My Girlfriend Admitted She Wasn’t in Love Anymore Yet Wanted to Continue Living Together, So… (Full Update)

My girlfriend said she wasn’t in love with me anymore but wanted to keep living together. So I became the perfect roommate and stopped doing everything for her until she realized what she lost and begged me to take her back, but I had already found someone better.

I’m Jake, 28M, and I’ve been with my girlfriend, Belinda, 26F, for three years. We moved in together about 18 months ago after she lost her job at a marketing firm.

I work as a software engineer at a tech company downtown and I make decent money. Belinda has been doing freelance graphic design work since then, but it’s pretty inconsistent income.

Let me give you some background about our relationship. When we first started dating, Belinda was this incredibly independent woman.

She had her own apartment, paid all her bills, and never asked me for anything. That’s actually what attracted me to her initially; she seemed like she had her life together.

But things changed gradually after she moved in. At first, she was contributing to rent and utilities from her savings.

Then her freelance work started drying up around the time COVID hit. I told her not to worry about it and that I could cover everything until she got back on her feet.

What I thought would be a temporary arrangement turned into something permanent. I started taking care of everything.

I paid the rent, utilities, groceries, car insurance for both our cars, and even her phone bill. I added her to my family plan because it was cheaper than her individual plan.

I handled all the household maintenance, fixed things when they broke, did most of the cleaning, and managed our social calendar. When we went out with friends, I picked up the tab.

When we went on vacation, I paid for flights, hotels, and meals. Belinda seemed grateful at first.

She would thank me and promise things would change once her career picked up. But as months passed, she stopped mentioning it.

She started acting like this was just how things worked in our relationship. She would ask me to book dinner reservations for her and her friends.

She expected me to drive her places when her car was acting up. She would make plans for us without consulting me, assuming I would handle the logistics and expenses.

The physical side of our relationship was good. We were intimate regularly and she seemed happy.

She would tell me she loved me. We would cuddle while watching TV and everything appeared normal from the outside.

Her friends liked me and my friends liked her. We talked about moving to a bigger place next year and maybe getting a dog.

A Sudden Revelation

Three weeks ago, we were sitting on the couch watching some reality show about people renovating houses. I was getting ready for bed because I had an early meeting the next morning.

I leaned over to kiss her good night like I always do. She pulled back and gave me this strange look.

She picked up the remote, muted the TV, and turned to face me directly. She said she needed to tell me something important.

She said “she liked me as a person and enjoyed living with me but she wasn’t in love with me anymore.”

She said “she hadn’t been in love with me for months, maybe longer.”

She said “she wanted to be honest because she respected me too much to keep pretending.”

I asked her what she wanted to do about our living situation and our relationship. She said she hoped we could continue living together as friends.

She said “we worked well as roommates and there was no reason to mess up a good thing.”

She said “she valued our friendship and didn’t want to lose that by making things complicated.”

I told her I needed to think about it. I went to the bedroom and lay down.

About 20 minutes later, my phone started buzzing with notifications. Belinda was in a group chat with her three closest friends, and I had access to it because we sometimes use the shared tablet to text when our phones were dead.

I could see she was telling them about our conversation. I watched the messages pop up on the screen.

Her friends were telling her how brave and mature she was for being honest. They said it showed how much she cared about me that she didn’t want to hurt me by lying.

They said lots of people stay in relationships for convenience, but it takes courage to have the hard conversations. I realized something while reading those messages.

Belinda wasn’t being brave or honest; she was being practical. She had figured out a way to keep all the benefits of our relationship without any of the obligations that come with being in love with someone.

She wanted to keep living in the apartment I pay for. She wanted to keep the financial security I provide.

She wanted to keep the emotional support and companionship. She just didn’t want to feel guilty about not loving me back anymore.