disgusting, unsidesired, etc. I told her “well, it’s really frustrating when the relationship just moves around the needs of one person” she got super pissed and pushed me, she hit the mattress, said “of course you had to bring that up” I stayed on my side and took my cover and stayed silent. After a moment I asked her if she was cold and wanted to switch covers but she got up and left to the bathroom. I stayed in bed because frankly I don’t think I’m being unreasonable and also she does this very often where she storms out of the bedroom and I always follow and console her but I’m so fucking tired. So I kinda fell asleep when she came back and started saying that she had nowhere to go, saying “this isn’t working, right?” And stuff like that. I calmed her down and told her that we need to talk about our problems like adults if we want to stay together etc. we cuddled a little and she then said that her head hurt because apparently when she was in the bathroom she knocked her head against the wall.
So I’m just left wondering if I’m being unreasonable for not going after her when she stormed out and specifically expecting her to handle things better or if I’m in a toxic relationship where my gf doesn’t care about my needs. What do you think? Any advice is appreciated!
UPDATE: so the last month I’ve been very confused and have been talking a lot to my therapist as well as reading a lot about toxic relationships. I don’t know if my gf has BPD or is narcissistic or just a jerk…. But I know that our relationship is toxic and that I have to stop rationalising her abusive behaviour. We’re currently looking for separate apartments and my plan is to break up with her as soon as there’s some physical space between us. Thanks so much for your input and kind words, it really helped me open my eyes and see my reality for what it is