TLDR: I need the internet to tell me to get my shit together. My girlfriend is amazing and really hard working but I don’t put any effort into our relationship and put financial pressure on her for no reason other than my own insecurity.

Preface: I am the A-hole. As the title states I (22M) am emotionally and financially manipulative towards my long distance (3-hour car drive) (22F) girlfriend of nearly 3-years due largely to what I believe to be immaturity and a slew of personal issues that I have with both myself and my family (note: this is just me speculating on myself, I do not attend therapy though I think this should really be a first step in fixing this and other issues). I want to be a better person and honestly just don’t know why I’m not making the necessary changes.

I’ll start with my girlfriend. All in all, she’s amazing, beautiful, a super kind and generous person who if she has $20, everyone has $20.  She’s a full time student in her final semester of college while working a part time job to pay her expenses. She works extremely hard at both of these while also making sure to have time for our dog taking the time to hang out with her friends, have hobbies, and to top it all off, she makes sure to make sure our relationship and myself are happy and taken care of (buying/making gifts, planning surprises, picking new restaurants, etc). She used to do more to make our relationship special like leaving love notes, surprise candy and stuffed animal, planning dates, but she stopped almost altogether after I did almost nothing to reciprocate/return any of this effort and care. I took these things for granted and they went away. She’s made it abundantly clear what she needs from me in our relationship (plan some dates, buy/make her small gifts to let her know I’m thinking of her, honestly just anything to show that I care) and I did almost nothing. Before we started dating and at the very beginning of our relationship I did try, and I was doing the things that she’s asking of me not because she was asking (she hadn’t asked for any of this yet) but because I wanted to and knew it would make her happy. But after we started dating I got lazy, complacent, and now it’s a rare occurrence that I so much as bring her flowers when I come to see her every couple weeks.

We frequently get into “arguments” where she comes to me with what is always a very, for lack of better verbiage, valid issue. It’s almost always something she has come to me with before and that I said I would fix/ improve upon. The problem is, I tend to shut down and get really defensive and just end up apologizing. As I said above, I pulled back almost immediately when we started dating and this has cause a ton of issues with her not feeling valued, acknowledged, loved, and respected. These issues are furthered when I do my best to end these conversations as fast as possible by apologizing and saying that I’ll do better and then proceed to do the exact same thing that I said I would fix. Honestly I don’t know how to fix this. I know I’m being dismissive of these things that I know are major issues that I have and need to fix if 1. I want to keep our relationship. 2. Simply want to stop being such a terrible person. Focusing on the financial manipulation, I make $60k per year in an office job while my girlfriend makes probably close to 8k. While being a full time student. She pays her own rent/utilities, pays for our dog almost entirely (I only help with unexpected bills usually related to the vet), purchased the vast majority of items for our apartment (we live together for a year prior to being long distance), and to top it all off she’s extremely generous when it comes to gifts/dinners for big events like birthdays and graduations (not just for me but for my younger brother!). I on the other hand, pay for my student loans, car insurance, vet plan for our cat, live rent free with and have meals made for me by HER PARENTS, and otherwise have no expenses other than going to visit her every other weekend. The differences between our bills and in the amount we make are not the problem, the problem is that I act like I’m equally broke if not more so that she is. I complain about spending money like it’s my job and make her feel guilty for wanting to go out on dates, get coffee in the mornings when I’m there, pay for anything for OUR DOG, etc. Overall, I make her feel like shit for not being able to split the weekends and anything else 50/50 with me. I know this is ridiculous. I know that I need to change my perspective from her expenses being unrelated to mine and that when we’re together, it should be even. I know that I’m in the position to at a bare minimum, cover the expenses when we’re together and not complain about it. But i always, without fail, complain about spending money and blame her. I don’t want to be this person. I don’t want to be the person who only care about themselves and makes her feel like shit for being a full time student with responsibilities. I want to be the person she can ask for help from without feeling like I’m going to complain about it. What do I need to do to fix myself?