First of all, this topic greatly saddens me, for multiple reasons. The obvious – I feel sad he’s neglecting me and it really hurts to be ignored and be treated like a nobody, when I am attending his parties as his gf. The more frustrating thing – my other mid-30s friends are dealing with bigger grown-up things like families and babies, while I am being hurt by my mid-30s bf who loves to drink to get drunk at parties. What are we doing? We’re not in our 20s anymore. Why am I dealing with this?

I feel guilty though. He treats me very well – when we’re alone. I just don’t know how I can accept that he ignores me when he’s in the presence of his friends. He literally abandons me and disappears, then comes back to see me twice during a 5 hour period to “see if I’m okay” for a couple minutes. NO – I’m not okay. Oh, okay, don’t worry, no one here knows anyone else either (runs off drinking with another buddy). What an entertainer. What a great host. What a shitty bf (at parties).

If I was a super extrovert, or had the same personality as him, maybe it’d be ideal and we could mingle separately and both have fun, separately. But he knows me – he knows I’m quiet, a bit insecure, and just don’t feel comfortable in large groups etc. He just doesn’t really care

The closest answer I found that was similar to my situation was this one:

Should I Accept It When My Boyfriend Leaves Me Alone At Parties?

I tried to be understanding. I tried to heed the advice from the above article. But it’s so much harder to do! I don’t think I have it in me. I felt so defeated and helpless.

A close second advice-article was this one:

http://www.quora.com/How-do-I-tell-my-boyfriend-that-he-is-hurting-me-by-ignoring-me-and-being-condescending-towards-me

Someone posted and suggested the following:

“You are hurting me by ignoring and being condescending towards me.”

Alternate phrasing: “When you ignore me and act condescending towards me, I feel hurt.”

Really, really delicate version: “Lately, I’ve been feeling ignored and I haven’t been feeling respected. I don’t know if you mean to treat me that way or if I’m just misunderstanding. I would like it if you’d _____.”

If none of these things lead to a change, then the problem isn’t making him understand how you feel. It’s persuading him to care about how you feel. And I don’t know about you, but I don’t waste my time trying to persuade people to care about how I feel. If they don’t care, they don’t get to be close to me. Period.

So true. I don’t know why I need to persuade him to care about how I feel. I know he knows how I feel. He texted me the next day saying he could guess that I was upset at his drinking and neglecting me (his own words). He just truly doesn’t care how I feel and assumes I should be a great gf and just very understanding. Is this selfish? Am I being selfish? Or do we just want different things?

Anyway. I need an outlet. They say you should always talk about these things with your partner if it’s bugging you. He has heard this from me several times and doesn’t care anymore. In fact, this time he knew and expected I’d have a terrible time and told me in advance that I should leave the party by myself whenever I feel like it. When I told him I was leaving, he just said ‘bye’, gave me a fake hug, and continued on joyously chatting and drinking with his friends. Couldn’t have made me feel any more insignificant.

I can’t help but create some distance between us. I know it’s dumb to remove myself like this. But I felt so hurt and neglected, and then more hurt that he doesn’t care. The next day, he acted all sweet again, as in to make up for the time he neglected me. Such BS. It hurts too much. Like I’m some pet dog – ignore me one day, please me the next. It shouldn’t be this way. I’m not a yo-yo ball, where he gets to pull me back up whenever he wants.