Never thought I'd do this but, I've got quite a story to tell & need help...

[AMC27]

Hello all,

 

I've always trawled the internet, seeking solace in advice forums during hard times. Never felt compelled to write for advice in any though, until now. I've got a bit of a dousey.

 

We met at university earlier this year (Feb 2016), I'd seen her around a lot, she was gorgeous, intelligent (we did similar master's degrees) and essentially everything I had wanted in a woman. I plucked up the courage to talk to her in the common room one day, and we clicked. She is half Spanish/Austrian (but grew up in India) and doesn't know the city, so we spent summer 2016 exploring my beloved home city London- guiding her around on our bicycles was perhaps the most blissful summer I've ever had. In all honesty, despite my outgoing exterior I've always felt a detachment from people, but I felt more connected and understood by her than Ive ever felt by someone beyond my immediate family. She felt the same, telling me she had never met a man like me. She opened up enormously, had breakdowns in front of me- things she would not do with many people. She had had a complicated childhood, her parents divorced at 7 after her father had had an affair, the woman he is still with. Her father was largely emotionally unavailable, living thousands of miles away in the States and this created complicated issues of abandonment and commitment in her. I've had a similarly complicated childhood with an alcoholic mother and emotionally stunted father, meaning we felt a great sense of affinity with one another.

 

Here is where it gets complicated. When we met she was in the process of applying for a job meaning come October 2016 she would be placed in a developing country. This was always the elephant in the room when we began dating, but around June, with things going extremely well, we both decided that I would go with her. 4 months in and agreeing to move abroad with someone is not in my nature, but I knew I would regret it if I did not take this opportunity. It had always been a desire of mine to live abroad with a gf, and this seemed the perfect opportunity. Turns out we are moving to West Africa in October 2016, Liberia to be exact. We establish that I will find a job out there and we will live together as her work pay for her (very comfortable) accommodation. This was clearly going to be tough- moving in together for the first time, as well as living in a challenging country, and all this after 7 months together- but we had had so few arguments, and had such a wonderful connection in London that it felt like we could handle it. We visit her dad in the US in September so he can meet me before we go, something she has never done with boyfriends before, and it all goes relatively well. I encourage her to talk with him properly for the first time, and she has a major breakthrough with him regarding their issues. Everything is quite perfect.

 

Fast forward three months, and I'm now sitting back in London, at my dad's home, heartbroken and feeling lost- in short I was dumped in Liberia.

 

I'm still trying to make sense of what happened, but essentially I could not find a job in Monrovia (shocking), living together became exhausting, and it became increasingly apparent that we saw this move abroad in completely different lights. I'm 26 (turning 27 shortly) and I suppose I saw this as a major life move with a potential life partner, she is 23, and I believe just saw this move as a continuation of exploring our relationship in London. I increasingly felt like a burden to her, with my low self-esteem confounded by my lack of job. She would have days in which she would be cold, distant or critical, making me feel undermined and criticised (for instance she told me one day my cooking was greasy and salty, where as she had always loved my cooking in London). I become increasingly consumed by what she thinks of me, the successful men she is interacting with in Liberia and how she views me in comparison. I begin to withdraw, go cold and distant, rejecting her but also constantly needing reassurance. She in turn withdraws, increasingly spending time with her new friends as she sees me unhappy and in danger of leaving Liberia and abandoning her any day. Living together is bringing out our worst characteristics and amplifying them- her critical and rejecting nature with people she feels close to or smothered by, and my anxiety around feeling good enough for her- I was no longer the confident, assertive and self-assured man she had known in London, and was now increasingly vulnerable and reliant upon her. She offers to pay for a therapist for me, but also tells me that if I'm not happy in Liberia then she is unwilling to leave and sacrifice her job/new life for me, which only increases the wedge between us. One day I say "this isn't working", she bursts out crying saying I'm breaking up with her and I instantly regret it, but by then it's too late, she breaks up with me the next day saying she can't move on from this and that she isn't happy with me.

 

Heartbroken, in shock, lost and scared in Liberia, I make a case for us to stay together, offer options to make it work (take a break, long distance etc) but in her eyes it's over. Unable to bear the thought of flying home to London immediately, tail between my legs, I make arrangements to fly to Ghana three days later to get away from it all, the day of her birthday. Those three days were actually good, the pressure was off and we enjoyed each others company again, we had sex and hung out. The morning of leaving (her b-day), was perhaps the worst morning of my life, I have never felt pain so profound leaving my weeping gf in our flat, on her birthday, to fly to the airport to go to a strange country. We departed with "I love you".

 

With no plan at all, I ended up spending one month in Ghana. It was incredibly lonely and painful at times, but I also made some nice new friends, travelled a lot, did some writing. I had told her I did not want to speak, that we needed to go no contact, and we did this for my first 2 weeks. She began liking my posts on facebook/instagram, we then had a phone conversation that I had initiated 3 weeks into my stay in Ghana. It was relaxed, happy, we spoke candidly about how hard it had been and how much we missed each other. She told me she had begun sleep walking every night again (something she does when she is down and anxious). It was as though there was nothing wrong with our relationship, and it was simply Liberia driving a wedge between us. I told her I could not go back to Liberia under the same circumstances, but I didn't want to lose her from my life, and that I wanted closure either way before I left West Africa whether she would be interested in trying to make it work. She pretty much told me she needed to be alone- she loved me but long distance wasn't what she wanted. I told her that I could not keep in contact with her for now in that case to move on properly, to which she replied "why does it have to be all or nothing with you, the all scares me too much".

