What happened? I'm still trying to make sense of getting shot down.

Hi my name is Kevz. Ladies I need your advice. I recently started to hang out with an ex-girlfriend of mine. After spending a few weeks with her I once again started to fall for her again. She invited me over her house to meet her family, invited me out to hang out with her 1 on 1 to various restaurants, to the movies, biking, you name it. At first I wasn't sure she had feelings for me, but the 3rd to last time I spent with her she seemed to be a little standoffish when we said goodbye, this is when I started to wonder if she had feelings for me. Then the 2nd to last time we went out, we went to a place with live music and halfway through dinner she started to bring up what I thought about distance relationships and how to make them work, which was extremely difficult for me since the two of us dated distantly because of school and I thought this was a sign that she was thinking about giving this another shot. Finally, 2 weeks ago I told her how I felt for her and that I liked her and wanted to date her just as she was boarding a bus and she smiled kissed me on the cheek and told me we will talk about this when she got back from vacation the following week.

During her vacation I invited her out to a picnic up and told her that I wanted to talk to her about everything, within a minute she responded to me saying it was a great idea and that she couldn't wait. Finally this past Tuesday she returned from vacation and called me. The first fifteen minutes we talked about our trips, but then she said she wanted to talk about what I said. She told me she liked what I said and wrote to her, but that she couldn't date me. After what seemed to me like I was being lead on for months I decided to dig for some answers to try to make sense of it. She told me that she got out of a relationship 3 months ago and that she is not ready to date again (fine I get that) and that if she dates me and it falls apart that she would never see me again and that she doesn't want that. (we stayed friends for years, and it worked because honestly I don't think either one of us thought we would see each other because of the distance). At this point I asked her if she ever had feelings for me since we started spending time together. For about 15 minutes she would not directly answer my question repeating in many ways that she can't date now, eventually I got a "yes" or "no" answer and she said no. I then replied if that is true that is fine, and that I still wish to be her friend, but that I can no longer hold on to a sliver of hope because of she doesn't have any feelings for me now it is unlikely she will in the future.

I then tried to get an ultimatum so that I could move on with my life and if we are going to stay friends to prevent it from being awkward. I asked her "can we agree we put this thing behind us once and for all and never bring it up again?" She started to get upset with me and more or less spent a good 10 minutes saying that things could change in the future, how I am pressuring her, being unfair, and how she can't understand how someone can have such strong feelings for her in such a short amount of time. The following morning I texted her that if she wants to talk about this in the future I would be happy to, but at the same time I needed to move on with my life and start seeing other women. Even stranger, 2 days later when I called to check up on her and mentioned while I was on vacation at the same time I got her a gift, she told me that she got me one too.

I need to move on with my life, this is a woman that I have extremely strong feelings for (and probably never got quite over), but if she doesn't have feelings for me I need to move on and get over her because I will only be denying myself to meet someone who wants to date me. At the same time, I get the impression that she is heart broken from a messy breakup and has some feelings for me, but is going through a tough point in her life and simply has no idea what to do. I am currently planning to go out on some dates in the meantime, but is this possible relationship done for or what. I am so confused and would like a woman's perspective what is going on. Thanks.

My diagnosis is that she used you to heal from her bad breakup. You were a rebound, and when push came to shove she back peddled. She hates dealing with the fear of loss and loneliness, that's why she wants to keep you close. Now that you have told her that you must move on, she is feeling threatened and that fear is overwhelming her. In a panic she is saying things to you so she doesn't lose that emotional support. She needs to learn to stand on her own two feet, and learn to be on her own. Yes you are doing the right thing by distancing yourself from her so you can find someone who wants to date you. It's not that this relationship is done, it needs to be done with, cast out, so you can find happiness.

It will be hard to let go of someone you care about so much and have had so many experiences with, but at the end of the day if she is not willing to commit you cannot wait around forever. Thank you.

I know it's tough when you give your heart to the wrong person. It happens to the best of us. Adjusting to the idea of not being with them is the hardest, but in time, you will feel a great weight lifted off your shoulders....then a kind of hope, and excitement will take over. You will see many things to look forward to that you never noticed before. You will realize how much that person had consumed your life. You are moving in the right direction even tho you feel some resistance to the idea. You will do just fine :)