First love

It honestly has been feeling like the world is ending lately. My boyfriend of 3 years broke up with me out of no where right before we were leaving for college (freshman year). We had never talked about breaking up..like ever. Almost the entirety of our relationship was us planning to say together or atleast implying that we would. At the beginning of our relationship (sophomore year of high school) we were very keen on staying together and even planning our future life together to the T. My boyfriend made me feel so wanted and I didnt have a doubt about us breaking up. As high school went on he did talk a little less about our futures. I was always really caring about planning our futures, especially our college plans as a couple. He was a really good boyfriend, super nice, very loving but I really did feel like I put most of the effort in to being together.

I started realizing after the breakup that sometimes when I would bring up college and our plans for it he would just say “I don’t want to talk about it. It’s too sad”. I’m wondering now if that meant he had second thoughts and just didn’t want to tell me. Towards the end of our relationship it kind of seemed like he didn’t really care either way if we hung out or not, although when we were together it was always a loving and happy time. We were a great couple.

So anyways, he broke up with me out of no where over TEXT which really hurt. He said that he didn’t want us to have sad college experiences by trying to stay together and that he just couldn’t date me in college. I asked him about visiting eachother in college (something I wanted more than anything) and he told me he wouldn’t want us to have to miss a “football game” or miss out on making friends by planning trips🙄It was so hard to swallow that. I couldn’t believe it. Afterwards he told me he wanted to still be my “best friend” and text me whenever. I agreed at first, I think becsuse I wanted to make him happy, maybe that would make him come back to me. The first couple weeks of college were actually great, and he texted me once to check in and told me he missed me. A week later he called crying saying his grandma had died and i comforted him on the phone. Things took a bad turn when I saw that he started deleting his captions on pictures of us. I didn’t understand why he would do this. It seemed petty and mean and I would text him telling him that. He just said that he “didn’t like those captions, it has nothing to do with you, I’m not trying to hurt you”. It really did hurt though. The first couple weeks I would also tell EVERYONE the situation, making it as complicated as possible, I think to clear my own head. I think I did this to make myself believe that he really did want me and that he just did this because of college. (Side note: he had texted me in the first couple of weeks saying he loved me and wanted to marry me after college and that this wasn’t about seeing other people).

I started to feel very frusterated:the situation was just too complicated. He’s telling me he loves me and wants me but he left me. I started to text HIM more and it was usually just trying to make him feel bad and rant to him about how he ruined our relationship and that If he really wanted me he would have stayed. He would get angry at this. It was bad. I called him telling him I didn’t want to be friends, that I couldn’t because it was too hard for me and that I needed time. The next time we talked a week later he said “well you said you hate me and never want to talk to me again”. Why is he making me out to sound like that when I never said those things?

So it had been a week since then and I found out he is now on tinder. It honestly pissed me off and hurt because he told me this was 0% about hooking up with other people. I texted him telling him I found out about his tinder and he told me he had made it as a joke and asked me why I cared after telling him I didn’t want to be friends. I told him I didn’t want to be friends because he was stringing me along and it hurt he had left. He replied back that he’s happier without me, that his friends never thought I treated him right, and that was was “blinded”. The friends part hurt a lot because his friends are my friends. I never gave them any reason not to like me, they used to compliment how great of a gf I was too because this girl we were friends with was obviously horrible to HER boyfriend and they would compare my ex and I. His friends are also single so maybe in a way they are happy because now they “have their boy back”. For the record, My boyfriend spent so much time with his friends, something i was happy about and even encouraged. It wasnt like he could only spend time with me. He even said “peace”. Why is he being so horrible? He now deleted all of his pictures with me on insta.

Can someone please read this and give me some in sight. Should I feel bad? When he says I treated him horrible I don’t see it. Our only fights were about me feeling like I cared more. I just care so much. Thanks, peachygirl20

Peachygirl20, can you please edit your post into readable paragraphs as it's almost impossible to read such a massive wall of text. It will also get you a lot more responses. Thanks!

Agree, I was willing to read your post until I saw the massive wall of text. Please break it into paragraphs.