 

So we began NC a week ago, I landed back in London last night, very teary eyed and remorseful. We have not spoken since, she has been off the radar on facebook (previously posting constantly). I'm trying to figure out what I hope to gain from posting my story, but essentially I'd like some input about what went wrong, and I'd love to hear similar stories of heartbreak to help me feel not so alone in this. Do you think her flight response was triggered by our increasingly rocky relationship? How do you think maintaining NC with a girl with abandonment/commitment issues going to affect her- will she return? What is the best course of action for me right now? Honestly, I still love this girl and want her to contact me, we have zero ill feelings towards one another- am I deluding myself by harboring these hopes considering she is in Liberia and I am in London? I keep vacillating between the ideas that it was simply me she did not love, and felt increasingly unattracted to in my weaker, more vulnerable state- or whether I triggered her abandonment/commitment fears with my unhappiness and discontent.

 

Thank you in advance for your thoughts,

 

AMC.

 

 

TL;DR

 

Meet dream girl, fall in love, move to Liberia, things get tough, she dumps me. I'm now back in London, hoping to hear similar stories of heartbreak/advice on what went wrong/best course of action to take from here.

[Andrina]

Of course you two moved the relationship too fast. It wasn't the normal pace of a healthy relationship. What's done is done. It's irrelevant at this point what her issues are and how she'll react to no contact. She says she's scared to be "all in," so that's all you need to know. She cannot fully you give you her heart and chose to end things versus caring enough to work on problems.

 

You have no choice but to move on. It'll be better if you give up hope of reconciling in the future. If her style is to run away from problems versus pulling out all the stops to make things right, then the past will repeat itself. If she did decide to move to your location one day and want to start things up to you, I'm sure she'll contact you. I have a feeling, though, that you will probably have a new partner by then and will think, "Oh, I'm so happy that relationship in the past didn't work out after all."

[gebaird]

I'm so sorry for your pain. From my point of view, there are a few things that could explain what went wrong in this relationship. One is that you only knew her for 7 months -- which may seem like enough, but it's not. I married my wife after only knowing her 6 months. We're still together twenty years later, but the first year of marriage was ROUGH because we were going through what's called "disillusionment" -- basically the wearing off of the falling in love brain chemicals. You saw her as perfect, and she saw you the same way, during those first seven months. But when the chemicals diminish, as they did when you were in Liberia, you suddenly realize you don't know each other at all. People are often at their very best in the beginning of a relationship. So you knew how good she can be when she's at her best, but not how bad she could be when she's at her worst.

 

Another challenge is your individual psychological histories. You've both been through a lot of trauma, which is what attracted you to each other because you had common experiences, but that also means that when the pressure is on there will be a lot of fearful and negative responses. The situation in Liberia would be hard enough for a psychologically healthy couple, but with the issues both of you have it's not hard to predict the outcome.

 

The most important thing you an do right now is focus on your own healing. See a therapist and work through your issues so you can attract a wonderful, stable person with whom you can enjoy a beautiful relationship.

 

Based on what happened in Liberia, I really think no contact and moving on is your best option. I'd block her so she can't contact you, because every time you talk to her it will prevent you from healing. I just don't see this relationship working long-term. No matter how well things may seem to be going, every time you get too close to her, it will be Liberia all over again.

[AMC27]

I'm so sorry for your pain. From my point of view, there are a few things that could explain what went wrong in this relationship. One is that you only knew her for 7 months -- which may seem like enough, but it's not. I married my wife after only knowing her 6 months. We're still together twenty years later, but the first year of marriage was ROUGH because we were going through what's called "disillusionment" -- basically the wearing off of the falling in love brain chemicals. You saw her as perfect, and she saw you the same way, during those first seven months. But when the chemicals diminish, as they did when you were in Liberia, you suddenly realize you don't know each other at all. People are often at their very best in the beginning of a relationship. So you knew how good she can be when she's at her best, but not how bad she could be when she's at her worst.

 

Another challenge is your individual psychological histories. You've both been through a lot of trauma, which is what attracted you to each other because you had common experiences, but that also means that when the pressure is on there will be a lot of fearful and negative responses. The situation in Liberia would be hard enough for a psychologically healthy couple, but with the issues both of you have it's not hard to predict the outcome.

 

The most important thing you an do right now is focus on your own healing. See a therapist and work through your issues so you can attract a wonderful, stable person with whom you can enjoy a beautiful relationship.

 

Based on what happened in Liberia, I really think no contact and moving on is your best option. I'd block her so she can't contact you, because every time you talk to her it will prevent you from healing. I just don't see this relationship working long-term. No matter how well things may seem to be going, every time you get too close to her, it will be Liberia all over again.

 

Incredibly helpful reply, thank you very much for taking the time to do so. Logically I know you're right, not only do I have some work to do on my own self-esteem, but she certainly does to. But that is a conclusion she needs to come to on her own, which I do not see happening any time soon.

 

Thanks again.

[AMC27]

Thank you for the reply Andrina. My rational side says you are right, history will repeat itself until we both do some major work on ourselves apart.

 

I've had similar (if not so unusual and intense) heartbreak before, in which I felt I would never move on, but of course I did.

 

Al