I met someone online over five months ago. He’s 20 and I’m 28. We hit it off very well; we had a lot in common and it was really easy to know what the other was thinking. Our connection is, or was, incredible. We found ourselves falling for each other, hard and fast.

But of course, the relationship wasn’t without its pitfalls. He lives in MI and I live in MO. He has his moments when he just falls into a funk and he starts to keep me at an arm’s length, and he becomes like a caged animal. After several communication mishaps, I’ve had to learn not to ask him what’s wrong when he says he’s feeling closed off. And when he says, “I don’t want to talk about this anymore,” he means it. Because if I “push” or continue to ask, he starts to shut down completely and lash out. And oh boy, when he lashes out, he sure does hit where it hurts. It tends to happen whenever he has a heated argument with his older sister or mother. He also gets like that if he was touched without permission while he was asleep. He has a pretty severe phobia of that, actually. But yeah, when he gets upset after an incident, he shuts down and if I try to talk, he lashes out.

Sometimes when he gets lonely for my company, to the point of wishing for my physical company, he gets upset instead because it’s not doable at the time, so he starts to shut me out.

It’s been kind of a one-sided relationship, I think. Because he’s always in control of how close I get to be to him and whether I can have a problem with something he said or did. I do realize that I have my emotional issues; I get cold and closed off when I’m upset. He’d ask me if something was bothering me, and it hurts him when I shut him out. But if he does the same to me, yeah, forget it. He’ll lash out, hard.

He’d ask for my attention and affection, and when things are good, it’s good. No drama or anything. Just a lot of support and sweetness and mutual interests in doing activities together. But when I’m feeling lonely and he’s not feeling himself, I usually won’t get a lot of it, if at all. Like sometimes during a Skype chat, he’ll be quiet for 15-45 minutes just because he got “distracted” by something like, browsing online stores or chatting with someone and sharing songs. He always apologizes, every single time, and he’d explain why without any questions from me. And then, he’ll do it again the next day or whatever. Not always, but it’s nothing new. He always has a good excuse for everything and I can’t really get upset because that would be being unreasonable.

He’s bisexual but he’s uncomfortable with his gay side, so he said it’d take time for him to become comfortable with being public with me, but it was still something he wanted to happen. I didn’t push him–coming out is incredibly personal and I’d only support his decisions. Sometimes he wonders if he isn’t really bisexual, and that he’s straight with a “fetish.” He has had gay relationships before.

We’ve had two opportunities to meet up, but they fell through. The first time was because of a problem related to the wisdom tooth removal surgery he had, which we planned around a month in advance. The second time, he had a hard time letting his family know that he’d be coming down to MO, because they’re very controlling, especially over his own money. He basically gave in to fear of causing problems, so we cancelled the motel room. Also, his 15-year-old dog died. This was last week. Eventually, when he seemed to be feeling better, I shared my idea with him of me coming up there this time and maybe meet his family. He was quite receptive to the idea, and in fact, he was excited about it. He started talking about the places he’d love to take me to, etc., etc.

We decided on either the last week of July and the first week of August. But yesterday, his sister upset him when she ignored his wishes and basically talked to her boss about a job for him. He has a very good chance of getting the job, but it also changed his attitude about my visit. All of a sudden, he was talking about how he wouldn’t have time to hang out during the week. Keep in mind that he hasn’t even gotten the job yet. It frustrated me because he focused on the negatives and a future that hasn’t even happened yet, instead of working with me to figure something out.

I’ve been comfortable with sending him photos and a few vids. But asking for a photo from him was just too difficult of a request. He always had an excuse like, his hands are too shaky or he doesn’t feel attractive on the day, etc., etc. Last week, I asked for his display photo because it was a good picture and he was fine with the request at first. But then it seemed like he was stalling or conveniently forgetting about it… I got slightly upset and asked him if he trusted me. He said yes, and asked why. I explained about the photo thing, and he got quiet for a few minutes, then sent me it. And he got upset with me because I got upset in the first place. Could you really blame me though? In the last few months I’ve known him, I have only three pictures of him. He has a lot more of me. I even pointed that out to him, in a gentle manner. I said I would love to see more of him because he has a nice smile, and he just kind of took it the wrong way. He said he didn’t know he was “obliged” to return the favour and if he had know, he wouldn’t have accepted most of them. This was a couple of months ago. Since then, I’ve learned to just let it go whenever I asked for something and he’s ambivalent about it. Until last week, because it felt like the right time to ask after getting to know each other better.

Whenever things are going really good, he tends to find something to be upset about, and then he’ll self-sabotage and shut down completely. He really is emotionally volatile and it’s like a riding a roller coaster sometimes. I do feel like a punching bag at times. I also feel guilty for asking about photos and for letting him know whenever I’m upset by something he said or did.

He’s also strange about adding me on Facebook–his excuse at the time was because of his sister. He said she’d be nosy and start asking questions.

I don’t know. He’s always afraid of something. He doesn’t stand up to his family either and establish boundaries.

Earlier this morning, we were chatting normally. It was warm and affectionate at times. But then, I accidentally fell asleep for 20-25 minutes (it was 7 o’clock in the morning! We had been chatting since 10 pm). When I woke up, he was still here, but he was clearly upset. He said he felt insulted and yeah. I apologized many times, and then he started doubting himself and whatever. Eventually, he said he was still feeling bleh (he’d been feeling that way for a week, a couple of days before his dog died), and I started saying that it was going to be okay. He’ll be okay, because what he’s feeling is temporary. He chose that moment to tell me he wanted to “define” our relationship, and that’s best if we’re friends for now. We should stay away from the romantic and sexual feelings for now. He needs to think about himself for a while and he “strongly suggested” I do the same. He also said that he doesn’t want me to “wait” for him, and that if we come back to each other, it’d be cool. If we met other people, that’d be fine too.

I went completely numb at this point. I just kept saying I understood and I’d respect his wishes, blah blah.

Now? I’m hurt, upset, angry, and disappointed. It just came out of the blue. He’s always been wishy-washy about a lot of things, but he always strongly asserted that his feelings for me were the same.

So yeah, I think he got scared of making something real. Maybe he’s more comfortable with keeping things “anonymous,” because it’s easier to deal. But I think he’s being immature and self-absorbed. Relationships are scary, yeah. I don’t have a great track record because I never felt right with my partners, but him? Oh, man. I was willing to make it work. Absolutely. But yeah, I do think that he needs to grow up and learn how to handle his emotions. He’s just too volatile and unpredictable, to the point where I’m cautious about what I say.

It sucks that I’m a casualty of his fear and whatever. It hurts like a b*tch. Now. I’m feeling lost and yeah, I really don’t know what to do. My first instinct is to send him some angry text/Skype messages, or an email, just to express how I felt. But that wouldn’t be good. I know that. It just sucks that I’m stuck with what I feel and I don’t know how to react right now.