Hi all,

My first post. I am going through a tough patch and just looking to share my story with you all.

So my ex and I were together for 3 years. We had an intense and deep connection. We met at work – she was married at the time. She had the big house, the picket fence and seemed happy in her marriage. We weren’t direct colleagues but saw each other every day and after a few months we started spending time together at work. She was very open about the fact she was married but it was clear there was chemistry between us. I began to back off –  I didn’t want to be a home wrecker and mess up her life or mine.

Time past and one day she asked me out for a coffee. She said after thinking about her feelings for me and where she was at in life, she had made the decision to leave her husband. I spoke to her as a friend and said I’d support her. She had a tough separation but I was helping her all the way through. She left the marital home and moved in to an apt by herself. At this point we rekindled our initial chemistry and started dating.

It was an amazing 2 years. We were really close. She was intoxicating – she completely gave all of herself to me now that she was free of her marriage. She was happy, in a healthy place emotionally and we were in sync. We were even talking about the future together.

That all changed when i was offered a job out of town. I gave her the option to come with me but she had a lot of committments back home. I made the decision to take the job (too good to refuse) and after 2 years we parted. We hadn’t officially broken up however. We decided to let destiny take its course. Over the course of a couple of months we were in contact every day. I was missing her and suggested she look in to jobs in my town. She said she was still in love with me and let’s commit to making it happen. A couple of months later she ended up scoring a new job and moving over. We were ecstatic at the thought of being together again.

When she relocated, things were a little different. She was in a new town with just me as her support network. I was busy with work and not giving her the attention and time she needed. I noticed she was distancing herself from us. After a few weeks, we had “the talk”. She said moving to a new town and our instability led her to withdrawing and now she needed space to refind herself. Initially I thought it was something we could work through but over the course of a couple of months we continued to drift. We ended amicably with love and empathy. But it also was soul destroying for me. I believe she had already grieved us months before and I was very much processing life without each other. When we split, she was still saying she loved me and she knows she won’t find what we had again. I won’t lie – it was confusing and still is.

I recently moved out of her town to ensure we got time apart. After leaving, I didn’t hear from her for a couple of weeks. Then Covid happened and she sent me a message after 2 weeks saying she missed me. missed us and checked in to see if I was ok. I got drawn back in and comms recommenced. We even had a couple of nights via video and talked about each others lives – she was cooking and I was chilling in my house. It was like nothing had changed. We also talked about what went wrong in our relationship. She made it clear that she is still very unsure if missing me means she wants to reconcile. She needed more time to figure that out but said she would never close the door on a future together. That, for me, was the last straw. I knew I needed to take action for my own mental health.

A few more weeks have past and we continued to speak to each other. Until this week. We had a very simple conversation How are you? What are you doing today etc? But I felt awful when I read it – like where is this relationship going and it keeps setting me back seeing her name pop up on my phone.  So I made the decision to not respond. Not because I don’t want to. But because I need to heal and honestly, so does she. I know she wants me in her life but I can’t be that person who makes myself emotionally available to someone who can’t give that in return.

I feel awful not returning her messages. It feels like I’m playing games to get her attention. But if I respond it will kick off another chain of communication that I can’t emotionally deal with right now. She sent me a couple of messages to see if I was ok – it’s not like me to not respond. But I feel broken and responding will drag me back in to that awful hopeful phase.

I hope she finds happiness, even if that means it’s not with me. She lit up my life for 3 years and I am blessed to have had that experience. But if I really love her, I need to be selfless and let her go on her own journey. That path may see us reconcile one day….but it is also ok if we don’t.

So that is where I am right now – fighting waves of complete sadness but also knowing that this feeling will pass in time. She will always be in my thoughts and in my heart.

Thanks for listening 🙂