'AITA for wanting to leave my BF of 6 years, knowing he may be proposing soon?' UPDATED

"AITA for wanting to leave my boyfriend of 6 years, knowing he may be proposing soon?"

I (23 female) have been dating my boyfriend (25 male) for almost 6 years. This one’s kind of a doozy, so I apologize haha. My boyfriend and I started dating my freshman year of college. Everything was going really well, and everything just fell into place. It just felt right … untiiiil the pandemic hit, and we all got sent home to finish college virtually during my senior year.

We have been in a long distance relationship since, because I then began attending graduate school for speech therapy. To save money, I lived with my parents, and he lived with his, who live 3 hours away from me.

When the long distance began, my only ask of him was that we be married when I graduate. In our families, it is super important that we are married before living together (you already know, purity culture 🙃). He saw this as reasonable and claimed it was something he really wanted. Then we could get married and get a place together once I’m done with school.

Here is the dilemma. He still hasn’t proposed yet, like we had agreed. He expressed that he was planning on talking to my parents to get their blessing before planning the proposal. Months ago, he initiated a conversation with my parents about next steps, and hasn’t said anything up until last week (he’s been at my house 3 times and never sought after opportunities to say something).

He’s putting it off and there’s only one reason why he would. It would be one thing if he had expressed that he wasn’t ready for marriage, whether that be not being emotionally ready or financially ready. But he’s been talking a lot about engagement for the last two years, getting my hopes up, and then nothing happens.

One important thing to note is that he is an only child, with a mom who has a meltdown when the idea of marriage/moving out is even mentioned. She’s been an issue throughout our entire relationship, because she is constantly trying to create division between us, whether that is talking sh!t about him to me, or vice versa.

He has now begun expressing fears of leaving his parents when he is the only one there to take care of them, and he is afraid of what they’ll think of him if he leaves for a career opportunity, or for me who is seeking career opportunities in speech therapy in various locations.

Onto his conversation with my parents, which is the biggest concern I am having. First, he told my parents he was planning on proposing this summer. He then expressed that he was afraid of commitment and sacrifice.

My dad asked him what he meant, to which he responded “well I like my ‘me time’ and my space to play video games and watch sporting events, which my parents give me. I’m scared to give that up for a wife or to help with kids."

This kind of broke me, because he would have NEVER said anything like this before moving back home with his parents. He’s extremely comfortable with his life and doesn’t want to change it. But I want to change mine. I want to move out and get an amazing speech therapy career opportunity this fall.

I want to get married and have kids. This was something I had wanted to do with him, but with his unsupportive parents and some of the concerns he’s expressing to everyone but me, I’m really scared to proceed with him, and include him in things such as apartment or job hunting. Things haven’t been the same as they were before we started long distance for a long time.

I’ve been trying to remain optimistic through all of this, in case things do go back to the way they were once we got a place together. But that optimism is fading. I thought I could have the best of both worlds (the career and the guy), but I’m stuck at a crossroads instead and am incredibly stressed and heartbroken.

This is supposed to be an exciting time, but is just dreadful because of all of this. Any thoughts? Please be brutally honest, especially if I could have proceeded differently with this.

What do you think? AITA? This is what top commenters had to say:

miyuki_m said:

It's understandable that you want to be married so that you can move in without having to take sh!t from parents who don't approve of premarital relations. However, the fact is that if you want your marriage to succeed, there are issues here that need to be worked through first.

"he is an only child, with a mom who has a meltdown when the idea of marriage/moving out is even mentioned." This is very likely the biggest issue you have. Who do you think is in his ear, encouraging these fears he's been expressing? I'd be willing to bet that this woman is fighting to maintain whatever control she has over him and will not relinquish even one iota of it to you willingly.

The only way she's going to stop is if your BF forces her to, but he's not ready to do that. The hard truth is that your BF is not ready to get married. We see so many stories on this app about MILs who treat their DILs like they are the enemy. If you marry your BF, you will become one of them.

