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HelenHi 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
Though I run this site, it is not mine. It's ours. It's not about me. It's about us. Your stories and your wisdom are just as meaningful as mine. 