I Love My Baby Daddy, But Not Enough To Live With Him

alternative living arrangements”You’re funny,” my boyfriend/baby daddy said to me after I told him I could see myself living with him six days a week.

But I wasn’t being funny at all. I was telling him the truth. I truly don’t see how married people do it. In fact, I wish married people would speak up more often about how they live with someone every single day, hopefully for the rest of their lives. There are so many books out there on being single, but no books out there about the truth about marriage and how to live with someone.

I hate to admit this, but my ideal is that my boyfriend/baby daddy could live next door to me. Don’t get me wrong: I love this man more than any man I’ve ever been with, and I want to spend the rest of my life with him. It’s just that I also want a break, at least one night a week. It isn’t feasible, economically, for us to afford two houses next to each other. However, it is feasible that he rents a place, which he does, to be closer to his own children’s school and so he can be there for their after-school activities. Even after we have our baby, I told him I’d pay for him to keep it.

As it stands, he sleeps there two nights a week, and I really look forward to those two nights a week. Don’t get me wrong, again, I miss him like hell, but it’s a good kind of missing, and after those two nights, I can’t wait to see him again. But there’s something so glorious about me being able to get into my ugly sweats that I won’t see let me see me in. (As a side note, I always dress sexily to bed when I’m with him. It’s such a small thing and it makes him very happy. Just my tip to you ladies!)

Also I get to sleep in the middle of the bed, which I can’t do if he’s sleeping with me. I can also gorge on disgusting junk food in bed, like pizza, something else I won’t let him see me do. My married friends tell me that once I have the baby I’m going to want to have him around all the time. I’m like, ”Really? Why?” With lots of family help, and a live-in nanny, could I not survive with a baby on my own for two nights a week?

I’ve been a single mother for five years now. And I’ve done it. And done it well. Plus, these married friends of mine, not all of them, but a number of them, don’t seem all that happy in their marriages. I truly believe if they took a break from each other, one night a week, their relationships would be better.

In any case, I really saw what it’s like to live with someone seven days a week, for years, when I went out for coffee with my friend a few months ago. We were walking back to her house, and when she saw her husband’s car in the driveway, her face dropped. It literally DROPPED. She said, “Oh, great. Now I’m not going to get any work done.” And I thought, God, if this is what marriage is, or what living together is like, then count me out.

I may not be the best person, or most knowledgeable person, when it comes to marriage, since I never have been married. I can honestly say that it’s never been a priority for me. I always wish that I could be more ”˜normal.’ I wish I didn’t need so much alone time. Or I wish that the rest of society could get on board with how I view marriage and living together, even with children in the picture, which is not necessarily living in the same house every single day. [tagbox tag=”marriage”]

Once again, I wish married people would speak up. The question I would ask them is, ”Don’t you need some alone time that includes more than just your husband going out for a night of poker, or you going out with friends for an evening?” I would also ask, ”Don’t you get annoyed with someone in your space, or face, every single day?”

When I say I’m in the greatest relationship, I’m not trying to brag (or make you gag). It’s the truth. I love him, but I don’t want to be with him seven nights a week. My therapist, when I told him how I felt, said when you find the right person, you’re going to want to sleep with them every night. And I’m there. Like I said, I do miss him when I’m not with him, and, yes, I suppose I do want to sleep with him every night, but I don’t need to. Nor do I think I will, even after baby arrives. We’ll keep his rented place, so either he or I will have somewhere to go for a night off.

Again, I see myself with him for the rest of my life and can also see myself married to him. Six days a week, that is.

(Photo: Sana Design/Shutterstock)

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