This woman is already talking sh!t about you and trying to break you up, and you're not even engaged yet. If you marry him, this is your future unless your BF grows a spine.

beito14159 said:

He doesn’t sound ready, the reason doesn’t really matter. I think the real problem is that he isn’t communicating this and that shows he is definitely not mature enough to be married.

If you are having any doubts at all, don’t accept a proposal from him. If you want to try and see how things go, do your own apartment and stuff and see if the relationship lasts. Honestly you’re too young to tie yourself down to someone who doesn’t want to be an adult.

Dry_Ask5493 said:

It sounds like you are wasting your time on this guy. Break up with him and move on. Let him stay living with his parents with his “me” time.

And NickelPickle2018 said:

He’s not ready for marriage. Accept that and continue dating or find someone that wants what you want.

EDIT:

The main issue isn’t that he hasn’t proposed, if he had concerns about a marriage or wasn’t ready he needs to tell me. But he either hasn’t told me or whenever I have asked he brushes it off and says he wants to marry me. My main issue is his consistency. He says one thing but doesn’t demonstrate it through actions. I’ve had conversations with him about this and he just says he’ll try to do better.

As far as the videogames/sports go I really try not to be nitpicky or controlling about what he does in his spare time or how much of it he does. I’ve been gaslit and hurt in previous relationships for “being too controlling” so I try to be extra conscientious of that.

I’m supportive of him hanging out with the boys, and try to get to know them as well. Although these things aren’t my go-tos, I try to watch sporting events with him and play videogames with him to try to understand the hype.

Five months later, she shared this update:

Holy s#!t y’all … it took me 4 months but I did it. I ended it. This update is ALSO a doozy, so bear with me. Over the last 4 months, all our relationship has been is just talks of either marriage/engagement or taking me out on, when he never actually does the things he says he’ll do. Lots of gaslighting. Manipulation. The works.

Whenever I wanted to have a conversation about serious stuff (e.g. where to live, finances, kids, etc), he brushed it off like it was nothing. This was how I knew he was not planning for the future. Apparently his parents know more about his financial situation than I do (which ugh don’t get me started 🙄). I approached them about it and they showed me how many loans he has. It was ASTRONOMICAL …

and he hadn’t paid a dime since he graduated from college 4 years ago. And he had zero expenses. Nothing. This made me upset because not only did I have expenses, but I was working insane hours to pay for school and for my expenses. And he didn’t make any attempts to have a stable, consistent job over the summer. At that point, I was done.

It took a lot of courage to leave, especially considering the problems with his mom (I thought she’d bite my head off for dumping her baby lmao). But I finally did it this past weekend. Damn did I dodge a bullet.

The whole conversation was very “gas-lighty” and manipulative. I felt like I was witnessing a toddler throwing a tantrum. He was crying, pacing, throwing stuff I bought him, etc. He accused me of cheating when I told him the long distance was affecting my feelings for him. He tried to bribe me with stuff to stay with him (like a Nintendo switch … bruh).

He guilted me for all the dates he took me on over the summer and in college YEARS ago (keep in mind I was paying for undergrad and graduate school out of pocket and had no money 🥴). He accused me of never wanting him to be happy. The worst part … when I told his mom we broke up, it was essentially a “don’t let the door hit you on the way out” kind of conversation.

She basically said “sorry y’all broke up, have a good life, sayonara Sammy, etc). To be honest, I was hoping she’d yell at me or “bite my head off”, just so I could see her stick up for him a little bit. Just to show me she truly cares about his well being and not just her own for whenever he decided to leave her.

I’m sad and extremely anxious, because I left something that was comfortable, and don’t know what the future brings. I hated hurting him, but he has inflicted a lot pain and doubts into my mind. A lot of you said in the comments that I’m young, and that it will be okay. And you’re right.

But being a girl in your 20’s is so hard, especially with finding/maintaining friendships and relationships. It’ll be fine though. Thank you for the advice and support, and thank you for taking the time to read all of my word vomit. This community is truly amazing