My girlfriend of seven years wants to leave me under the guise of relocating to another city to find a job. I am not against her looking for a job. It is just that I feel there is more to it.

First of all, we started dating under weird circumstances.I did not like her in the beginning, but as time went on, I fell in love with her. She is the kind of woman society would describe as a good woman and a good wife, but for some reason, I just did not see her that way at first. It took a business trip to completely change how I looked at her. Slowly, I learned to love her, and it did not happen overnight. It took effort on my part, but eventually it worked.

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I do not know exactly how it happened, but one day she left a toothbrush at my place. The next time, it was her sandals. Then it was office clothes and other personal things. At first, I thought it was just about making things easier when she came over on weekends, but then she suggested that we move in together.

“It will help us save money,” she said.

So, we started cohabitating. Then, out of nowhere, my girlfriend and I lost our jobs one after the other. While I was still convincing myself that at least her salary could keep us afloat while I searched for another job, she came home one evening looking defeated and dropped her termination letter in front of me. As a man, I could not break down in front of her, so I swallowed my own fears and immediately started encouraging her.

“God will help us. He will not put us to shame.”

But God did not help us as quickly as we hoped.

Eventually, we packed our bags and moved to another country. The land was supposedly flowing with milk and honey, and we thought we would finally catch a break, put food on our table, and send some money home. Instead, she got pregnant again at a time when we could barely afford three square meals a day.

I will not lie, it frustrated me.

We had always planned to get married properly before having children, and bringing a child into the middle of our struggles made everything harder. Still, we welcomed our first child, and just when we started talking seriously about marriage again, she became pregnant once more.

Meanwhile, our debts kept piling up.

Every cent I earned seemed to disappear into paying one bill or another. But we were not sleeping hungry. We were not wearing rags, and we were not sleeping on the streets. We had a roof over our heads, and I kept pushing myself to do more as a man, as a father, and not so husband.

Like every couple, we had our issues, but they were small compared to everything else we had survived together.

That is why I genuinely want to understand where I went wrong.

One dawn, she woke me up and told me she wanted to leave. She said she did not sign up for the situation we are in right now.

“I am going to look for a job in another city.”

That was what she said.

I mean, apart from the fact that she saw messages between me and another woman. Yes, there was another woman, but it was not what she thought. I was not in love with her. I did not have plans with her. She was simply someone I enjoyed talking to. That was all it was, at least from my perspective.

And now, seven years later, after everything we have walked through together, we are here.

I still try to talk to her now that she is here. She sits there and nods while I speak, but from the look of things, her mind is already made up. If I am being honest, part of me feels exhausted too. If she chooses to leave, I do not think I can keep fighting for a relationship that only one person wants to save.

I am not angry. I am not bitter. I am just tired.

I tried when it came to loving her. I was not perfect, but I was intentional. I chose her every day, even during the periods when life gave us very little to work with.

So if she wants to leave in the name of finding a job in another city, then maybe the truth is that she is not looking for work.

I Called My Girlfriend And Another Man Answered The Phone

Maybe she is trying to get away from me. That is it, right? She wants to leave me after all these years of suffering with her.

I do not know what will happen from here. No matter what, I remain a father first if she leaves me.

—Steven
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