Is this relationship worth it anymore ?

[rolfedewolfe]

Hello again, very recently I've had a pretty heartbreaking conversation with my boyfriend.

He told me it's something he meant to tell me a month ago, but just never found the right time, so I convinced him to rip the bandaid and after extensive discussion, I'm still lost...

So if I understand correctly, he felt that our monogamy is not ideal, that he wished to form a connection like ours with other people as well. He said we could be friends and keep the same benefits (the love and sex). He doesn't really get his needs met with me I think, his needs of intellectuality and to always question and analyse things. I don't have the energy for that kind of stuff but I try my best to listen to what he has to say at least.

Now where we are at right now is that we stay monogamous partners. On his side, he will try to make deeper platonic connections because he wans to deconstruct the idea that romance is the only way he can have deep connections with others. He says I'm his deepest connection and he doesn't want to lose me. That's his conclusion, not mine.

Now I still love him, he still loves me, we have fun together despite the fact that his needs aren't always met exactly. The idea of becoming friends is very painful to me, because it will never be like our romance. Our relationship was sexual from the beginning so we never had much time to explore ourselves platonically before becoming a couple. If we became friends, we would need to readapt and rediscover each other. And I think I wouldn't be okay being friends with benefits with him, even if that's basically how our relationship started.
I don't know if I would like to be friends, and I'm definitely not ready yet because I like how our romance is going.

Sooo... What the hell. Do you guys have some insight ?

[char]

Hi rolfedewolfe, welcome back. I'm sorry to hear that your boyfriend's confession has been troubling you, though.

Before giving specific advice, I'd like to make sure a few things. First of all, is this the same boyfriend you mentioned in your post from December 2025? How have things been going since then? I'd also like to know how you'd differentiate between romantic, platonic, and sexual relationships, since it sounds like these dynamics are distinct from one another to you. Could you walk us through it?

[rolfedewolfe]

Hi Char, yes it's the same boyfriend. I would say that things have been pretty well, mostly positive.

As for how I differentiate different types of relationships, well I'm honestly not sure.
In romantic relationships for me I have this idea of committement, stability, routine, and a more open and frequent showing of love through physical affection and just enjoying the presence of your significant other.

In friendships to me it's also an important connection with someone, minus the need for physical affection and sex, and it's less committed and routine is not so important.

As for sexual relationships, the only one i've had is with romantic partners, but my current boyfriend is where I've been able to explore it the most. I don't have a lot of experience outside of that. I just know that me and my bf started off as FWB, and quickly emotions got involved and we decided to become exclusive to each other. I am pretty open to him about my sexual attraction to other men, although I never act on it because I am committed. He is a bit less open about his sexual attraction to other women for some reason, maybe I scared him off by expressing my fears of him falling in love with someone else through the gateway of sex (like I did with him). He reassures me that he wouldn't cheat, which I believe.

[char]

Thanks for clarifying! I wonder if your boyfriend is aware of how you differentiate between those three dynamics, and whether or not he's aligned with you on that matter. After all, it's good practice that everyone on board of a relationship knows exactly what they have going on and what they can/should or can't/shouldn't do. And since having deep talks seems to be an activity he likes to do, it might be something you can bring up/bring up again. What do you think of that?

Secondly, if this romantic relationship changed into a platonic and sexual one, what would be the hardest thing to adjust to on your end? You mentioned that you wouldn't want to be in a friends-with-benefits situation with him after this, and I think it's important for you to keep that in mind. Further, this also makes me wonder if you have close friends/trusted family members other than your boyfriend to support you. Frankly, if your boyfriend is the only person you have deep attachment to, I worry that changing your relationship with him into something with less intensity could greatly affect your wellbeing.

Lastly, I'd like to remind you of Heather's message to you on your December 2025 thread. Sometimes our relationships won't last forever, and that's okay. Even if they don't last forever, these relationships can and will still give us valuable lessons. It doesn't mean that this relationship you have with him was inherently bad and abusive, it's just that we're not going to click with everyone we meet in life and that's completely typical of human relationships. Do you get what I mean?

