I've been with someone for 18 months. We met and fell for one another. We actually live together.

Almost from the beginning (well, 2 months in) my physical health went to crap and my mental health swirled down the drain with it. It's been really hard on us both. It's not easy for even the most emotionally healthy person to cope with someone grappling with the stuff that I am and he's got his own issues so he's not a bastion of Emotional Health either.

There have been many tears, many fights, many hurts on both sides. Yes, there has been laughter and tenderness but, being truthful, the hard times have outweighed the good times.

I know that even if I get my act together that he isn't "the one". He's a lovely person but for a variety of reasons we're just not ideally suited. And, no, it's unlikely that it's the sort of thing that couples therapy would remedy. Getting to know him over this time I've come to believe that we are just fundamentally very different people as far as a few different pretty important things.

But he loved me so much for so long. I think far past the point where I don't think I truly loved him because I don't love myself: how could I give away to him what I don't even have for myself?

Lately, though, he's....different. I don't know how to put it. Basically I don't hear the love he used to have for me in his voice anymore whenever he talks to me. He's not nasty or mean. I just can tell something that was there is not there any longer. It's best; I believe trying to have a romantic relationship with each other is not a good thing for either of us.

So why does hearing him sound this way make me so sad? I KNOW we're not a "good match".

If I know that this is best so why does realizing he doesn't love me "like that" anymore hurt? Not "oh-god-I'm-dying" hurt - but it does hurt and make me so, so sad. Why? I don't understand.