Friends wedding today and I am finding it hard

[miss_sunshine]

I just attended my friends wedding and I have a couple of hours now until the reception. I just need to get out all my feelings. I can't talk to friends about this stuff as they just do not understand and feel that I should just get over him.

 

I have been friends with the bride for about 10 years. We used to meet for coffee or dinner and chat about when we would finally get married and lament about how long we had to wait haha in a nice way, it was just this thing we both loved our guys and always thought it was going to end up with us both getting married. Well they were together less time than my ex and I were but they got married today after 9 or so years. It was really hard for me. Don't get me wrong, I am soooo happy for her, but it just made me so sad.

 

I saw the groom waiting for her to walk down the aisle and I wondered why my ex did not want that with me? I just find it so hard to believe that all that love, all that time, lead to nothing. It seems so unfair that I was with someone for almost 12 years and I did not get my happy ending. I loved him so much, was there for him every day, was loving, affectionate, caring, attentive and now he does not care less about me. I have to start all over again and it just seems so wrong. Sometimes I feel like I must be in a parallel universe or something because my ex would not have left me, We loved each other, we were soul mates, we were for life. I just do not get what happened.

 

I know I just have to get on with my life but today I realised just how not over him I really am. I still love him with all my heart. I can still see him clearly when I close my eyes, feel his hug, his kiss. I just want what I used to have. A partner in life, a best friend, why did I get dealt this hand in life, it just seems so utterly unfair. I miss him so much and I do not know how I am ever going to learn to just live without the person I love more than anything. I just want to talk to him, laugh with him, be with him, sleep next to him and I never will again and it is so hard to accept. It was there one minute and gone the next and my mind struggles so much with accepting that. I feel like after 10 months I should be in a different place but I just feel quite stuck sometimes.

 

I will get through this day, just like I always do and I know the sun will shine again but it just all feels so unfair. I feel so gypped, so misled and I do not know why. Why did I have to end up with the man who was a cheater and a liar? Why did he lead me on for so many years. What does this new girl have that I don't? Why couldn't I be my friend getting my happy ending.

 

Anyway, Happy Easter everyone and I hope you are all having a good weekend.

[pavlo81]

Life can be ed ey

[90_hour_sleep]

Life is full of endings...both happy and otherwise. It's also full of new beginnings.

 

You'll find your new beginning.

 

Sending some warmth your way...on a difficult day.

[brigirl92]

I hope you enjoy the reception despite how you feel right now. Just cause your friend is getting a happy ending right now, that doesn't mean a happy ending is out of the books for you. Please don't compare yourself to the new girl. Think of it as a blessing that she took a liar and a cheater off of your hands. Let's be honest, the reception is the best part of the wedding. There's food, dancing, laughs, and tons if fun. I'm sure you'll enjoy it ☺☺

[greta96]

This is life, and there is nothing anyone can do about it. We are all dealt different cards, so we have to play them the best we can.

Some find the biggest love of their lives on first attempt, others go through life searching and hoping, only to never find it, and everybody else is in between. It's not fair, and it's so random, that it can't be understood or made sense out of. It just is. Good things don't always happen to deserving people, in fact they happen to a lot of undeserving people, and viceversa.

 

After all those years you spent with your ex, it is only natural that you still hurt, 10 months after the breakup, especially since your relationship ended with him cheating, and he is now with the woman he cheated with. I can tell you for sure that "she" doesn't have anything more than what you have, and neither does your best friend who got married...it was just the way things turned out. So thinking about the why's and how's is not going to help you one bit, because nobody can answer that. All you can do is try and accept it, and force your brain to not think about what would have been if....

 

I know you feel gypped, but maybe it happened for the best, maybe your ex wasn't "the one" for you (meaning, the man who would have made you the happiest), actually, since he cheated, obviously he wasn't, but it will happen for you too. Just give it time...

[chickadeedee]

>>I was with someone for almost 12 years and I did not get my happy ending.

 

I am sorry you are sad. But I think there are a few things to learn here that will serve you well in future. First, life isn't about a wedding being a happy ending, because it is just one day in the rest of your life. Just because you are married it doesn't guarantee you will be happy or life will be fine. It is an important milestone for a couple, but it is no guarantee that everything will be wonderful and perfect as more than half of all couples who divorce discover. So please don't add an extra helping of sorrow onto yourself by having that kind of girl-like fantasy that a wedding is an 'happy ending' or will fix your life. Some couples marry and have total bliss, some marry and lead a life of bickering and discontentment, and everything in between.

 

Next, you learned that maybe you shouldn't spend a whole 12 years with someone if they don't help you meet a milestone or goal. You wanted marriage and children, and this guy strung you along for 12 years because you had your eye so fixed on the 'prize' of an 'ending' with him (marriage) that you didn't stop and look around and realize regardless of being together, he was not moving any closer to your goal after 12 long years. Some women hang onto a guy for dear life for years and years on the assumption that it must lead to marriage if they only hang around long enough because they are determined to get that 'happy ending' even when the guy is refusing to move forward with them toward that goal. You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink, and if you get with a guy and he isn't proposing after a couple years or seriously talking marriage within about 3 years, you have to let him go because his goals and yours don't mesh.

 

So YOUR feelings about how much you love someone else won't magically make HIS feelings be that he wants to marry you and settle down with kids. That is really a negotiation, and you need to really status his feelings and goals and plans, and if you're not on the same page after a couple years, you have to let him go.

