I’m very broken

I don’t know where to begin but I’m just so hurt.

I’m a 29 year old female, my boyfriend is 30. We have been going out for seven years. My mom and my grandma, who have had a big influence in my life, are upset that he hasn’t decided to be committed by proposing marriage to me.

To give some background, my boyfriend is the oldest of his three siblings. His mom passed when he was 12 years old and their dad was deported when he was 16. His aunts and uncles on either side of his family have helped raise him and his siblings throughout the years of their life. When I met him, he lived (and still lives) in an apartment with his brother in a town that’s 30 minutes away that everyone considers to be a “bad area.” Despite all of that, I’ve accepted this.

Before my boyfriend met me, he worked in construction with his uncles. I’m not entirely sure what happened, but at some point, his uncle asked my boyfriend (when he was younger, like 18) to use his social security number for the checks they received for the construction jobs they did. Since my boyfriend didn’t fully understand all the details, he let his uncle use it and because of this, even though it’s been years, my boyfriends wages are now garnished by the government because they believe that he made all this money (which he didn’t) and didn’t file taxes for it.

This has definitely put a strain on our relationship. My boyfriend used to buy me dinner and gifts and now he can’t do that anymore. He’s racked up so much credit card debt trying to get by. Because of this, I don’t really expect much from him anymore. This Christmas that passed, he didn’t get me anything. But I got him and all of his siblings something. It really upset my mom more than me and now that I’m writing this, maybe I am stupid.

My mom and grandma are aware of his situation but they still don’t understand why he won’t propose to me. My mom pretty much said to my face that he doesn’t give a *** about me and that he’s ruined my life and that all of his problems turn into my problems. These problems also being that this October, he crashed his car on the expressway because he’d been working so much trying to pay bills. So, often, he’ll ask me to either take him to work or drive him home… which again, is a 30 minute drive to and from.

In the years that we’ve been together, he’s also taken in two dogs. The one dog is well behaved, ever since he was a puppy. However the second dog is a very active dog. He needs to go on walks, needs to play and run around… the problem is that my boyfriend and his brother work almost all the time and all day. Since I don’t live with them, I am often asked if I can check on them and I’ll usually play with them… but since I’ve recently changed jobs myself, and work farther than I used to, I can’t check on them as often. Even if I was to hire someone to check on them, the second dog is very reactive to new people he doesn’t know due to poor socialization, so he becomes destructive by chewing the couch or the walls.

So tonight, I drove my boyfriend home from work. While I was driving home, he sent me a picture how the second dog chewed the couch again. He’s over it and upset. I was upset and cried to him over the phone and on my way home. When I explained the situation to my mom tonight, she blew up on me. She basically told me how he’s ruined my life and I’ve wasted all of these years with him. She proceeded to tell me how much she hates him, his siblings and family. She told me that he doesn’t care about me and that no one in his family cares about me either.

I know that she’s hurt for me and she’s told me how she feels bad for me. At this point, I would just rather be alone. I’ve wanted marriage, I’ve wanted a future with my boyfriend. We wanted to live together and do all these things but he’s sacrificed more for his siblings than he has for me and I guess that should have been my wake up call… but I guess I was just trying to be understanding and accept that he’s not only a brother but also a parental figure to his siblings as well.

I don’t care about being alone. I’m content on doing that for the rest of my life. I don’t want marriage or kids anymore. But I guess what’s hard to do is just actually saying to my boyfriend that we’re over. I’ll feel so sad about not seeing the dogs and worrying about them even if we broke up.

I just don’t know what to do anymore. I know if I broke up with him, my mom and grandma would probably be so happy because then that would mean I could find someone else. But that’s the thing is that I don’t think I’d want to be with anyone else. I just want to be alone. I don’t need another half to make me happy.

I just wish I had the answers or knew what to do.