Hello Anita

Thank you for getting back to me. I had to collect my thoughts in the past week because there were too many things going on.

First of all, no, I never really asked him about his past relationships. We talked briefly about it but I couldn’t handle so much information. I told him I needed time to process his past with his exes.

He came back to me after some days of silence. In the beginning, he acted as nothing had happened. As we talked more, he started opening up and telling me he was sorry for being distant and wanting to end things when he didn’t really want to.

We talked about his insecurity and why he had to run. He said he’s a “manchild”. Having strong feelings for me was too overwhelming because he hadn’t had any feelings for so long. He forgot relationships need work and at the same time, he felt he was letting me down because he turned down my plans of going out for a date night.

I felt he had a switch. Some days he is extremely affectionate and caring, but some days it almost feels like he’s “switched off,” acting really indifferent and strange. When he gets better, he would come back and apologize because he was fully aware of what he was doing to me.

I don’t doubt his feelings for me and I have been thinking a lot. We do want the same things in the end. But perhaps we are just walking at different paces. We have a lot of things in common and always feel we are connected to each other even when we are apart. We are so similar to a point I almost feel loving him is loving myself.

I also thought about his emotional unavailability. I just realized that there are some things that switch me off as well – when he talked about his past relationships, when we get too close and it becomes overwhelming, and when I can’t respond to him after the silence. Those are the times I become emotionally unavailable. The only difference between us is that it takes me a shorter time to break my silence but my unavailability is still there.

And I forgot the fact that “relationships need work.” I used to fantasize about meeting my Mr. Right and things would work out magically and we would live happily ever after. This Mr. Right is a perfect figure that doesn’t really exist. Even if he does, am I the Ms. Right? Do I magically make his world better? Can I accept all his flaws and imperfections without any complaints or doubts?

I am still learning this person and learning myself.