Hi Candice – I’m very late to your thread here, but just wanted to say that I was moved by everything you’ve written and by how quickly your relationship with M spiraled downhill.  I can only imagine how much emotional pain and turmoil you’re in right now, and how much the cheating, lying, and betrayal you’ve experienced has eaten away at your self-esteem and made you feel worthless, vulnerable, and expendable.  I think it’s completely normal, after experiencing what you have, to have those feelings, and it’s absolutely worth acknowledging that they’re there…but remember that just because a particular thought or emotion enters your reality doesn’t make it true.  You’re not worthless.  There is nothing wrong with you, and you are more than enough despite being cheated on.  You seem like a bright, resourceful and introspective woman, and sometimes it’s only when we’re pushed into situations like these that we discover an inner reserve of strength and self-confidence that we never imagined we had access to.

It’s not your fault that you’ve been in relationships with S, M, or any other man that may have turned out to be a complete and utter a-hole.   Analyzing and reflecting why you entered those relationships or when you could have first seen the red flags has value up to a certain point, but remember that you don’t have to figure out the why now.  At a certain point,  rather lamenting past choices or blaming ourselves for what we’ve experienced, we just have to accept that a combination of different factors may have led us to be in a certain relationship with someone who wasn’t good for us, and that we NOW recognize those aren’t people that can adequately fulfill our needs or that we can have strong, stable, loving relationships with.

In dealing with painful situations like this, I’ve sometimes found it helpful to frame the setback as a challenge of some sort, an opportunity in disguise.  Maybe–particularly since you mentioned that he lives 10 minutes from you–this is an opportunity to develop healthy boundaries and focus on yourself and all the things that drive you as a person.  To show yourself the same love, understanding, and empathy that you clearly showed him.  As much as it hurts and as it difficult as it sounds, you may want to use this as an opportunity to shift all your attention away from S or M and towards the things in your life that ARE working.  That bring you joy.  Use this as an opportunity to explore your spirituality, reconnect with old friends, develop a new exercise or morning routine (doing the Miracle Morning by Hal Elrod on a consistent basis has helped me through many a breakup), accomplish a new goal (no matter how small), meditate, read books on topics you’ve always wanted to know more about–the list goes on.  Just because he’s close by doesn’t mean you have to engage with him in any meaningful way or continue to give him your energy and attention. And if he comes back, asking for your forgiveness and chalking up his shitty behavior to childhood trauma, drug addiction, [fill in the blank], take that as an opportunity to practice saying no. Go away. Even if it hurts in the moment.  The more you recognize and acknowledge your wholeness and self-worth, the easier saying no becomes.

Also, you’re 28–you’re so young!  If you want a romantic partner, that relationship will eventually come.  You don’t have to just accept that you might never find someone (I’ve had well-meaning friends tell me similar things, by the way, and they were wrong).  You will eventually find someone amazing–even though it doesn’t feel that way now–when the timing is right and when you probably least expect it.  But sometimes the process of getting there can be winding and painful, and the more we can just relax and lean into the opportunities we’re given to learn, grow, and heal our wounds, the easier it is to be in the frame of mind that actually gives rise to the things we most desire.

Sorry–weird formatting issues posting through my phone!  Posting from my computer instead 🙂

First of all, I want to say that I completely understand that all of us have a limited view and understanding of your situation given that we are not in it and given that we don’t know you beyond what you’ve stated in this virtual platform.  So I agree that you should take everything others tell you with a grain of salt and question everything.  Even what society tells you about what relationships should look like.  What your favorite YouTube spiritual guru tells you, or what your friends or family tell you.  That’s part of the spiritual path—realizing that no one has the answers for us, we have to reach in and uncover them ourselves. Towards the end of my so-called “twin flame” journey, I stopped asking for others’ input, not because it wasn’t valuable or valid but because my feelings towards my twin couldn’t be rationalized and it felt frustrating talking about those feelings just to be met with analysis from well-meaning friends who wanted to get to the root of my fixation with this guy. Weirdly enough, it’s only when I stopped analyzing and just accepting feelings for him—and stopped caring about whether he felt them too, because I would never be able to truly know that and wondering would just trigger another episode of futile analysis—that my feelings of anxiety lessened considerably and I was able to enjoy the love I felt for him without any expectations about the future or regrets about the past.  And eventually, I met someone else that I now have a healthy, fulfilling relationship with, and my TF became someone who still evokes positive feelings in me, but is not someone I could ever see myself pining for again.

