@Dannydan

Oh, I got it now! You see, I read your phrase as “I can be sure that he wants commitment if he contacts me again”, hence all those questions of mine. And you meant it as advice, as in “make sure he wants commitment.” That sure explains it! Talk about male ambiguity, he-he…

No, it goes without saying that if he starts something akin to – I can’t really call it “love bombing,” but something akin to that – I won’t be shy.

I’ll be sure to drill him on what took place in 2015-2016 and where we are heading now.

No clue if this will happen though.

Although one more guy whom I couldn’t stand ten years ago (and still can’t) dropped me a line yesterday, poking me to see if maybe now I have changed my mind. Nope, sorry, not even if I am starving…

And yet another guy from the past contacted me on social media yet again. He was charming at all, but to his charms I managed not to succumb having seen something that could be interpreted in only one manner and that unflattering for him. I have learnt since that he had borrowed money from his colleagues, including female once, and now refuses to return it. I had never trusted him; those ladies – and a few much more experienced and older than I was – did. And they had worked more closely with him and for a longer time than I did – how’s that??? So I bet that he is counting on drawing me out to chit-chat and then will ask for a loan. Anyway…

So yes, everything is possible, especially if ‘B’ and his girlfriend don’t work out.

‘B’ may very well say to himself, “Hey, and why did I rule NBC out? She is not what she seemed back in 2015-2016!” He may even remember that I told him in that recent meeting of ours that I thought we had had some special connection and convince himself of it (or remember that it had been there indeed) – and there you go.

But we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. And IF we do. I sincerely hope both of us are not what we were five years ago. He is no longer married; I have done quite a lot of work on myself.

If I am completely honest, I don’t know if I want it to happen or not. It may very well be the case of “Not getting what you want is a wonderful stroke of luck.”

Of course, it would be better if he had the same awakening as you did. I can only hope that he gives more thought to why I brought up his behaviour from five years ago and talked about his ambiguity and being hurt…

Although I am still clueless about the mismatch between him pulling away from me and his body language for two years afterwards.

The only explanation I could give myself (and of the believe-in-people type) was that he pulled away to finish off his ambiguous marriage situation. If I were him, I wouldn’t be able to ask the object of my affections to wait for me for a couple of years – if not five – until the younger daughter starts college.

Clearly, I overestimated, thought too highly of him if in reality he pulled away because he wanted sex and didn’t get it.

Or if he pulled away because he wanted casual whilst still married and I was worth so much more.

So much for Christian men with untarnished reputation at work and elsewhere. Ha!

But I guess that this is over. I didn’t detect anything akin to that excitement he had displayed in my presence in the past when we met two weeks ago.

So it must indeed be over for him, but, ultimately, it doesn’t matter now. Some questions must remain unanswered for some time or forever. Make peace with it. I honestly tried to get answers – with your and @Sammy1’s help.

Or if he did still feel something and hid it well – well, what do I care if he still doesn’t want me in his life?

For if he wanted, he would make sure I knew it.

Especially now that he is no longer married.

This is the truth.

No, I am not holding my breath counting on his return and putting my life on hold.

I stopped his Twitter for good – the only feed about him I was getting since his retirement, and I’ll plough on living my life.

This, too, shall pass.

And no, I don’t feel like I have wasted five years of my life on him. And I don’t think I ever will.

I always try to project into the future playing with “and what would I feel or think in …years’ time if I did this or didn’t do this?…”

So no regrets anywhere.

First, I do credit him with pulling me out of an abyss that opened after A’s betrayal.

And second, I did have a couple of very strong infatuations and a few minor ones that completely eclipsed ‘B’ and pushed him into the background. I knew that ‘B’ couldn’t stand comparison to the objects of those strong infatuations. Too bad that one of them adored his wife and the other didn’t want any relationship whatsoever. Besides, they were both significantly older than me. So obviously, no future possible, but they helped me to see yet once again that I was not as hung up on ‘B’ as one might have thought. (I for one always knew that whatever feelings I had for him were not on par with what I had had with ‘A’ – too little time together, too long ago, too little contact in-between. And ‘A’, when courting me, in the infatuation phase, had done so many more things than ‘B’ did – and I did pick on those to myself when I couldn’t decide what it was that ‘B’ wanted from me – friendship or love.)

When everything is clear as day – and I do filter out 95% of the “bad guys” – no problem. But if the guy has charisma and his actions can be interpreted either way (“innocent until proven guilty” – unequivocally guilty, I might add) – that is when I don’t let go until a stronger feeling for somebody else visits me or the mystery is dissipated.

Danny, one more psychology question for you. Curious how the mind works.

I came back to your original post and read this:

However through mutual friend, I’ve heard she was badly upset and I deeply hurt her more than I thought. I know she did not deserve any pain, I thought selfishly only about myself. She wasn’t taking pity and in fact really liked me for who I was and I was idiotic and pushed her away.

If I’m honest I feel like I had no real intention of being with someone again longterm when I first met B I was just looking for a way to distract because I had not healed the scars left by A.

I acted like the relationship with B was going to go somewhere, I made efforts and then when things actually began to feel real, I just bailed on her. I awakened feelings in her only to screw her over. I think there’s a part of me which acted unknowingly to inflict the pain I’d felt from what A did to me onto B. I feel like a sadist.

I am curious as to what was Square One for you in deciding to go back to ‘B’? This quote makes it sound like the words of that mutual friend along with your knowing deep down that ‘B’ didn’t deserve what you did to her?

What do you think about my encounter with my ‘B’? Do you think I should have told him in more detailed, described more vividly how he had hurt me?