Guys, do you ever realize how you hurt your ex girlfriend and regret it?

[QuestionHeart]

Part of my healing at this point is not even hoping that we will get back together, but instead hoping that one day he will realize how he hurt me and feel badly about it. I hope he regrets how he acted. I hope he sees how he hurt me. I hope he understands how he hurt me. Right now he just blames me for everything and points out everything I did wrong. It hurts. It hurts that he never appreciated me and that he took the beautiful that I gave him and threw it in the trash. Will he ever realize all of this? When I am long gone, will he ever regret it and see my point of view of things on how he hurt me and what he did? I wanted to be good with him and wanted to have something beautiful with him...will he ever regret losing that and not cherishing it when he had the opportunity?

[morrowrd]

What you need to do is change from thinking about "will he ever realize what he threw away" to "will I ever learn not to throw myself away by giving something beautiful to someone who doesn't appreciate it."

 

At this point, it shouldn't matter about what your ex thinks, and continue your healing process so you don't make the same mistake twice. There ARE men out there who will cherish you and take those affections of yours that you're so generous with, and treasure them.

[ThatwasThen]

I doubt it. However; that's neither her nor there. What you should be concentrating on is what an idiot he is and how you're better of without him and working on getting to the stage of indifference to him so that you can be ready and open to meeting the man that will appreciate the "beautiful" you give him. The key is to get out quick as soon as you notice you're not being valued. That way, you hold all the power of you in your own hands and instead of framing him as the prize, you frame yourself as the prize and when you can do that, that is when you will quickly ditch the fluff so that you don't waste any unnecessary time trying to fit a square peg into a round hole.

 

It doesn't matter if he regrets what he did or didn't do so don't be worrying or wondering if he does. What matters is that you're now clear of someone who didn't appreciate your efforts and you are free to find the RIGHT person for you.

[Thorshammer]

I have only broke up with one girl, that HAD to end but i still felt really bad. Even with women who i just dated i would feel bad, they wanted to date me seriously and i didnt want that - ya sure, i felt bad, sometimes i felt horrible. I used to call my friend and tell her how sad i felt and that i hope i didnt hurt her too bad. These women would never believe i would feel as hurt as i was when i had to turn them down - because im so cold faced and careless. Some didnt even care, and they quickly moved on to other men - but before this i would feel really down.'

 

I dated someone from the site 2 years ago and i had to let her go due to not having a good connection plus due to distance. I kept apologizing to her every week.

 

But thats me, it all depends on how his mind works.

[HopsonMcGee]

If I dumped the girl and my only reason for doing so was, e.g., she wasn't attractive enough, or she was too religious, or she had bad taste in music that she was nonetheless passionate about, etc., then yes, I felt bad while doing so, and I still feel bad to this day. In mitigation, I always make these determinations within two months, so they don't get terribly attached to me. On the other hand, if I'm dumping her, odds are a lot of other guys dumped her before me. My reasoning is that women get dumped far less often than men, and it's highly unlikely I'm more particular than my counterparts. It follows, therefore, this girl gets dumped a lot, and with every instance, she loses a bit more confidence in herself. The worst is when they say, "is there something wrong with me?" through a veil of tears. That stings, and honestly, it stays with you. It's never fun to hurt someone.

 

If the girl dumped me, than I have no regrets at all. Chances are she was high maintenance and her perception that I "hurt" her was an illusion. I'm glad she's no longer in my life, and she can ruminate in her room, alone, in her own personal little pity party for the rest of eternity for all I care.

 

So my regret vel non depends entirely on who dumped who and for what reason. As one final caveat, if she dumped me because I cheated, either physically or emotionally, than I feel bad and you may refer to the first paragraph. This only happened once over 10 years ago, and I had no ill will for the girl after she left me because I totally deserved it.

[HopsonMcGee]

I agree. When I dump a girl, I show no emotion. I remain as stoic as humanly possible because my hope is that they'll view me as a soulless monster and it will therefore make it easier for them to get over me. Also, it better conveys the finality of the whole thing, I think. I don't follow-up with them thereafter, however. I say goodbye, and ignore their pleas for continued friendship. This comes off as extremely callous to them, but my rationale is that it will drive home the basic fact to them that I'm an uncaring brute that serves only to destroy them emotionally. I don't actually believe that's who I am, but that's what I want them to think so they'll more easily move along to brighter pastures.

 

If we dated for nine months or more, than my procedure would be considerably different. I don't know what that procedure is yet since I've never broken up with a long term girlfriend, but I'm sure it wouldn't be as impersonal.

[FindingClarity]

I understand where you are coming from. I can get that he might not want to be with me anymore, and have to come to terms with the fact that he treated me badly and that I let him do that. But I think that it would help me if I knew that now and then he had enough feeling for me think of me and feel some remorse. But I think thats because I still love him to some extent. Hopefully I'll get to a point where it doesn't matter anymore.

