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Tee.
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November 1, 2021 at 12:40 pm #388060
Anonymous
InactiveWhen I broke up with my ex of 5 years, the pandemic started and I was healing. I cleaned every bad memories, every anxiety feelings and thoughts about him. Started hanging out with the same friends including his friends actually they became mutual friends after these years. And suddenly I’ve started hanging out with his friend more often and in the end we become lovers. We didn’t know what would happen and how this would go. And we were seeing each other for a year when we’ve decided to stop.
Even though we felt like we found our soulmates, we were absolutely compatible we have found factors that are not letting us be together.
1. He still hangs out with my ex. It’s very rare cause they are on a different continents now.
2. One of the mutual friend in this group, is his ex. They were secretly dating 1-2 year ago. We are still hanging out with her.
I am hurt because he says that we are very happy together and he is so drawn to me. He want to stop because he doesn’t see a solution but he keeps seeing me in that way. I want to work this out in the best way possible. I want us to be lovers but he has decided that is too complicated this relationship to be public. He is very hurt by his decision but he cares about everyone else in this situation than his happiness.
I even ask myself if that is the problem or there is something else behind all of this.
Any solution/advices on how to accept/let go/move on or solve this?
November 1, 2021 at 1:12 pm #388065Anonymous
GuestDear aphroitte1:
You shared about this situation March last year, the beginning of the pandemic- seems like ages ago. I am sorry that the relationship does not seem to be working out, reads like you really, really like him. Too bad. “I even ask myself if.. there is something else behind all this“- I think that there is, that’s my hunch. What do you think it might be?
anita
November 1, 2021 at 1:31 pm #388068Anonymous
InactiveMaybe he still keeps his ex as an opportunity?
Or he doesn’t want them to be angry about this and to not lose them as friends.
But something feels very strange because his words are that I am the one for him but we can’t be together in any way.
November 1, 2021 at 1:38 pm #388069Anonymous
InactiveI am asking myself, is it really an impossible situation? Are we going to be the bad guys here? It seems unfair to not fight for our love and tend to keep other people happy. I don’t see it as him, I think if you are very in love or you enjoy with someone you’ll make sacrifice because that makes you happy and your life. But he seems to deny that choice and choose to save his friends.
He wants us to be friends, even close friends after all this. But I feel like it would be very hard for me, thinking of him having another girlfriend..
November 1, 2021 at 1:42 pm #388070Anonymous
GuestDear aphroitte1:
“something feels very strange because his words are that I am the one for him but we can’t be together in any way“- reads to me that the first part, that you are “the one for him” is a lie, that he didn’t mean it. I am sorry for suggesting this.. but people do say things they don’t mean, especially when breaking up with someone.. so that the one broken up with doesn’t get angry.. you know, to soften the blow.
anita
November 1, 2021 at 1:47 pm #388071Anonymous
Inactiveyes, I was suspecting it too.
But how do I continue from this type of relationship? I mean we are going to stay in touch after all, maybe rare contact but still..How do I not get hurt by him moving on and having another girlfriend?
November 1, 2021 at 1:55 pm #388072Anonymous
GuestDear aphroitte1:
I don’t think it’s possible for you to not get hurt by him moving on and having another girlfriend. I am guessing that when that happens you will be hoping he’ll break up with that future girlfriend and get back with you.. and maybe he will, for a while at least.. Better find a man who wants YOU, who really wants you and only you. Can you imagine that.. do you want that?
anita
November 6, 2021 at 8:15 am #388251Tee
ParticipantDear aphroitte1,
I am sorry you are still entangled with this young man and cannot seem to move on. The title of your thread is “Two friends who can’t be together”. The truth is that you could be together, but he doesn’t want to. He doesn’t want to go public, he prefers to sneak around, because he did the same thing with his ex – she too was a part of your circle and they dated in secret. So when you say:
Even though we felt like we found our soulmates, we were absolutely compatible we have found factors that are not letting us be together.
The truth is, he has found factors why you two can’t be together. And he is trying to convince you that those are valid reasons. But actually those are excuses, because as you say, if he truly loved you, he’d come out in the open about the two of you:
I think if you are very in love or you enjoy with someone you’ll make sacrifice because that makes you happy and your life.
Then you say:
But he seems to deny that choice and choose to save his friends.
Actually, I believe he is trying to save his face, because he’d need to admit that he’s dated two girls from his friends circle in secret, and that might be awkward. He is not saving his friends, because they have nothing to lose – he is saving his own face. I believe this is behind his sleazy behavior: he cares more about himself and his reputation than he cares about you.
