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Dear Breakup Girl,

My boyfriend and I start dating seriously in January. We quickly become quite involved. He wants to see me every weekday (he was obligated to be out of town almost every weekend until June) and our respective crowds intermingle. All seems quite happy. I get my work done during the day and/or weekends so I have free time to spend with him. I grew accustomed to having him around a lot (something that never happened with previous jerky boyfriends).

Around May or so, I find out that he's feeling "compressed." Between hanging out with me every weekday and being out of town every weekend, he isn't getting enough stuff done/alone time. So, fine, we schedule a "night off" for him. This quickly multiplies into two nights off a week. Eventually I find out that he feels icky if he's around someone, even a loved one, for more than say, 72 hours, and that he then needs to get away from them for awhile. (He used to be married, and I cannot imagine how he managed this problem then.) I had no idea about this, as he seemed perfectly happy around me and still seems that way even if I've seen him over the time limit (like when we went on vacation for a week together). In all honesty, I cannot understand this. I only need to get away from someone if they're pissing me off, not because I get sick of them (or whatever his problem is). For me, getting time off from him is more along the lines of having a few hours alone; I just don't feel the need to GET AWAY like he does. So I don't get it. He was the one who wanted to spend time with me every night, even if it was between 2 and 8 AM.

The problem, BG? Most of the time, it's driving me nuts that he has these nights off. I'm so ashamed to admit this. It's such a reasonable thing, really. But somehow it's always gnawing at me that at least half of his having a night off (other than him doing work, which he sometimes does even when I'm over) is to GET AWAY FROM ME. Yes, he's admitted this to me (and now regrets it, because it bugs me so). It hurts to know that I have to be gotten away from like that so often. I know, his friends should see him alone, too, and I should see my friends alone (which I did on weekends back in the old days), etc.. I have to agree with that, even with my evil feelings going on. But it doesn't help that almost nobody understands why he has these nights off; his oldest friends say things like, "Why are you still doing nights off? He's not gone every weekend anymore." I really miss not seeing him at least sometime during the day, and, in all honesty, I never have liked sleeping alone at night. Even as a kid, I had 15 stuffed animals in the bed.

Here's how it works, for the most part: We pick some night he has off. On that night, he does whatever he wants, and I do whatever I want. Supposedly, if the two of us want to go to the same place, then we should (and not not go in order to avoid each other). However, I'm not exactly sure on this one. When he finds out I'm going someplace where he wants to go, he wants to come along. I like that, and he's just as affectionate to me as he usually is. However, this is not the case when he's going somewhere I'd like to go. He doesn't ask me along, and I don't feel comfortable asking him if I can go if he doesn't want me to come. (He knows I want him along almost all the time.) After all, it's his time with his friends, without me.

He has never said this to me; it's what I think. If the point is his having time without me, then I shouldn't go where he's going. I feel guilty if I do. And yes, I do try to find things to do with my own friends (make that: whatever friends he's not hanging out with on nights off), but I can't constantly make plans every time this goes on, and I can't help but feel icky and jealous when I'm stuck at home (dying to get out but unable to find anyone to do anything with me) and later find out that he went off somewhere with the entire gang. But even if I went, I'd feel like I was intruding on him. I can't even figure out if it's okay to talk to him if he shows up on IRC (we go on the same channel frequently) -- if that's bugging him on his time off or not. He can't seem to decide; mostly he's said it's OK and I'm not bugging him, but sometimes he's all, "If you think you're bugging me, then stop doing it." I just have this guilt complex that my seeing/contacting him at all on nights off is BAD and defeats the purpose of having a night off from me.

It's a mess. We can't come up with solutions that'll make both of us happy. He doesn't like the idea of having time apart and meeting up with me just to go to sleep (my idea). I suggested that instead of assuming we see each other whenever there isn't a night off scheduled, he should just call me when he wants to see me and otherwise it's all his time. But he wants to see me more and figures I'd just be hurt when he didn't call me. I don't know if that's true or not.

He doesn't like the idea of scheduling time off, but how else am I supposed to make plans? I asked him what his ideal night off thing would be, and he said that I'd coincidentally have work to do whenever he'd feel the need to get away. I said, "That doesn't exactly work in practice." I've given up on asking him when he wants time off, and he now refuses to mention the words; he just says, "I'm going (X place)," and it takes me a bit of time to get the hint, "Without you, please."

I'm not saying I want us to be like Paul and Linda McCartney, but I'm feeling like I'm the smothering queen no matter what I do. I'm sick of feeling bad about this every couple of days. I feel like I'm completely irrational about this, that I should just shut up and get the heck over it already. And no, I don't want to find a boyfriend who will want to be with me 24-7; I just want to stop feeling bad about this or come up with some way that neither of us feels bad about this. But I suspect that there is no solution that'll make us both happy.

Am I really being irrational? Should I shut up and get over being bothered about this? I feel like such a stereotypical girly-girl now; it's disgusting.

--Linda M.

Dear Linda,

Whoa. Boundaries are good. But walking on eggshells around them is not. I mean, plenty of couples have this Night On, Night Off thing, sure. It's not a bad idea. Sometimes they explicitly enforce it, sometimes it just sorts itself out in the natural rhythm of being two people with two lives. Which itself is also not a bad idea. And if they find themselves up for the same thing, even on a Night Off, then off they go: 'cause that -- enjoying the same stuff at the same time -- is what couples are all about.

So why, why, why is this so complicated? Why, why, why is this letter so long?

Of course we all feel impertinent, irrational, pouty little pinpricks when, God forbid, our significant others don't want to spend every freaking waking moment with us. But it would indeed behoove you to be able to chuckle from time to time and distinguish reflex from reality. I also dare say that you are doing way too much oversensitive sentence-completion (" ... without you."). Unnecessary. Linda: go ahead and make plans. If your friends are always last-minute in-case-of-Night-Off plan B, no wonder they're not always around.

But to be fair to you: boy oh boy, is your boyfriend not helping. How did he "manage this problem" while he was married? Linda: "was married." Maybe he didn't.

Anyway, result: you two never get a night off from this constant he-this-blah-blah-she-that-blah-blah ticker tape. Solution: not sure. But I do know that at this point it's beyond some sort of practical calendar math that you just haven't thought of. Maybe it's a priority thing: not in the Day-Runner sense, but in the Life-meaning sense. Committing -- as a couple --  simply to lightening up about this might be analogous to toughening up about where this relationship is going.

Love,
Breakup Girl

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