It’s natural that you take care of people you love. But to what extent? When does the caring end and being exploited start?
I’m a non-smoker who met and began dating a man who smokes. That may seem as a minor thing, a trifle, I know. But after getting to know him better, I found that smoking was the least of his problems.
Over the course of our relationship, I discovered he had several family, health, financial and alcohol abuse problems, too. I’ve walked him through overcoming some of these things during our two years together. But other issues seem irresolvable.
He allows his mother to manipulate his life. He’s still smoking even though I despise it. I feel that the more I do for him, the less he does for himself.
When I try to discuss these issues with him, he keeps asking me to be patient because he’s “newly clean and sober”. At this point, I’m completely fed up with his mother, family, friends, and I’m feeling as though I’m doing everything for him… but he’s doing nothing to take care of himself.
We are just two years into this relationship and I feel like I need to cut my losses and leave him to his family and get on with my life. He thinks I’m being impatient and need to give him more time to become the man I want. I gave him 6 months to stop smoking, and that was a year ago. And it’s only the smokng issue. Am I wrong for wanting to leave for the sake of my health and sanity?
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