Hi all. This is my first time posting, and I couldn’t decide if it was better to place this under “Relationships” or under “Tough Times”, so I apologize if it’s in the wrong place. I’ve been struggling for the past 2 months with a horrible breakup. She is 25 and I am a 27 year old guy. Our story is peculiar (and long, sorry) because of the whole underlying situation.

Almost 3 years ago, her fiancé died in a car accident. We worked together, and over the next 8 months we started getting very close, and we started dating almost a year after the death of her late boyfriend. During the course of our 1.5 year relationship, she kept saying she had feelings for me but she would hold back and not show them because of what happened to her. After being intimate, she would feel guilty some times, although I was very understanding and patient with her. I thought eventually she would come around and start reciprocating my feelings and showing what she claimed to be feeling, because she would never kiss me, hug me, hold my hand, etc. We went to Europe for a month last year and it was great for a while, I finally felt like she was my girlfriend… but then she would post on Facebook about how she could only think about her late boyfriend every minute of every day while we were there.

We got back to the US and for the next year, I pretty much slept over at her place 90% of the time and we spent 99% of our time together. We enjoyed each other’s company, but it bothered me that she treated me more like a friend in public and would deny we were together when people would ask or hint about it. Additionally, she started putting up a sort of shrine for her late boyfriend, and there were pictures (some poster-sized) of him all over the room, and she even still has his toothbrush in the bathroom. In April, I was feeling severely neglected by her, emotionally, physically, and sexually. She would never initiate sex, she would never hug or kiss me or show me any sort of affection. I spoke with her about this and she said she did have feelings but held back because of what happened to her, because she felt like a hypocrite being with someone “so soon” (more than 2 years had passed).

This summer, we went on a month-long trip again, but this time to my home country, where she would meet my parents. I talked to her about feeling neglected and unloved by her 2 weeks before we left, and asked her if she saw me in her life in the future, to which she replied she did. She knows what meeting the parent means, and the underlying principle of it implying a steady relationship. After our trip, which went fine but not great because of the tension due to me feeling neglected, she went back to the US for 5 weeks while I stayed with my family. Immediately after she left, she changed drastically. She would rarely call, would seem busy or annoyed when I called, and was hanging out with this one guy that has been chasing after her since she was 18. I always felt uneasy about this guy, he would text her pretty much every day but I never saw anything that made my alarms go off… it was just a gut feeling, but since I never saw much besides them hanging out when she went to her home town, I gave her the benefit of the doubt. Being with her 99% of the time, I know she would ignore his texts until the next day and if she did talk to him, it was probably while she was at work. This guy has a daughter with another woman, pays child support, is a player, lives 9 hours away, and is not someone she would consider dating (all of this according to her).

However, 3000 miles away, my gut kept telling me this guy had something to do with everything. I confronted her about him but she denied everything. I gave her an ultimatum: Either you decide to treat me with respect and make me feel wanted in some way, or I’m out. Well, she disappeared for a week. When I got back to the US, we talked and she said she could not reciprocate my feelings, that she tried to fall in love with me couldn’t, etc. but we ended up having sex. Right after sex, clothes still off (this is the part that has messed me up so much), she told me “I want you to know that N (that guy) has been calling me a lot and we talk everyday”. I was shocked and felt my heart stop for a second, and I confronted her again telling her to admit that she likes him. After a long pause, she said she likes the way he pays attention to her and all the little things he does for her. I put my clothes on and left, I had never felt so hurt in my life. WE didn’t talk for a week, and then she called me at 3am just to “see how I was doing”, I told her to call this other guy instead of me, and hung up. She called again the next day, texted me, and I ignored her. The day after that, she texted me good morning wishing me a great day at work. It was confusing, to say the least.

A week later (early September), a friend went to dinner with her and she told her she was indeed “talking” to this guy and that she’s excited to see where it goes. I was devastated. I “knew” but now I actually KNEW. I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t eat, I had a physical pain in my chest all the time, it was horrible. I called her and told her how much of a hypocrite and a liar she is for denying everything with this guy, for going home to meet my parents only to disappear after a week, and how much of a heartless person she is by telling me she’s seeing him right after we had sex, during the most intimate moment two people can share. She finally admitted they’d been talking for two months, which was the time when she was in my home country. I have not spoken to her in a month but I still feel devastated and can’t seem to start moving on. I also told her how the image of the grieving girlfriend is a lie… if she were grieving, she wouldn’t be sleeping with me next to her shrine and late boyfriend’s pictures, while thinking of the next guy she had lined up. I had so much anger built up inside because of her betrayal that I said I regret the day I made her, which I can tell hurt her a lot. I’m not proud of it, but my emotions took over.

I have so much resentment but I still miss her and love her, sadly. I’m going to therapy, the gym, keeping myself busy, finding new hobbies, recently meditating etc. but nothing seems to help. I have this pain in my heart that won’t go away, I can’ sleep well, and I feel resentful because she strung me along while knowing she was going to run off with some other guy. I feel so betrayed that it was the guy I always had suspicions about and that she always denied having anything with. Knowing she’s all happy and moved on to someone else without regard for me or anything else, when I was the one who helped her the most through the most difficult time of her life is extremely hurtful. I don’t know what I need to do to move on and accept what has happened, I can’t believe she did so much harm, most of it knowingly, when I was always clear with her that if she felt she couldn’t be with me she should just leave.

What do I do? How do I start moving on? How do I start letting the pain go and accepting the fact that she’s never coming back? How do I make peace with the fact that even after all she did, she might be completely happy with this other guy while I struggle to even get out of bed in the morning?