Is there hope?

[renaissancewoman101]

I am not sure if he is going to be able to notice. He lives about two hours away from me, in another city, and we dont really have any mutual friends. He doesnt drive either so he rarely comes up to my city except to visit a friend that lives about 20 minutes from me.

 

The only ways I may see him or hear from him again would hinge on two things: 1) he still has my cell phone attached to my cell phone plan which I PAY FOR; 2) he owes me about $1500 of the $1800 that I lent him to pay off his credit card bills.

[DN]

well you can work stuff out and then talk to him

[renaissancewoman101]

Today, I sat there and thought about the whole situation that I am stuck in right now. I am still seriously thinking about trying to make contact with his mom to see if there is anything salvageable out of this relationship. He is close to his mom and she did want this relationship to stay alive once before, so maybe talking to her might help. It shouldnt hurt. She knows I am a decent woman and that I do love her son and I have taken care of him in the past.

 

Another thing that is on the back of my mind has to do with my ex's personality. In many ways he is like a little kid. He likes kid things like hanging around toy stores, playing computer games, buying stuffed animals to put on his bed. He has about 50-60 stuffed animals on his bed. They are all in a big pile on his bed. His bedroom is full of toys (Star Wars toys, action figures, etc) and he has renaissance weapon replicas on his walls. He loves to hang at Toys R Us and look for stuff like action figures, Transformers, Star Wars stuff, light sabres, etc. Sometimes, I think he likes living as a child since it helps him avoid growing up and dealing with life. He did move out on his own with his first girlfriend for about three years, and she broke up with him, because she couldnt stand that he didnt make anything of himself, and because he would not propose marriage to her after seven years of dating. Right now he lives at home, spends most of his money on cigarettes, beer, toys, ren faire things, books, etc. He only has one credit card bill to pay. He doesnt pay his parents room and board to stay. I think he likes being a kid and hanging out with his kidlike friends. He doesnt want to grow up, and I think he found a lot of the grown up things that I liked to do, kind of uncomfortable.

 

I do think he stayed with me for two years because I took care of him. Before the last few months, I would pay for almost everything. I paid for most of our dinners out, our trips both around the states and to CA to see my parents. My parents were ok with him and treated him quite well out there. I would buy him things to cheer him up. I helped him out by driving him around to places. He could stay at my place to get away from his parents, etc. I was literally parenting him but without all the nagging and stuff that his parents give him. He loved that a lot. I dont think he could handle the fact though that I was close friends with my gay friend and that he was doing A LOT better than my ex-bf. Also, my gay friend did not like my ex-bf and thought he was a mooch. Also, in the last few months, I began to nag at him about things, mostly concerning the way he dressed, acted, and when he was around my place, his tendency to be messy about things. In the beginning those things didnt drive me crazy. In the last few months, they drove me up a wall. I think that had a part in causing him to dump me. Basically, I think I lost part of my feelings for him and didnt care to hide my displeasure of him.

 

The sad part is, now that he has dumped me, I miss him like hell and I am pining away for him. This whole situation has destroyed me. I cant eat well, sleep well, etc. I look shellshocked and if I dont take care of myself soon, I am going to get very sick. My stress levels are high.

 

Sometimes, I wonder if I do talk to his mom and let her know that I miss him a lot and am willing to "parent" him again, will she give me guidance in getting him back???? Part of me, right now, is willing to stoop that low to get him back.

[DN]

Do you really want someone who isn't a partner but a dependent child?

[renaissancewoman101]

You know, I am not sure what I want. He wasnt completely dependent on me. He did have a life, he had friends, most of them were kind of like him, almost all of them were a lot younger than him and his friends constantly mooched off him since most of them didnt work and my bf had a steady sales job.

 

He did give me some things in return. He bought me stuff like flowers, cards, little gifts, etc. He was very romantic. But, he drank a lot and he smoked a lot which bothered me at times. He helped me a lot around the house, which I truly appreciated.

 

I am not sure what I want. I am so desperately lonely and alone right now that I cant think straight. I dont have a lot of friends, and my best friend, the gay guy, is too busy to give me any time. And he has a bf that doesnt like me to spend a lot of time with them.

 

I feel so alone.

 

Some days I wish I wasnt alive.

 

I dont know what there is about me that drives people away. Sometimes, I feel so unlovable.

[DN]

Is the fact that you are lonely driving your hope that he comes back? Or is it that you are truly ambivalent about your feelings for him.

 

If you can separate out what you want in life and from a partner from the fear of being lonely you may be able to reach some clarity about how to achieve what you want.

[renaissancewoman101]

DN, I am not sure what it is anymore. Sometimes, I feel as though my life is cursed. I cant get a hold of his mom and the one time I called today, his dad answered. I really hope he doesnt recognize my voice. I dont need my ex finding out I have been trying to call for his mom.

