Hi Eliana,

I think that makes sense, unfortunately the one time I tried talking to her on the phone she texted me after saying she couldn’t talk… and because our schedules are kind of different, there isn’t really an ideal time for us to just chat. But I do like what you are saying about building a foundation of friendship.

We’ve kept it very light over the past week, exchanging a couple texts here and there, mainly just hello’s and how are you’s as we both got through our week. We plan on seeing each other tonight, and my main goal is to just enjoy conversation with her… to get to know her more, to build more of a connection there. I’m glad things have calmed down a bit, but I certainly want to keep it going. Hopefully I get a better idea of what page she’s on tonight.

Thanks for your thoughts.

Thank you Anita and Trianglesun for your posts. Your kind words of encouragement are wonderful to keep looking back on when I am feeling low.

I had old high school/college friends come visit me this weekend, and it was nice to have their company. It reminded me of a time before I moved to the city I live in now, in my hometown, where I had different ups and downs and things to worry about. The weekend was a fun adventure and it meant a lot to me. At times I would get hit with missing her, but I’d simply accept it and try to bring myself back to the present.

Last night before bed I was thinking about one of the best parts of this whole process… and that is my freedom of time and commitment. I realized I don’t have to wait around for her anymore. There were so many times where I would stay up late into the night waiting for her to get off of work or just to see if we would even make plans. I would even set alarms so that if I fell asleep I could still wake up in time to ask if she wanted to come over. It wasn’t ideal, but I wanted to do it at the time so I could see her.

But now I can make my own schedule again, and that’s really nice. So with that, I turned off the light at about 10pm.. and I set an alarm for 6:30am.. and I drove an hour to get to the ocean where I spent my whole morning. I walked a couple miles, I rented a surfboard and went out on the water, and I had a great time with just me. I’ve always liked the idea of surfing and this was the 3rd time in my life I’ve ever tried. I think I’m going to go again on my day off next week.

It was a really beautiful day, and I felt myself enjoying things more. It was a nice change. It wasn’t constant, but that’s okay.. it’s one of the things I’ve come to understand. Feelings come and go, I feel them very intensely.. which can make the hard ones difficult to manage… but it’s also what makes the positive ones so enjoyable.

The sun has set now and I am okay with everything and grateful for how I’ve handled the past few days. I’ve been working hard at not dwelling on the past or worrying about the future. I try not to think about her or what she is doing. Little reminders come through often, but I let them leave after acknowledging them. I saved a few quotes (some from this very website) that I try to read every day. Maybe they will provide help to anyone else who is reading this with some sadness in their heart:

• “Every activity is an act of strength when you’re struggling.”

• “We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.”

• “Letting go doesn’t mean that you don’t care about someone anymore. It’s just realizing that the only person you really have control over is yourself.”

• “You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself ‘I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.’ You must do the thing you think you cannot do.”

• We can incessantly pick at the “should haves” and “would haves,” but your inner GPS chose a route based on the information you had at the time. You couldn’t have done anything different. When you can fully embrace this, it is an act of forgiveness to yourself, because you stop questioning your capabilities. Everything you did was as it was supposed to be.”

I’ll post again soon. Thank you all.

Thanks for posting Cognition and Anita, nice to hear from both of you. Believe me Cognition, I have a pretty stacked break up playlist with songs from Bob Dylan, Frank Sinatra, Beck, Tom Waits, and a grip of others haha. There’s definitely a peace that comes with listening to the heart break of others.

My dwelling feelings of missing her have calmed down again, and I am doing my very best to be as present as possible. Today I am sad but stronger than I was yesterday. I have been doing everything possible to keep myself busy and in good company. One troubling thing is that she has been in every one of my dreams for the past week or so. Sometimes we are together again in them, sometimes we aren’t, but she’s always there. Someone once told me that we work out a lot of impossible scenarios in our dreams, and they bring us strength in reality. I remember when my best friend went through his biggest break up, and he had haunting dreams for months. This process is so intense and I wish there was an easier way through it… but I know the best way is to just keep living day by day.

I’ve been thinking about that saying “if you truly love something set it free, and if it doesn’t come back it wasn’t meant to be”
I wonder if that is true for my current situation.

I remember my first heartbreak, when I was 16 years old. After she broke up with me I tried so hard to win her back. I read up on techniques and strategies and talked to everyone I knew about it… But we never got back together, and I eventually got over her. I set it free, she never came back into my life, and thus it wasn’t meant to be. It took a long time for me to let her go. Over a year I think… and it solidified with me moving back to my hometown across the country. Now that pain feels so distant and yet almost nostalgic. I think it might have been easier then. Less complex. Maybe this pain will one day be the same.

Thank you all for sharing your thoughts with me, I need them now more than ever.

I don’t know what she did or who she talked to in the 13 days that have gone by since we had the break up, but she wouldn’t have been able to see her ex because he lives on the other side of the country. I’m sure they talked like they normally do. She probably didn’t make any changes… she just felt the loss of me from her life and was saddened by that. It gave her the feeling like she had to pull me in again. And for that hour and a half on the phone she almost did… but the pain I’ve felt since getting off the phone has only gotten worse. After talking with my best friend, my sister, my mother, and all of you on here… I know that it’s not moving the right way.

