Dear Demetria:
I have been with my boyfriend for almost three years in a long-distance relationship. In January I moved to his city to be with him. We have talked about getting married in the future. But I’m super frustrated that almost six months into living together, he hasn’t proposed yet. I try not to bring it up, but I can’t help it. Then it turns into an argument about how he isn’t ready yet, etc. My question is, how do I keep sane while I have to sit in this waiting limbo period? It is consuming me! —Anonymous
This is a hard one to conveniently “fix” because there have been a lot of missteps along the way that led to this point. Your situation will be hard, but not impossible, to neatly unravel. If it makes you feel better, this is a surprisingly common conundrum. Also, you do know that waiting is a choice you’ve made. He’s not making you do that. You do not have to wait. Own the choice you’ve made to do so.
That said, you two have been in a long-distance relationship for a significant amount of time. At nearly three years, it was time to figure out, “What are we doing here?”
It seems that there was a desire from both of you to be together in the same city. But it also seems that you were both so caught up in the romance and the excitement of finally being together that you overlooked, or avoided, some important detailed conversations about where this relationship is headed and when. You’re now both learning this information on the back end, when it’s the most inconvenient and frustrating for the both of you.
It’s great that you and your partner had a conversation about wanting to be married to each other before you moved, but as you’re finding, the timeline for that matters. A lot. You’ve made a big sacrifice by packing up and moving to a new city—likely leaving your friends, maybe family, and a job behind. You’re looking for a reward, of sorts, for doing that.
I don’t fault you for feeling that way. But since that was your outlook, you should have relayed it clearly to your partner before you quit your job and opted not to renew your lease so that you knew exactly what situation you were moving into—or not—and could manage your expectations and relationship accordingly.
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