Dear Mariella

My ex has had a breakdown and says he'd smoke less weed if I was with him. But that would mean giving up my life and job prospects, and I tend to be too kind…

The dilemma I'm 23, female and have just finished my MA in a northern university town far away from my home. I moved there with my boyfriend of slightly less than a year. We had quite a youthful, excitable relationship, I think, with the feeling we'd both saved each other from something. Moving and living there together was romantic but also stressful – he was working almost full time to fund his part-time MA and mine was full time. We were living in a new city, very far away from our old friends, doing separate things from each other. He started smoking weed more than he had previously, though already I felt it was too much. In the summer he had a breakdown, and we broke up after I tried for a long time to look after him. Now he's having counselling and wants to stop drug taking, but has realised this will take time to achieve. Part of me still loves him. He says he wants to do these destructive things less when I'm around, but as far as I can see he still does them. He'd like me back up there, but he's trying not put his life on hold, seeing other girls etc. In London I have good friends, my family is near and there's more stability if I stay here until I find a job. I want to look after my ex badly and for him to be OK, but I'm young and have a tendency to be too kind for my own good. Where should I choose to live?

Mariella replies It's not like you're having to choose between the devil and the deep blue sea now, is it? You already know the answer. In London you have your life ahead of you. Returning to your boyfriend you have the chance to play Florence Nightingale while your budding career goes into hibernation.

Listen to yourself: this isn't a geographical question – there are plenty of places north and south where you can ply a trade and lead a fulfilled life. This is a question of quality of life and I'm afraid it's yours versus his. As soon as you mention him you start sounding like a health worker, not a girlfriend. I'd suggest that what your current location has to recommend it is that it's 500 miles away from a man who only appears to have his own interests at heart. His commitment to you is measured by what would be better for him, and that's a perilous foundation to build a relationship on. He's also displaying an unhealthy tendency to lay his problems at your feet to sort out. Perhaps he's mistaken you for his mother? Whether or not he kicks his weed habit is not down to your proximity, and it's totally unfair of him to try and lure you by guilt. Kicking any drug requires personal resolve, not the abdication of responsibility that your ex clearly aspires to. How egotistical to think that helping him sort out his problems is the fate you deserve; it shows little respect for your achievements. There is no less fulfilling destiny than policing another person's bad habits in the hopes that you can bring about change. This guy is displaying all the worst tendencies of the confirmed addict: weakness, dereliction of responsibility and blind selfishness. Until he addresses those aspects of his personality he has little to offer anyone else. The evidence is apparent in what he considers to be the enticement to lure you back. The once-in-a-lifetime chance to play a part in his rehabilitation! Whoopee! LUCKY GIRL. Just think – all those years of hard study, and now you can throw it all away and take up a much more fulfilling role as responsible carer for this presently rather useless adult. The hint that he might reduce his dope smoking if you are around is hardly the offer of a lifetime, is it? Clearly his self-indulgence stretches to an inability to see further than his own toes.

I often wonder why, when youth is supposedly defined by giddy irresponsibility, so many young women end up feeling protective and responsible for undeserving boyfriends. Whether it's accepting their vices, infidelities, lack of interest or downright lies, they'll embrace their partner's problems as justification for lying across the door and allowing feet to be wiped on them. It's partly because at that age you do think you have time to waste, so a challenging project has some appeal. When you get to my advanced years you become miserly with every minute.

But there are also very serious self-worth issues dominating the lives of too many young girls. Luckily you seem to have a healthy regard for your own potential and I encourage you enthusiastically to follow that path. The benefit of hindsight is worthless unless the little wisdom you've accrued can be passed on to the next generation! Let's be brutal. What is he offering you? The tempting lure appears to be that when he's with you he's less likely to be stoned. It's hardly the stuff of epic romance. Imagine if that was the carrot Mark had thrown to Cleopatra, Rhett to Scarlett or Harry to Sally?

You are at the beginning of your adult life, with everything to live for – if you decide to sacrifice this precious time for a boy who wants to piggyback your potential rather than develop his own, it'll be hard to choose which one of you is more dysfunctional!★
