F29 and M29 - LDR and Breakup
I (F29) am struggling to understand my boyfriend’s behaviour and honestly don’t know if I’m being strung along or if he’s genuinely confused.
We’ve known each other since school. We liked me back then and used to talk every day for 3 years and even again in college but when he asked me he was in Canada and I was India. And I said no because I didn’t know how it would work.
At 27, after years of knowing each other, we finally decided to date. He came to India, stayed with me for 5 months and we made a plan as to how this would work. We’ve now been in a long-distance relationship for about 1.5 years. In the beginning, everything felt amazing. We were serious, talking about marriage, and even planning a future where I would move continents, do an MBA, and build a life together with him in the US.
After 6 months, every 2–3 months there would be a breakup. Usually over fights, emotional overwhelm, insecurity, or him spiralling about my past relationships. I’ve dated 5 people before him; he has had 1 serious relationship. Somehow my past became a recurring issue he could never fully get over, even though he knew about it from the beginning.
At the same time, his ex would occasionally text and they would talk, which also caused friction between us. Add long distance on top of that, and things would become emotionally exhausting.
This time, around my birthday, we had another huge fight and breakup, but he patched things up again. Then right after he went back to the US, he suddenly asked for a “break to think.” Soon after that, he broke up with me again.
This time he said something that completely shattered me:
He said he loves me, but he cannot accept my past.
It’s now been a month since the breakup. I was devastated and begged him not to do this. Since then, we’ve still been talking every few days, but nothing actually changes. In our last conversation, he said he needed “a month” to think because I’m coming to the US soon. He also said he would “appreciate” if I didn’t move on, but that I’m “free to move on if I want.”
I genuinely cannot understand this behaviour.
How do you ask someone not to move on while also refusing to commit to them?
How do you plan marriage with someone, discuss meeting their family, and then suddenly become “confused” after 1.5 years?
And if my past was truly unacceptable to him, why stay, repeatedly come back, and deepen the relationship every single time?
I feel emotionally exhausted because I keep holding onto the version of us that was planning a future together, while he keeps oscillating between love and uncertainty.
I don’t know whether this is fear, insecurity, emotional immaturity, or whether he simply doesn’t want this relationship but also doesn’t want to lose me completely. Any advice would be helpful!