I know he’s great. I know you trust him, I know he loves your parents and will stroke your back if you can’t sleep. I realise you’ve had children and own a place together. Sure, he’s the first person you’d have dinner with/go dancing with/play cards with. But still …
I know he’s seen you at your lowest, your most raw, your most vulnerable. I bet he was great in the birthing room, when you lost your job and when you found out your parent wasn’t well. You’ve been through a lot together.
But don’t expect him to fill you up to the top.
If he’s great, he’ll get quite near the top. After a particularly close time – ‘can I be honest with you’ chats/fulfilling sex/a big old thing happening in one of your lives – he’ll get bloody near. But it’s unfair to think your partner can fill you up to the brim. You need friends and family and laughs and great boots and everything else in between. It’s too much to think he alone will be enough – too much pressure on him, on you, on the relationship. The truth is, if he gets to near the 80 per cent mark then that’s excellent – but you’ll need to find the rest from somewhere else.
He shouldn’t think you are all he needs either. OK, maybe we’d sometimes like to think they desire nothing or anybody else – not the football or the laughs with friends or the long chats with his family – but that’s unfair and a hideous burden. Of course he needs those things, that’s what makes him, him.
Love him or her and let them love you back. Be honest with them and listen to their worries and their hopes. Lie in bed all wrapped round each other laughing about when you first met and making plans for how the future is going to work (they want Eastbourne, you want King’s Cross) and give them your whole heart. But please, they cannot be the only thing.