How to politely tell my girlfriend to move out? (we hadn't actually agreed to live together)

Question

I know the title sounds worse than it is, she's not that creepy to just move in with me out of the blue.

But the thing is, I live very close to where she works, so when the occasion came for me to go on a trip to my hometown for a couple of weeks, I told her that she could stay in my place in the meantime.

When I was coming back (already on my way from the airport to my place by train), she joked in whatsapp that she had left because she thought that I wanted everything cleared on the same day (when she texted me that I said "of course not! if I'm coming back, the more reason for you to wait for me there"); and then she proceeded to surprise me playing hide&seek when I arrived to my apartment, because she was actually hiding in the terrace.

It has been nice to be able to spend with her some days in my apartment after coming back from my hometown, but it's been already 5 days and there is no sign from her to get back to her parents' place, and my feelings of needing some alone time are starting to arise (for reference, I came back on a Wednesday, now I'm writing this on a Monday morning after she has left to her office).

I don't know how to bring this up without hurting her feelings. Some background that might help for building my case:

• We've been talking for a long time about moving to another city together. At work they just promoted her from consultant to permanent, which in theory should help her for this, given that the new employer has a lot offices around the world.
• Despite the above, it feels she's not in a rush to explore this because she just signed up for a 6-months course in the city we are currently living (and despite me telling her that I'm starting to get tired of this country and want to move out).
• She suggested we go check out another apartment in the city together, which is even closer to her office, cheaper and bigger than my current place (2bedroom instead 1bedroom). So, in a way, it feels like she understands that if we live together, we should both pay rent (I doubt that she wants to just move in without chipping in). However, I told her last week that I made a mistake when agreeing to the apartment viewing, and asked her to postpone it to another day (for another set of reasons, she decided not to postpone and she'll probably going to check it out on her own).

Things that I'm thinking of bringing up to justify me wanting to leave:

• I have a very busy two weeks ahead (work, assignments, and exams) and I fear I don't concentrate so well when she's around all the time. I really need to be alone to work hard.
• I still have jet-lag from my trip so sometimes I wake up at 4am in the middle of the night, and when this happens I cannot do anything for the fear of waking her up (which would lead her to not be well-rested for work) so I end up bored for hours looking at my phone. If I was alone I would just start my morning routine earlier and get the heck out of the house as soon as possible.

Any more advice in how to approach this conversation that I need to have with her? I love her so much but I'm still not prepared to live together, especially in this city that is draining on me already.

(Some background: I'm in my early 40s, she's in her early 30s, and we've been about 2.5 years together.)

Answer 1

I had kind of a similar situation when my boyfriend was moving to my city. We had agreed that he can stay at my place while he checks out apartments he had picked out and if non work out he rents an airbnb as usual. Luckily one of the apartments worked out and he could move in immediately, but he just... didn't. It made sense because he would need to buy basics like a mattress etc but I realised he isn't checking or ordering stuff at all.

I really, really hated bringing it up, even though the agreed staying time already was over, so I just assumed he'll figure it out by himself. Big mistake. He was very comfortable with the situation while my contempt grew stronger and when I finally brought it up I was quite fed up and it came out ruder than I would have liked. In the end he had no issue moving along, he was just comfortable and assumed if I'm not saying anything, I'm liking the setup too.

Moral of the story is - better state you want them out sooner than later. I don't get how he was more comfortable in my tiny apartment instead of his new one, but he just was and he was not about to move. And I feel like there's no nice way to say it, but if you don't do it soon, you might throw out the niceness out of the window.

Better just say

"Hey, thank you for staying over but I would like for us to return to our own places, when do you think that would be possible"

without bringing in the justifications. She might have the best intentions and be like "Omg, hard times coming up? I'll stay and help out then!". If the matter of fact is you want your place back, you want your place back and just state it. If you bring up justifications, she might try to solve them while staying with you.

TL;DR

1. Don't postpone it
2. Don't rely on justifications

Yeah, it will be awkward but this is a great practice of stating your boundaries and you really need that for long term relationships.

Answer 2

With my first girlfriends, I tried to treat the resting / sleeping like in the movies: falling asleep hugged, waking up in a certain way etc. For me, it was terrorizing, because I could not have a proper rest at all. We did not live together, we just spend nights occasionally.

Fast forward: I had this new girlfriend. The first time we had to rest together (we were in a trip with some other friends), I decided to have this discussion with her:

I like being with you, I am happy to spend time with you. But I have the experience that if we try to sleep being hugged and other "romantic" stuff, I will not have a good rest at all. So I propose this: when we actually want to fall asleep, all "friendship" goes away, we are not "together" anymore. I do not have to hug you, you do not *have to hug me. We can still hug each other if we want or if it is comfortable, but not as a duty. Also, please note that I propose this rule strictly for the purpose of sleeping / resting. Everything else is normal business, will all rules and all romance we want.

She gladly accepted. We had other discussions on serious matters, and we always found the way which was suitable for both.

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So I suggest you to take responsibility for yourself and for your relationship. Discuss the proper things at the proper time, make the proper decisions at the proper time. And stop having the expectation that anyone will read your mind and fulfill your wishes out of thin air, that does not happen in our world, unfortunately.

Additionally, it is normal behavior for girls t think very seriously about marriage even much sooner than 2.5 years. Most likely, she tries to send you an important message, about a life changing matter. Make your decisions, and act according to those decisions. She already made her decisions, and she already acted.

Answer 3

I'm missing the reason why you dont want her to move in. You describe some justifications and "building a case", but not the reason you want her to move out.

Find that reason and explain that to her. To me it feels like you dont really have a real reason are (no bad intention suggested) grasping for some meta reason. The reason I think that is because:

• Needing absolute silence likely is not needed and you can come to an agreement on how to work at home, for example when you are in the work room, she may not disturb you. And when you come in for eg lunch, then some socials can occur. Or some good headphones.
• Jetlag isn't a real reason, that is something that fixes itself in a few days. And even when this happens on a regular basis you can come to an agreement, eg "when I come back I need you to be quiet around the house until I'm back in sync".

Ofcourse you can determine wether or not my bullet points are correct, but both of those reasons can be solved fairly easy, giving the impression some deeper reason it present.

I'm not saying you must let her move in! If you dont want that, then dont. I'm saying that there might be a more "deeper" reason. Maybe its just a bit permanent, making things to real? That may feel like a weird thing to say, but I kept my own appartment for 8 months after moving in with my GF, just in case. A waste of money, but I found it very uncertain to move in.

If you dont mind her moving in, but not instantly 100%: You can start with just weekends. You can easily explain that completely moving in at this point is a bit too much and you are having difficulty with 100%, but (every other?) weekend could be a nice start.

You can add that you can understand that moving out from her parent is granting her freedom, but is costing yours. Not per se in a bad way, but something that needs some getting used to (Im guessing you're solo for).