Please try to see his behavior for what it is – it should help you move on. And I wouldn’t stay friends with him either, because having such a manipulative person for a friend isn’t really fun.
November 7, 2021 at 12:33 am #388275Tee
ParticipantDear aphroitte1,
I also understand that it might not be easy for you to let go, because 1) you like him a lot, he feels like a great match, even soul mate, and 2) you don’t see his behavior as manipulative because you don’t value yourself enough to demand for your relationship to be in the open. He managed to convince you (and his previous girlfriend) to keep your relationship in secret, as if there was something to be embarrassed about. Is there anything embarrassing about you? No! But if you don’t value yourself enough, you’ll agree to such scams and take part in his lie. And even believe that “we can’t be together”, when deep in your heart, you know it’s not right.
November 9, 2021 at 2:22 pm #388395Anonymous
InactiveDear TeaK,
Everything that is written is very true and I agree.
Yesterday we had a big fight I could name it about this and he openly told me that his ex is still an option in the future because everything would be easier (they can be together without hurting someone else). But that freaks me out because now he seems very selfish : in order not to hurt two friends he will hurt me. Which is devastating and I started not believing anything he says. Something always felt wrong because his words don’t match his deeds and that is my intuitive feeling. After all I gave up yesterday because I saw his true colors and I knew that something was very fishy. I don’t feel that it would be possible to stay friends after this. Maybe if we broke it off months ago yes, but now it seems like I saw all the layers that he had been hiding.
And there comes another problem when one is solved… My ex came back. I trust my intiution very well because I can feel and know when and where he will come back. And that happened two times already. He had written me on a app we are still friends in september then october and two days before I saw the messages. We were texting each other the whole day, how are you, what’s new, nothing very special and I’ve realised something.
I have very serious codependency/emotional attachment issues. I believe so, because when my other ex texted me I didn’t feel bad or hurt by the conversation with “my friend”. I was able to be rude and not to care, because I now have attention of someone else. I’ve noticed this problem when my ex stopped texting today. I don’t know what is the reason but I’ve started feeling anxious, stressed again. I have this psychosomatic problem with my stomach and I have stomach acid when I think of things like this. I still don’t know how to solve it. Anyways I am scared and I don’t like to be like this. Attached to people. I want to be okay to accept and let people go and not to feel this level od anxiety. I really want to be independent.
November 10, 2021 at 5:49 am #388404Tee
ParticipantDear aphroitte1,
After all I gave up yesterday because I saw his true colors and I knew that something was very fishy. I don’t feel that it would be possible to stay friends after this. Maybe if we broke it off months ago yes, but now it seems like I saw all the layers that he had been hiding.
Good decision! I am glad you broke up with him (without agreeing to remain friends) because he is just continuing with his excuses.
he openly told me that his ex is still an option in the future because everything would be easier (they can be together without hurting someone else). But that freaks me out because now he seems very selfish : in order not to hurt two friends he will hurt me
Yes, it shows that he doesn’t truly care about you. As I said earlier, I don’t think he is worried about hurting those two people, but rather, he is worried about his reputation – to be viewed as someone who tends to date people in secret. Because, following his logic, one could say that he didn’t want to hurt his best friend (he felt some loyalty towards him), and that’s why he dated you in secret. So I can understand his discomfort about the situation, although if he truly loved you, it could have been solved, it wouldn’t be the first time that people date their best friends’ exes. BUT, how can he explain the fact that he dated his ex in secret? What was the reason for keeping that a secret? Was she another friend’s ex, so that too was a “taboo”?
As for your previous ex coming into the picture and you started feeling stressed when he stopped texting you – it could be related to abandonment anxiety. Do you feel bad alone and can’t really stay single for a long time? If you need to be in a relationship to feel safe, or to feel loved, or to feel worthy, those could all be the reasons why you’re reacting like this. The thought of being alone causes you stress and anxiety, which probably causes the stomach acid problem.
Anyways I am scared and I don’t like to be like this. Attached to people. I want to be okay to accept and let people go and not to feel this level od anxiety. I really want to be independent.
I hear you. It’s not pleasant to be so attached to people, I know from experience. But I can tell you right off the bat that your anxiety is most probably related to your childhood and the relationship you had with your parents or care-takers. If you felt unsafe or unappreciated in that relationship, if you craved love but never truly received it – that would have influenced your present-day relationships as well. If you’d like to share some more about your adult relationship patterns, or about your childhood, please do, and I’ll try to help.
November 10, 2021 at 6:55 am #388405Anonymous
InactiveYes I indeed think that there is something wrong with hiding his girlfriends. Maybe it’s the thought of being free and having no commitment.
