I think I need help...

[spsmnt]

Hello. I've been with my girlfriend for almost 1.5 years so far. I'm from Greece and she is from Taiwan. We met online last year, we started to chat, some romance developed and we established our relationship, and eventually two months later I went to Taiwan and we spent our first 12 days together, where I met her family too. Everything was beautiful and went perfect, and those were some of the best 12 days of my life.
After I came back, due to both of us being students and our distance being huge, we had to endure a whole year being separate, until we could meet again. It was hard in some parts, but most of it was happy and it worked fine. We spent a long time together almost every day, except the ones we were more busy. We used to chat on skype for plenty of hours, we slept together leaving the call on (well, at least during our common sleeping hours) and we handled the 6-hour time difference quite well. I tried to be home most days of the week in time to call and tell her goodnight. I made handmade things for her and I sent her stuff quite regularly.

Until this summer, she came to Greece late June and we met again, and she stayed for almost two months. She stayed at my home, and we went on vacation to some islands as well.
The thing is, I have problems with my home country. I don't really feel it as a 'home' country. I don't feel my home as 'home' either and my relationship with my parents is not good, it's quite estranged. On the other hand, Asian people's relationship with parents is always tighter, as they tend to show respect no matter what. My complete disregard towards my parents made her feel very awkward too, because my mom was always cooking for us and doing many things (because she felt she 'had to', not because she wanted), which gave her the exact opposite impression. Anyway, the point is that I feel Greece more as a prison than a home, where most of hope is lost due to the financial hardships, and I look forward to finishing my degree and going abroad to study and work.
So, things didn't go as we were expecting. I was constantly feeling the pressure of the combining presence of my parents and my girlfriend, which was totally awful. I really couldn't feel free, I couldn't express my love to her the way I wanted/should have. I mean, she was there, with me, but I kind of wasn't. I was just "in Greece", which means pretty much nothing to me. Also, I was still busy with some university projects until late July. I was feeling totally imprisoned.
There were some nice moments, but other than that we used to fight and disagree a lot. I'm a bit unorganised and do things at the last moment, she's the opposite. I start a bit later than I should, she always starts earlier to make sure she's on time. I love walking, she gets tired easily and wants to wait for the bus. I hate waiting for buses. But most of the times we couldn't really meet halfway, and I feel it was mostly because of my discomfort. And thus (and for some other stuff) she started to believe that we are not that good a match for each other after all. I really don't think that's true, because all of these things are quite petty and unimportant and we can overcome them. It was just all about the negative vibe she was getting.

In late August she went back to Taiwan and mid-September I moved to London for 3 months as an erasmus (European student exchange program) student, and I'm going back to Greece in almost two weeks from now. Since she went back, she hasn't been the same. We still love each other, but she constantly feels a big gap inside her. She has a lonely, negative feeling constantly. Our time difference is much bigger and it's harder to find times to chat a lot and spend time together. I'm also much more busy here. But no matter what I tell her and how I try to get her to hold her hope, her ill feeling doesn't go away. She misses me too often and many times I'm not there, and then she feels that waiting one more year to meet again (considering this year's 'setbacks') wouldn't be worth.

Yesterday she asked me to end it, because she really tried but can't fix her bad feeling. But I don't want to. I want to go back to what we had before summer. I love her and the thought of not being with her simply can't work in my head. I planned my future based on living with her, because our relationship was stable and because this is what I tend to do (unfortunately). It would mean that a huge part of my world is collapsing.
I think it's my fault for not being more available to her while I'm here. I told her that I want to try to fix her feeling by spending more time together and creating more beautiful memories that will eventually overwhelm her make the bad ones fade out of her mind. But she's unwilling and tired and she has lost most of her hope. She thinks it might be too late to fix things.

Could you suggest things I could do to make her feel more optimistic about us?

[sasad]

There are so many issues here.. You don't like your home or your parents, and seems like there was some disrespect and lots of tension. She experienced that and had to see a pretty negative side of you. You also complained a lot about what you disliked.. you never seem to compromise even though you knew there were issues . You saw that as unimportant, when in reality, its the little things that can make or break a relationship. You blew off some of the basic conflicts you need to learn to resolve.. and not blame them on "Greece" or everything else.
You need to take responsibility for yourself and your actions as well. You pretty much say how you want stuff to be your way. You cant fix things by spending time and overwhelm her with new memories to make the bad ones fade. FIX YOU!
That being said, you cant force her to stay with you. She had some pretty negative stuff and may be at the point where she is done. "I don't want to" is such a bad thing to say. Its not about YOU. Its a about 2 people.

[spsmnt]

Maybe I didn't explain some parts well.

