Rager105

Hi sleepers, I know exactly what you're talking about. I'm still coping with a breakup, which happened for a lot of the same reasons you mentioned. I know that this soon after a breakup, it's hard to grasp, but at the very least you should take a break. Trust me, I know how desperate you might feel, but that very desperation might hurt your chances. I'm guessing that you understand WHY you turned into someone you weren't. At least I hope you do, because I can't tell you that. If there are any questions in your mind, if it feels like some mysterious unexplainable phenomenon, then go back over your relationship with yourself and figure out what caused it. There is also simply a process by which you must accept what has happened. It has to sink in before you can do anything else. There are different ways to deal with a relationship gone bad, and unfortunately he felt the only way to deal with the bad relationship was to terminate it. I'm not saying that everything is over with him, but he has a point when he says he's over with the relationship. In this case, you have to start from scratch with a whole new relationship, and if you're feeling insecure right now, it's going to be bad. It's understandable that he doesn't want to be put through the pain. What you should do is to work through your problems yourself, or with a therapist, but OUTSIDE a relationship. It will give you the opportunity to distance yourself from the relationship and see it more objectively. It could also make you look very attractive in his eyes, if you let him know that you are resolved to do the right thing. A postscript: I want you to know that you are quite lucky that you realised what was wrong so early after the breakup. It took me 3 MONTHS before I realised that a lot of the problems in my relationship were my fault, and for that entire time, I was trying every imaginable thing wrong to get my ex back. It's been 6 months now, I took a break, and only now do I think that I objectively have a chance. It's just crazy enough to work. So don't lose hope. --Rager

Hello again. I made one post on here a few months ago, "Horribly, horribly frightened to even talk to her..." Remember? For those who don't, a brief refresher. My girlfriend, whom I had met over the Internet, had been broken up with me for about 4 months (now about 6). During the course of our breakup, the reasons for not being together became more and more different. At first it was the geographical distance between us (which, all things considered, really isn't that great). Then, she started telling me that our relationship was becoming very unhealthy, period (which, in retrospect, I totally understand). On top of that, for a few months after we broke up I was so desperate to get her back, and it resulted in my trying to guilt-trip her and basically act like an all-around jerk. Knowing how I had so messed things up, I had become enstranged from her; as the title of my first post suggests, I was terrified to talk to her, lest I lose her forever. I was also beginning to wonder if she ever wanted to talk to me again. I'd say that over the past half year, I've matured a lot, and I know that things would be different. There were a number of things I did wrong, and I will never do them again, with her or with any other girlfriend. Now, to the happy news. The other night, my ex finally took the initiative and IMed me. We didn't discuss going out again or anything, but both of us admitted that we missed talking with one another, and we are back on speaking terms. I received a few signs which I perceived as hopeful: 1) I mentioned a song that she knows is one of my favourites, and she told me that she thinks about me whenever she hears the song. 2) She asked me--in a rather nervous manner, it seems--how things are going for me on the dating front. (Our respective situations are similar: we're both pretty much on hold when it comes to dating.) In any event, I'm posting this to 1) give an update to anyone who may have read my first post, 2) to try to get an outside appraisal of my situation (i.e. do I really have a shot, or am I just delusional?), and 3) to ask for some advice on how to proceed. We had a very friendly conversation, and we seem able to acknowledge without any weirdness that we were once going out, but I don't know how or when to re-approach the prospect of getting back together. (I really don't want to freak her out.) Any advice would be appreciated. Thank you, Rager

OK...about four months ago, I broke up with my girlfriend. There were a lot of reasons for it, and one by one they gradually came to the surface. The catalyst for the breakup was the geographical distance between us (I live in NYC, she lives in Philadelphia; we met over the Internet. Please, I know that exclusively Internet relationships don't work, and if I were to get back together with her, it would be different). That really wasn't the main reason, though. As time went by, she started talking more about how unhealthy our relationship was. We tended to freak out at each other more than would be expected in a healthy relationship, and somewhere along the line, we just didn't quite click. The bottom line was, distance or chemistry, that even though she loved me, she just couldn't handle it anymore. In the four months since we broke up, I've had so many different feelings, and things that I've wanted to tell her. I suppose that for the first month or so, I was just feeling so depressed over it (why was this happening to me, etc.) that I couldn't even accept that the problems in our relationship were that dire. For that matter, I never really apologised for what I did wrong. I was being extremely selfish, inwardly being angry at her, not seeing how she could do this to me. Anyway, lately I've been feeling really ashamed of that. I feel that I was unconsciously trying to get her back together with me against her own will. Please understand...even if I could do that, I wouldn't want to. Anyhow, once I was able to stop feeling sorry for myself, I started doing some thinking. Something kept pestering me; my instinct was telling me that something wasn't right. Note that this was my first ever relationship with a girl. We both had crushes on each other from the beginning, but we didn't really want to let on. We flirted with each other a lot, but it was sort of like "Aren't you glad we're above this cheesy crap?" Anyway, it soon came out that we were both really interested in one another, and we were going out by April. Things went gradually downhill from there, in a very subtle manner. First of all, since she was my first girlfriend, I wasn't quite sure of how to act. I figured that since just about nothing I had ever done while single had ever really worked in my favour, I sort of started acting the opposite, trying to play the part of the serious, black-bile-burdened boyfriend. And this is not to say that I loved her any less. The point is that I started losing touch with myself, the guy she fell in love with. So here I am, with this belated realisation. I only wish I could tell her this. But I haven't spoken to her in over a month seriously about the relationship. We last left it with "This relationship wasn't working out, so we need to get past what we had." I want to tell her that I can change, and it's not only for her. It's because I want to get back to who I really am. I'm just so scared. I don't want to freak her out (she's kind of nervous)...so if anyone can help me, please, do. --Roger