Lend me your opinion, pleaaaase. | avidofpathology's Blog

Alright, so, I'm not sure anyone on here knows this or not, but I have a boyfriend named Mike who I've been dating for 5 years, this August. For the past fews months, we both have noticed a decline in our relationship due to poor communication and simply busy schedules. (I'm a full time Biology major, and he has a high demanding job that keeps him working pretty much 7 days a week.) Lately, however, it has seemed worse than it ever has been, but not worse in the sense that we don't seem ok on the surface. We never argue, which I've come to realize is unhealthy because of the lack of communication, but we have kinda turned our backs on each other here and there. Overall, it just seems our relationship has become a bit black and white.

Because we both have expression issues and hate the idea of confrontation, that's where the poor communication comes into play. Our personal pasts offer us nothing but secrets and misunderstandings which places one another in the same ditch. We can easily relate to each other with this, yet, it's still so hard for us to communicate. Why?

About a month and a half ago, I brought it to his attention via text message, while I was at work, that I felt like he wasn't happy and that our relationship seemed friend-based; he agreed and decided to add, "To be honest, I miss being single sometimes." Do guys often think this when in a long term relationship? Do we all subconsciously ponder that and the 'what ifs'? I don't know, but we talked about it the next day where he comforted me and my inevitable sadness to the thought of breaking up and explained that, "We're fine, sweetie. Trust me. We'll get through it." I wanted to believe him after it being said to me roughly 6 times that night, but I still had doubt. The doubt stayed with me until today, before a small 'breakthrough' - maybe - and I'm not sure how to decipher our next approach. I explained to him at work today that I still felt uneasy about us and that I missed the way we used to be; I wanted to make things better. He replied with, "Yeah, I feel the same."

Aside from the current issue, when we're together, we act like little kids with each other a lot. My friends actually make fun of me because of the little kid talk Mike and I do to one another. We make forts out of blankets and hide from each other, just to jump out  and scare them, when one goes upstairs for a minute. It's obvious that we care about each other, but the little things like holding hands  and quick "love you's" at the end of messages seem absent. I haven't been in this long of a relationship before, so I have a hard time judging situations and emotions because I can't compare it to another long relationship. 

...We're gonna try 'starting over' or 'starting fresh'.

Does this work? Do people even still do this? Better yet, will it last or will it require us to press the reset button again in 5 years? - I just don't know, so I'd like your opinion. I know it's difficult to give advice to someone you don't know well, especially about someone you don't know at all, but anything would be appreciated.