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HelenParticipantThanks @Inky! Contact faded again the last couple of days, nothing. So, for self preservation, I think I need to not get carried away on this and really work on letting go. I run a mile with every inch he gives, and I just don’t think that’s healthy or good for me and the kind of person I am. I really needed this time of reflection and feedback from wise and experienced souls like yourself to muster the strength to say out loud, and mean, that this individual is not right or good for me and I need to let it go.
Small steps but I feel like I am on the right track now! Thank you again! xxxx
HelenParticipant@Inky I ended up sending the message and felt like a huge weight was lifted. He didn’t reply initially but a couple of days after just sent me a normal kid of friendly chatty messages and has been in contact more these last few days than at all the last few months. Talk about confusing?!?!
@Kat Thank you for your wise, lovely (by no means ‘preachy’) words shared above! I completely align with everything you say. As I mention in the lines above, since he started messaging me more on a friendship level, in my head I am getting carried away and reigniting old hopes like maybe he’s changed his mind and appreciated me standing up for myself when he said I’d changed. Who knows. Anyway I think you are right, it is healthier for us not to be in touch right now as it is all quite raw and if it continues I fear I may be left with more pain – springing from unrequited feelings and misplaced hopes from my side. I wonder if I should tell this to him and say that from my side I just need some time to step back and reduce the contact so I can heal and not create expectations in my head, and I hope he respects that?Thank you again for both of your input into this, it’s so touching to know that other people on another side of the world care enough to respond to my (non!) problem!
With love,
Helen
HelenParticipantThanks @Inky 🙂 that made me feel better! I love the reply you phrased, it is strong and to the point, but I’m still mulling over whether I should reply at all or just walk away after what he said and completely cut off. I don’t want it to become a war of words. But I fear if I don’t reply that he may think that I feel guilty about ‘changing’ so am retreating, when I actually don’t feel that way, I just feel angry he has placed a huge burden of blame on me!
Thank you again, I hope one day I can return the favour for you.
Helen
HelenParticipantOk so he replied… “Sorry for the late reply. I just don’t think it’s that easy. We’re not the same people we knew each other as. You’re not the way I knew you. Something was lost in that change and the same connection just isn’t there anymore.”
These words really upset me, I feel like he always finds a way to twist the knife in and make me feel guilty. He is insinuating that I changed for the worse over the time we were apart and with other people, when really I just feel like the same old Helen deep down inside, but a little stronger as a person with more knowledge of the world. These words make me feel like I’ve stepped backwards and become someone he doesn’t even want anything to do with, which really hurts.
How can I overcome this guilt which he is placing on me? And should I now step back and keep a quiet silence or reply once again defending myself? A friend once said that he sounds like an emotional manipulator as he makes me feel guilty about things when I shouldn’t necessarily feel that way. Part of me wants to reply and make him reflect on HIS flaws as he always maintains an air of moral superiority whatever the situation.
Or, perhaps I am just too emotional and reading into this too much and its actually a fine harmless message trying to tell me ITS OVER FOR GOOD. I would really appreciate your thoughts on this.
With love,
Helen xx
HelenParticipantHi Sanchez,
Better late than never, thank you so much for your words of wisdom, they helped me to see real clarity. The question around loving myself, its a tough one, I feel that I do more than I ever have before in life, but still maybe not enough. it was also interesting to reflect on past relationships and notice a pattern – the pattern is that I gave my everything to each one of them but they all failed (usually due to their infidelity). I began to notice that every guy I had ever been with ended the relationship by saying along the lines of ‘Im so sorry Helen, but thank you for everything you are amazing and deserve better’. All bar one, Craig. I felt that in fact I was the one running ot him to say sorry/thank you whenever we had a bump in the road. Maybe this reflects a type of infatuation rather than real love, it is something I am still working out.
As for the Craig situation, I did as advised, took a step back but still reached out to him now and again. It became apparent that he didn’t really want to hang out or spend time with me, often he would make an excuse like he had to work all weekend, but then I hear that he had a pool day on one of the weekend days. Or he would simply not answer my suggestion of meeting up when I wrote it as part of a bigger message. It came to a head last weekend when I said we should get together before he goes away for a few weeks, and again he squirmed out of it and said he was busy for the whole weekend. I then, with nothing to lose, straight out asked him why he seemed to be avoiding me, as I was making efforts but it seemed like he didn’t want to see me, and I would just ask for his honesty on this one. He replied saying sorry it wasn’t intentional he does want to see me but ‘romantically…I just don’t think I have the energy or trust for that after our most recent history. Lets work on being friends’. Which I guess made sense after what happened, but I just felt a sense of sadness and slight anger because actually, I hadn’t really done anything wrong as Inky mentioned, and I felt that for my own sense of closure I had to reply to tell him my side, so I wrote:
Hey again. Thanks for your honesty. I totally understand, it’s been on and off for a while now and I don’t think that’s healthy for either of us. Since we’re on this discussion, there’s a few things I want you to know.
The last few weeks I’ve been making an effort to be kind to myself and understand my motivations for taking a step back from you earlier this year. Put simply I did not want to break my loyalty to my partner. Because I still had feelings for you I couldn’t risk being disloyal which I felt seeing you would lead to, especially since we both know we can’t be just friends. Combine that with having a really difficult few weeks personally and professionally, I made what was the ‘right’ choice for me considering the state of mind I was in at the time.
I can’t let myself feel ashamed by what happened as I know my intentions were pure and I know my feelings for you were real. I just had to work out how to sensitively let this other person go, which involved not seeing you until it was done. Yes, it took longer than I wanted but I couldn’t anticipate what would knock me down emotionally during that time, and the much needed support I would receive from him. There’s actually a lot you don’t know that I think would soften the sense of betrayal you felt.
Without making a direct comparison, remember on our yurt trip when I found out you’d been messaging an ex quite explicitly, at a time I thought we were together? That hurt me, it disappointed me, it eroded away my trust. But I realised that I couldn’t judge you based on your actions at face value, I had to go deeper and think about what was driving your actions; insecurities and fears we didn’t talk about. Just as my lack of contact with you earlier this year was because I felt stressed at the thought of making a complicated situation even more difficult.
I’m not meaning to turn the tables in saying all this but I’d just like you to see it from my view too. Do you have more than friend feelings feelings for me? If so I don’t think we should let a blip like this ruin a chance for a fresh start with everything open and on the table. But since I don’t think you’ll see me in the same light again, I’m happy to work on being friends after some time. I can’t force you into any kind of believing, nor will I try to prove my worthiness if its not felt by you freely. I’m at peace with that and I hope you are too.
AND…no response. I don’t know why, maybe it was too much for him to take, but in a strange way it helped me to draw a line under everything, because I know that my intentions were always good and that I did have strong feelings for him, the circumstances just meant that it was a difficult time for me to act on them.
What do you think? Why would he not reply, in the most likely scenario? Shall I just leave it now completely? His birthday is on Friday and I had bought him a gift (a book and his favourite delicacy) but I am not sure if its best to contact him again and ask if he wants me to give it to him. Is now the time to let go?
Thank you for helping me out with this, sometimes you just need an extra bit of advice before you can confidently stride forward with life.
Thank you and I look forward to hearing back from you!
Helen
HelenParticipantInky,
Thank you for your lovely and insightful response! It really lifted me. And I know you are right about expressing interest but not making him feel choked. I will do just that. I can’t force him into any kind of believing; when love is not freely given is not love after all, right?
Thanks again and have a great day!
Helen
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