She would always say “he should fight for your attention, want to be with you always”… “you’re apart but dont you realise, you could see each other again tomorrow!”. “I cant believe how dysfunctional he is”… “wasn’t it just a summer fling”. At the time I think I didnt really feel that way… about him, I just resented how clingy he made me feel because it was distracting me, as now, from healing.

I remembered all these a while ago and thought they had given me too high expectations of the relationship with him. She had had a long term relationship, of 3 or 4 years, with her then boyfriend, but they were distant. They had been physically together but she came back to the UK for university… so the context was a little different. Maybe, she was talking from their relationship perspective. Once she had also said, about her, and me, being clingy “I wish I could realise, I’m alone. Not lonely, but alone. I’m my own seperate person totally responsible for my own happiness. I’m intelligent enough to know that but I always want more and more from my boyfriend”. “I was so upset about uni, he just said itll be ok, then he went to bed!” Hers too, was distant, and as she settled in the UK and he remained in South Africa, they eventually parted ways. Perhaps this allowed it to get tangled up in my head, my feelings, my expectations etc… But, when I read them for real yesterday they made more sense.

• This reply was modified 6 years, 1 month ago by Ben.