Post Boot Camp Problems

[Sailor's Man]

Hello all. This is going to be a very long post but I need some answers or something. My fiancé and sailor just graduated from boot camp a while back. We had just gotten engaged back in March right before he went in for boot camp, he’s 19. I love him dearly and I know he loves me. We had some issues before he proposed with him “wondering off the path” but nothing passed talking, that I know for a fact. Anyway, we had worked it all out and we were great. He went to camp and the letters he sent me were so unbelievably heartfelt with proclamations of his love for me and how during camp he doesn’t mind the early wake ups or the crappy food but not being with me was unbearable. He said that before me he was led by temptation and I brought him from that and provided him with a base of love he hadn’t felt before. He even promised that he wanted to provide me with a life where I wouldn’t have to worry about anything at all and living a life without me would be the worst. He also stopped writing his own mother so that he had more time to write me and wrote two letters every Sunday. In his last letter to me from camp he thanked me for the letters I sent every day and that they were the only ones he looked forward to every night. He even wrote me a one page letter every night in the address book his mom got him

 

Graduation was a dream. Seeing him and him seeing me, it was so amazing. His mom even was getting worked up (understandably) that he wasn’t giving his mom or his brothers the attention he was giving me. He ended up yelling at his mom saying that he now knows a life without me and never wants that again. “He is my life now,” he said. He also added me to all his Navy accounts so we wouldn’t have to worry later on and provided me with other information of his.

 

After Sunday, he went back to Great Lakes to wait to be shipped out to A school. As the week progressed, I noticed he slowly became distant through texting and asked what was wrong. He told me he just felt like he was drifting from me and that he hated that he couldn’t talk to me as much as he thought he could because of the classes. He thought he was still adjusting and felt that we needed to take a step back. I asked how much and he said he needed space, a break. I was devastated but understood him. It was okay and I was doing fine then I noticed be restricted what I could see on Facebook and he eventually blocked me and deleted all our photos on there. He finally unfriended me on Snapchat. He also unfriended my mom but not my sister (I think that is his window to me).

 

I am holding it in and I don’t how much longer I can. I sent him one last text before letting him have his space telling him I would honor my promise I made in every letter I sent him during camp that I would never leave his side and that I would wait for him. I honestly feel in heart that he just wants to reset himself and really settle into the man he wants to be and wants to continue our lives with. I KNOW he loves me and I love him. I am willing to wait for him because I know he still wants to build that life we always talked about.

 

What are your thoughts, input, or whatever? I’ll take it all. 

 

[Anti M]

You won't like what I have to say.   He put you on his "accounts"?   You are not married, you do not exist to the Navy, so I am not sure what he meant.  Made you his beneficiary on his life insurance?  He could do that, and make you his emergency contact.  Those are easy to change.  Are you on his bank accounts?  Are you still included now he has decided to take a break?

This happens.  Boot camp is an emotional pressure cooker; the romantic letters and promises of marriage come early and easily.  With the younger sailors, who have not been away from home  (as is his case, I'm guessing, never been away much?) suddenly find themselves in a wider world, with pay in their pocket, new friends, adult responsibilities and expectations.  It is an exciting time for them, and sometimes, their visions of the future change a bit.  Or a lot.  And those changes often do not include the hometown or high school sweetheart, especially given he has immediate gratification right in front of him.  

He has deleted and blocked you.  He has ample opportunity to text and talk when not in school or on watch.  He didn't indicate the conditions of the "break".  I am very sorry, but it sounds like he is ghosting you, and that this is a coward's version of a break up.  He may have loved the idea of you, more than for you yourself.

If you want to wait, then wait as long as is healthy and productive to you.  His actions do not sound like the actions of a man who loves you, but of a man who very much loves himself.

[Sailor's Man]

Thank you Anti M. I appreciate your input. I should have also stated we started and have always been a long-distance relationship, though I'm sure it doesn't matter. Yes, he still has me on all his accounts and such. 

[Sailor's Man]

I've thought about all this. Truthfully, my heart says and feels differently but I'm not totally blind to some of the obvious. I know I'm not obligated to wait but I want to. I believe he will come back. I won't wait forever, that's for sure. As for him to only say he wanted a break: he said nothing about not loving me or wanting to be with me anymore. If he felt that way, he would tell me. I know he would.

[Anti M]

@mewlianne ... I went to A school in Great Lakes, you are not wrong.  It was before the internet, so no FB so you could check up on people.  I dated a number of guys who claimed they were unattached but were just liars.  One had even gotten married just a few weeks before, so I tend to have a very mistrustful view of young sailors and their freedom.  When I met my current husband, I knew he had been married briefly, and I insisted he show me his divorce papers!

This guy may just be exploring.  Hopefully he doesn't fall into the trap of dating another A school student, those relationships burn hot and fast, and often lead to regretful legal situations. 

[Sailor's Man]

Right. Well that makes me feel a tad better. Like I said, I honestly feel he still loves me. He never said he didn't want to be with me just that he needed a break.

[Michael]

Anti m is right I also feel it's fishy that he block you and your mom but keep your sister that to me is fishy. I would talk to your sister to see why he's on her account. But anti m is right on all issues.

[Sailor's Man]

That's what I have wondered. They have no special connection other than me. It's only me, my mom, and my sister in my family anyway. I'm also still friends with his mom and brothers. He didn't block me on Snapchat though, just unfriended.

[Lovelymom]

Exactly