Hi Carolyn: I’ve had my cat since college (almost 10 years). I’ve been dating my boyfriend for two years, I love him more than I’ve ever loved anyone, and we’d like to move in together.
My boyfriend hates cats. Hates them. He isn’t allergic (though he used to say he was, until I insisted on a test). He does have a strong aversion to them, probably from his family, who have some kind of belief that they’re evil or unclean. I’ve sought to understand it but could never get a coherent explanation out of any of them.
He jumps when the cat is in the room. And my cat is extremely affectionate, so doesn’t understand why he can’t come sit with us and be friends.
My boyfriend is offended I won’t give up the cat so he can move in. I’ve suggested compromises such as keeping the cat to just one part of the apartment, but he insists he needs the cat out.
I feel the cat was here first so this is an unreasonable ask. My boyfriend feels if I really love him then nothing should take precedence over his moving in, and he now says my hesitance is causing him to question the foundation of the entire relationship.
I cannot imagine rehoming my cat. I also can’t imagine ending my relationship. Am I being unreasonable or is he? — S.
S.: “Team Cat. No question. And I don’t like cats.” That opened my first draft of this answer. But it bothered me: He’s a person, not a Kleenex, and you’re gutted by having to part with a deep love of two or 10 years. I owe you a better answer. So I sat with it for a while. (And my dogs.)
Some people love us best in our context, amid our own people and pets and quirks and old furniture. Some people love us best out of our context and in theirs, with all their people and things. It’s an oversimplification but gets at a fundamental tension in some couples who really do love each other but also both feel worn down, uncomfortable, unsupported.
If the pair are both invested in pushing through initial discomfort to create an environment together that suits them both — and strong enough to recognize and walk away from an impasse — then it’s worth trying to make it work.
This could be you two, except you have tried to understand him and offered compromises (unrealistic ones, maybe, involving cat-free zones, but still) — while he has shooed the cat, lied about an allergy, then, when busted, settled on emotional blackmail: If you “really love him then” blah blah and you’re “causing him to question … the entire relationship.”
So reasonable or un- is the wrong standard.
Both of you want to live in your own definitions of comfort, reasonably — and you don’t have to live by anyone else’s just because it’s “reasonable.”
The standard for each of you is internal and about you alone: Is a particular accommodation for someone else comfortable or un-? Is it healthy for you or un-? Could you live with the choice peacefully ever after, or not? Cat, dog, city, faith, kids — could be anything.
The cat is a hairy decoy, distracting you from the serious mistake you’re poised to make: thinking about your relationship in terms of what you owe the other person. All you owe anyone is to be yourself. Respect others; be you.
It’s on him to ask his own questions about living with that real you. It’s on him to assume the work of living with his own answers.