Well, you said it at the end, you always cared more about him than he cared about you, and guys really don't want to hear arguments like that because it just pushes them away.

Anyways, I think he did the right thing. High school romances usually don't last, and people grow apart from each other as they mature, especially during your ages. Also college changes you and there are so many other opportunities to make friends and go out with different girls and experience the world. Most people on ENA will routinely tell you that you shouldn't try to continue high school romances as a LDR. And he did that.

This is the time where you can meet different people and experience different things. You can grieve for a while, but then move on. I'm sure there are plenty of cute guys where you are and you should go out, date, and have a great time. You will think about your college days fondly for the rest of your life. And you will find boys are a bit more mature than your boyfriend was when he was 15 or 16.

My advice is to stop going on his social media, stop contacting him, and live your own life.

Ok, I have edited into paragraphs as you passed the 30 minute edit window. Hopefully that will help to get more responses for you.

You need to cut him out of your life until you have moved on and have reached total indifference. The truth of the matter is that you lost nobody special. People with integrity do not break up a (non-abusive) LTR over text. Immature selfish cowards with no spine do. You need to block him out of all your social media and phone. And you need to stop any friend who tries to update you on what he is doing. And whatever you do, NO cyber stalking. Learning new information about him will prolong your suffering and keep you stuck in the past; it hurts your healing.

Right now you may not be able to see it, but you lost nobody special. He turned out to be just another guy who bailed out when the going got tough. Most people (men and women) do that at that age. What you described is very common in this day and age and you can find thousands of stories like yours online.

If you were to continue to be his friend, he would use you as a stepping stone (venting his doubts and using you for emotional support, while searching for his next girlfriend) to his next relationship. You would then likely be dropped again as most girls don't like their boyfriend to regularly communicate with their exes.

What he is doing right now is rewriting history in his mind trying to justify to himself and others why dumping you was the right thing. All dupers do that. It's a psychological defense mechanism to stave off the doubts that a dumper naturally feels at times about his decision. The worst thing you can do is remain in contact with him and try to analyze/reason with all the garbage excuses and guilt that will come and go through his mind. His mind at times of doubt will be like scales out of balance. At one time he will paint you like a saint and the next time he will paint you like the girlfriend from hell. Don't try to analyze it. It's pointless and it will keep changing. When he feels guilt he is liable to contact you and say beautiful hollow words to make HIMSELF feel better. Don't fall for it. Based on how he broke up with you, this is a person who is immature and selfish. If you keep in contact you will end up being used as a stepping stone to make himself feel better and he will drop you altogether once he is ready. Don't do that to yourself.

This boy turned out to be nobody special. There are millions like him out there. Please give yourself the gift of clarity by going total no contact on him. Take down the pictures. Erase the tags. Box the gifts. Block and delete from every electronic media.

The person you remember does no longer exist. He has changed. He had been changing for months. He is no longer the person you remember. The person you remember is dead in a way. I am very sorry for your loss. You need to grieve and once ready move on. The sooner you go strict no contact, the sooner you will move on to find someone who cares about you as much as you do.

You did not treat him horribly. He is just rewriting relationship history in his mind to justify his actions, assuage his guilt and move on. What you are doing wrong is staying in contact and engaging/participating in his process of detaching from the past. If you stay around, you will be used as an emotional aid for him to move on - an emotional crutch at times of doubt and as a bad guy when you don't play along in catering his whims. Your choice.

He did you a favor and it makes a lot of sense. LDRs are difficult and you will both be happier not tied down at college. You can both be free to do whatever you want and grow as people.

Sending nasty angry texts trying to make him feel guilty for making the right choice won't help. You did treat him horribly by being clingy, dramatic and nasty about the breakup.

You need to focus on going to collage and enjoying your new freedom and new endeavors there enjoying college life. Stop communicating with him.

He said that he didn’t want us to have sad college experiences by trying to stay together and that he just couldn’t date me in college. I started to text HIM more and it was usually just trying to make him feel bad and rant to him about how he ruined our relationship. he says I treated him horrible