So. I would like to preface this by saying that I am almost 90% sure that I am in the wrong here. But because I am so stressed and upset and crazy right now, I've lost all ability to be objective. Which is why I'm returning to Life Issues for the first time in a long time in the first place.

I would also like to say that I know that this is all stupid shit to be upset about. So please don't flame me for it.

My girlfriend and I don't have problems, generally. Every couple fights from time to time, and our fights are few and far between. We often go weeks without fighting.

When we DO fight, it's not really severe. Neither of us are aggressive people in any sense. In fact, the fights only last a short while, typically. We usually spend a large amount of time in the "guilt and sadness over the wrongdoing that sparked the fight" stage because we both have heavy consciences.

We've been together two years now. And since then, there are maybe three things that we have fought about multiple times. And one of them is something that we fight about every so often. Because it is the one area in the relationship where she does not do something for me that I feel that I deserve.

It's how she treats me with little consideration compared to her friends.

When we text, she claims she does the same thing I do, which is always answer texts from each other first, no matter how many people we're texting. And such. And she does so much for me. She really is wonderful and sensitive much of the time.

But not always. I am going to use a relevant part of the story as an example of what she does to me all the time: We got together in October of 2010. However, she was still a junior in high school, while I was a freshman at college. My university, where I lived in a dorm, was about forty-five minutes away from where she lived, so it was something of a long-distance relationship from the start, though we saw each other about every other week.

With our relationship as such, I asked her to get Skype since I knew she had a webcam. However, she despises change, and would only use Windows Live as a means of talking on the computer, but my computer's webcam wouldn't cooperate with Windows Live for whatever reason. I begged her and begged her until the following summer to get Skype, and she never would.

During the summers, I live in another city (which is about the same distance from her as my university) so that I can return to my job and work. However, the relatives I stay with during the summers don't have internet, so I have no consistent internet access. And then, her friend from school moved away about the same time I moved to my relatives' for the summer. The day her friend moved away, my girlfriend downloaded Skype so she could talk to her.

This made me horribly upset. I had been begging and begging her to get Skype. And then, she gets Skype for someone else. Two weeks after I lost the ability to use Skype for several months, no less.

That's the kind of thing she does with a fair amount of consistency. Both she and my best friend, who is decent friends with her, have assured me it is unintentional and that she doesn't realize she does that. She has also told me she'd try to do better countless times. Which is why everytime she does it, we fight. Which is about once every couple of months.

Well, since I work nights, the only window we have to text or talk during the day is the three or four hours I have between waking up in the afternoon and leaving for work. And this week, Tuesday, she absolutely didn't reply at all. Like. She texted me back maybe two times in those hours. Which was okay.

Wednesday, she was skyping with a mutual friend, whom happens to be her best friend. Said friend has been dreadfully upset, and so I understood why my girlfriend was being slow to reply to my texts. I still got a little put off, though, because I didn't know she was skyping that person until that person texted me and passively mentioned it. I texted them both during the duration of my time available to talk, and the friend, whom doesn't even like texting often, was texting me much faster, and showed much more interest, than my girlfriend. So she can't blame it on skype entirely.

Then Thursday night, she actually talked to me! It made me happy! However, an hour or so into conversation, I learned she was also talking to her ex, which sort of ruined the whole thing for me. This is where I'm finally starting to get to the point.

Her ex is a very bad person, in my opinion. He cheats, he lies. He's an ass. I'm not a jealous person, but I will never like their friendship, not that I would ever forbid her of anything, or attempt to do so. They've given me plenty of reasons not to, including, but not limited to, the fact he's told her he still loves her several times in the two years I've been with her, and about two months into our relationship, she told him she still loved him too. He also treated her like shit during their whole relationship and just a whole mess of shit.

I know it was a stupid reason to get legitimately upset, but her first time talking to me in days, and she was talking to him too. It just horridly upset me. Because I needed attention so badly, and I felt like I was having to share it with him, I guess. I don't even know why it set me off quite so badly. We fought and talked about it for hours. Right up until I clocked into work. I asked her if the next day, she could be considerate of my feelings and just focus on me. She apologized and swore she would.

Then yesterday morning, I stayed up a little to talk to her before I went to bed because I don't work Friday nights. And we wound up fighting again. Over stupid crap. I had offhandedly said something about the way she spends money because she always complains she doesn't have any to spend on me, and she just started spiraling, even though I had also said I didn't mind, and after the family life she had growing up, now that she had her own money she deserved to spoil herself some. Then, she spiraled for half an hour, defending herself from an argument that didn't exist, as I begged and begged her to stop and to at least acknowledge what I was saying. But she didn't, and I wound up getting upset again eventually, though I tried not to, because she wouldn't even notice that I was talking, let alone the words I was saying. I needed to be paid attention to. Just as I had the night before.

Then tonight, when I woke up, we got into another fight almost instantly! About her not paying attention to me. :/ I didn't even mean to start that one. But she wasn't paying attention to me, still. And after the past few days, I needed her to. Eventually, she told me she would, and things settled down. I apologized for being so crazy lately. Usually I'm not so needy. I've just had a dreadful week, and needed to feel loved.

And I've been on the computer all night talking to her. And at some point, I learned that she'd been skyping her friend for over an hour. And hadn't even asked if I wanted her to call me. And I know it was stupid, but I got super upset again.

We talked again, more rationally and less fighty this time, and she said that she's been stressed, and it's been clouding her judgment. She said she isn't used to me being this needy (because I'm usually not) and the harder she tries to give me what I keep asking for, which is attention and consideration, the more she fucks up at it, because she gets stressed. And I know she gets upset easily from stress. She always has been an easily stressed person.

She's gone to bed now, but I'm just feeling...alone? Empty? I don't know. I want this crap to end. I want her to actually follow through for once. Usually she isn't so neglectful of me.

Oh Alice, you have no idea how much it hurts to see you and Nat going through this.
I really have no idea how to type how I feel but you know you have my support.
I am going to try and call you...
I think she is either distancing herself on purpose or she really doesn't know what she is doing. I know you two have fought more frequently lately because you feel lonely and you just want her to acknowledge you.
Oh hell it is 5 am... sorry if I sound stupid.
I think you should do what I told you before,
sit down and talk about it again. Actually sit her down and throw everything on the table and work it out with each other. Even if that means waiting a week or a few you know. I am no expert on relationships but a couple of the friends did that and they worked everything out.
I will just call you and tell you the rest... I keep typing and forgetting what I want to say.

Babe, I don't blame you for being upset one bit. There are a lot of red flags that you may not see because you're in the relationship. Just something to think about though, one, she doesn't pay attention to you. Two, she talks to an ex and three, she does stuff for other people that she could do for you. This to me says that something is not right. Reason being is that I had an ex doing the same kind of things and turns out he had a girlfriend on the side. He started acting weird when he started dating her and I noticed but he swore it was nothing then I found out about her. I know that's probably not what you want to hear but it's a possibility. I don't know your whole relationship so I really can't say much.

I really hope she's not realizing what she's doing and it's just because of the stress of distance but just keep in mind that with distance it's easier to hide things. I hope things work out for you guys and if you ever need anything feel free to PM me.

Thanks, Daisy and Mystic. Really, though, Girlfriend can just be thoughtless sometimes. She can be so insensitive...but so sweet other times! And she was just going through an insensitivity spell. We're past it now. :]