I certainly have either abandonement anxiety or something similar to that. These days I am working on journaling to heal my inner child, a process I’ve begun before all this started. And I think it was the perfect time for this. But I can’t remember how I’ve felt when I was really young, but I do remember how I’ve felt when I was 13-14, and in my late teenage years. I had a lot of fighting with my dad, we never spoken and never had a close relationship father-daughter. He would be so mad that I was having a boyfriend and that time and even if it was not about the boyfriend he would be angry and giving me silent treatment about something. He always expected of me to be perfect, well behaved and have perfect grades. I do remember being scared if I told him I’ve got 3 (that’s equivalent to C grade). I would be punished often and I was not able to go on picnics and friends hangouts when I was 12-13 because I was still young. And while everyone was hanging out I was staying at home. I also remember that I often felt not understood at home. I’ve never had close relationship with my parents and our love language is not physical touch at all. Sometimes, even today if my dad hugs me I don’t feel anything loveable I feel cold and weird in that situation and it bothers me.
Previous years, I had a trauma because my parents were fighting very bad at one point. There was one night with a very dramatic fight including words like: suicide, divorce, you don’t love me, you don’t need me (my fathers’ words). My sister was little at that time maybe 13 I don’t remember but I was so devastated and angry at my father because I still vividly remember the shock and scare he gave my sister. There was no fighting (meaning physical fight) but there was dramatic pushing, running, going away with his car and not calling back. Total disaster that escalated to feel cold towards my dad.
I am sad that they are this way and I acknowledge that I can’t be responsible for their action and feelings but their over protective attitude almost ( I can’t think of the world in english, we use it kept as in glass bell = meaning overprotective even dangerous for the kid because they don’t let anything happen to him). Because of that overprotectivness I think I had that self esteem issues, thinking that I am never good enough and being perfectionist. I developed OCD and that actually reflected in my relationships. And because of every fight my parents have and the threats that my dad will leave that leaves me to believe that is the biggest problem of having abandonment issues.
About the relationship patterns I’ve noticed that I am always drawn to boys that are patriachal even though they are the last thing I want to be with me. I’ve also noticed that my relationship were always somehow forbidden and hidden. For example:
1. My first boyfriend, I was forbidden to be with him because I was young (13 years) and his grandad was a serial killer. I know very ironic and bad situation, but they were afraid that he is brining the DNA with him. So, we were hiding a lot.
2. My second boyfriend, who I was with the most and my ex that recently texted me, we had a very bad relationship. I believed he was a narcissist but I am afraid that I may also have narcisstic traits. I’ve written about my ex 3 years ago here and it was a troublant relationship with a lot of break-ups, ignoring, bad words and emotional abuse I believe. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to be with me but kept going back to me and after some time he would say oh, I don’t think this is working. I feel very anxious and bad with you. And because of our numbered getting back together I became being afraid and ashamed to tell anyone we are back together. That led us to this situation now, even if we are grownups now we can’t be together because of other opinions including my parents.
3. There was a fling between these break ups and meeting my friend as a lover, where I personally, by choice hide the relationship in some way. Maybe because I was thinking that me and my ex would be back together. The boy was doing everything to make me happy, he was sincere and he would do literally everything, but I was not attracted to that. So after month of dating my ex showed up and I dumped this boy to be back with my ex who broke up with me again after sometime.
4. And my friend-lover, who was also hiding the realtionship. He seems very reasonable, grown up person, but with this choices I think he has his own traumas that he hasn’t be working on. He seems to be narcissist as well and patriachal so much. He doesn’t even know how to make coffee! In other areas he is well behaved and everything but when I think, I’ve never known about previous of his relationships. I just know about his ex, my friend also, because I asked him and his sister suspected. His family even doesn’t know about that!
November 10, 2021 at 8:52 am #388414Anonymous
GuestDear aphroitte1:
I don’t want to interrupt your current promising communication with TeaK for too long, so this is a supplementary post, if you will, following my re-reading of all your posts on your three threads. I will be quoting from you and commenting, often typing away whatever comes to my mind, and I hope this will be helpful to you somewhat:
In January 2018, at 19, you shared about a boyfriend: “When we met him, everything was beyond perfect. He was exactly the guy I was dreaming“- it is very, very common for teenage girls who were not loved much as children, and who were anxious as children, to dream about a perfect love with a perfect boy.. to dream a lot about such perfect love. A lack of parental love as children creates an intense thirst for love that expands into the romantic context.
