A Student Teacher Relationship

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Visitor's Question:
Me and my boyfriend split up 4 months ago. Our relationship was amazing. I have known him for 2 and a half years and we were together for 9 months. We fell for eachother long before we got together, but had to wait, because I was a student at the college he teaches at. So as soon as we could be together, we were. We were so happy together and missed eachother so much when we were apart. I was his first relationship in 7 years. He was on his own for so long because he didn't meet anyone he wanted to be with, so when we got together he was the perfect gentleman and would always tell me how much he loved and needed me.

Anyway, we started arguing a lot, because we spent every day together and he was stressed with work. After one particular argument, he stupidly said we should just be friends. I knew he didn't mean it, but I wanted some space for a while so I accepted it,

That day I went out for a drink with a friend. He tried to text me to come along, but I didn't text back as I wanted some space and time to think. I had started to doubt my feelings for him because all our good times had started to be overshadowed by our arguments.

Aanyway, that day I got really drunk and kissed another lad. My boyfriend found out and went mad. He was so upset and cried for days. My argument was that we weren't together, but his was that I knew he didn't mean to finish it, and I shouldn't have kissed someone else.

I apologised loads but he was really hurt and I hated myself for doing that to him.

Everytime we met up for two months after us finishing he would get upset and angry at what I'd done and for ruining what we had. He said he couldn't get back with me because his opinion of me had lowered. But he'd test me to see what I'd do if I really wanted him back. Another lad phoned me while I was out with him, and he refused to speak to me all the way home. But a few days later he told me he met another girl in a pub when he was drunk, 3 weeks ago. He said they had sent a few texts, but told me not to get the wrong idea because she was nothing and he wasn't over me.

A friend saw them together two days later and when I asked him about her, his reply was "I'm only doing what you're doing".

This was 2 months ago now and they are still together. We were friends until a month ago. We arranged to go for a drink, but I was busy on a night he suggested. I was going out for a meal with some friends. My ex assumed it was a date and went really weird. He didn't text the next day to arrange the drink that night, like we had planned, and he ignored me for a week. When I asked why he said we should not have any contact. He was really nasty to me, and so cocky about having someone else. I was really hurt and couldn't believe what he was saying, because it was completely out of character.

That was a month ago and he has not been in touch He tried to phone a few times, but I couldn't speak to him, so I didn't answer. I saw him once and he smiled and waved. He didn't even phone to wish me Happy Birthday last week. I miss him so much. I know its him that I miss because its been 4 months and I think about him everyday. It hurts that he can kick me out of his life so easily after all we have been through. I dont understand what changed in that week for him to want nothing to do with me??!

Please help me, I'm so confused and hurt, and depressed. I want him back. I thought this new girl would be a rebound, but they have been together for 2 months now, so surely he must be over me already.

Please can you help me, I dont know what else to do. He just wont listen to me anymore. He's changed so much.

Our Suggestion:
Well first, it was very good of you guys to wait until you were free of the college before you started dating. The whole student-teacher taboo isn't there just because it would "look bad" to have a student dating a teacher. It's because of a very real psychological thing that happens between students and teachers.

In essence, the girl student sees this guy (we'll use the guy-teacher scenario since that is what you're in) as a responsible, mature, caring man who is much more mature and attractive than the "childish students" around her. He has so much he can teach people! He actually likes helping others! He has a steady job, he has a nice place to live (or at least better than most students). So this is VERY attractive to the average college girl.

In the other direction, many older men sort of look at college girls as being the ideal age of a woman, physically. She's no longer a "little girl". She hasn't begun the normal ageing and sagging and wrinkling that all women (and men for that matter) go through in life. She's an adult - but still a fresh, bright-eyed adult that hasn't had life wear her down yet. It's not something that most college boys appreciate, because of course that's all that is around them at the time. They don't realize that it's anything special. So the older guy is someone who really appreciates this age, makes the woman feel beautiful, has money to take her places, has the experience to treat her nicely and do fun things with her.

So it's pretty natural that you two would appreciate these things in each other. And of course when you first got together things were fantastic. New love usually is. But, also naturally, the longer you're together, the more you actually have to *work* at the relationship - because that initial hormone rush only carries you so far. And if you guys started arguing, it seems like you didn't work on it. Yes, work is stressful. But work is ALWAYS stressful in one way or another. The reason that some relationships survive those stresses and others don't have to do with how you guys handle the stress, handle the relationship and actively support each other. It may be you both thought it would always be easy and fun. But life isn't like that. It's always as fun as you make it, always as easy as you think it is. But it doesn't just "happen".

If you got to the point that you BOTH called it quits (remember, while he suggested, you accepted) then things were very bad. You should always be able to work out issues. To both throw in the towel and give up is pretty final. And yes, you should have given it several weeks to really settle out. But as far as *cheating*, you guys had broken up. So your kiss wasn't cheating. It did, though, show rather clearly that your commitment wasn't fully with him any more. A woman who fully loves her guy and wants to be with him forever doesn't start kissing other guys as soon as the "floodgates are opened". She would have been back with her guy the next night, trying to work something out.

So more than anything else, your action showed him that you weren't fully absorbed in him. He probably thought, as part of his "She's a young, fresh college student" frame of mind, that you were eager to love him fully, heart and soul. That you were sort of a "new car". Some guys can very much get hooked onto that "My possessions were never really touched by anyone else before ME!!" idea. I'm not saying you were a virgin necessarily. But he was your first "real adult relationship" and he thought that was an incredibly powerful thing.

So once he realized that that was NOT the case, it probably damaged his entire view of the relationship. Now you were just an adult woman like millions of other adult women, who could and did think about other guys. It sounds like he never recovered from that.

So then, having that thought of you being off talking to other guys, he felt fine (and maybe even revenge-filled) when he was able to do it. And he ran into a woman who he went right back into that new-love-flush with, and is once again in that hormone-filled stage where everything seems perfect. Sure, after a few months things will settle down for him and her and he'll realize that once again it involves work. Maybe at that point he'll realize that you really are much better for him, and start thinking about you. Or maybe he'll realize that if there is work involved, that he'll just have to do it with his current girl, having learned his lesson with you about how arguing destroys a relationship.

In any case, I wouldn't wait around for him to change or not change. I know it's hard, but obviously things were pretty bad between you guys if you both threw in the towel after arguing a ton. Neither of those are healthy in a relationship. It's easy to dream about "going back" but life does not move backwards, and the bad parts of your relationship would not just vanish. I think it's better to really understand what you learned and look for a new guy in your life that you can talk with honestly and openly, so that those fights and distance don't develop.

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