TL;DR: Girlfriend is enmeshed with her mom, and I worry about what this means for our future since we are discussing marriage. I'm trying to figure out what to do.
My girlfriend (37F) and I (32F) have been dating for 8 months and known each other for 4 years. It was a friends-to-lovers romance; we're part of the same friend group, and late last year, something shifted and we realized that we were more than friends. It was nerve-wracking at first to decide to date within our tight-knit community, but once we committed to doing so, our romance built quickly. Now we are inseparable, and she shows her love of me in SO many beautiful ways… tons of acts of service, words of affirmation, touch, quality time, and gifts. I could go on and on describing all the incredible things she has done for me. She tells me I'm "everything to her," the "air in her lungs," her "home," and that she "can't see a future without me in it." And my feelings for her are just as strong.
Lately, we've started discussing marriage, and it has brought up some serious concerns. Context: my girlfriend is the only child of a twice-divorced Eastern European immigrant mother (60F). My girlfriend's mom had a stroke about 10 years ago and can't work–or so my girlfriend says– so she lives with my girlfriend in a 2-bedroom condo that my girlfriend owns. Her mom has no other friends or family. From an outside perspective, her mom is able-bodied and mentally functional enough to have a job, but according to my girlfriend she has lasting mental damage from the stroke and is now essentially her dependent. Her mom doesn't speak English, and apparently her mom's anxiety is so debilitating that my girlfriend worries that leaving her for an extended period of time could give her another stroke and/or kill her due to hypertension. My girlfriend and I have managed to do short weekend trips together, but that's the most we can do because my girlfriend apparently can't leave her mom alone for too long.
I asked my girlfriend what this means for us living together some day. My girlfriend doesn't think her mom can live independently. Not even in the building next door. MAYBE a studio apartment within the same building, but my girlfriend even seemed skeptical about that idea. I'm a travel lover, and I asked my girlfriend if she'd be able to get away for 2 weeks out of the year to travel with me. She said no. One week? No. She has to be there for her mom, and her mom can't even do the grocery shopping without her. Additionally, my girlfriend is also unwilling to compromise on another issue: she's vegetarian and adamant that I don't bring meat into the home we share some day. So if we end up marrying some day, I'll not only be giving up my travel and my desired cohabitating situation (just me and her), but also my diet.
I've tried to have empathy and an open mind about the situation, but I'm starting to fear that this is unresolvable. To me, once a couple takes a vow of marriage, they commit to prioritizing each other and the relationship above all else. Obviously, emergencies are an exception and if her mom was in critical, urgent need of her attention, I'd understand the need for my girlfriend to go take care of her. But as it stands now, my girlfriend's care for her mom seems more like enmeshment, and enablement of her mom's learned helplessness. My girlfriend is constantly under a great deal of stress from this caretaking role and has broken down and sobbed to me about it, saying, "my life is not my own." If this is the way she sees it, I feel that I'm always going to come secondary to her mom.
Last night, my girlfriend and I had an emotional discussion about all of this, and she told me that the decision is mine to make. She won't leave me. So I have to decide what I'm willing to sacrifice and put up with, because according to her she can "never" give me all that I envision.
I don't know what to do, because my heart is telling me to work things out with her, but my brain is telling me that we're doomed.
How should I handle this?