 

I didnt understand your question about whether I am lonely driving my hopes that he comes back, or that I am truly ambivalent about my feelings for him. Yes, my lonliness does drive me to want him back. I am not ambivalent about my feelings for him.

 

I really hope Brian (his best friend) hasnt betrayed me by telling him all I have been telling him. No, I havent been telling Brian anything bad, just that I miss my ex-bf and wish that there was any way to get him back.

 

Brian's advice was to give him space but to give him some contact every so often.

 

I also think my ex is holding the fight we had that night, when I was drunk and yelling at him, against me. He really reacts bad when someone starts yelling at him. It is something that really bothers him and triggers a defensive reaction in him and causes him to hold a grudge against that person.

 

Before the night we had that fight, he was still civil with me and would talk with me and allowed me to come and hang out with him and his buddy (hence the fight). Now, he is nervous around me and wont have much to do with me.

 

I really regret that fight. I shouldnt have drank anything that night.

 

He drinks a lot and knows what it is like to get drunk, he should not hold that against me.

[DN]

What I meant is this:

 

Is your love for him a genuine love for him as a person or is it because you are afraid that if you lose him you won't find someone else and will be lonely?

[renaissancewoman101]

I do love him as a person and I see the good that is in him. He treated me well and actually cared about me, although the way he is reacting to me now kind of makes me doubt how much he loved me.

 

My ex-bf when we were in a relationship, he was so nice, loving, and caring for me. He treated me with utmost respect and care and was sweet to me. Now that he broke up with me, he cant look me in the eyes, wont talk to me, and wont have much conversation with me. It is like night and day and that HURTS, esp. last week when I had to put one of my pet guinea pigs to sleep. He had been there for me when she had her surgery and watched me take care of her, etc. The day I went to put her to sleep, I was crying on the way to the vet, so I called my ex at work. He sounded cold to me, he did say the necessary words, but it didnt sound like he cared anymore. That hurt a lot. Although he did tell me that I could call him later to talk if I wanted to, I didnt call him back.

 

HOw can people change their reactions to you so quickly??? It is like night and day. Maybe they didnt really love you.

 

My love for him is a mixture of loving him for some of his uniqueness and loving him for the relationship he gave me, and the care and love he gave me.

 

Right now, I am just frustrated and pissed off because I feel like NO ONE wants me, not even someone as strange as my bf.

[DN]

HOw can people change their reactions to you so quickly??? It is like night and day. Maybe they didnt really love you.

 

But then this is what you said in your original post - isn't it much the same thing?

 

All of a sudden I began to look at him in a different light and things he did and the way he was began to bug the hell out of me. I had never had that happen to me, where I can be so in love with someone, and then all of a sudden everything the person does, I begin to hate and find annoying to the point that I try to avoid the person. I didnt know what to do so I severly curtailed the time I spent with him. I saw him less and when I did see him, I would spend little time with him.

 

Maybe that is why he is distant now. He is scared of that happening again.

[renaissancewoman101]

DN, I guess you are right, when my feelings for him changed in late Feb., it was like night and day. One minute here I was so in love with him and couldnt stand being away from him, and the next minute everything about him drove me nuts and I wanted to be as far away from him as possible. I could not understand how I felt at that point but I was afraid to tell him because I was afraid that he would leave me. At that point in time, I had other issues about why I didnt want him to leave (I had suspicions that I could be pregnant and didnt know what to do about it). So I did the next best thing, which was pull away from him and cut almost in half, the time I spent with him. What I did then, scared him a lot and he clung to me. I was scared too because I thought I was pregnant. He then began to chase me and try to do anything possible to get me to open up to him and let him understand what I was feeling.

 

I did end up telling him I was pregnant and the day after my birthday, I had an abortion. Sometimes I wonder if that is something that is poisoning our relationship too. He did not pressure me for an abortion. He was willing to be there for me if I decided to keep the baby. But, I was afraid. At that time, my feelings for him were all a jumble, and I wasnt all that happy around him. He was kind and considerate of me, but all I could see was his personality and the way he was, his mannerisms, his attitude towards life, and that bothered me a lot.

 

Sometimes, I wonder if the abortion had anything to do with the demise of our relationship. He was there for me for the abortion and he was very supportive of me. But, my feelings for him had changed and I pushed him away. We clung on to the relationship until last month when he finally decided to end it.

 

His reactions to me now make me want to cry and want him back. Maybe you are right, these are his defense mechanisms since I must have hurt him bad, and now he is afraid of falling for me again, so he has put up a wall. I dont know why I did what I did. My feelings changed and I couldnt see it getting any better. I told him my feelings changed but I didnt work on changing them. I was wrong for what happened, now I am paying the price, because I dont think he will ever come back.

