I (31F) chose my family over my boyfriend (34M) and now he's not talking to me.
For some background, I (31F) have been in a long-distance relationship with my boyfriend (34M) for almost 3 years. We live about 1.5 hours away from each other and both still live with our parents (we're S.E. Asian and it's common to live with your parents until you get married). We see each other almost every weekend--he drives to my place or I commute to his place and stay over the weekend. Aside from this, we talk on discord almost every night. He's the only one I talk to since I don't have a lot of friends, maybe just a couple with whom I exchange memes. I really do not have time to socialize since I work 8-5 but also travel 1.5-2 hours to get to work. Meanwhile, my bf works from home full time (night shift), has friends in his neighborhood, has online friends from gaming, and he attends a weekly badminton game with his co-workers.
On to the issue. I've been diagnosed with Bipolar 2 disorder 4 years ago and I was due for my biannual checkup and therapy with my psychiatrist on Saturday afternoon, which is usually when my bf and I meet up. I asked him if we could skip that weekend since I have my online appointment, but he asked me if I could have it at his place instead so I can stay over. I make it a point to be relaxed and comfortable before my appointments because I will be baring myself and therefore feel very vulnerable. Now, he lives in a very crowded and noisy urban area, and I honestly felt like I wouldn't be comfortable talking with my psychiatrist there. His place is also cramped and I feel like people will hear me. However, he insisted by saying that he'll leave the room and look for food during my session and through the following days, he was "bribing" me with good food and massages when I get there. I reluctantly agreed.
The night before, I suddenly got an invite from my cousin to have dinner on Saturday to celebrate his and his gf's new jobs. My bf was also invited along with our other cousins and their partners. I am very close with my cousins, we're like siblings. I do not have a good relationship with my older brothers, and so I cherish my relationship with my cousins a lot. Despite living in the same city, we rarely hang out anymore because we're all busy and have conflicting schedules. When we do hang out, it's never planned and almost always short notice. I've been longing to chat with other people since I haven't socialized in so long, and truth be told, I don't always get satisfaction from my conversations with my bf. With that, I lowkey asked my bf if he wanted to have dinner with my cousins instead. But I told him it was fine if he didn't want to and we can just continue with our original plan. I know it was wrong of me to even consider changing our plans so suddenly and I apologized. He got mad and said that we should just cancel our plans and I should just hangout with my cousins since I was having second thoughts. I tried appeasing him but I only got short replies from then on.
On the day itself, I was sending updates and photos to my bf but only got "okay"s as replies. I pushed it to the back of my mind as I didn't want to show my cousins that I was sad and I wanted to enjoy myself with them. He finally sent me a message when I got home. He said that he felt like he was only an option and that I didn't give enough updates. So I told him that I gave him updates but he kept replying with "okay" which made it seem like he was uninterested and didn't want to talk to me. I also said that he's always been my priority, but my relationship with my cousins is also important to me. I haven't talked to anyone else in so long and I was feeling lonely. We're both hurt and have reached an impasse. Now he's not talking to me. Is this relationship still salvageable? I don't want to lose him.
Sorry for the long post. I know it's wrong to cancel plans last minute and I owned up to it. How can I make him feel that he's not just an option? Any advice is appreciated.
Posted Oct 7, 2025, 2:42 AM UTC