Have I blown it forever?

[robertf]

Hello all. My story is similar to all the others here, only the situation is a little different. I have proven that no matter how well educated you might be, you are still capable of incredible stupidity when it comes to matters of the heart. For background info, I met my girlfriend in 2007. We both were married at the time, but separated, and well on the way to divorces. We began an intense relationship that was wonderful. Full of life, happiness, and love…everything that was missing in our marriages. And it lasted. It went beyond the initial lust phase and into something special that transcended time and space. It was beautiful and pure magic. Naturally, it all then proceeded to fall apart.

 

First my ex wife got breast cancer and our kids feared losing her. That delayed our divorce proceedings quite a bit. My ex wife recovered from the breast cancer, and I proceeded to move back out of the house and start a new life with my wonderful girlfriend. Then my career took a nosedive after a private equity firm bought my company and changed everything, deciding to put their own people in senior management roles and leaving me out. Simultaneously, my father was diagnosed with stage IV melanoma in his spine and suffered greatly. And to round it all out, my ex wife made the divorce a personal living hell for me, in many different ways. So the time to spend with my wonderful girlfriend was less and less. Naturally, she began to get upset and think I didn’t love her. But I was under tremendous stress and pressure and was feeling weak and incapable, what with all these 3 events hitting me simultaneously. It’s a wonder I didn’t explode. We tried to keep our relationship afloat throughout all this, but found ourselves fighting more than enjoying each other. She would get her feelings hurt and pick a fight, and I would get defensive because of the stress I was under, then pull away and hide so I didn’t have to face her. Not a good place to be at all. After weeks and weeks of on again off again dating, it finally happened. She told me she loved me, but she had to move on with her life. I was in denial, thinking we were only taking a break and we would resume our relationship when my life issues sorted themselves out. I was so foolish. So we go on our “break”, as I thought, and I was in a NC frame of mind. In that time period, my father passed away after a 4 month battle with melanoma, ending his suffering. My job ended and I had another one lined up before I hit the unemployment line, with more responsibility and better pay. The divorce was still chugging away, but the ex wife was dragging her feet and playing games. Even her own attorney got disgusted with her for how she managed herself. With all this going on, I just couldn’t be there for my lovely girlfriend.

 

So, one day after 5 weeks of NC, she texts me and says hello. The text exchanges lead to a lunch meeting, which is where I began to blow it. The week before our final breakup, she met another man at a party. He asked her out and she accepted, thinking our relationship was all but dead. Soon, they were hot and heavy and living the life we used to have. He takes her to dinner and concerts. They travel out of town and spend weekends together. He stays over all the time, in the bed I bought her and watching the TV I bought her. All this after only 2 months of dating! I was flabbergasted. We had a 4 year, wonderful and passionate relationship, and after only 2 months she is doing this!!! I find all this out at lunch! It blew me away. I leave the lunch with a lump in my throat and began a downward spiral. I became obsessed with her. All I could think about was her sleeping with this guy she hardly knew. How could she move on so fast? Didn’t she love me? Didn’t I matter to her? Didn’t she understand what I went through earlier? In my despair and suffering, WHAT I HAD FAILED TO REALIZE WAS THAT AFTER 5 WEEKS OF NC, SHE HAD REACHED OUT TO ME! She admitted at lunch she still loved me and that she thinks about me all the time. But blinded by hurt and obsessed over this new relationship she had, I started sending her long emails about how much I love her and that I apologized for the mistakes I had made. I wanted her back. I would be different. Blah, blah, blah…all the things the people here advise you NOT to do, I was doing. And this was AFTER she had contacted me and told me she loved me. What an idiot I am. Naturally, my emotional explosion freaked her out and she pulled away, no longer responding to emails or text messages. I have since stopped cold turkey. I am now finishing week 1 of no contact, and hoping that love spark she still has for me hasn’t died out yet. I fully believe that this relationship she is in now is 100% rebound, giving her something to do this summer instead of sitting at home waiting for me to get my act together. I just worry that it will grow beyond rebound and into true love, which means I will have lost forever. What an idiot I am.

 

So now I’m trying the NC thing again, after sending her a final email apologizing for all the other emotional hand grenades I hit her with and telling her we are better off separate right now, as I finalize my divorce and get my head back on straight. The thought of her in another man’s arms makes me physically ill, but I know I can’t turn back the hands of time. She and I had it all, and I blew it. I pushed her away when I should have embraced her and now I’m “shocked” she is with another man. How stupid am I? Now I can’t eat, sleep, or think straight. I am lost and devastated. I don’t know what to do. I pray for her return, but know it won’t happen overnight. I made it worse with my emotional dump on her last week, even though she admitted she still loved me.

 

So what do you all think? Does she still love me? Does she want to come back and I keep blowing it? Should I just forget her and move on, despite the pain? I truly do not know what to do. I know the NC method works (see above), but what do I do if she calls/texts me again? I don’t want to make any more mistakes in this whole thing. Thanks for listening.