That being said, some level of analysis may be useful, and to an outsider like me, it seems like you’re attributing your anxiousness and need for certainty as the source of the problem in the relationship (rather than anything your partner has done).  So your response to your anxiousness has been to fiercely cling to something that many people (particularly those with more secure attachment styles) would have left by now, because on some level you’re clinging to the perception that you can gain control if you just learn to reign in your anxiousness. It’s okay to accept that you’re not giving up—you’re not letting your anxious attachment style dominate your love life—by letting this person go. You’ve already spent plenty of time in this relationship, given it time and energy and opportunity to grow, and at this point you’ve received clear-as-day signals that he’s not going to be able to reciprocate the way you’d like him to.

You’re not making a premature decision to bow out of this; in fact, it’s your anxious attachment style that’s likely been keeping you in this for so long.  His ambivalence and mixed signals is fueling your anxiety, fueling your hope one day, before crushing it the next, so that you’re left in a perpetual state of disequilibrium and confusion where you no longer know what’s real and what’s not.  You react by staying and hoping that things sort of figure themselves out on their own, that he gets clarity as to what he feels, when all signs indicate that’s likely not going to happen.

I agree with Anita that he seems quite selfish, in that he’s clearly aware of his own ambivalence and yet doesn’t seem to be considering, or caring about, the negative consequences that ambivalence may be having on you.  Has he expressed concern for your well-being, for the impact the relationship is having on your psyche and emotional state?  Does he know or care about the impact of his words—words that are immensely hurtful, yet give you just enough hope to stick around?  One of the qualities I realized I needed in a partner was being impeccable to one’s word, being cognizant of the impact words can have on others before carelessly throwing them around.  I also need a partner that is considerate and truly cares about my well/being, and wants to help ameliorate my Anxiety rather than contribute to it.

I suggest trying out an exercise that I’ve found helpful in restoring a sense of equilibrium and balance in my romantic interactions with men.  Take a piece of paper and fold it in half.  On one side, make a list of all the qualities you absolutely DON’T want in a person.  Think back to your failed relationships and the reasons why you  or your partner ultimately ended things, and qualities you saw in past partners that made you realize you weren’t compatible.  Then, on the other half of the piece of paper, use the negative statements to create positive statements about what you do want—so, if one of the things you didn’t want was “I do not want a person who is flaky and inconsistent,” on the right, write, “I need a partner who demonstrates consistency and sticks to plans.”  Or “I do not want someone who does drugs or binge drinks all the time” becomes “I want someone who is moderate in their consumption of alcohol and avoids drugs.”  Then transfer the “positive” list on the right to a new piece of paper and take your time re-writing it and making it pretty lol—something that you’ll want to re-reference in the future.

At the end, if you’ve done this exercise thoughtfully and are honest about what you need in someone else and what has led to the demise of relationships in the past, you’ll be left with a list of qualities that can help guide you in determining how close someone is to meeting your needs and desires.  In my case, by referring to this list every time I started to date someone, it felt like I was using a concrete tool that I had created for myself that was based on years of introspection and growing to know myself. I started fully comprehending my pattern of letting intense chemistry drive my relationships, while ignoring all the ways those relationships were detrimental to me.

I also allowed myself to dream big and imagine that a person with all those qualities really did exist—in some ways, I felt encouraged to embody those qualities myself, since it felt hypocritical to want things in others that I myself did not have.  It might be worth trying out and assessing how many qualities your current partner embodies, since it’s not clear to me based on your posts what about him it is that is drawing you to him so deeply.