I worked up the courage to send her a message. One of closure that I hope she respects this time. It read:

“I know I said we should go a week, and I hate going back on that so quickly. But I have been heavily conflicted since we spoke, to the point where I was breaking into tears in the middle of the night and am now doing it at work. I don’t want to feel this kind of pain anymore. There is certainly a part of me that wants to have your love in my life, but I don’t think it is possible anymore. My reasons are many, though I think the most important is that nothing really has changed. You still feel you can’t commit to me the way I would want you to. I also know you still have feelings for [ex’s name] and wouldn’t be able to cut that off entirely for me. It doesn’t matter if we were to try and take it slow or not because throughout our time together you were trying to slow it down and I couldn’t do it. I wouldn’t be able to this time around either. There are just too many what ifs, too serious of doubts, and too many feelings that hurt. It’s still just as messy as it was, and if we try to make it work now I can’t see it being for either of us. I wish I had the strength to try, or the patience to wait, but my emotional capacity has drained. I’m so sorry it can’t work. I think it would be best if we stopped talking for good now and we both moved on from this completely.”

I’ve eradicated any romantic fantasies of how this will play out now. If I see her again in life, then I will assess it all then. If I don’t, I’m probably better off. It’s very difficult to have to kill off whatever love still lingers. But you have all helped me realize that I have to for my own health.

Well we ended up talking again last night. We didn’t see each other, but we spent an hour and half talking on the phone. I was able to express all the pain and sadness I felt, all the things I felt were unfair, all the problems that were there. She apologized for her actions… and she told me how important I was to her and how much she wanted me to be in her life. She felt that we really rushed into things, and it wasn’t either of our faults but it made things very difficult for her. She never wanted it to be like she belonged to me, or her ex. She wanted to be independent even though we had some kind of relationship… But she was never really clear about that. I think she felt so much pressure from her previous one to be defined by the relationship that she was trying to avoid that again at all costs. She made a lot of mistakes with me, and she regrets them. She wants to try and start slowly again. No rushing into anything, just trying to build something better over time.

I told her we should take a full week before we talk again. I need to get some more clarity and she needs to understand what I want and need if we were to go forward – I made all of that pretty clear. She thought that was a good idea, and so thus the week has begun.

I’m conflicted. I of course really care about this girl and see the genuine feelings coming from her. I know she feels like she messed up, and I know she doesn’t want me back just because she’s lonely. She wants me back because she feels like I’m someone special too. I told her it wouldn’t work if her ex is still in the picture. That’s a stipulation I can’t back down on… but at this point I feel like I’ve put so much work into letting her go that it feels wrong to turn around. All of my friends and family have supported me, all of you on this site have supported me. To disown everyone’s support seems like the wrong thing to do. My sister thinks that it will just end up in a bad spot again… that after some 7 months of it I have a pretty good idea of how this girl handles things and what could happen again. I don’t want to put myself in that position.

I’m not sure what other information is useful here. I really felt like she was trying, but I don’t know if it’s right or wrong to work on it with her again. Thank you all again for your thoughts.

Thanks to everyone who wrote back.

I’ve had a weird feeling sitting with me since I talked to her. I spent a lot of time yesterday and today debating if I should reach out to her… If I should take her up on her invite to meet for a drink tonight, if I should write her a message explaining why it is probably not for the best… At this point though I feel I should just leave it alone. That also seems to be supported by my friends and family.

Jenny you asked if I feel I could ever be just friends with her, and I think the answer is yes but it’s hard to say right now. Of course, while I’m in the thick of mourning the loss of love, it would be too difficult. I certainly have no intention of being her friend anytime soon. and it’s probably for the best that we don’t talk often (or at all) while we let each other go. With that said, I think that if things weren’t ever to work out romantically between us I would still like to keep in touch with her. She’s too special of a person for me to write off forever. Perhaps I would be even more inclined towards a friendship if I found the love I deserve with someone else… someone who was really good to me, who I wouldn’t want to leave for anyone. At that point I wouldn’t entertain the idea of a possible romantic future with her. But it’s all hard to say at this point.

Cognition, I find myself completely agreeing with your post. Before all of this, I really believed that fighting for love was courageous, no matter the emotional cost. I look back on previous relationships I had and I remember fighting for them too… but a fantasy ending never came. It seems like once you’ve had a little bit, it’s worth putting yourself on the line for all of it. I’m much too exhausted now to do that. I think I’ve become jaded in a lot of ways at this point… and I don’t mean that in a pessimistic “love doesn’t exist” kind of way. I still very much believe in romance, love, and the beauty of both, but I’m much too tired to put myself on the line for it right now. For her or for anyone else.

I miss her. I don’t know if I find any comfort in knowing she misses me too. It’s sad that there really isn’t anything that can be done about that. I know we must think about each other equally, and both be feeling the loss in a difficult way. She wanted so bad to see me, but I just can’t see that being good for either of us. I hope my absence helps her realize that I can no longer play the game. I hope it brings her some clarity even though it hurts.

Thank you for sharing more of your story Jenny. What you went through sounds like an incredibly painful experience, and I’m grateful that you are in a place now where you can share it. I was actually taking anti depressants for the first time right before I met this girl, but there were unforeseen side-effects that made me want to try something else. When my doctor picked another for me, it seemed my anxiety symptoms got worse, so I just decided to do away with a daily medication and stick to taking Xanax when my panic attacks happened. That seems to have worked out good enough. I just don’t have the courage to try out new once-daily prescriptions anymore.

The anger in my panic attack brought a lot of reality out, and killed a lot of fantasy. That was difficult, because like I said I had convinced myself all the trouble was going to dissipate and it would all get better. I put her on a pedestal, and I put too much heart into the unlikely future. It was an important realization.

I woke up today with little anger left in me. Just like Jenny said, the days fluctuate feelings. I’m back to feeling the loss of a person I cared deeply for. I miss having her around… but I don’t mess the stress of not knowing when she would be.

I hung out with friends last night, and I’m going out again tonight. My weekend should be nice. Work will be less chaotic next week too. Things are going in the right direction ever so slowly.

She sent me a game invite to that app we played again last night. It didn’t really bother me as much this time, and I simply ignored it. I guess I know for certain that she misses me too.

Thanks for reading.