Tell me i'm doing the right thing and not making a huge mistake

[deavyin]

i don't know about attraction but i definitely haven't burnt the bridge between us. If I wanted to (which right now i obviously don't) I could easily gain back her friendship. It would take a while and would never be a strong one while she is with him but, hypothetically speaking were they to break up like 6 months from now and i put in the effort to rebuild the friendship, i'm sure we'd be good friends.

 

again, right now this isn't something I want. I don't want to get close to her because i'll only hurt myself and I know that. As for hope of getting back together...yeah, sure..it's tucked away in there. Is there some magic way to get rid of it completely? I tell myself she won't come back (and my mind knows it to be true) but we all have unrealistic dreams. It's going to take time for that hope to fade. It took time with my big ex and then it eventually did. I can now see my life without her in it and I would hate the idea of being with her again. It took a while to get there. Right after we broke up I had a lot of hope we'd get back together and she'd realize she made a mistake. It's been 2 months now and that hope is fading. I know we won't get back together any time soon and that it probably will never happen. A few months from now I won't have any hope left. It's a gradual fade and not a light switch.

[Tryptophan]

That's true. It's crazy how much little circles we create of hope and just play along with them. YOU have to help the hope fade though. Think of it as a wound, do you let it heal or do you keep picking at it? It'll heal both ways but YOU choose how much of a scar it leaves.

 

 

 

I think it's important to consider how they'll remember you because it's about your dignity and your pride. If you destroy that even more than they already did for you, then you'll have a really hard time getting over the breakup. That's because recovery is about getting your self-esteem/dignity/pride back together, and recovery is relative to how much damage they caused (or you caused yourself). It's also about you seeing them years from now and not have to hide behind the nearest wall because you remember how pathetic you acted. I would want to be able to look at them with my head held high and not like "Damn, I can't even look you in the eye".

 

I don't know, I guess that's the way I see it.

[deavyin]

I completely agree with you tryptophan. I burned that bridge with my big ex but I don't feel bad about it. We were each other's first loves. She left me for my best friend of over a decade/coworker, lied to me about it, i moved into his place as he was moving in with her (behind my back) and I had to work with him months after finding out about it. I don't feel bad about how I acted. I totally lost my * * * * and yet still managed to keep myself from kicking his ass and i'm proud of that.

 

Still, that bridge is burned completely. Not long ago I asked that ex if she wanted to meet up for a beer and catch up and i tried to add her on facebook. She said "move on with your life! I thought I made it clear to you I don't want you on facebook when i deleted your alias from my page". Keep in mind, I never created an alias and got her to add it. That's all in her mind. Still, she truly thinks I am not over her some 4 years later. Believe me I am.

 

I care about how people think of me. I'll never be with this girl again and I accept that (i still have hope but that's a different matter...i'm working on getting rid of it). Still, someday down the road maybe i'll want to be her friend. No one on here can sit there and say "NO NO NO BIG MISTAKE". I'm not talking about near future. I'm talking about a while from now and only if they are broken up and I'm completely over her. The only reason I entertain the idea is because I have had my heart broken a couple of times and i've done the same. I still am friends with a few of those girls and one of them just contacted me 2 days ago after a decade. I don't want to have to hide behind a wall feeling ashamed each time I see this girl.

 

I care about how she thinks of me because I still care about her. Eventually i won't care about her but i'll be glad that at least I ended things on an even keel.

[Tryptophan]

Yeah exes like to think you never really got over them. On my end, I don't ever even look back on the exes. If I do see them, I do diplomatically say hello, and move on. A lot of them try to be good friends and whatever, but let's be honest, it won't work as "good friends". We are lucky if we ever get to be good acquaintances. One of my exes does actually work on a different floor of where I currently work and I'm glad I don't have to be ashamed when I see him. He also acted normally when we broke up (mutual-ish breakup), so we both are okay with seeing each other. I know that no matter what happens, there are still a couple of sour feelings present too so pushing for friendship would be asking for too much.

 

I usually think that I don't want to be friends with the exes, but it's very unrealistic to think I'll never see them again. If I do ever see them again, I don't want to have that resentful, bitter outlook that "I don't care what you think", I want to have the outlook that "I have my own life now and caring or not caring isn't really even option". It's about YOUR pride, not theirs. They do a pretty damn good job when they dump you and shatter your pride/self-esteem. If you go out of your way to further shatter it, it hurts even more when you try to get over it. I don't know why we don't remember this when breakups happen. I hope I have learned my lesson to deal with the next one, if there's any at all.

[Eocsor]

To each his own. I for one really couldn't care less about how an ex percieves me. I think if you're still hung up on how they'll remember you, you're retarding your healing process. But then, I've never been one to look in the rearview mirror.

[Tryptophan]

To each his own. I for one really couldn't care less about how an ex percieves me. I think if you're still hung up on how they'll remember you, you're retarding your healing process. But then, I've never been one to look in the rearview mirror.

 

I guess it is still caring a little from the way you see it but it also motivates to kind of watch out with what you say and do after a breakup. Because what you say and do has more potential to slow down your healing than trying to protect your self esteem. I'd rather think "I want them to remember me with my head held high" is better than "I'll act all sad and pathetic" and not care what they think. I thought the same way with my past exes and it worked. I haven't begged, pleaded to anyone, just because I was trying to protect my pride; God knows I didn't want it any more abused. It applies to anyone I know, not just my ex; I don't want anyone looking at me like a sad, pathetic case who can't handle rejection. No matter how much I am hurting inside, no matter how much I have to resort to the ENA forums, I'm not letting my ex remember me with pity. **** that. It's just a personal preference.