This is a repost. I am not the original author (see disclaimer at the bottom).
I (29F) moved to the US 7 years ago as a grad school student from Indonesia. I met my boyfriend (30M) a few months after I moved and we've been together ever since. My boyfriend is a US citizen.
After I graduated, we had a serious discussion about where our relationship was headed. I made it very clear that I wanted to eventually get married and have children. My bf echoed the sentiments. I remember asking him if he saw that happening with me because I didn't want to be in a relationship with no future. He told me he loved me, and that we were definitely headed in that direction.
As of last week, we've been dating for 7 years. We've occasionally talked about marriage, but we were both busy with our respective careers, so the timing didn't seem quite right. However, recently my company announced that there's a chance that my department's work will be outsourced. I'm on an H1B visa (temporary worker), so this means that I need to start looking for a job ASAP if I want to continue staying in the US.
Last week, during our anniversary, I brought this up. I asked him if he thought it was the right time to think about getting married, as that will also help with sorting out my visa issues. He looked like he was about to vomit. After much prodding, he confessed that he wasn't planning on us getting married before I was able to get a green card (permanent resident) in the US. I was incredibly confused because he'd never mentioned this before. His reason was that he didn't want to be used as a "visa mule" (his words, not mine) by me and that he wanted to make sure that I married him because I loved him and not because it was a ticket to getting to stay in the US, which can only happen when I get a GC. It took me a while to process what he said, and I asked him if he'd be okay to move to Indonesia with me, which he wasn't. I did not react well and ended up leaving because I couldn't deal with what just happened.
I am still in disbelief. I started dating him because he was the kindest, most thoughtful, and generous man I'd met. I now feel like I wasted seven years. While the visa issues are certainly a problem, I did not date him with the intention of making him my safety net. I cannot believe that even after nearly a decade together, he doesn't know what kind of person I am.
I feel like this relationship is possibly over and it hurts. It hurts so much.
A few days back I made a post about how my bf of 7 years didn't want to marry me because I was an immigrant on an H1B, and he didn't want to be a visa mule.
I got a lot of wonderful comments and DMs (a few trolls too, but that's expected from Reddit haha).
Because the thread got locked and the post was subsequently removed (because I have a low-karma account), I was unable to respond to anyone. I'm posting this update to do that, plus add in some more things that have transpired since. (TL;DR at the bottom)
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Addressing some of the stuff in the comments
- I've been on an H1B visa for a bit more than two years now. I was on STEM OPT for about three years after grad school. I had terrible luck with the H1B lottery and I got one in the last round I was eligible to apply in.
- Getting PR in the US is NOT easy. I know people who've been here for 15+ years who are still waiting for their PR.
- For those of you who DM'd me calling me a gold digger, you guys made me LOL. I am aware of the legalities around sponsoring a spouse for a PR, including the financial aspect. It shouldn't have been a problem for the following reasons:
- I'm a STEM major who recently shifted into management. I work for a large company and I do quite well for myself. My boyfriend is a teacher and our incomes are not comparable (he earns around ~$60K, I earn close to ~$300K).
- We've been living together for ~6 years. We have a shared account to pay for expenses like rent and utilities that we both deposit a percentage of our salary into. The rest of our money goes into our own private accounts and we don't manage each other's money.
- Because I'm pretty frugal, I've saved up quite a bit of money in the form of savings + investments. If my boyfriend was worried about the legality of sponsoring me financially for 10+ years, I would have happily discussed moving the money around. I was even considering buying a house, so we could have made that a joint-ownership thing. The point is, we could have figured it out. I haven't relied on him financially ever, and I didn't intend on doing that in the future.
- I might not have considered everything, but you have to note that I thought about the marriage-for-visa thing very recently, only when the threat of possibly having to leave loomed over me. This isn't something I'd thought about in detail at all.
- Regarding my situation back home in Indonesia: I come from a very religious and conservative family and had a horrible childhood. My family doesn't support my career choices. I cut contact with my family when I moved to the US, so they are not in the picture at all. I was on great terms with bf's family - they loved me. —
Now, for the actual update: He is now my ex-boyfriend
I took a few days to collect myself and then reached out to him wanting to talk. He agreed.
It turns out that he has been insecure about earning less than I did for a while. Apparently, his friends have been poking fun at our relationship, calling me the "sugar mommy" because I take care of most of the expenses. He never told me this until now. He apparently didn't feel like an equal because our pay differs so much, and started feeling that I was only with him as a quick way to get a PR here. I was speechless - I couldn't believe that his friends gaslighted him into doubting our relationship.
I reminded him how he had supported me when I was in grad school, like getting me groceries when I had little money to spare, allowing me to stay with him rent-free in my last year of grad school to help me minimize expenses so I didn't have to take out a loan, letting me use his car when I was attending interviews. I told him that he did them because he loved me and me taking on the majority of household expenses (since I started working) is my way of paying him back for all the things he did for me back then. He said that he gets what I'm saying but also that he didn't expect me to start earning more than him straight off the bat.
I asked if there was any chance he'd consider going to couple's therapy (like some of you had suggested) and he declined because he didn't think he was being unreasonable. He said that he wanted to be the "provider" in a relationship and that he didn't feel like one in ours, so there's no going back from this unless I quit my job and found another that paid substantially less, which isn't going to happen.
Well, long story short, we broke up. His family is in disbelief (they were hoping that he would propose soon). I've moved into an airbnb for now.
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A little bit of good news to end this update with:
My company offered me a similar role in a different department. However, this is based out of France, and there's a small decrease in pay. I've always dreamed about living in Europe and I've accepted this offer. I've signed the relocation agreement, and I'll move there in the next 8-12 weeks.
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TL;DR:
Boyfriend was insecure about earning less than me. Boyfriend has now become ex-boyfriend.
Company offered a new job in France. Leaving US in 2-3 months to start a new life in France.
Allons-y!
Disclaimer
This is a repost from reddit. I really missed this sub so I decided to post some top articles from time to time until hopefully one day this community will be large enough to produce its own content.
Read the original here