[tresqua]

Well, you certainly have a fairly good handle on the situation and how you messed up. Can't say I blame you though, this guy slipped right in under the wire and is living the life you wanted because he wasn't held back by an exwife. Then again I have to wonder why you couldn't move on with your life even though your divorce got really dragged out. For all practical purposes, most divorces are over long before the ink is starting to dry on the divorce decree. You move out, you live your own life, and you meet new people. Sounds to me like your biggest mistake was long before that lunch date, and that was just sitting on things a bit too long.

[90_hour_sleep]

forever's a long time....

[Ms Darcy]

When you were separated, did your wife know about your new gf? Did she want to reconcile? Same questions for her husband

[robertf]

While separated by wife did know about the relationship. Her husband did not. It didn't cause her that many issues because he didn't care at all. It was harder for me because I had married a top notch control freak and she didn't want to lose country club lifestyle...not that she missed me or anything. She laid a massive guilt trip on me that made it hard for me to deal with, causing the ONLY woman I have ever loved more pain and suffering - yes, I had never been in love before until now, in my late 40's. Never experienced what so many others younger have. It just sucks.

 

I know I've let a really good one slip away because of my foolishness and I'm just absolutely sick over it, now that reality has set in.

[tresqua]

She laid a massive guilt trip on me that made it hard for me to deal with, causing the ONLY woman I have ever loved more pain and suffering

 

You allowed her to manipulate you into feeling guilty. If that somehow cause the only woman you ever loved more pain and suffering, well that's on YOU.

[Ms Darcy]

From what I am hearing you say, you were married and your wife didn't want the marriage to end whilst you got a gf.

 

I tend not to think relationships started and growing so dysfunctionally will last.

[marshmlofluff]

Robertf, I want to speak frankly and I am going to apologize in advance. I am not trying to be judgmental, I am just trying to offer what my perspective was an outsider when I read your story.

 

The way I interpreted your story, you had a wife, and it sounds like you were married for a long time. You had children with her, and your wife had breast cancer and nearly died. I don't know your ex-wife, but what strikes me is that you have nothing good to say about her, and that I don't hear a single ounce of compassion toward her; you even sound annoyed with her for having cancer, because it was an obstacle to your ending your marriage to be with another woman. You are contemptuous of, and blame your wife because she didn't want to get a divorce, which to me seems like a fairly normal reaction to the end of a marriage. Was she really as bad a woman as you are making her out to be?

 

Meanwhile you say that while your dad was dying you "just couldn’t be there for your lovely girlfriend"--that in fact she left then and the two of you were NC even when your dad died. If this woman was really your committed partner of four years, and you were going through a major trauma, seems like it's her who ought to have been there for you. It sounds a lot to me like she rebounded with you; she was fresh off an unhappy marriage, and you were interesting and fun for a few years, maybe in part because you took her to concerts and dinners and bought her a TV and a bed and who knows what else. She was interested in you as long as you weren't emotionally available, and she didn't have to make too much of a commitment. Then when you were available, suddenly you weren't interesting any more. Her blaming the end of the relationship on you sounds an awful lot like an excuse for her simply having lost interest, and someone newer and shinier having come along; your relationship with her had gotten mature and boring, and when real life problems--your dad dying, your job loss, etc. came along, it wasn't all wine and roses any more...it was like marriage. She lost interest in you, and left--possibly the same way you lost interest in, and left your wife.

 

I don't think you should be thinking about trying to get your girlfriend back; you haven't even finished divorcing your wife. I think you have a good opportunity now to detox--step back, take a good, hard, look at yourself, your attitudes toward relationships and marriage, and how you want to live the rest of your life. If this woman really loved you, something as immaterial as whether you broke NC too soon or not would not matter.

 

Again I am really sorry if this came accross as judgmental. I felt that it was important to say, as a total outsider, how your situation came accross to me.

[robertf]

Marsh, thanks for the reply. I appreciate it more than you know. You are right, I didn't show much compassion for my ex wife. The truth is that the fire burned out over 10 years ago, once the children were born. She became all about the kids and not about me. I tried to fix it, asking her to go on trips with me, get couseling, go to dinners and date nights,...etc, but to no avail. It was clear that the ex didn't love me any longer and I was horribly lonely. So it wasn't like I got annoyed that she got breast cancer because it messed up my plans to leave. The truth is that I was just going through the motions of being a husband, when in reality I was trapped in a loveless marriage with no hope. The breast cancer was a horrible thing for her to go through, but it didn't change how I felt about her. Just wanted to expand on this a little bit.

 

Your advice and analysis is pretty good. You got me thinking about things a little differently. Maybe she was bored with us, and our relationship had become more like a marriage and not the fun thing it once was. Maybe that was all she was attracted to. I don't know. Since my first post, we have been out once and had lunch twice. I know I still feel deeply for her, and I definitely still love her, but I just don't know where she is. The more I think about it, the more I think I just need to give us both space and let the chips fall where they may. It is hard to do, because I do want her back, but it is the right thing to do. I am just too emotional about the whole thing and really want to recapture the magic that we had, not willing to admit that maybe the magic is gone forever.

 

As I like to say, it is what it is...not what it could be, nor what it should be. It just is what it is.

 

Thanks for the advice. I appreciate.