Hi Michelle,

I think you hit the nail on the head earlier when you suggested that fear of being without him is what’s keeping you in your current situation.  Ending things with someone you’re emotional invested in and feel an intense, even fated, connection with can be incredibly difficult.  But remaining in a relationship where there is inequality and imbalance—where those involved have two different levels of commitment, two different sets of expectations surrounding the relationship and two very different communication styles—is much more difficult in the long-run.

I know there’s always a temptation to adopt the wait and see approach and allow things to “unfold naturally”—sometimes it feels like we’re expecting too much too soon and that we just have to take things day by day.  But I’ve noticed, with myself and friends who have been in similar romantic situations, that we often tell ourselves that when we’re holding out hope that the situation is going to change, that the other person is going to change and they will suddenly, one day, be in a position to [insert here…fulfill our needs/address their psychological wounds/say I love you/figure out what they want/etc]. We’re attached to a specific outcome, whether we realize it or not, and in the meantime that attachment has become detrimental to our current emotional and mental well-being and has prevented us from considering and being open to the wide range of other potential outcomes.  I think truly living in the moment is accepting the current realities of a relationship—the other person does not reciprocate the way I’d like them to.  They have issues that prevent them for being open in the romantic context, and that causes them to doubt and question things all the time, and this is taking a toll on my emotional (and perhaps spiritual) wellbeing.

You’ve been open and vulnerable with him, found the courage to express what you need, and that has been met with words that suggest that nothing has really changed.  Perhaps he’s made some outward progress—probably because he sensed he needed to take some actions in order to preserve the status quo and maintain a relationship that clearly has benefits for him—but inwardly, it seems he is very much the same person who you began seeing many months ago.  Change and personal growth sometimes unfolds quickly, but when one doesn’t have the drive and initiative to drive the growth oneself, change tends to unfold very slowly, if at all. And I don’t think he’s simply going to become the person who can fulfill your relationship desires  (at least as you’ve relayed them to be) anytime soon.

When you open yourself up to the present moment, you realize that the universe has given you all the information you need to make an informed decision, based on something much less heavy-feeling and limiting than fear.  When you truly rely on your intuition, and look deep within yourself in a more neutral manner that feels affirming and expansive rather than constrictive, that allows trust and faith and stillness to be the main guide instead of anxiety and constant racing thoughts,  we’re more likely find the answer.  You said you meditate, which is great…I believe it can help cut through all the fuzzy layers of thought and fear and the egoic mind that is constantly working overtime and struggling to find an answer.

You say that his actions contradict his words, but actually it seems they are very much in tune with his words.  He says he doesn’t know what he wants, that he’s ambivalent—and his actions seem to support that.  He spends time with you and takes you on dates, but doesn’t see you moving in together or having something long-term.  He doesn’t think there’s someone else out there that he’ll meet and fall in love with, but he doesn’t think you’re the one either and was on dating apps until not too long ago.  He acknowledges he has a lot of emotional wounds and mental health issues, including OCD, but hasn’t taken any concrete steps towards addressing those issues.  In a lot of ways, he’s exactly what he represents himself to be—a very confused and ambivalent person.  Do you want to be in a relationship with someone who doesn’t know what they want?

I agree that he probably is and will continue to be an important person for you—just probably not in the way you expected him to be. Sometimes we just have to trust that life has its own plan that we can’t quite discern in the moment because we’re just seeing one wave of the larger ocean.  The second that you stop fighting what is, and be open to what could be—which eventually reveals itself once we give it a chance to—the second I think you’ll start to make positive changes that will end this cycle of pain and hurt you seem to be in with him.

Dear Michelle,

I read through your posts and, even though it’s been a while since your first post and I’m not sure if you’re looking for more advice or input into your situation, I feel compelled to comment because of how similar your attachment style and experiences with men are to mine.  Even the way you describe your mom’s parenting style sounds so similar to mine–she, too, was sometimes physically abusive, very strict/authoritarian, would subject me to the silent treatment and was generally someone with whom I had a love-hate relationship growing up.  Our relationship has become much, much better over time, but I still do find it hard to be emotionally open and vulnerable with her (which sometimes extends to other relationships/friendships…my fear of rejection and being vulnerable).