 

Sometimes I think he really might have fallen in love with me and when I pushed him away, he got really hurt by me, and maybe that is reason why he doesnt want to get back together.

 

I am not sure if he still loves me now. I now realized what I have lost and am weeping for it terribly. I would do ANYTHING to get this relationship back because now I know what I have thrown away.

[DN]

I am not sure if you have said how old you both are - are you ok with letting us know that?

[renaissancewoman101]

We are both 32 years old, although he is 4 months older than me. This is his first time dating someone so close to him in age. Most of the time he dates women who are younger than him. The last girl he dated, he was 30 and the girl was 20. His first serious relationship was with someone who was abot 4-5 years younger than him. I am his second serious relationship. He has had a few non-serious relationships with girls a lot younger than him, who end up dumping him.

 

Me, I mostly date older guys (a few years older). My first serious relationship was with my best friend who is the gay guy. He is around the same age as me. We share a lot in common, except that he is gay.

[DN]

I think you should give him a little time and then write him a letter. Not an e-mail, but a handwritten letter. Somehow that always seems to lend more weight to what you are saying.

 

Don't make it too long and rambling. Just tell him that you love him, that you want to make the relationship work and would both of you to give it a chance.

 

Tell him why you feel you went wrong in the relationship before, that you understand what happened and why you are sure that it would not happen again.

 

It may be wise to have someone read the letter before you send it. PM someone on here with it, me if you like, to offer an outsider's opinion as to how it reads.

[renaissancewoman101]

DN, I like your idea, I will give him some time and space, maybe a month or so. He still has my cell phone, so if he wants to, he can call me. I do worry about him finding a new gf. I dont think he will forget about me because I am only his second long term relationship.

 

As for letter writing, I will probably write him in a month or so (sometime in Nov.). I am not sure if he reads letters or not. Most of the time, the mail he gets, his parents just dump it into his room, and it sits in piles. He has ADD so it is hard for him to go and sort things out. His room is kind of a reflection of the jumbleness of his mindset. That is why, I am not sure if letter writing is a good idea or not. But, I may go and write the letter in a month or so.

 

I may also call him in a month or so to see how he is doing. I hope after a month and things have calmed down that he might be open to retrying the relationship.

 

I am willing to work things out. I miss him so much, from the bottom of my heart.

[DN]

You know him best - but I think a month may be too long. I was thinking a week or two. You want him to miss you - but not get used to it.

[renaissancewoman101]

Only reason I said a month or so is because of what he said to me on Sat when I saw him at the Faire. He told me that he needed a lot of time and space to get his life together (pay bills, work on artwork, etc), and that he didnt know what to do about us and that he really needed space from me and time.

 

I am worried at the time part. I think he is used to not seeing me, because in the last few months or so, we havent hung out a lot. We see each other maybe 3-4 times a month, when we used to spend Wed and every weekends together.

 

I know he needs time and space, but I am afraid he will forget me. I want to respect his need for time and space, since I have a feeling, I will drive him away more, if I dont.

 

The biggest problem now is I think he knows what life is like without me, because this last 6 months, he hasnt seen much or me, but has talked to me on the phone 1-2 times a week.

 

If he is used to being away from me, because of the fact that I had pushed him away for the last few months, how do I go about getting him to realize that I regret what I did and want him back and am willing to spend more time with him???? I dont think he misses me. The last time we broke up, we were just a year into the relationship and I spent a lot of time with him, so when he was away from me for the week, he was really sad and cried and missed me a lot.

[renaissancewoman101]

Any ideas?

 

The biggest problem now is I think he knows what life is like without me, because this last 6 months, he hasnt seen much or me, but has talked to me on the phone 1-2 times a week.

 

If he is used to being away from me, because of the fact that I had pushed him away for the last few months, how do I go about getting him to realize that I regret what I did and want him back and am willing to spend more time with him???? I dont think he misses me. The last time we broke up, we were just a year into the relationship and I spent a lot of time with him, so when he was away from me for the week, he was really sad and cried and missed me a lot.

[DN]

I think you have nothing to lose by writing that letter and sending it.

[nataliejulie]

Before me and my ex got back together, we didn't hang out for a good 2 months because he wanted his space from me.

 

He told me his life was miserable without me and I, too, just like you, was afraid he'd forget about me.

 

They miss us. They all miss us. If he truly loves you, honey, he wouldn't forget about you like that.

 

From my experience, keep the phoning occasional. Don't push him, don't smother him and don't show him you are nervous -- it just scares 'em off. Keep your conversations upbeat and light hearted. If he really wants his space -- keep to his speed. And every time you do see him, make it a great, amazing memorable one ! The idea is to make him miss the you he loves. To have him miss the you he loves spending time with.

 

Take care, keep me updated!

