I just need someone to tell me it gets better...
Good morning all,
New user here, recent victim of a breakup after a 1 year relationship and I've been experiencing feelings I haven't felt in the past and need some advice.
The long story short, we dated for a year. I'm 30, she's 24. We met at our place of employment and share a bunch of friends now. Our relationship was like a roller coaster. After two months she asked for space and wanted to be alone, but wanted the option of coming back to me if she decided to. I said no, it's all or nothing. She said "nothing" and that was that. Two days later she texted me with " I miss you" and we ended up back together. We progressed through the next 5 months with a handful of fights over irrelivant stuff here and there over things like what time she was going to come over or whether or not I was going to spend the night at her place on a certain weeknight since I have work early the next morning. She threatened to breakup each time giving me the "look, this isn't working, you're hiding something from me and I don't trust you". She was very impulsive. It usually ended with me sitting down and calmly speaking to her rationally, and talking her down and everything would be ok after that. Then we hit another point about 5 months in where she asked for her "space" again for a week, once again wanting the option to come back to me if she so desired. Again I told her no, it's all or nothing. We broke up again and I was miserable for a few days until we got back together - to be honest I don't even remember how we got back together this time, it's a blur. Now after that point, things seemed to have gotten better. In fact they were amazing, I'd never experienced love like this before. There were still little tiffs here and there but for the most part things were great. We were constantly texting each other stuff, telling each other how much we loved the other one. Then a few weeks ago I noticed a change, a lot of the lovey dovey texting stopped. I knew something was wrong, but I kept telling myself this is just that our "honeymoon phase" is over and that's it. She started falling asleep at night without texting or calling me (we always used to talk before going to sleep) and I'd have to say "I love you" first at the end of a convo for her to say it. However, when we were together things were amazing - everything felt so right. We were constantly holding each other. Finally 3 days ago she texted me with "I can't do this anymore, I'm so sorry." We spoke in person, and she rattled off a bunch of incidents over the past year that bothered her (some dating back as far as 1-2 months into our relationship) that she never told me bothered her in the past. She proceeded to tell me "I just don't feel like you're the one", with her reasoning being the multiple small incidents/things that bothered her in the past that she never told me about. Again she asked for her space, saying she needs time to "figure out what she wants." And again I told her this has to be all or nothing, I'm not going to play games or wait around. We ended up spending the night together (no sex), I held her, we kissed. I told her "doesn't this feel right?" and she said it feels awesome, but that when I left she knew the rollercoaster ride would start again. But then 5 mins later she said "I can't imagine my life without you." I think she really was conflicted. It ended the following morning with again her saying she needs to be alone, I told her this means we're breaking up for good. She said if that's what it has to mean, then so be it. We pecked on the cheek and I left, leaving some of my clothes there that she wanted me to take.
If you're still reading this novel of high school drama and drivel I commend you. It actually feels a little better typing all that out. Now my questions. The day I left her, I felt ok and thought this isn't so bad - it kind of sucks but I can tolerate it. Then the day after it hit me and I started getting sad. Yesterday was day #3, and I deleted all her old "I love you" texts from my phone, threw out all her stuff in my apartment (disposable stuff). This was the hardest thing I ever had to do. I had such mixed emotions - I'm embarassed to say this, as I am a 30 year old man, but I was hysterical crying as I was throwing stuff out. The pain was nearly unbearable. I had difficultly concentrating at work. Now today is day #4. I sit here typing and my eyes are tearing up. She hasn't had any contact with me as she did in the past. No texts, no IMs, no phone calls. I think this time it's really over. I check my phone every 5 mins to see if she texted me. I have a few close friends and family members who I've cried to and it helps temporarily, but even they're getting sick of my whining (they didn't say it in so many words but I can tell). Now I know based on the story I told above, everyone is going to say it's for the best as things were never going smoothly. My friends and family say the same thing. But when things were good with us, I had never experienced love and feelings like that before and I can't let that go.
You cannot imagine how badly I want to text her, but I haven't let myself do it for two reasons:
1) It will make me seem desperate - the last two times she came back to me when I stood strong and I think she thought I was unaffected. This is the WRONG reason to not have contact with her, I understand - but this is the main reason.
2) I know I need to cut off all contact with her if I'm ever going to move on.
The problem is im stuck between trying to move on and hoping she'll call to give it another shot. I am considering texting her sister (who is my age) and saying "Listen, I just need to know if this is really over or not so I can move on." Does that seem like a reasonable thing to do to get some closure? I really don't care who was right or wrong in the relationship. I'm not playing the blame game and I'm not angry at her in the least (maybe that's part of the problem?).
I feel like a child or a little girl saying this, but I just need someone to tell me it gets better. This is the worst pain I've ever experienced in my life and I cannot imagine life without her. Everything I do, see, hear, eat reminds me of her. I can't listen to the radio because every song reminds me of her, I couldn't eat a certain food last night because that was the last meal we had when we were together. I understand there are people who are married for decades and get divorced, and I understand they have it MUCH MUCH harder than I do. But this pain to me is just unbearable, it's worse than physical pain. There are female 'friends' who I know are sexually attracted to me and were waiting for this relationship to end, but I have zero desire to be with anyone else. I feel like this is ruining my life and to be honest it feels like these feelings will never go away. I run into ex girlfriends every once in a while and we'll talk, catch up, but I have no feelings whatsoever. I can't see that ever happening with this girl.
I guess the bottom line is I need someone to tell me that what I'm feeling is normal even though I'm 30 years old and a guy. I need someone to tell me that this feeling of dread, that knot in my stomach, the lack of appetite, the difficultly focusing at work will all subside. I know the relationship was always rocky, I know it's probably for the best that we broke up... so you can save your breath on that advice lol :D But the irrational part of me wants to be back with her, praying that she texts me again with "I miss you."
I know this was long and drawn out with boring details, but putting this stuff into writing actually helped me a little bit though in some weird way. I really appreciate any advice anybody can offer who has been in a similar situation before.
