Depression? Loneliness? What do you call this?

[jackofall]

Short version of where I'm at: Went out with a girl for 2 years, broke up but remained friends. 6 months later I realized I wanted to start a life with someone, and we had a mutual breakup so I figured why not? There were rumors she was seeing someone but she was still consistently hanging out with me too (with a bit of sleeping over thrown in). Turns out she somehow has turned off any romantic feelings she has for me and insists we're just friends. I tried to remain friends but I just didn't agree that we were hopeless as a couple so I went full NC.

 

The weird thing about it is that I feel depressed. I miss her a great deal, still want her back right or wrong, and generally feel like crap all day every day, BUT at the same time I can't stand to be in the house. All I want to do is get out and do things with friends constantly. I desperately want to have somewhere to go all day, I play sports and sometimes exercise on my own time. I thought depressed people just shut themselves in the house and felt sorry for themselves? I'm not necessarily doing that in this case. I'm upset over the fact that my friends are all attached and have their own lives and that hanging out with me is now secondary for them. If anything I want to be a social butterfly, not the opposite. How would you categorize this?

[learning2relax]

I would categorize it as regret? Possibly?

 

You regret that you didn't realize that you would want her in your life and now that you have established a friendship - or as others may coin it, you have been "friendzoned" she isn't allowing that line to be crossed?

 

You can decide what you want to do here though and there are still several possibilities/outcomes for this as I see it going from only your post above..... You could go "radio silence" on her and see if she comes to seek you out as a friend or more (this might not be entirely evident up front). You could tell her how you feel (if you haven't - not sure if you did or if what you state above is your perception) and see how she responds. You could distance yourself enough that you aren't focused on her as your target for a relationship and therefore not making yourself available to other woman who you could enter into a new relationship with.

 

If your objective is to find someone to spend your life with then you have choices to make if she is preoccupying your mind. If your objective is to get back with her, all you can do is ask and if she is not on the same page, the best you can do is get enough separation from her to heal so that you are open to a new relationship with someone else.

 

It wasn't really clear but did you break up with her or did she break up with you?

[jackofall]

It was a mutual break up, but I did in fact tell her how I felt months later (I had an epiphany if you will). She had JUST started seeing someone else and she chose that over me, claiming she thought we were better as friends and apparently this guy is the greatest thing ever as always happens when people are in la la land at the beginning of a new relationship. Regardless we broke up mutually but after that rejection it pretty much feels like she dumped me at this point haha.

 

We hung out as friend for a month or two and I never initiated contact with her. I thought I was getting somewhere but she just hid behind the fact that I said I was okay being just a friend and claimed it was nothing. So I packed up all her stuff and gave it to her, saying we just couldn't be friends under these circumstances. I said obviously if she texted me I wouldn't ignore her or something like that, but at the end of the day I'm either going to heal and MAYBE reconnect with her as a friend or she's going to have to initiate contact when we're on the same page.....if ever.

[learning2relax]

How long ago was this last exchange? Is she still with the other guy? In your first post you said there were rumors in the second post it sounds like she actually talked to you about her relationship.

 

In an attempt to answer the question you posted with this thread based on what you said and how I relate from my own personal experiences......sounds like you may be feeling depressed as you are just now dealing with the loss of the relationship for the first time.

 

It sounds like you regretted the mutual end of the relationship (upon your epiphany). You might have gone into denial that she was telling you it was over and she was into someone else that she was with. So you then compromised your healing by allowing yourself to be friends with her. You were in denial that she did not feel the same for you and you hid your feelings for her in order to co-exist in a friendship. However, you had an alterior motive. You were hoping that by being in contact with her as a friend, she would run her course with "new guy" and realize her feelings for you and return to a relationship with you. You chose to interpret that you were gaining favor for which she may return to a committed relationship with you because she was the one initiating contact with you to interact or hang out with you as a friend.