[SooSad33]

It will get to that point... after some time. For now you're just full of emotions (anger, sadness, denial, confusion, lonely etc)

 

Does he think of you? Yes, he does. Does he have 'regrets'? He may not at this time, as normally each side is still furious and very emotional and can still act out in either cold/hot or negative (nothing at all).

In time though- say 3 months from now, i'm sure he WILL come to regret what has happened, as he starts to remember the 'good' of the relationship, after the heated & painful ending of it.

 

Dumpee's hurt a lot first.. and when things start to calm down a bit, after a few months, it's usual for the Dumper's to start 'feeling' more with the facts and the loss.

 

Give it time.. but be sure, yes he will feel. In the meantime though, for now is YOUR time. Time to work on yourself, your pains, emotions etc. It will take a while to get over, yes.

 

One day at a time....

 

tc

[QuestionHeart]

very informative............but i actually tried to tie up all the loose ends and he actually threw in a "well maybe someday down the road but I need to be away from you for a long while now until we can talk again".......that kinda annoyed me because I was trying to escape alltogether completely and he is always leaving an untied end like that

[QuestionHeart]

The worst is when they say, "is there something wrong with me?" through a veil of tears. That stings, and honestly, it stays with you. It's never fun to hurt someone.

 

This is me. i started to cry as I said it. the ugly cry. then he cried. i dont know if he cried out of pity or if he cried because I was making it unbearably hard for him to get away.

[mbee]

I feel your pain and had these feelings and emotions for many months. I'm about 8-9 months post-breakup, don't even keep count anymore. My ex hurt me so badly that it still comes back and hurts me every so often, unexpectedly. He has never once apologized to me. He's had 2 girlfriends since our breakup. Like yourself, I wished many months that he would regret what we had. Honestly every person handles things differently. I don't talk to my ex and he stopped reaching out to me 6 months ago, but he's asked my friend about me 4 months ago. He still keeps our photos on his Facebook, even his profile pictures (he's deleted all of his pictures with other exes). He sent me a very rude and aggressive email a couple of weeks ago out of nowhere, and after 4 months NC. This reflects someone who is still battling with anger and unresolved issues from our breakup. It's not what I want, but like I said every person handles things differently.

 

Don't put a timeline on the regret and hope thing since it will only lead to disappointment. He may show remorse and regret and that could be 2 months from now, 6 months, a year or a decade from now. To be honest, you may be in so much pain to see this right now, but hopefully it'll be a year from now or so when you both have had time to reflect, heal and let go.

 

Learn to know your worth and to give it to some very lucky guy in the future. Trust me, your energy is spent elsewhere. I think it's normal to fantasize about the future and hope for an apology but please know that these things rarely happen on your timeline and there's a good chance you may never hear from him again. It's a sad reality but it's life. We'll get through this! Stay strong!

[Ms Darcy]

QuestionHeart, if a guy who thought like this dumped you, you would be Muuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuch better off.

 

I know you want him to suffer, but if he had stayed, he would only make you suffer by not loving you the way you deserve.

[The_Seeker]

To be honest, they do feel hurt and regret.

 

They have their own reasons why. You will never find the truth.

 

All you can do is move on, and make yourself better with or without him.

[savignon]

Even if he does regret it, he likely won't reach out to you 2, 5, 10 or more years from now to tell you so it's not helpful to think about.

For me it's been freeing to realize that I'm no longer responsible for how an ex turns out (not that I ever was but I've led myself to believe that). I believe all my exes and I were meant to meet for mutually beneficial reasons and I know exactly what the reasons have been relative to my journey. If they figure out for themselves what I was supposed to bring to their journey or not is irrelevant to me. And for anyone who has ever treated me poorly, I truly don't care and am not invested in how their life turns out (although I wish them well from a spiritual standpoint). The exception is my ex husband ....I truly hope his life turns around and he finds happiness and I am invested in that outcome because we have a child together.

Decide what your "take aways" from the relationship were and say them to him (not to actually him but maybe to his picture out loud or in a letter). Then say anything else you want to say, wish him well, say your goodbye and burn it (the letter/picture/whatever).

It's very cathartic.

[QuestionHeart]

so would writing him a goodbye email telling him that i loved him a bad idea?

[savignon]

so would writing him a goodbye email telling him that i loved him a bad idea?

 

The mainstream suggestion is to a) handwrite it (as opposed to email) and b) not send it.

If you knew you could stop yourself from engaging if he write back, it's up to you to send it. For me I would get sooo confident that it was my "last email" and then he'd say something that pushed the right button and days later we were still emailing and I hadn't moved one step forward. Ugh.