I know it's about 2 people. Both of us still love each other. I'm not some kind of an egomaniac. It's not like she broke up with me, giving me no choice and now I just "want" her by myself. She's only trying to deal with a problem. She has a constantly negative feeling which renders an inability to find a balance in her personal daily and social life. That's why she suggested breaking up, because she's struggling to find any better solution. I want to find a way to help her reach that balance. I totally understand her feeling and it's perfectly sensible too. On the one hand, she misses me all the time, and on the other hand, because of the way the summer affected her, she is afraid that we wouldn't make it as a couple, so all of her patience and pain would not be worth the efforts. Which goes back to her missing me more, and needing me to help her fix that feeling of uncertainty that she can't fix by herself. It's like a dead end cycle, so now she is burdened by the fact that we are together.
She did see a negative side of me and considered that this is how I really am and how we would be living together in real life. But this is not true, since this was just my totally frustrated and restricted self. I couldn't handle the combination of being with my parents, being with my girlfriend and being busy with university all at the same time.
And yes, I know I have other issues, and I wish they were easier to fix but it's not that simple for me unfortunately. And yes, Greece is not my main problem (it still is quite an important one, though), my home is the main problem, but it is a fact that my relationship with my home affects the entire environment for me. I feel much more relaxed and free abroad. The more far away I get to be from home, the more I can find myself and be myself without restrictions.
It's not that I didn't want to compromise, I tried but it didn't work at all. I was constantly feeling trapped and getting negative effects from stuff that really are unimportant in themselves (but as you said and is obviously true, they can prove important for a relationship).

So, this is where I was wrong initially, I guess. The purpose first and foremost is not to make her feel optimistic about us, it's to help her feel optimistic and hopeful in general. To just be able to smile more, for her own sake first, without thinking of me or us.
I suggested to her to try to forget that we are a couple, to lay back and spend more time together, as close friends. We are very open, honest and intimate with each other, and we understand each other's feelings. Even if we did break up, we would still remain friends anyway. Thus maybe she could start to feel more relaxed by getting rid of the burdening thought of us as a couple. She wouldn't constantly feel my absence from her side and she wouldn't need me that much. But I can still be there for her always and keep showing my love for her. Wouldn't that possibly help?

[hmrambling]

Could you suggest things I could do to make her feel more optimistic about us?

I am going to suggest to you that you can't make anyone feel anything. You cannot make her feel more optimistic. You cannot make her feel anything. You do not have the power to make anyone feel anything. It's like trying to force someone to feel a certain way.

If she asked you to end it, please respect her wishes. She will contact you if she wants contact. If not, you need to accept it.

[differentcountries]

The thing is, she was feeling very vounerable in on her (LONG!) vacation probably, having to witness the tention between you and your parents. You were not able to move beside that to take care of her (even being nice to your parents to make HER more comfortable). You think it does not matter that she has to walk very fast when she does not like that - it matters very much! My SO normally walks very fast, but for me he slows down - and it makes me love him so much. It is a small thing, but it shows he cares. In many other matters, I let him have his way, I dont mind because he shows me it is not all about him.

There is no "other self". The person who struggled to balance studies, parents and girlfriend was YOU. Life IS about balancing different people who want different things from you - even if you will not live with your parents forever, you still have to relate to them somehow (unless you cut contact).

I have experienced something like this in a very tiny way, last time I visited SO. He had then lived with his family several months, due to him not having a job in his work town (long story). He felt like there was "nothing for him there"; all his relatives and old schoolmates were studying, working, starting up a family (his brother is engaged and the family is even now builing on the house to include them and their future family), having money to spend etc (he had food and lodging, but his family did not give him pocket money). I was visiting, very happy with myself because I had financed rather expensive tickets, and managed to go there at a rather difficult time myself (I had just lost my old job), happy to be there etc. Then he was kind of bitter that I liked it... We had a few rough discussions about it until I said: Love, I realize that this is your home town and you feel ambivalent about it. Last visit you felt good about showing me around, now you are more like meh because you have already been here way too long. 2,5 months is too long to be here. In the future, weather we live in Turkey or Norway, we will not go here to stay 2,5 months. I love it here, but it is boring and you are more relaxed in your work town. Please allow me to say you home town is pretty and to not feel miserable from hearing the frogs sing, laying in the grass with you. you are going to leave here soon to go back to work in a different job, so please focus on that. If we lived here, I would be here with you, you would have a job, it would be different and better. But we are not going to do that, because it will be better for both of us to live somewhere else. And I realized that he was actually scared that I would fall in love so much with his home town that I would suggest that we moved there.

I imagine the problem for her is, you may be "free" abroad, but she needs to have a life presented for her that she could see herself living. Are you going to live in her country? Yours? Abroad? Who will be living with you? How will your daily life be? You speak like someone who is not in a serious relationship. It does not matter if you feel free, living by yourself, away from the people who matter in your life. What is important is how you manage to mesh together the challenges that will come. Do you plan to have kids? How "free" do you need to feel?

If you want to date her, present her a realistic future - or listen when she tries to come up with suggestions for one. If you are going to break up, dont be her friend, just let her go on with her life. The point here is that to be a lover (or friend) you need to see things at least partly from her point of view, otherwise there is not point in staying in touch. Either way, I wish you luck working on some of the weak spots she pointed out to you - you will have to face them with her, or the next one.

[spsmnt]

I am going to suggest to you that you can't make anyone feel anything. You cannot make her feel more optimistic. You cannot make her feel anything. You do not have the power to make anyone feel anything. It's like trying to force someone to feel a certain way.

If she asked you to end it, please respect her wishes. She will contact you if she wants contact. If not, you need to accept it.

Thanks, but did you read my second post?

We are still in contact every day. We communicate well. We understand each other. And we both want to change the feeling, not just me. She thinks of breaking up because she has lost hope in her endless efforts to deal with it. Besides that, our relationship is fine. There is no kind of tension or misunderstanding between us.