 

Sounds like, over time your hopes of her returning to a relationship with you didn't materialize. Your feelings were growing stronger and surfacing and attempting to deny them for the price of friendship became more than you could bare. So you told her you just couldn't do it with where your heart and feelings for her were at and had to go take care of yourself for anything positive to exist between the both of you whether a friendship (after you have healed over the loss of the relationship) or relationship (if she eliminates "new guy" and initiates contact with you.....and you are on the same page when she does).

 

Does that all sound right? To me it sounds like you just put your healing on hold through the string of events of the break up of the relationship, the realization that you didn't want it to end, and the compromise of your feelings for her friendship. So you feel what those of us that are on here after having been "dumped" feel.......lonely, sad, rejected, etc.....and it can manifest itself as depression. But I think you already knew all this. Yes?

 

So now, you have to get about taking care of yourself and allow yourself to go through the phases of grief and gain back your self confidence. Build back your self esteem. Build back your self worth. Learn to love yourself. I would say the biggest lesson in all of this is that you just can't compromise you or your feelings for someone else. The cost to you is huge. And in your case you chose to pay later vs. pay now when the relationship ended and when you realized you wanted it back and she turned you down. You went on the deferred payment plan and now it is time where you have no choice but to deal.

 

Don't beat yourself up too badly - the majority of us on here have made these mistakes to varying degrees. Because you have had the realization and you have actually told her you can't be friends - you are actually further along then some others of us on here who are still in straight up denial. Those initial stages can be doozies. Not fun. Where you are at now, you can actually start to move forward and repair and come through the other side of this stronger than you were before. You learn. We all do. We are human and we learn. Some of us just are more stubborn about accepting the lesson than others is all. If it makes you feel any better - I was reallllly stubborn. Yeah, after trying the same thing over and over again and getting no where - I realized I was going to drive my self insane and got a grip, accepted what I didn't want to and am better now because of it.

 

You are doing ok. And the fact that you actually get about moving and doing things.....you are better and stronger than you think.

[jackofall]

Thanks for the advice, and the kind words at the end.

 

Our last exchange was only 2-3 weeks ago, when I pretty much told her I had to move on or whatever. Between me telling her my true feelings about wanting to get back together and now, about 3 months has passed. Yeah she's still with the other guy.

 

I was afraid you'd say that about finally dealing with it for the first time. The good thing though is that throughout the period where we were still "friends" recently and I wasn't initiating contact, I did get a bit better. It's not much but it was a small investment I'm building on now. I still feel bad almost all the time, but before it was ALL the time. Essentially I feel like I blew an opportunity at what could've been everything, but who knows? We obviously broke up for a reason.

 

For the record I do still have to "get over it". It's probably my ego, but I think most or all of this comes from the fact that I just can't believe she didn't give our relationship another shot. It's like my usual confidence has smacked me in the face full force in the opposite direction.

[learning2relax]

I hear you....I don't know how old you are - I am in my 40's. But I can share this with you.....when I was young my reactions were quick and not often with the thought that was warranted for certain situations. I didn't value things and relationships and actually life as much as I do now. Perhaps that comes in time and through lessons like this. Perhaps what you can take from this is if faced with similar circumstances in the future, find a way to sit with it and play it forward and hang on to your decision for a while (you may have done this already - don't know) before ending it. Maybe what feels like the right decision one day will not feel as right a week later. And if there is uncertainty, wait it out to get a better read that is consistent to feel more confident about it. I have found that this works for me. It helps to keep me from possibly reacting to a circumstance vs. truly knowing that it isn't working for me. If I have the same feeling every day or for the next so many visits consistently, I have my answer. If it waffles, I wait it out. It has served me well. Or at least better than the approach I took prior to learning the hard way.

 

You never know what the future holds. There is a lot of truth to the "if you love something....." saying. If it is meant to be, it will come back around. If it isn't, it isn't and you are meant to be with someone that is meant to be with you - you just haven't tripped accross each other yet. Hang in there. The practice of not initiating will help tremendously. Took me too long to get my impulse to contact under control so you are ahead of the game from where I started.

 

Keep moving forward. At least you are taking care of yourself now......better than compromising your feelings. Much better.