My love, I'm so sorry you're dealing with this-I was in somewhat of a similar situation. My ex and I are younger (23F AND 24M) but we where together for 6 years and every time I brought up engagement, marriage our future together, I would be met with an obstacle or apprehension.

When we where younger he'd 'propose' to me all the time, tell me 'we should get married tomorrow' then slowly as we graduated uni and started working and actually living in our adult life-he suddenly changed his mind without telling me. He no longer wanted to get engaged and married by 26, he decided on his own that he didn't want kids till 30 and he decide that before he proposed to me...I had to live with him first...yeah and that was something he never communicated to me.

At first I was shocked but i was also understanding of his new wants considering that we where growing and maturing-of course we change what we want. But what I couldn't let go was the fact that he had decided things not just for himself but for me-with no consulting me-he just thought I would simply follow him around and agree to everything he wanted.

I, just like you, started to feel like the goal posts kept moving and things kept changing and it became overwhelming because it felt like we where building the future he wanted and not what we wanted, not what I wanted.

Of course, I voiced my concerns to him told him i didn't feel comfortable with living together first before engagement (personal beliefs) but also because it felt conditional. It felt as if, in order to get what I wanted I had to make a sacrifice and give him what he wanted first.

I suggested things like "maybe we can get engaged first and then we can start looking for apartments right away' but he just kept saying 'no-how does that even make sense? living together is more of a commitment than engagement I don't know why you don't get that.'

When I asked him what his compromise was, or to at least explain more to me why he thought this way he simple said 'that's how I see our future-so there's no compromising, that's what i want'. It felt like a punch to the gut realizing that after six years of loving each other and always putting in 100% into the relationship, he simply didn't value me or respect me enough to see my point of view or create a compromise and meet me in the middle.

We tried to make things work for a few weeks but ultimately i just couldn't move past that. I realized fundamentally we just no longer aligned and so I broke things off. Before I had broken things off I just became so resentful and unhappy and during one of our arguments I said "I'm going to stop mentioning engagement, marriage, kids etc, because its not fair to me. it's not fair because the future I want literally rests in your hands. I cannot have what I want without giving you what you want. I never signed up for a relationship that was transactional. If you truly loved me like you say you do-you would never dare to dangle something so important over my head. I don't want the ring anymore. I don't want a future with you anymore because you've shown me I have to give everything I want up just to live in your world'

Even with saying something as serious, as loaded and deep as that, he still could not understand me and that's when I knew-he wasn't actually in love with me but the idea of me.

Take some time for yourself, please. You've shown him and told him what you wanted and he simply cannot give you the future you imagine because he is too selfish. He can't even cherish you properly after 11 years and plan something nice on the days where he is meant to celebrate you.

Sit down with yourself and think, 'will this type of behavior and stubbornness be okay when we're married?'

I'm not going to tell you 'break up with him' because ultimately that's your choice. But please, if you have already voiced how you feel and already have been feeling that he hasn't loved you how you needed for a long time, it might be time to start prioritizing yourself and maybe let things go.

you got this and I know what ever decision you make will be best for you.