 

A simple analogy here is if you are looking for water and start digging a well, if you are drilling in the wrong place, no matter how deep you drill you won't get water. So with your ex, you kept drilling and drilling and drilling for 12 years, but you were drilling in the wrong place, a dry well. You HOPED he would pay off and you THOUGHT he would pay off, but that was counter to the evidence that you had drilled way beyond the reasonable time and still nothing. So next time, you drill for a reasonable period of time and either hit water or don't. And if you don't, you pack up the drill and go somewhere else to look until you find it.

 

So your task now becomes really letting this guy go emotionally. You're still hanging onto him, still drilling that well and telling yourself this is the ONLY place in the universe you can get water (love and marriage), which just isn't true. You had him cast in your head as your prince charming who would provide your happy ending, but he was not interested in playing that role and made that clear by refusing to marry for 12 years. So regardless of your feelings for him, he didn't feel the same, and wasn't interested in the same goals as you were.

 

So it is time to really accept that that 'future' life you had projected with him was just a fantasy you need to let go. If it has been 9 months and you are still unable to really free yourself emotionally so that you can start dating again and find a guy who does want marriage and family, then I'd suggest counseling for you.

[chickadeedee]

>>and lament about how long we had to wait

 

btw, stop waiting. By that i mean, don't be that passive girl who sits around waiting for Prince Charming to pop for a ring. If you have to wait 10 years with the groom dragging his feet down the aisle, a very common scenario i've seen with couples like this with overly long courtships is that they finally marry because the guy feels he 'ought' to marry or he 'owes it to her' after a long relationship. It's not out of a big desire to marry her or he'd have done it sooner. She's happily thinking she's finally got her ending and is dreaming of houses and babies, and he's gone underground thinking, 'what have i gotten myself into? this is all wrong, what a mistake, how do i get myself out again?'

 

So as soon as he marries, and it settles into the day to day routine of being 'stuck' in a marriage, he suddenly he realizes the reason he took so long is he really didn't want to be married to her and he feels trapped and miserable at being trapped and all hell breaks loose and he eventually cheats and/or bolts and a divorce ensues.

 

So if a man ever balks on the subject of marriage when you've been together a couple years, believe him (that he doesn't want marriage and/or he doesn't believe you're the right one though he is willing to hang out with until he meets her), and let him go.

[loyalroyal]

Good afternoon Babydoll.

First and foremost, I want to wrap my arms around you, give you a massive hug and a kiss on the top of your head and tell you that everything is going to be alright. And when i'm telling you that, i mean it with eveything that i am and with as much love as i can.Because it will be. Sometimes in life, thats what we need more than anything. Someone to wrap there arms around you and tell you everything is going to be alright....and if they can do it in a stupid jamaican accent pretending to be Bob Marley....even better.

 

I can completely and utterly understand where you are coming from and I completely feel your pain. I am in the same boat as you. I came home from work one Friday, looking forward to the weekend hoping to spend it with my wife and stepchildren.... had a wee snooze after a long day at work... woke up asked the wife if she was ok.... completely unexpected and out of the blue...I don't love you any more, I don't want to be with you. I've felt this way for months, wasn't looking forward to you coming back from Afghanistan( after a 7 month tour of duty) and I want you to leave. All out of the blue. There wasn't any indication that our marriage was in trouble. The night before we were cuddling up in bed and she was telling me that she loved me. The week before we had a fabulous Valentines weekend. In that instance my whole world fell apart. All my plans had be blown to pieces. I had lost my wife of 6 years, we had been together 8 years and friends for 20 years.Yet as soon as she told me it was as if she felt nothing. No emotion, no sadness...nothing. I saw just complete emptiness in her. Whatever it was in her that made her live and made me love her was gone. I haven't seen or spoken to her since. She changed her number immediately. At the time we split, I was falling more in love with her everyday. I still have no idea why she stopped loving me. She gave me no reason, no chance to try and make things better. I am in many ways still in love with her. Part of me woukd take her back tomorrow. You can't just cut it off. It's a part of you. All you can do is try your best to move on. There is nothing and I mean nothing you could have done that would have made a difference to him. He either loved you for who you were or he never loved you at all. And he's treated you like , so that tells you everything. If you need someone to talk to, I am here for you. I will support you as much as I can (mutual support) just keep busy and whatever you do...don't you ever blame yourself.

[invisibleheart]

Sending big hug for you and yeah, I am running out of words as I feel your pain.

 

I myself, people that I know... Are getting nowadays. A close friend of mine seemingly enjoying the best in her life with someone now, I envy her but altogether happy for her.

 

Yeah, just breathe and take day at a time. I like how you end your post with a hope and strength, such hope and courage. Keep on. We are here for you babydoll.

[Ms Darcy]

Remember that today is about your friend. I am sympathetic to your pain but take care to remember that the focus is on your friend. Be happy for her and focus on that.

 

Your pain isn't the center of everyone else's life. So, at times like these we just have to focus on others.

[miss_sunshine]

Thank you all so much. There are some really lovely responses here and I am so grateful. The wedding was lovely and I really am so happy for my friend. My friend was very sick and had to postpone her wedding and is now is remission so she so deserved a wonderful day and it really was. Perfect weather, beautiful speeches, she looked amazing, it was just a wonderful day. I was out to 5am after the reception so I enjoyed myself too!

 

This forum really reminds me that there are lovely people out there and people who care as much as I do. I am seeing am seeing a psychologist too and she is helping me to work on my self esteem and the internal negative talk that I use.

 

Thank you all again so much. I really needed to have support and you all provided it for me. I think I just have to accept that I am probably going to love him for a long time, if not always and that is not going to go away. It will just hurt less and time goes on. I guess that is what happens when you truly love someone, you just go on loving them even though they have shattered your heart into millions of pieces.