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Please help me, TL.
The girlfriend and I have been dating for 6 months and get along really well. She tells me that she feels like we're best friends rather than lovers and that she couldn't see us getting married. I don't know if this feeling is natural for a couple that's been dating for 6 months. We work together and spend 60+ hours a week together (40 at work and 20+ outside of work). As I found out last night, neither of us is "in love" with the other. I think this scares her, and she's seriously considering calling it quits. Nothing has really changed in our relationship from 3 months ago, other than the fact she feels that 6 months in is a good time to reflect on the relationship. She's had this feeling for a week or two.
I don't want to call it quits just yet. I feel like it's too soon to tell, and we get along completely fine from day to day. What should I do?
Has anyone been in a similar situation? When did you and your girlfriend know you were in love?
 
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my first advise would be to change the time-balance.
40h at work and only 20h outside of that?
its not a good balance imo
maybe you should try to avoid eachother at work and meet in sparetime.
because this big ammount of working time wont help you to get a better connection, it might make it even worse because you relate the "work-feeling" to her (or she to you).
another idea would be to step it down a little bit:
cut the 40h at work and drop from 20h outside to 15h, see if thats helping.
so you dont sit on each others face the whole time and each of you has some time for him/herself.
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Yea, we didn't start off working together. I used to be really happy seeing her after work, but now since I see her everyday, that excitement is gone. We try not to see too much of each at work, but it's hard since we sit two cubes away. I think seeing her less might be a good idea...
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If you enjoy being together and like to exchange body fluids then whats the prob?
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Seeing her less is a pretty surefire cure dude. The hurdle in that is actually doing it. It may be too late for this relationship, but in the future, you have to start slow and take it easy. As you probably have figured out by now, if you've been spending most of your time together, you can't really go to seeing her for a few hours a week; it doesn't work that way.
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tell her that she should only quit if she already like someone else, else why bother?
it's kind of like switching jobs rofl. You only quit your current job once you already have a new offer.
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it's burnout... when you are around someone that much, you start to feel indifferent, if not bitter towards them (from my experience, at least)
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I advise you to leave her immeadtly and to not look back, the fackt that you work together is bad in that regard, maybe you should also look for a new job. If she says she doesnt love you and if she is not sure about you and what not then there is no reason to stay with her.
If she doesn't leave you in the next year or month she might leave you if you have a family (you say you are considering marriage?)
This is no woman to build a future with or to love. If she is not sure about you, she doesn't deserve your love.
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On January 02 2013 01:40 B.I.G. wrote:
If you enjoy being together and like to exchange body fluids then whats the prob?
this definition brought to mind and covers quite a few unusual relationships.
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United States15275 Posts
OP, the simple fact is that you may have stumbled into a good relationship occurring in a bad space. Every relationship requires a certain balance in order to maintain consistent emotional responses (unlike sports/music/writing practice, there is no clear distinct goal you work towards). Considering that 60 hours a week is the near-equivalent of 9 hours per day, both of you are probably suffering from overexposure. There is little to look forward to and you are dealing with each other's personalities on a daily basis.
You can stop interacting with her at work and do it during your free time, or you can break off the relationship and remain friends. Either option is infinitely preferable to a sexual, intimate relationship that lacks sexuality and intimacy.
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On January 02 2013 02:14 Holy_AT wrote:
I advise you to leave her immeadtly and to not look back, the fackt that you work together is bad in that regard, maybe you should also look for a new job. If she says she doesnt love you and if she is not sure about you and what not then there is no reason to stay with her.
If she doesn't leave you in the next year or month she might leave you if you have a family (you say you are considering marriage?)
This is no woman to build a future with or to love. If she is not sure about you, she doesn't deserve your love.
