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My father told me I may never find another girl...


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So I recently broke up with my girlfriend. I had been off an on trying to decide whether to break up with her for a while. But after a huge fight and feeling like she wanted out of the relationship (and pretty much having it confirmed right before my eyes as she lied and she told me "I don't know" while telling MySpace it's a done deal - but that's another tangent all together.)

 

A month or so ago while considering breaking up with her I consulted my Dad for advice. And my Dad told me something that in the back of my mind existed and was a large part of halting me breaking up with her - "if I break up with her, I may never find another girl." I was and still am devistated to hear that. But the cards seem stacked against me - she was my first and only girlfriend, and I got her at age 24. I'm at 26 now. I should have had many relationships before then. But I had never 100% actively pursued finding love, it just found me. Thinking positively, the difference between me now and then is now I have relationship experience and I feel a hell of a lot more confident than I did back then (back then I thought I was ugly since no girl wanted to date me, or so it seemed, now I feel like I'm attractive when I look in the mirror and it feels good.) I still have an incredible amount of shyness. Honestly and objectively, is it possible for someone who is very shy to find love? Or does extensive social training need to take place? Is there any field manual for... not looking for love necessarily but eliminating shyness and learning social skills.. to know what to say in situations, to break the ice?

 

I have thought about, after moving on from this break up and getting into a place in my life where I'm happy single finding some sort of counselor or life coach for this kind of thing. Does such a thing exist? I know I should probably seek therapy in general to avoid depression. I have a tendency after a break up to obsess over it for a truly long time. Once I dated a girl (and it wasnt official) for about 2 months and it took me 2 years to get over that after she dumped me. This time I want to go through everything I need to do to grieve it out of my system but expedite it as much as possible. I am not looking to date for a while. But eventually I will be. It's important that I can reassure myself that my Dad is wrong, horribly wrong, and believe it. That I can and will have the girl of my dreams... someday. What Dad said has presented a huge obstacle in healing... because I worry that this girl was my final chance.

 

Sorry for the rambling, it's 2:14am and I'm unable to sleep because of obsessing over this issue. Thanks for listening...

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No. Your dad is wrong. There are billions of people in this world. It's inevitable that some of them are going to find you attractive and compatible, as long as you're open to meeting them.

I'm glad that you realize now you're not ugly, but even if you were ugly, it's not as if you would be THE Ugliest Person in the World - it would just mean you'd have to be willing to consider meeting girls who were also lacking in the looks department. I've definitely learned that there is truth to the saying "There's someone out there for everyone".

 

I think it is easier for shy people to find love now that internet dating is normal and popular. But of course it never hurts to try to learn better social skills. There are indeed counselors and therapists out there who offer help with learning social skills. Try calling around asking about "social skills training" or support groups for this purpose and I bet that someone out there can offer some help.

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Thank you very much for your replies. I'm pretty much paralyzed in anxiety and fear right now. Yesterday I went and got all my things from the apartment we shared together. One of my best friends (who is a mutual friend to the both of us) helped us out. After we got our things out we talked privately for about 15-20 minutes.

 

My best friend was at our apartment the night before yesterday and gathered my things that way I would have to spend minimal time there. I told him how hurt I was that my ex was okay with us breaking up. He said that she didn't want it to break up but accepted my decision. He said that my ex doesn't feel at fault whatsoever (which is not surprising given the conversation we had and I feel she was at fault for some things.) When asked if we would get back together, she said "probably not soon unless he decides to change." I really wanted to change but feel I was never given the opportunity. I told my friend the truth. The past couple of days I hadn't really thought of my ex, but rather how I feel totally alone. I told him I'm not looking to get back together with my ex though I wouldn't rule it out in the future. After talking my friend thinks I made the "right decision." All my friends are getting married and soon they will have kids so I feel like I have no people to lean on. The good news is my friend is letting me stay at his apartment this Friday night and plans not to let me be alone on weekends for a while. The bad news is there is so much that I have to overcome. I really want to work through this with a therapist or something. I am unable to sleep or think about anything else other my lonely feelings. Even with taking sleep aids I wake up in the middle of the night and I can't go back to sleep.

 

I am scared more of being alone than losing my ex right now. I don't know if it will stay this way and if in time I'll miss her specifically, but I'm just terrified of loneliness. I want to learn to be happy by myself. To not feel lonely. To not feel that my father is right and I'll never find love again. But when I think about finding love... I feel like the deck is heavily stacked against me. I do not know how to find love, as I never ever looked for love before - as I said before this was my first serious girlfriend and I met her when I was 24. I do know I'm not going to actively pursue love for at least a few months or until all my feelings for my ex are purged from my system.

 

There are a lot of things I need to fix in my life. I need to find a job closer to where all my friends are but I'm scared to death of failing there. Right now I live about 80 miles from every single one of my friends and the only time I can see them is on weekends. So my week days are painful... I will probably exercise so that my time isn't wasted on week days.

 

Sorry for the long rant. And I don't want to come off as needy, but if anybody wants to talk to me privately on PMs or whatever and reach out to me, it would be much much appreciated.

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I'm glad that your buddy helped you pack up and is going to let you stay with him. You're lucky that you've got a buddy who is willing to be supportive like that!

 

The idea about trying to focus on exercise and such is a good one. You might want to look into getting involved in a group kind of activity if you can. Meeting new people who might become friends is always a good thing, and can be especially good in the throes of a breakup.

Hope things look up for you soon!

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I feel like I'm suffocating.

 

She broke no contact yesterday after being broken up since last Wednesday (actually last Monday night.) Yesterday she got on my LiveJournal and read what I wrote and then wrote to me at work saying the following: "I have read your LiveJournal and just wanted to say I'm extremely proud of you." I didn't reply to it. But then today she wrote about how to hook up the DVR and I had to respond and I said "I D K" in a text message. She then said that her purchases from Torrid was only $80, because I bought her some things that she offered to pay me back, and I gave her a $290 check for my part of rent. I said to her "370-80=290." She replied back that rent was actually $380 and I said to her I'm sorry for miscalculating and I will write her a ten dollar check and give it to a mutual friend to pass along to her this weekend and she said "don't worry about it its only ten dollars" and I said I wanted to be fair but she insisted it was no big deal. She then went on joking about how it was a "pain in the ass" to put the DVR back together and she was "omg" about it, being friendly. I told her "I gotta go, I am sorry for the inconvenience I didn't think it would be that hard to hook back up after I unhooked everything." She said, "later!"

 

No contact is back on from my end but the damage is done in my road to recovery and healing.

 

I am not ready to be friends because I still have feelings. EVEN THOUGH I am the dumper... I feel as though I am the dumpee and I've been dumped. I had a dream last night of her dumping me.

 

I'm miserable.

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