Anyway, I just wanted to say that I understand how difficult it is to be in a (semi? sorta?) relationship with someone who is scared of love and has a hard, impenetrable shell around him that prevents him from letting you in.  For about a year and a half, I was very much stuck on a guy that I believed was my “twin flame”–the person who mirrored and reflected my fears and insecurities back to me, who made me feel a sense of kinship and closeness and intimacy I had never before experienced.  I too believed our relationship was fated–there were two many weird synchronicities for it to be anything but, in my mind.  We were born a few days days apart, both November babies (11:11 is a huge thing in the twin flame world), kept running into each other despite living in a huge city, had similar outlooks on life despite how differently we raised and despite our different cultural and religious backgrounds.  I  convinced myself that because he had been through a lot of trauma, he was just a scared little boy who needed time to step out of his shell (even when he quite clearly told me he wasn’t looking for anything serious), and even though physically I checked out of our very short-lived fling, emotionally I was very, very hung up on him for a long time.

I’m not any more. I’m in a happy, committed relationship with someone I am very much in love with.  Looking back, I now question whether he was my “twin flame” after all and to be honest, I don’t even care if he is or not.   The thing is, once you start truly loving yourself and giving yourself the same time, attention, and care that you gave that person–the second you start prioritizing your needs and realizing that you have to communicate them in order for there to be a shot of those needs being met–the second you’ll realize that you won’t need to spend time journaling and posting and endlessly talking about a man who just doesn’t want something deeper. Plain and simple.  It doesn’t matter why he’s that way, or who made him that way, and whether he will one day change–all that matters is that right now, he’s not someone who has communicated to you that he’s in love with you.  While you can extrapolate and conjecture and imagine a scenario where one day, he says those words to you, the truth is, you don’t know if that scenario will take place, and there’s very little from his actions and words to indicate that that reality will come to be.  While uncertainty is something we all have to deal with in relationships from time to time, I’ve found–in my all too many experiences of dating avoidant men–that the type of man that is truly ready for a committed, loving relationship is someone that will minimize that feeling of uncertainty to the greatest extent possible.  It’s someone whose actions align with their words and indicates clearly and loudly that they’re into you.  It’s someone who doesn’t prowl dating apps just to “people watch” or who makes you wonder if they’re agreeing to move in just to save on rent.  It’s someone who has gone through enough self-growth and has enough insight and self-awareness that they don’t need someone to tear down their defenses for them–they’ve worked on doing that for themselves.  All your kindness and support towards him and eagerness to explore and understand his psyche and why he’s so scared to open up isn’t going to change him.  In the end, he has to take the leap himself.  Be willing to shed some of his old habits and behavioral patterns, difficult as that is.  You can’t do it for him.  And the longer you hang around in the hope that he’ll eventually come around, the longer you’ll be stuck in a place where you’re not truly happy, where there’s a little nagging voice inside that’s telling you that something’s not quite right.  That you deserve better.  You deserve someone that tells you in no uncertain terms that you ARE someone he does see or could see as “the one”,  and that you’re not just a stepping stone to whatever he truly desires (which I doubt he even knows).

Anyway, I do think it sounds like there’s so much growth and change that he’s igniting within you..that’s the beautiful thing about relationships and intense connections, no matter how fleeting.  They tend to force you to confront the ugly and uncomfortable aspects of yourself.  It sounds like you’re being forced, through your interactions with him, to realize how much YOU’RE now willing to lower your defenses and open up to someone to an extent that maybe you weren’t in the past.  So even if your relationship with him doesn’t work out, I think the upside is that you’re a stronger person for it.  You’re more ready now to plunge in to something deep and scary at times but incredibly satisfying.  Real love, based on trust and commitment and mutual understanding, is a beautiful thing that we all deserve to experience, and sometimes the road getting there is long and winding and messy but it seems like you’re on the way there.

Peace!

Rosalia