Well, I'm trying to take it one step at a time. I'm still young and marriage is a few years off. I'm not entirely ruling it out, but right now I don't see us getting married. My main concern right now is that it seems like she wants to break up because we hit the "6 month period" and she's still not in love. I think the root of the problem is that she's thinking long term and I am taking it one step at a time. I don't want to hold her back if her end goal is marriage, but at the same time, I don't think we've given the relationship enough time to bud for her to warrant breaking up with me. We get along fine and great. I almost feel like this is a concern she had in her head and it festered into something material until it became a problem. *Sigh*
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On January 02 2013 02:37 CosmicSpiral wrote:
OP, the simple fact is that you may have stumbled into a good relationship occurring in a bad space. Every relationship requires a certain balance in order to maintain consistent emotional responses (unlike sports/music/writing practice, there is no clear distinct goal you work towards). Considering that 60 hours a week is the near-equivalent of 9 hours per day, both of you are probably suffering from overexposure. There is little to look forward to and you are dealing with each other's personalities on a daily basis.
You can stop interacting with her at work and do it during your free time, or you can break off the relationship and remain friends. Either option is infinitely preferable to a sexual, intimate relationship that lacks sexuality and intimacy.
Thank you. I appreciate your analysis. Have you or anyone you know spent 9+ hours a day with your significant other and maintained a steady relationship?
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United States15275 Posts
On January 02 2013 02:47 xiaofan wrote:Show nested quote +On January 02 2013 02:37 CosmicSpiral wrote:
OP, the simple fact is that you may have stumbled into a good relationship occurring in a bad space. Every relationship requires a certain balance in order to maintain consistent emotional responses (unlike sports/music/writing practice, there is no clear distinct goal you work towards). Considering that 60 hours a week is the near-equivalent of 9 hours per day, both of you are probably suffering from overexposure. There is little to look forward to and you are dealing with each other's personalities on a daily basis.
You can stop interacting with her at work and do it during your free time, or you can break off the relationship and remain friends. Either option is infinitely preferable to a sexual, intimate relationship that lacks sexuality and intimacy. Thank you. I appreciate your analysis. Have you or anyone you know spent 9+ hours a day with your significant other and maintained a steady relationship?
Personally, I've never seen or heard of such a relationship working. Perhaps they do exist but it would require a much stronger base of empathy/tolerance than what should be expected of two people who are merely dating. That's the kind of bond that develops between soldiers in war or servants to their master. It would be frankly unrealistic.
Regardless of whether this can happen, your girlfriend is going through a period of cognitive dissonance. She is going out with someone in an environment that kills the spontaneity and desire associated with such a relationship; she can't fool herself into feeling the emotions she expects. This is why dating someone you work with is generally frowned upon. Both sets of expectations (the worker-worker and boyfriend-girlfriend paradigms) cannot mutually co-exist without one degrading the other. Clearly the former is doing well at the expense of the latter.
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prob. spending too much time at work with her. i agree. *nod*
just be careful because there is a minimum level of exposure as well. but any exposure at work doesn't add any value and consumes a lot of resources in terms of time.
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just make her dream again noob. GIVE HER SOME F***ING DREAMS.
Go out, have fun, make special things, give her some care but not too much, sex at least 3 times a weak.
In that way everythings gonna be allright
JUST MAKE SHE DREAM bring her to a good restaurant, then to a fashion pub/bar where she could have a fucking cosmopolitan, here you give her a single rose.
BE CREATIVE MORON
And please do not over react giving her a full time attention.
User was banned for being a terrible poster and posting malicious links in the past.
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Where do you guys work? Could you find another similar job to it relatively easy? Or is it more of a full-time/career which would be difficult to do so?
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Start flirting with her friend. If she gets jealous it's still on.
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This isn't about spending too much time together, this is about not enough sexual attraction.
Quantity?
Quality?
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If she hasn't figured out she is in love now, it isn't going to happen dude. This is the time when the honeymoon phase ends, if the puppy love never happened, it never will. I hate to say that to you, but it is true. We need to know if this is a career or just a random job. Being honest here, she is being very nice to you about this. She is explaining herself, and not leaving anything off about it that might make you wonder. You can try to save it, but the only way to do it to do 3 things
- You need to seperate A LOT, like cut the hours you see each other by 3/4
- You need to start slipping aphrodesiacs, sweet nothings, and things she loves into your lives (i.e. if she is sick, put a book that she loves out on a desk easily to reach or leave notes that you love her around
- You need to NOT be needy here. You being needy here means she is walking out the door, be confident that she will love you
Like r.Evo said, it is quality, not quantity.
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EPT
