karmapolice
01-02-2007, 08:42 PM
My girlfriend and I have been in an intimate romantic relationship for roughly two years. We were going in different states for college so naturally I was concerned with how we were going to continue our relationship being unable to see each other for months at a time. I tentatively suggested we have an “open relationship” in college.
As weeks passed in our first semester of college I became concerned due to the fact that Hana stopped displaying any affection over the phone except in response to me. I felt like I was talking to a good friend. Not the girl who I’ve loved for the past two years. Also in this time I grew increasingly uncomfortable with the idea of us dating other people.
Once my girlfriend expressed surprise when I said I would be upset if she slept with someone else. This surprised me since I suppose I had a more conservative view of what an open relationship was. I guess I thought that being in such an important and long lasting relationship, I wanted to leave the possibility of seeing other people open, but it didn’t mean having casual sex. To me that undermined the importance of our long term relationship and the intimacy we shared. I suppose at this point I was leaning more heavily towards a monogamous relationship anyway but I didn’t know how to tell Hana my change of heart. She reassured me that there was no one there who she would even think about having casual sex with.
At this point I had abandoned any intentions to date any of the girls I had met because none of them interested me as much as Hana. It was an important concept to me not to risk lessening or trivializing what I had with Hana for a girl that didn’t mean a whole lot to me. I suppose I mislead Hana into believing I was more ok with her seeing other people than I really was. I didn’t want to flip on her and say it wasn’t ok and since I didn’t expect anything to happen in the first semester I wasn’t too concerned.
Well something did happen in the first semester. Hana slept with someone. This hit me like a freight train. It’s a good thing she told me online and I was able to respond calmly. It was apparently a friend of hers and she regretted it. She said “I’d never slept with anyone I didn’t love and I don’t care to repeat the experience.” I told her it was ok and we tentatively decided to break up.
When we were broken up things were basically the same as they were before except I was periodically depressed over the whole thing. We kept in touch and on thanksgiving break I saw Hana and we reconciled but nary a mention was made of what happened. For the next three weeks until I would see her again we kept in touch over the phone and Hana was more warm and loving than I remember in months. It was like seeing her changed everything.
When she finally came home for winter break it was just like old times. I had a sit down with her to talk about what happened and basically told her everything that I’ve just written. She was unaware of how much it meant to me and what degree of commitment I expected. I concluded that I mislead her into thinking that I was more ok with her seeing other people than I was and we need to talk further on the matter so that we’re both on the same page before we go back to school. I also expressed to her how important I realize now a monogamous relationship is to me and that for the time being I would like to have a committed long distance relationship at least until we figure out exactly what we want to do. She was very hesitant about this and still hasn’t given me an answer.
Things have been going really well over break but a few things have been bothering me. First, after two years of an intimate romantic relationship I can’t get Hana to agree to a monogamous long distance relationship at least for the time being? Second, I know virtually nothing about the guy she slept with. I figured out that his name was Chris because that’s the only guy’s name I can remember her mentioning more than once. When I ask about their relationship all she tells me is that he is just a friend. They seem to be keeping in touch pretty well over the break. Hana was finishing up an IM conversation with him once when I came over. I’ve been around twice when he has called her. And I feel very guilty about this but I read a recent text message to him on Hana’s phone. It said “I love you!”. Hana says that to everyone though. She tells friends that she loves them all the time. But the fact that he is a friend, who she had sex with, and whom she keeps in touch with over break, and she is text messaging him to say “I love you!”, it just doesn’t feel like he’s “just a friend”.
So I’m worried that Hana may be unintentionally misleading one of us. She seems very committed to me I genuinely believe she loves me more than anyone just like she says. But she won’t make a commitment or even get back to me about the whole long distance relationship question. And meanwhile I get the strong feeling that she may be unintentionally misleading her friend in college to believe that there is more going on.
I don’t believe she is trying to mislead me but I think she may be unaware of how this all looks to me. Sex means a lot to me so it was very painful to realize that it does not mean to Hana what it does to me. And although Hana tells people all the time that she loves them, I take it to heart when she says it to me. It’s a very difficult thing to see these connections that are important to me tossed around with her friend whom she has known for a few months.