“I always tried to make things right, doing everything so I can prove him that I love him and I want to be with him. I did literally everything… I was always begging for attention“- just like an unloved child tries to make things right, beg for attention, literally doing everything in her power to change an unloving parent to a loving parent, so does the teenage girl and young woman in the romantic context.
“I always bought him presents doing stuff for him, while I had nothing.. I love him so much“- this is how thirsty for love you were ever since you were a child.
In March 2021, at 22, you shared about your current “complicated situation” made complicated by a man within a group of friends, a man with whom you had a secretive intimate/ sexual relationship. Likely, he insisted that his intimate and sexual relationship with you remains a secret because you were not the only person within the group, or associated with the group, with whom he had such a relationship.
“he says that they were on friendly terms now and everything is okay… saying that I was the perfect girl with every trait that he was searching for in a girl.. (saying) there were no chances for us to be a public relationship because it’s not moral.. and he says that.. and he said maybe.. He told me… he was saying…he kept saying “- I don’t think that he is in the habit of saying and telling you what is true, lying to you instead (intentionally telling you what he knows to be not true). I imagine he lies to others in the group and elsewhere, hence his demand for secrecy: with secrecy his lies are protected from being exposed.
“before me they were dating secretly, I found out about the dating after we hooked up. And she still doesn’t know anything about me and him dating.. he keeps dating secretly“- other than his words, supported by his ex’s and your secrecy, do you have any reason to believe that the two of them did not hook up at the same time period that you and him hooked up…
“he told me such stuff, romantic“- again, do not assume that anything he tells you is true.
“believing him that we will find a way”– better to not believe a person who is in the habit of lying.
“I have problem now that I don’t know how to stay friends, close (he want that“- can’t be truly close friends with a person who hides the truth and tells you lies. He wants not to have a close friendship with you, but to keep you close so that you don’t expose his lies.
“we felt like we found our soulmates“- You felt that you found your soulmate, and you believed that he felt the same way .. because he told you…
“we were absolutely compatible“- except in the area of telling the truth..
“we have found factors that are not letting us be together. 1… 2…“- these are the factor he stated, and you believed him…
“he says that we are very happy together.. He is very hurt by his decision.. “- so he says.
“I even ask myself if that is the problem or there is something else behind all of this“- something else= lies.
“How do I not get hurt by him moving on and having another girlfriend?“- it will take getting over the hurt of him repeatedly lying to you, and the hurt of him likely hooking up with others in addition to you.
“he openly told me that his ex is still an option in the future because everything would be easier“- when a person habitually lies, not every single thing they say is a lie (that would be impossible). I am guessing that his ex is not really an ex, and that what he means by “everything would be easier”, is that it is getting too difficult for him to keep his lies and secrecy going on and on and on, particularly when you argue with him, confronting him with his lies.
“I started not believing anything he says. Something always felt wrong because his words don’t match his deeds.. I saw his true colors.. very fishy.. I saw all the layers that he had been hiding (Nov 9)“- congratulations! And better that you continue to not believe anything he says.
“I have very serious codependency/emotional attachment issues. I believe so, because when my other ex texted me.. I was able to be rude and not to care, because I now have attention of someone else“-a child unattended to, left alone is a very scared child, and understandably, all alone, she is not selective as to who she wants to take away her alone-ness, who she wants to keep her safe from harm: anyone will do!
For as long as the only someone-there-with-you was your lying “friend”, you did not feel safe enough to admit to yourself that indeed he is “very fishy”. To remain with him and feel relatively safe, you closed your eyes to “his true colors” best you could. But once there is another option, another guy, you feel safe enough, at least for a while, to smell the fishiness and see the true colors of the previous guy.
“when my ex stopped texting today…I’ve started feeling anxious, stressed again. I have this psychosomatic problem with my stomach and I have stomach acid“- this is how a child feels when she finds herself alone, particularly, in a scary situation: scared, anxious.. and anxiousness (fear that goes on and on for too long) harms the body.
“my parents were fighting very bad at one point. There was one night with a very dramatic fight including words like: suicide, divorce, you don’t love me, you don’t need me.. there was dramatic pushing, running, going away with his car and not calling back. Total disaster that escalated“-it was not only one night when disaster escalated, and your fear extended from one night to the next and the next.. which is what anxiety is about. The words you heard your father say that night kept repeating in your head following that night. Nothing scares a child more than watching or hearing violence (or the scary promise of violence) involving a parent.