[cutebubbles012]

I agree with savignon. Hand write it but do not send it. You could also write a draft email but not send it as well. I had about 7 drafted emails sitting in my email for months which I never ended up sending. At the time of the break up I was so sure i would feel better after writing him but 6 months later, i am so glad i never sent it to him. I left with my pride and dignity. Someone who treats you poorly and doesn't value your worth is NOT worth it. TRULY.

 

It's not your responsibility whether or not he realizes what he did. Of course we would feel better if we knew they were suffering as much as we are….but reality is that we just don't know. Its better not to know. Just focus on yourself. Make yourself the lead character in your story now. This is just the end of one chapter. You have so many more left waiting to be created.

 

I know that its hard now. I truly feel your pain because I felt the exact same way. It gets better. You will be okay.

 

Take care of yourself.

[sunnyb]

He may regret it at some point, but you likely won't know it. If he felt strong enough to end it with you, he isn't having feelings of concern for you, so I wouldn't bet that he is hurting like you are. I had a guy saunter in and out of my life like it was nothing after he hurt me. He would pop up with texts like "Hey, I was at the mall and thought of you". Stuff like that. I got so tired of it that I sent him a message telling him how much I was disgusted by him and how much he had hurt me. He had no clue! He actually responded with "I had no idea I hurt you that badly. I am sorry". Then, I had my heart smashed into a million pieced by a guy who never once looked back and never reached out. I doubt he felt bad at all. The final one is when an ex reached out 10 years after the fact to apologize. He had his heart broken and saw what it felt like. By then, it came off as weird that he was even reaching out because I didn't care any more anyway. Point is, not everyone thinks the same way. I wouldn't bet on anything from him.

[Shainet]

I agree. When I dump a girl, I show no emotion. I remain as stoic as humanly possible because my hope is that they'll view me as a soulless monster and it will therefore make it easier for them to get over me. Also, it better conveys the finality of the whole thing, I think. I don't follow-up with them thereafter, however. I say goodbye, and ignore their pleas for continued friendship. This comes off as extremely callous to them, but my rationale is that it will drive home the basic fact to them that I'm an uncaring brute that serves only to destroy them emotionally. I don't actually believe that's who I am, but that's what I want them to think so they'll more easily move along to brighter pastures.

 

This is what i feel my ex did. He even told me to be mad at him. That i should start talking to other men, and that there's nomchance to fix us and not to make it difficult for myself that i should just move on and accept the break up.

[StillLearning]

This is such an old post and I don't even know if you'll see this, or what impact it might have so many years later. But here goes. 

I met at a girl in my late twenties, and I was sure she was the one. I immediately told my family that I met the woman who I hoped would become my wife. We have been broken up for 3 years now after 5 years of dating and living together, and I still at times struggle to cope with the way that I treated her.

In certain ways this has helped me grow and not repeat those mistakes, as I am painfully cognizant of the errors of my past, but that isn't this conversation.

I was neglectful and constantly took her for granted, and eventually tried to change her from the person that I ultimately fell in love with. I projected my own deficits as a companion onto her and even at times crossed into gaslighting. I am intense, passionate, extroverted, loud and at times obnoxious, and she is(well at least was at the time, in my obviously subjective approximation) introverted, kind empathetic and more mild mannered. This is a very rough synopsis but in the present I realize how cold I was and that I was simply not mentally or emotionally mature enough to nurture the things I claimed to be wanting to grow and I was not prepared to present the things I claimed to be about, and at my core selfish. In short, I didn't hold up my end of the bargain. I was never physical, but I certainly took a severe psychological toll on this sweet, beautiful and happy woman who loved me like no one ever had. In whatever way possible we are actually still friends and we even went out to dinner about a month ago, but I can still see that broken glimmer when she looks at me, that I know I put there, and my heart breaks. I hope she finds all the happiness in the world and that she finds a person who will lover her exactly as she is, and will cherish her, and if I knew swearing that off for myself could bring her that I would do it. I didn't deserve her and she certainly never deserved to be treated that way. 

I am not looking for sympathy or even catharsis, I need to live with this and learn from my mistakes and never ever treat another human this way. 

Some of us do realize and hopefully we learn. I like to think I have but only time can tell. 

[Rb1980]

I was dumped about a year ago and it still hurts a lot. 

When I think about it in depth I often think about whether my actions ever hurt her.

I never abused her, cheated on her or anything like that but the fact she ended up unhappy in the relationship makes me feel guilty that I made someone so sweet and caring become unhappy for some reason.

I tried to help with her mental health issues, her job loss and her grief from a family death and on the whole it was appreciated but for some reason she just became unhappy. She always says it was nothing I had done or not done but I can't help feeling that somewhere along the way I pushed her into unhappiness. It's a thought that kills me.