I hope you read my editorial.  You see, I have this boyfriend- let’s call him “D” for short.  We have been together for over two decades now.  You’d  think he would have proposed already, but in his usual fashion D always takes me on an emotional rollercoaster.  There are lots of highs and lots of lows.  Some days are okay, and those are the days where I think D isn’t so bad.  I mean, he loves me!  I swear he does!  People always look at us on the street together.  We have all the fanciest technology and we sport it around town wherever we go.  Some people stop me and say that they’re proud of us, of the relationship that we’ve built.  It’s not easy, they say.  But they don’t really know the reality of living with D.

D keeps me up at night a lot.  He is loud and needy and incessantly wants to eat.  In some ways it’s like tending to a child.  And then I have to go to work the next day, and then go to graduate class after work, and society tells me that I should not complain.  “D is not THAT bad.  There are always worse boyfriends to have.  Plus, my grandma dated a guy like D- haha D type 2!- and she just took a few pills to get over him.”  They don’t see that D makes me cry sometimes.  He can be a jerk, and he always acts up whenever something important is happening.  On the good days, he makes me laugh, though.  And I have found other people who also date D’s, and they have made me feel like we can do this.  They are strong people.  They are funny people.  They know exactly what to say to make me feel better about D.

What can I do to improve my relationship with D?  I am not ready to give up hope that we can work things out yet.

Sincerely,

Concerned Caregiver