Dear Captain,
I (she/her) am thinking about moving in with my boyfriend (he/him) of 4 years. The problem is that I am afraid of losing my sense of self, and I don't now if I can be, or want to be, 100% committed to him.
My boyfriend is wonderful in many ways. I love him, and really like spending time with him. I also tend to have better habits concerning sleep and food when I live with someone versus when I live on my own. So, co-habitation with him seems like a good choice. From former relationships, I know that I tend to care too much about my partner's happiness, and forget to think about what I want. For example, I want to have more adventures than my boyfriend, but I might tell myself I am content with staying at home when he doesn't want to join me. Maybe this is because as a woman in our patriarchal society, having a successful relationship with a man is seen as the objective.
I should also mention my long distance friend/former hookup, let's call him Mr. Distance. We met five years ago and spent a couple of days together. We live on opposites ends of the continent, so we couldn't date. We have have kept in touch, and met two more times as friends. Our conversation can still be a little bit flirty. It's easy to fantasize and image a perfect relationship, when we never had one. In reality I think any relationship would crash and burn in less than than a year if we tried. But talking to him still gives me a thrill, that I miss in my daily life. It gives me a resort from the worries of everyday life, a space where I don't have to care what anyone else thinks.
A work-friend of mine was diagnosed with cancer recently, and the first thing she did besides starting treatment was marrying her long time partner. That made me realize that if I had a year to live, I wouldn't spend that year with my boyfriend. I would travel the world, alone or with Mr Distance. But if I am thinking about the long term future, then I don't know what to do.
Kind regards,
Twined
Dear Twined,
There's no rule that couples have to live together after a certain amount of time, and there are other ways to improve your sleep hygiene and eating habits than mixing your books with someone else's books. If you'd rather not move in with your boyfriend, don't.
If you decide to give living together a try despite your misgivings, put safeguards in place. For example, instead of combining your current rent payments to afford a bigger place, cut your housing payments in half by looking for a place that either of you could afford on your own if the other person moved out. Talk openly about how you both want money, housework, and house rules to work to make sure you're on the same page, like you would with any potential roommate. Talk about what happens when the lease ends and make a plan to check in a few months before and decide for sure whether you want to renew (together, separately, at all) for another year. Lots of people move in with romantic partners as a compatibility test for eventual marriage or long-term cohabitation. Lots of those same people skip these conversations even when they explicitly call it a trial run, and I hear from them when they "can't" break up without massively destabilizing their finances or access to safe housing.
"What do we do if one or both of us realizes that living together isn't working?" is a scary question. Love yourselves and each other enough to ask the scary questions. Would your boyfriend want to move in with you in the first place if he knew about these doubts? Does he have doubts of his own, and is there something either of you could do that would make moving in easier to say yes to? Does delaying that step spell the end of your relationship, and is that risk worse than the alternative? 'Cause I can tell you from experience that moving in with someone when you are unsure about the relationship and then realizing that you've made a huge mistake once you're already locked in is in no way easier, cheaper, or better than breaking up or deciding to hold off until you're truly ready. (Signed, a lady who looked at multiple studio apartments the same month she packed to move in with her ex)
You say "I want to have more adventures than my boyfriend, but I might tell myself I am content with staying at home when he doesn't want to join me." Is your boyfriend stopping you from having those adventures, or are you stopping you? Meaning, is this a "break up with people who make your world feel small" problem or is this a "please get a therapist and learn to do stuff without him" problem? "Mr. Distance" sounds like one of those motivating crushes, where it's not so much about being with the person as it is liking the parts of yourself that come awake when you're around him, like those first dates where the conversation didn't lag and everybody laughed the whole time, but three dates in you realize that it's not because the other person is fun and interesting, it's because you shine so bright that their comparative lack of sparkle isn't immediately obvious. The realization that you wouldn't spend your last year on earth with your boyfriend is another version of the same message: There's a happier version of you out there, and there is still time to become her! In your letter you are literally describing what it's like to experience a call to adventure, so what would happen if you answered? If your life were a rom-com, you'd be in the part where the heroine has to date herself.
Movie-Twined would have a pretty good relationship with a solid guy who wants her to move in with him, let's call him Mr. Dependable, and she'd also have tempting Mr. Distance circling around. But"which guy does she pick" wouldn't be the story, it would just be the rom-com shaped vessel for the real story about figuring out who she wants to be.
Fade in on Twined and Mr. Dependable as guests at a terminally ill coworker's wedding, where the topic of "what would you do if you only had a year left" is on everyone's mind. During wedding planning, the bride and groom made a giant list of all the places they want to go and everything they want to see and do over a lifetime together. They've written each adventure-task on a slip of paper, and put the slips into a giant bucket, and their plan at the wedding is to draw twelve slips, one for each month of the next year, and then distribute the leftovers between the guests. The couple will accomplish as many things as they can in the time they have, and then it's up to the people they love to do the rest in their honor.
Twined ends up with three slips of paper. We don't see what's written on them before we head into a montage of tearful toasts, first dances, and other wedding reception staples while the soundtrack lays it on thick with At Last and Time In A Bottle and (I've Had) The Time Of My Life. By the time Ben Folds sticks the knife allllllllll the way in, we find a runny-mascara'd Twined out on the balcony for a little much-needed air. She's finally looking at her "bucket list" items when Mr. Dependable comes up behind her and wraps his arms around her from behind, and the last thing we see is her, engulfed in his bear hug almost like she's being strangled, the slips of paper clutched tightly in her hand. Each subsequent act of the movie will correspond to one of the slips as living out her friend's dreams leads Twined to discover her own.
What are the adventures on the slips? You tell me. If I were really writing this as a movie, I might build a trio of the bride's best friends, and each of them gets one adventure like it's Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants-meets-Little Women-meets-Sitting In Bars With Cake. Since this is your story, you get to fill in the blanks with everything you'd rather be doing when you pretend to be content with staying home with your boyfriend. What could you do with a year?
You could get a therapist and ask them, "How do I figure out where I end and other people begin?"
You could devote one night a week to do something interesting outside of your house, invite your boyfriend or not invite him, and if he doesn't want to join you, you could do it anyway.
You could finally learn to fence or play an instrument or do the moonwalk or get really into darkroom photography or roller derby or improv or a foreign language or whatever that thing is that you keep resolving to try every January 1 and then not doing.
You could close your eyes, spin a globe, and plan a trip to wherever your finger lands when it stops.
You could volunteer for a cause that you care about and do your bit to change the world.
You could make this the year you focus on making new friends and deepening ties you already have.
You could make this the year that you put in the work to level up in your chosen career field.
You could go to your nearest animal shelter and walk out with just one of the many loves of your life.
I don't know, but you do. These are your sculptures, your potions, your traveling show, and this is your song. If the duet you're currently singing has stopped feeling good, improvise something new.
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