[rolfedewolfe]

So, he has told me that he believes romance and sex can be detached, that you can have sex with your friends and not develop feelings for them. I guess I sort of agree with him on that theoritically, but in practice me and him ended up falling in love so I don't know if I agree with it that much anymore.
And also he believes we can basically keep our current dynamic and slap the label of friends on it instead of couple which doesn't sit right with me... I have never felt this strongly about my friends, and I've never felt so many unexplainable emotions and feelings like this over anyone but him, so I feel like we just can't be friends. If we did become friends, my feelings for him would have to be much less intense, less of these unknown feelings and more familiar feelings I associate with friends.

I don't know how my feelings could change, and I'm not ready to give up on these feelings, although I won't lie that this conversation has broken something in the bond we had and I do feel different. I was just hoping it would go back to normal at some point since we decided to keep going with our relationship, since this is a super recent event.

I do have some close friends that can give me support but my friends are all so different I wouldn't trade one for another. I wouldn't wanna lose what me and my boyfriend have, I'm not ready.

It's so painful to talk about this because of all these feelings I don't understand, some random things will make me want to cry. Him hugging me, kissing me after all this makes me want to cry.

[KierC]

Hey there rolfedewolfe <3 I hope it’s ok I’m popping in here.

Gosh, it sounds like that was a really painful conversation. I read through this thread and the last one, and honestly I’m sorry to hear you’re feeling this way, though I totally understand how you’re feeling this way. I’d feel this way too, and I certainly have before in relationships. It sounds like he wants to shift to “friends with benefits” and has kinda just decided it, and that doesn’t seem like something you want to do. Is that right?

Choosing the relationship dynamic isn’t something he can do without your input. Relationships should be co-created, not something where one person decides the dynamic that works for them and the other person is along for the ride. Know what I mean?

I’m hearing you say he “says” a lot of things without necessarily asking how *you* feel too, as someone who is also present in the relationship dynamic. It sounds like he shares a lot of intellectualized opinions about sex and relationships, but I’m not hearing him asking you how you feel about those things. Can I ask, how does he typically participate in these conversations? Do you feel like you’re being listened to and cared for in these conversations?

I know it can be really, really awful when you want romance and closeness with someone, and the dynamic they’re wanting isn’t compatible with what you want. I can imagine this dynamic might make it especially painful or heart-breaking to experience physical affection directly around this tough conversation, so I hear you when you say you want to cry after he hugged and kissed you What sort of meaning did you take from feeling that way?

[rolfedewolfe]

Hi KierC, you're right, I did feel like he kinda had decided that he wanted to be "fwb" and assumed I would be okay with it.

In those discussions I tried my best to explain my views, so he knows that I'm not okay with having an open relationship, although I'll probably have to get back to him about the friendship topic now that it's more clear to me. On my side I had already accepted that I don't really want to have an open relationship. I guess he is still not exactly accepting of this, but I don't understand if he can or cannot live with monogamy, and he's not sure himself. He seems to really like the idea of polygamy, without any experience with it. I feel like there's not much else I can do, I feel like now I can only give him some sort of space to figure it out.

I really don't know what to make of these feelings, they're extremely unpleasant and unconstructive. I really wish to avoid them. I think it's a clear sign that we are more than friends. And maybe it's a sign that we are unsalvageable as a couple and that there's no point in trying to fix things... Or maybe I'm just really glad to still have him but I'm still scared to trust him fully.

I don't want to lose what we have just yet, I still like what we have. He does too, he just thinks that he's settling for "good" when he could be missing out on "amazing".

[Heather]

rolfedewolfe, I'm so sorry to see you still having such a hard time in this relationship. My heart is really breaking for you. It's often challenging when one partner wants a shift in the model of relationship you have, but I think the reason this is so heartbreaking isn't so much about the kind of changes your partner wants as the ways he keeps going about it, very much including what keeps sounding to me like him just not coming at this like someone in a partnership, and instead, approaching it as someone deciding about your relationship himself, and based on what he wants for himself.

I don't want to interrupt the conversation you're having with Kier, but I do want to pose a question to you regarding this last thing you said:

Don't you want to be in intimate relationships where the person you are in them with already thinks what you both have IS amazing? And where they are as focused on making what they have with you amazing, instead of just seeking out amazing for themselves?