Lost the love of my life, where do I go from here...
This is long and mostly just a way to vent, but some advice would be greatly appreciated.
About 2 months ago, my gf of 8 months left me. Her reason for leaving was that she "wasn't happy", yet our relationship was very good (in my opinion). When she left she was still very much in love with me, but I guess not enough to stick around and try to figure things out. She said many times that I was the best relationship she ever had and that she never loved anyone this much before. But when she decided to break things off she felt we just had to go our separate ways for now and take the next step in our lives, then maybe down the road we could try again, and said that "right now this just isn't what i want". I guess she felt that her life wasn't going in the direction she wanted it to, and with the way things were going, couldn't see the future she wanted with me. For two weeks straight I tried everything to get her back, but to no avial. She just kept saying that she "still has feelings for me but knew that, right now, things aren't going to work out".
Since she left, I have done alot of maturing and personal development as well as rearranged my priorities in life. I've never loved anyone as much as her, and even after two months I am still DAY TO DAY on trying to deal with this. I feel like I'm going crazy because no matter what I do she is still in the majority of my thoughts. I've been keeping very busy with work, excercising (alot actually), hanging out with friends, and have even been upgrading my education so i can go to univercity next year. Non of it seems to be able to keep my mind off her for more than five minutes though. It seems like the only time I am happy nowdays is when I believe that she will see all the good things i've been doing and will eventually want to be with me again, but as time goes on it just feels like wishful thinking. The fact that we were still very much in love with each other when she left is what keeps me clinging on to the hope that she will come around eventually. I treated her like gold and highly doubt that she will find someone else that would love and care for her as much as i did. But recently I have started to have my doubts about her...
Just a few weeks ago I seen her at a bar with another guy that is, in my opinion, a big time loser, and completely lost it when i found out she was hooking up with him. At that point I should have had some closure to things between us, knowing she had moved on, but I could only stay mad for a short while cause i know she doesn't love this guy. I told myself I wasn't going to have any contact anymore, but then a few days later, like an idiot, I continued talking to her as though nothing had happaned. Then, just the other day, someone told me that she was hanging out with another guy that is a total dirt bag as well, and most people that know him share the same opnion. Basically she is just rebounding all over the place now, and it makes me sick to my stomach thinking about it. Everyone is telling me to just stop talking to her completely, which is what I have officially started doing. As of recently, I don't know what to think of her anymore. She is only 19, and I knew that eventually she was going to start hooking up with other ppl, but not like this. It appears that she isn't as classy as i though she was and is showing her true colors. Dare I say she is a slut now? Or is it just a rebound phase that will pass? I am more confused than ever now because I am twice the man compared to any of these douchebags she's been hanging out with lately. If the scenario of her realising that she does miss me and wants to come back ever does happen, I don't even know if i could take her back now. It feels like she is a different person that I would become jelous around because I'd feel as though I couldn't trust her anymore.
If I truely felt that her heart was 100% sure of wanting to be with me again, I would probably forgive her, because as much as I hate what she is doing, I still love her and want to be her man. I guess it's just a matter giving her time to figure out what she really wants. In the meantime though, how should I be going about this? Should I just continue to appear as though I don't care about her anymore? A girl-friend told me that if she were to ever find out about me being with someone else she would realise how much she really misses me IF she still loves me. Is this something that is generally true? Is jelousy an angle i should exploit to try and get her to realise how much she still cares?