I only have a few days to tie up these loose end with Hana before we go back to school and I won’t see her for another three months. I need a fresh pair of eyes on this issue.
As weeks passed in our first semester of college I became concerned due to the fact that Hana stopped displaying any affection over the phone except in response to me. I felt like I was talking to a good friend. Not the girl who I’ve loved for the past two years. Also in this time I grew increasingly uncomfortable with the idea of us dating other people.
Once my girlfriend expressed surprise when I said I would be upset if she slept with someone else. This surprised me since I suppose I had a more conservative view of what an open relationship was. I guess I thought that being in such an important and long lasting relationship, I wanted to leave the possibility of seeing other people open, but it didn’t mean having casual sex. To me that undermined the importance of our long term relationship and the intimacy we shared. I suppose at this point I was leaning more heavily towards a monogamous relationship anyway but I didn’t know how to tell Hana my change of heart. She reassured me that there was no one there who she would even think about having casual sex with.
At this point I had abandoned any intentions to date any of the girls I had met because none of them interested me as much as Hana. It was an important concept to me not to risk lessening or trivializing what I had with Hana for a girl that didn’t mean a whole lot to me. I suppose I mislead Hana into believing I was more ok with her seeing other people than I really was. I didn’t want to flip on her and say it wasn’t ok and since I didn’t expect anything to happen in the first semester I wasn’t too concerned.
Well something did happen in the first semester. Hana slept with someone. This hit me like a freight train. It’s a good thing she told me online and I was able to respond calmly. It was apparently a friend of hers and she regretted it. She said “I’d never slept with anyone I didn’t love and I don’t care to repeat the experience.” I told her it was ok and we tentatively decided to break up.
When we were broken up things were basically the same as they were before except I was periodically depressed over the whole thing. We kept in touch and on thanksgiving break I saw Hana and we reconciled but nary a mention was made of what happened. For the next three weeks until I would see her again we kept in touch over the phone and Hana was more warm and loving than I remember in months. It was like seeing her changed everything.
When she finally came home for winter break it was just like old times. I had a sit down with her to talk about what happened and basically told her everything that I’ve just written. She was unaware of how much it meant to me and what degree of commitment I expected. I concluded that I mislead her into thinking that I was more ok with her seeing other people than I was and we need to talk further on the matter so that we’re both on the same page before we go back to school. I also expressed to her how important I realize now a monogamous relationship is to me and that for the time being I would like to have a committed long distance relationship at least until we figure out exactly what we want to do. She was very hesitant about this and still hasn’t given me an answer.
Things have been going really well over break but a few things have been bothering me. First, after two years of an intimate romantic relationship I can’t get Hana to agree to a monogamous long distance relationship at least for the time being? Second, I know virtually nothing about the guy she slept with. I figured out that his name was Chris because that’s the only guy’s name I can remember her mentioning more than once. When I ask about their relationship all she tells me is that he is just a friend. They seem to be keeping in touch pretty well over the break. Hana was finishing up an IM conversation with him once when I came over. I’ve been around twice when he has called her. And I feel very guilty about this but I read a recent text message to him on Hana’s phone. It said “I love you!”. Hana says that to everyone though. She tells friends that she loves them all the time. But the fact that he is a friend, who she had sex with, and whom she keeps in touch with over break, and she is text messaging him to say “I love you!”, it just doesn’t feel like he’s “just a friend”.
So I’m worried that Hana may be unintentionally misleading one of us. She seems very committed to me I genuinely believe she loves me more than anyone just like she says. But she won’t make a commitment or even get back to me about the whole long distance relationship question. And meanwhile I get the strong feeling that she may be unintentionally misleading her friend in college to believe that there is more going on.
I don’t believe she is trying to mislead me but I think she may be unaware of how this all looks to me. Sex means a lot to me so it was very painful to realize that it does not mean to Hana what it does to me. And although Hana tells people all the time that she loves them, I take it to heart when she says it to me. It’s a very difficult thing to see these connections that are important to me tossed around with her friend whom she has known for a few months.
I only have a few days to tie up these loose end with Hana before we go back to school and I won’t see her for another three months. I need a fresh pair of eyes on this issue.