[renaissancewoman101]

I am not sure when I am going to phone him. When I saw him this past Sat, he told me that he needed A LOT of time and space from me. I am not sure how to take that. He still has my cell phone that I gave him. I pay the bill for our cell phones. He offered to give it back to me if I wanted it, but I told him if he wanted to keep it for now, he could. He told me that he didnt want to COMPLETELY dump me out of his life.

 

He still has my cell phone and he still owes me some money ($1500). I am not going to call him for about a few weeks, maybe sometime in Nov. I miss the hell out of him. He had a long enough relationship with me not to forget about me. I am his second long term girlfriend. His first long term one dumped him after 7 years and he still mourns that loss.

 

Problem is, I am not sure when I am ever going to see him again. He lives about 2 hours away from me in a big city that I dont go to that often when he isnt around. So, it isnt going to be easy for us to just run into each other. The next time I may see him at a function would be at the end of Jan., when the Ren Faire folks have their midwinter gathering. I am not sure if I can wait that long to try to contact him.

[renaissancewoman101]

Another thing, how can a guy who once loved you so much, wanted you so much, to the point that he was contemplating a long term relationship with me (ending in marriage), to the point he bought me a diamond pendant necklace, etc., all of a sudden after the break up, act like he doesnt want to see or speak to you anymore? And when he sees you, he tries to run away?????? He was acting like that yesterday at first, but then he calmed down and managed to have a conversation with me. I can tell he still loves me, but he wont look at me straight in the face anymore.

Also, when he was talking to me, he kept avoiding looking at me, and he kept looking at other girls passing by and making comments about how they looked.

 

Was he doing that to HURT me????

 

Does he miss me in any way possible?????

 

 

If someone was in my shoes, how long would they wait before trying to make contact with the ex. My ex told me that he wanted A LOT of time and space from me so he could get his life back together. A LOT is so relative. Any ideas?????

 

I really want him back because I knew that he loved me and for once, treated me decently, something of which I have had a hard time finding in other relationships.

[renaissancewoman101]

I went out with some friends tonight. They are lesbians. We went to a lesbian bar. They went out with me to help me try and forget about my ex. I am so fricking drunk, but at least I am happy for the time being. Wish I could get back with my ex. I miss him so much.

[skyjuice]

Hi

 

how can a guy who once loved you so much, wanted you so much, to the point that he was contemplating a long term relationship with me (ending in marriage), to the point he bought me a diamond pendant necklace, etc., all of a sudden after the break up, act like he doesnt want to see or speak to you anymore? And when he sees you, he tries to run away??????

 

I think you answer the question yourself in your previous post, where you love him very much and all of the sudden you feel that everything he do irritate you. That time you thought you were pregnant.

I do not know what cause this. I do hope to find out.

[renaissancewoman101]

Yes, that was a sudden thing. I was so in love with him earlier this year. I took him away for the weekend for Valentine's Day and, I dont know, my feelings started to change. It was so weird. That night when we went out to dinner at a really fancy place and I sat accross the table looking at him, I started to realize that I didnt like him, and that everything that he did began to bother me.

 

I did learn one thing out of the whole thing, if one begins to pull away, usually the other party begins to chase. He noticed that my feelings were changing so he began to chase me, try to buy me things, spend more time with me, all the while, I started to not be able to stand being around him. That was so weird. It wasnt as though he was mean to me or anything like that.

 

The sad thing is that I pretty much shut myself off from him emotionally. I still had sex with him though. He tried hard to get me to open up and trust him, but I couldnt. I dont know why I was like that, and it wasnt like I was out to hurt him either. He didnt do anything to deserve to be hurt. I had never had this happen to me in a relationship, and it kinda scared me. I should have opened up to him and we could probably have worked on some issues. It was just that everything about him bothered me, when before, I liked everything about him.

 

Now, since he did go and dump me, I miss him like hell and I want him back bad. I wish I had not acted the way I did to him these past few months, otherwise, we could have had a good relationship. He was very good to me, like everybody's dream boyfriend.

 

I did try to go down to see his mom today. I drove two hours down to his house only to find that his parents werent home. I may write a letter and send it out this week to his mom, explaining that I still love her son very much and explain a few things to her and tell her I wish he would give me a second chance.

 

Another thing I noticed, he has been using a lot of my weekend minutes this weekend. He still has the cell and uses it. He is very conscientious about only using my night and weekend minutes. I am just mad that I cant find out who he called since this month's bill doesnt print until next month, and the idiotic people at Sprint will not give out the call information over the phone even though both the phones are MY PHONES AND IN MY NAME AND I PAY THE BILL. The idiotic people refuse to give the phone numbers that were called. It isnt as though I wont find out later. I just have to wait till the bill prints, and it isnt as though they dont have the information on their screens, they are just being a**holes about it.