Care for yourself first so you can care for others

Dear Miss U,
I am very depressed and lonely lately. My fiance is having a rough time, as he struggles with depression which gets much worse in winter. He’s been trying to find stable employment for years with no luck. He lost his dog of 11 years last month. He doesn’t have professional support because he has no insurance. He is isolating and he hardly talks to me. When we do talk, it doesn’t feel the same. It feels like he’d rather be doing anything else than dealing with my emotional neediness. I also have depression, so when he isolates I feel very rejected and unloved. I feel like he is putting his depression first, and isn’t really bothered about our relationship because he finds that hard to deal with too. I am due to fly out to him on Christmas Eve, and he has said he thinks I will regret it and wish I hadn’t come because he will be so depressed. I offered to fly out sooner to be by his side through this depression and he just threw excuses at me as to why he didn’t want me there. This is the second time I have felt rejected by him and it really hurts… [read more]

No One Deserves This

Dear Miss U,
My boyfriend and I have been together on and off for almost 2 years. He is in Australia and I am in the US. We broke up last December for 8 months (due to him not seeing a true future because of the distance) and got back together this July (because we never truly got over one another). After we got back together, we were both so excited for the future and have even talked about marriage and kids. I am graduating college this December and had originally decided to move to Australia for 6 months while figuring my life out so that way we could have some genuine time together to build our relationships further. However, he came to visit a few weeks ago and I woke up one morning questioning everything. Now I don’t know if I even want to be with him at all… [read more]

Is This Goodbye?

Dear Miss U,
…On my last visit, I felt a change in his interest toward intimacy and am concerned he has met someone else. I wasn’t snooping, but found an email from a French girl in my boyfriend’s inbox – he hadn’t signed out – I borrowed his laptop. The tone was friendly, however, he was suggesting airlines that fly to his closest city for her. Their sign off said ‘send you little kisses.’ I fear she visited before my last visit as, he went to stay with, as he called, “friends of friends,” who he had never met before (from France) visiting the USA in his closest city for 5 nights. This is not something that had happened before. In this time, he wasn’t online every day as usual. Maybe I’m over-reacting but I just have a bad gut feeling… [read more]

Battles Worth Picking

Dear Miss U,
My boyfriend and I met almost 2.5 years ago, our senior year of high school. He moved 6 hours away after graduation to college. The first year was rocky, he hid many things from me and although he said he never cheated, I found things like pictures of him with girls in his room his first year. He ended up switching roommates and was surrounded by better friends and a better environment. After the first year, he tried to transfer closer to home to a different school because he hated the first one. His parents said if he moved home, he has to end his relationship with me. At almost 20 years old, in the second year of LDR, his parents still control when we hang out, and how much time we spend together on breaks… [read more]

That Military Man

Dear Miss U,
I’ve been dating my boyfriend for 10 months. After being together for about 7 months he found out he was getting deployed for 9 months. When he first left we talked all the time and FaceTimed. As of recently, he started doing online classes and I work a lot. Now, when we do get a chance to talk, we bicker a lot and argue. As time goes by we try to not let little things bother us but it is becoming a reoccurring issue and I feel as though he has his life over there and I mine. It feels like we are both trying and we are still in this rut. I’m worried this distance will tear us apart and I’m not sure what to do anymore… [read more]

Proceed With Caution: LDR Boyfriend Asks for Gifts and Other Red Flags

Dear Miss U,
…This most recent visit was a little unusual; I told him I needed to abstain this time due to a medical issue, and he was going to cut the 3-day visit short because he “had things to do.” I asked him to please say for the whole time, and he said no. The next day he said he would stay for the whole time, which he did. He asks me to pay for things and once he said he wants me to buy him gifts. He has given me nice cards in the past but that is all. He is a flight attendant so he flies here for free. He keeps saying that he will “stay longer/ stay for a week,” but he actually stays for 1 to 3 days. Am I wasting my time? [read more]

You’re Not A Tree

Dear Miss U,
In high school, I dated a guy for about 6 months. He was from Colorado originally so he would always go back there for breaks. When he was gone I was so miserable because I missed him. I ended up breaking up with him because he cheated on me and ever since then I swore I’d never do a LDR again. Fast forward 4 years later, I have been dating my boyfriend for 1.5 years and we are in a LDR. He is from NY and I’m from MA but we both go to school in NY, about an hour apart from each other. We really only see each other once a week and during breaks, we’re lucky if see each other. I thought I would get used to it but I haven’t. Him, on the other hand, only knows LDR and I try to explain to him how much I hate it, but he always says, “We’ll get through it, we’ll get through it.” I love him, but I’m afraid that when it comes time for jobs, he’ll find a job outside of NY and we’ll have to continue the LDR. I don’t know if I can do that or want to do that but I don’t want to break up with him either… [read more]