“I often felt not understood at home. I’ve never had close relationship with my parents and our love language is not physical touch at all. Sometimes, even today if my dad hugs me I don’t feel anything loveable I feel cold and weird in that situation and it bothers me”- scared from one night to the next, there was no one to calm your fear, to quiet your anxiety. When your father hugs you, his hug cannot calm your anxiety because it is his voice that keeps replaying and scaring you. Parents who scared and traumatized a child cannot be the same people to provide comfort (at least not without having the trauma resolved over a long time, such as in the context of family therapy).
My mother touched me “lovingly” in between the times she traumatized me, and like you feeling about your father’s hugs, I too felt “cold and weird” by her touch, and I too was very bothered by it.
“their over protective attitude“- same with my mother’s attitude: she protected me from a few other people, but not from herself.
“I developed OCD“- interesting, following a traumatic fights between my parents, when I was about 5 or 6, I too developed OCD.
“The boy was doing everything to make me happy, he was sincere and he would do literally everything, but I was not attracted to that“- as teenagers and adults, following a troubled childhood, we are attracted to romantic partners who remind us of a parent, and we are driven to make the relationship with them work with the same intensity that we were driven as children to make the relationship with a parent work.
When you met a guy who was sincere and loving toward you were not attracted to him because, being too different from any of your parents, he did not offer you the (retroactive and therefore doomed) opportunity to try again and make a parent (an unloving, insincere and scary parent) love you and keep you safe.
anita
November 10, 2021 at 10:05 am #388415Tee
ParticipantDear aphroitte1,
thank you for sharing some more. I’ve also read what you’ve written almost 4 years ago about your turbulent relationship with your previous ex. A lot of things make sense now, and it seems to me that you desperately want to be loved by men who remind you of your father.
Your father was angry with you and giving you silent treatments, and your previous ex did the same. Your father was never pleased with you – he expected perfection from you and straight As, and he would punish you for any “lesser” performance (not physically but emotionally: by being angry and giving you silent treatment). I imagine you tried to please him best you could, but you never succeeded. With your previous ex, you said you did everything to make him happy, you tried everything to make the relationship work, sometimes you were even begging him to return to you, but to no avail. So again, it’s the same pattern of trying to please an angry, cold, distant, judgmental father.
Your father would threaten to leave, to commit suicide, and I imagine that you felt the urge to stop him, and perhaps even felt partly responsible for him wanting to leave? Your previous ex would always be leaving you, then coming back, then leaving again, telling you how awful you are and that you are destroying his life. Most probably a part of you believed it was your fault that he was treating you poorly, and that indeed you were “destroying” him. Same as with your father – you probably believed it was partly your responsibility that he was unhappy and wanted to leave. And then you tried everything to please him, so he wouldn’t leave…
Would you say that this is true?
With your latest ex, you also tried everything to keep him, you agreed to keep your relationship secret, you agreed to his terms – because you couldn’t bear the thought of him leaving. It was a similar pattern of you begging and him retreating and rejecting you.
As far as the fling you had in between the breakups with your previous ex:
The boy was doing everything to make me happy, he was sincere and he would do literally everything, but I was not attracted to that. So after month of dating my ex showed up and I dumped this boy to be back with my ex who broke up with me again after sometime.
You needed to be with someone, so you wouldn’t feel alone and unloved. But you weren’t attracted to him, because as anita said, you were craving for love of someone who reminds you of your father… that’s why you agreed to get back with your previous ex so many times, because there was always a hope that he would finally change… And even now, when he contacted you again, there is probably a hope again.. But he probably hasn’t changed but feels bad at the moment and needs someone’s attention (maybe he is at a low point in his life, and he remembered you?). But if you get back with him, it will be the same as before – he’ll get angry with you and send you away within a week or so.
How are you feeling right now about all of this? It’s okay to feel sadness and anger and disappointment and all of the emotions…
You said you’ve started working on your inner child – what kind of work have you done?
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This reply was modified 2 years, 10 months ago by
Tee.
November 10, 2021 at 11:11 am #388417Anonymous
InactiveEverything you have said it’s right. And I have analyzed the same things and led to same conclusions.
I feel panicky a lot to be honest. I know rationally that these relationship are draining me and are toxic. But I still feel the need to be loved from these person and still looking for validation from them. I am anxious a lot and I am trying to cope with rejection and feeling alone. I really don’t know how will I handle it but I know that it’s the right thing to do.
Anyways I am doing a Inner Child Challenge on Instagram with a girl named @elevatedbyem, she is doing these short daily videos and asks quiestion to write in your diary like :
What was your dream job as a child? Can you include elements from that passion into daily life?
or
What was your biggest friendship break up in the past? Relationship with your parents in the past? etc.
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This reply was modified 2 years, 10 months ago by
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