Dear Peppermint:

I am glad you posted your dilemma here. I think that moving to the UK is a bad idea for you, at this time, for the following reasons that you indicated:

1. This is how you feel about moving to the UK: “any thought of change terrifies me to the extent that I feel light- headed and I would withdraw. Every time I think about the possibility of moving overseas I just panic”. You don’t get excited and motivated when you think about moving to the UK, you feel terrified, light headed, withdrawn and panicked.

2.  You do not have job prospects in the UK.

3. Your plan was this: “to live the rest of my life back in my home country”, and you didn’t indicate a change of plans.

4. You feel guilty about leaving your aging parents back in your home country and are worried about your mother’s health.

5. Your boyfriend in the UK is in his late 50s while you are in your late 20s, a three decade age gap, and you are conflicted about the age gap: “I feel like we might drift apart because of our age gap.. life has kind of just begun for me and he is somewhat close to retirement age”, plus you don’t know if you “can commit to a relationship for the long term, due to a fear of loss of identity and independence”.

And for the following reasons that come up in my mind:

6. Your boyfriend might be healthy now, but he will be entering his seventh decade soon and health often deteriorate at that age. Imagine how you may feel taking care of a sick, aging man while your mother (or father) is aging and sick in your home country (?)

7. A pandemic is not a good time to make life changing decisions. Wait until the pandemic is contained and the economy begins to recover before you decide where in the world you want to live.

* I am wondering: do you feel guilty regarding your older boyfriend, as in being indebted to him in any way?

anita

• This reply was modified 3 years, 9 months ago by .

Dear Peppermint:

You are welcome. I agree with you: no one knows if the pandemic will be over in six months. No one knows if an effective vaccine will be developed or not. We really don’t know.

“I am worried that if I tell him I want to hold off any decision-making we might get into a row”-

– I am surprised you mention a possible row because you wrote that the two of you got along so well: “he was really supportive and always protected me. He has treated me really well and we do get on well”. If there was never a row between you and him, why is it that you are afraid that there might be a row if you tell him to hold off any decision making?

Another item, the indebtedness you feel to him, it is something to look at and resolve. If you want to look at it, list what you believe your debts are. Do you owe him for time he spent with you, for money spent on you (how much money, and was there any agreement about returning that money?), did he suggest to you in one way or another that you owe him something, and if so, what did he suggest that you owe him?

One more thing: does he tend to tell you how things are and what you should do, silencing your doubts and concerns with his overly confident, overly optimistic assertions, sort of.. sending you the message that your thoughts are not valid, that your feelings are not to be considered because he knows what you should be doing?

anita

Dear Peppermint:

You are welcome. Good to read that you have no financial debts to him.

“He has treated me really well… sometimes hanging up on me”- well, like you stated yourself, it is rude to hang up the phone on you. So he has treated you really well and really rudely.

“sometimes hanging up on me. I know he has a stressful job and works about 10-12 hours for 5-6 days per week”- if he is rude because he works so many hours, can you then expect him to treat you well only when he works fewer hours and when he is not otherwise distressed? (It is possible for a person to be kind/not rude when calm and when overworked and otherwise distressed).

In my recent post to you I asked you: “does he tend to tell you how things are and what you should do, silencing your doubts and concerns with his overly confident, overly optimistic assertions, sort of.. sending you the message that your thoughts are not valid, that your feelings are not to be considered..?”, and you answered: “you have identified my feelings very accurately, I do feel like the overly optimistic assertions make me feel that my thoughts are not valid and that I need to be ‘positive’ all the time”-

– First, when he engages in a row with you and hangs up the phone on you, he is not making “overly optimistic assertions”; he is making pessimistic, aggressive assertions.

Second, when he, an allegedly “overly optimistic” person, forces his said optimism on you, it leads me to expect a pessimistic future for yourself if you were to live with him. The issue I see is not one of optimism, but of him forcing his position on you. Whatever his position may be (optimistic, pessimistic or realistic), he shouldn’t be forcing it on you.

anita

Dear Peppermint:

“It’s almost like talking to a brick wall.. I just don’t know how to get through to…”- well, how can you get through a brick wall = a person who has no interest in what you want and whose only interest is in what he wants?

You tell him what you think and he says that he understands, but he doesn’t understand, he just says the words. He doesn’t understand not because he lacks the intelligence required to understand, but because he lacks the interest to understand you.

Seems to me that you are like a child who is trying to get a parent to understand you, so to get the parent’s permission to do what you think is the right thing for you to do. It is as if this older man, in your mind, is an authority figure. As if you are afraid of him somewhat and that fear (fear of disappointing him/ fear of his short temper) is tiring you (“I’m just a bit tired”).

Am I correct?

anita

• This reply was modified 3 years, 9 months ago by .

Dear Peppermint:

You are welcome. “I don’t want a row… He is expecting me to submit a visa application this week but at the moment, the place I’m living in is in lockdown and many places are shut. Is it a bad sign that I am nervous about telling him that there are more delays re stuff like visa applications, flights etc.? I guess in other words, things he probably doesnt want to hear?”-

– it is a bad sign to be living under the threat of a row. A life lived in fear of a row is a bad kind of life, no matter where you live it.

He told you: “you just need to bite the bullet”. Will he bite the bullet if you told him that you need to have no communication with him for two months, until Sept 15 (or longer)?

anita