She needs space to figure out if she can be happy on her own.

Hi everyone. I am brand new to this forum. I don't really know what I'm supposed to be posting so I'm going to write a rather large summary of my relationship up to present.

I am 20. I am a boy (lol). I met my girlfriend when we were 14. Her mother was my doctor and was so impressed with my manners or something that she had to introduce me to her daughter. Things didn't really pan out at first and we didn't speak again until 2 years later.

I was 16 and trying to get over my first highschool girlfriend by dating as many girls as I could meet. I remembered Steph, my current girlfriend, and we began talking again. We dated through the fall that year but i had doubts because of how strongly I felt about our relationship. At my request, we broke up for about a month until Jan '11.

From January '11 - November '12 we dated without any major issues. Our love has grown and flourished and even amid a fight we are rarely unhappy together for long periods of time. That November I was quickly failing out of college at Pitt and was searching for control. I thought that if I ended my relationship and rid myself of those responsibilities that I would find the happiness I needed to feel whole - I did not and my girlfriend and I resumed dating until May '13.

In May 2013 we took a break for a few weeks because I again had doubts due to temptations from a coworker. When our relationship was given space, these feelings dissolved. We got back together in July 2013 and were together until January 15 2015.

My girlfriend just got her first taste of freedom. She moved into dorms at a different satellite campus. Through fall of 2014, we felt distance. I believe that I let how I feel about the decisions she was making (Dancing with other boys at parties, drunk driving, drinking nightly) effect the way I treat her. I began to ignore her stories of friends and missed out on a lot of the developing she did in those first few months.

This all culminated on January 15, when she shows up my house with a few hickeys on her neck. I ask her about them and she said that it was just some kid named Stephen (a name I had heard throughout the fall) and that she was drunk and that distance allowed her to make the mistake. Ultimately we talked it over and agreed to make it work and stay together (despite her initial desire for space to figure herself out). That was until last night.

She came over and said that she needed space. I said that I understood, that I knew she loved me and would be with me if she could, and that my feelings would not change. I also told her that I would not wait to start moving on emotionally, because we both know that she is putting our relationship on the back burner to explore promiscuity.

Here I am, getting drug along in the dirt behind her.
Hopelessly in love, and desperately wanting out.