So I died last night...

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

Any advice I might give would be tempered by what order things happened in.

Did she start seeing this guy before problems set in a few months ago or after? If it was before, chances are, the problems were a symptom of her infidelity. She was pulling away from you, perhaps conciously or subconciously looking for ways to provoke you into breaking up with her. If it began after the problems, then she may have been looking for something she thought she couldn’t get from you.

If it’s the latter, I would suggest that you make one - and only one - statement telling her how much you love her and want her in your life, committing to work things out.

If it’s the former, cut her loose. There’s no kind or easy way to put it, but your relationship is over. You have just been living with its corpse for a while now.

I know you’re hurting. I’ve been there. Whatever you do, DON’T compromise yourself or your values. You’ll lose respect for yourself, and so will she.

22

{{Kinthalis}}

I wish I had a magic wand to wave to make the pain go away, but I don’t. I also don’t have any words of wisdom for you, either. Just know that there are a lot of people here that care and are willing to talk.

Keep us updated, 'kay sweetie?

23

Ow. Yes, I’ve been there, and experienced the deathlike misery of this kind of breakup.

Best wishes. I sure wish there was something we could say, sadly, the only way out…you know the rest.
{{{{{hugs}}}}}

24

I feel your pain.

Don’t let her push you around, no matter how badly you want her back. You are a beautiful…er… handsome and unique snowflake.

25

Wow, you guys brought me to tears, I can barely see the monitor.

Thank you all, your suggestions and good wishes make me that much stronger.

I’m leaving in a few hours. It’s goung to be tough, but I’ll pull through it.

I lvoe her veyr much, and so I do have plans to try and win her back, I have a feeling my attempts might fail. ::sigh:: But as they say, if you set love free and it returns then it’s meant to be, right?

I’ll definately keep you updated, hopefully once I’m gone I won’t flip out and do something stupid, sometimes I feel like I would, specially as the time of my leaving looms closer. But your words have helped a lot.

Kindest regards,
Kin

P.S: We had that dance last night. It was nice.

26

Damn honey, I’m so sorry about all of this :(. If you want some really good advice you should listen to all of the other Dopers beacuse I’m no good at the relationship advice stuff. But I’ve been in your situation. We’ve all been in your situation and we all can help. Just don’t do what I did when I got dumped which was to not eat anything for - literally - two weeks and lose almost 10 pounds when I only weighed 115 to begin with. No relationship is worth torturing yourself over.

27

God, do I know what you’re going through! Had a break up just like yours, and thought I would definitely die of grief. Wanted to, actually, and it was a rough set of months, but now I can look back on it, shake my head, and say, “Damn, thank God I’m never going through THAT again…” with a rueful laugh. Forgive me if I’m projecting here, but I’m going to try to say to you what I needed to hear when I went through it. Take it for what it’s worth.

Right now, you feel totally alone, like all the meaning and joy in your life has been drained off and now resides in the hands of someone you thought you knew and knew you better than anyone else in the world, who has just been revealed to be a veritable stranger. You are not overreacting-- it is one of the most horrifying, terrible emotional moments a person can go through in the course of normal life. Your pain is real and appropriate, but it’s not rational. You probably can’t hear rational right now, which is normal. I advise you to allow yourself to grieve as you see fit without castigating yourself too much.

I am going to offer you some rational insights anyway, though, in case you can store them for later consideration: maybe you can get back together and fix things so they work right. It can happen, but it’s best not to harbor false hopes of a future reunion. Clinging to such a belief will only slow your healing process. The best advice anyone gave me was to just…let…go. Give yourself permission to grieve, feel horrible, cry on your friends, listen to sad music, write sappy poetry, eat chocolate, the works, whatever you have to do, but banish thoughts of reunion from your mind as much as possible.

Remind yourself that any woman who is willing to betray your trust and the monogamy you shared isn’t the angel you thought she was. Assuming the problems in your relationship were normal, human problems and not the product of extreme bad behavior on your part, her infidelity is a major breach of your trust, not to mention hazardous to your health (sex is dangerous these days, man). Pick your self-esteem up off the ground and remember that you are a good person who deserves to be loved and treated with gentleness and respect. If this isn’t the woman who can do that for you, then she is doing you a great service by leaving you so you can find the woman who can, or simply learn to be happy alone for a while.

I know all this probably sounds like bullshit to you now, which is OK. I hope you can maybe just think about it, say it to yourself a few times even if you can’t believe it, and someday you’ll realize that you can survive without her. You can be happy. You deserve it.

Keep us posted on how you’re doing, OK?

28

Ah you poor bastard.

IMO, Rubystreak’s advice is very very good. Whatever you do, don’t hang on. If it’s possible (because Lord knows your brain won’t be working properly at the moment), take this on board: fugeddaboudit*.

You’re doing the right thing by moving out. Take it further: take control of every contact you have. Deny her the pleasure of being in your company (I personally found leaving the country and drinking heavily helped, though clearly some people - like harmless - would find this bad advice). In my opinion, any contact with her from now on must be on your terms and, if it is at all possible, you should end each visit yourself. Try not to hang on like a puppy. She’s treated you like shit; don’t behave like a piece of shit and confirm it.

This is all hypothetical though: you’ll probably be in denial for a while, a concept I didn’t understand fully until I experienced it: rationally you know it’s over, but your emotional self will not admit it, no matter what your rational self does.

Dude, I was round at my long-term ex’s house for a cup of tea this evening, with her fiancé. Even after seven years, it still hurts a little bit. Not a raw pain like you’re feeling now. Not even like picking at a scab, but more like an old nostalgic war wound that aches every now and again. But it’s totally bearable. I’ve moved on and have found the woman I’m going to spend the rest of my life with, and that’s way better than what went before.

Never forget though: it will get better.

*I once gave this advice to a friend who then reconciled and did reunite with his girl, thus proving my advice wrong, but this circumstance is very rare indeed.

29

I feel your pain. The same thing happened to me, several times, with the guy I was with for 9 years. Reading your post reminded me of all the pain.

However, I don’t understand this:

WHY would you want to marry this woman, who cheated on you and lied to you? :confused:

Not. A. Good. Idea.

Once a liar, always a liar. I gave my ex several “second chances.” Bad bad idea.

Please, run far far away, very fast.

30

: checks the Bud Light in her hand :
Ummmmm…, nope, no problem with the drinking. :smiley:

That was a friendly tap on the head for the “bitch” comment.
:wink:

31

This is all terribly dramatic and seemingly gut-wrenching, but not really. There is no need for soul-searching and inappropriate commitments when she is looking elsewhere.

Hell, give her a miss and move on. There are other women and other chances at happiness. Keep searching and flick this one off as a bad investment.

32

It’s just not that easy Sisiphus. I know somewhere inside me that you’re probably right, that all of you are probably right, but as RubyStreak and Jjim mentioned, these emotions are very powerful right now and they won’t let me do anything that that would mean admitting the very real possibility that I won’t ever be with her again.

I just can’t wrap my brain around it, not yet atleast.

Nyctea I don’t know why I would give her another chance. It’s weird isn’t it? I never thought I would even consider this after omeone had betrayed my trust. And even now, I’m not sure that it would really work, that I would truly forgive here, but I would try to if she was back with me.

She’s more to me than a girlfriend, she’s my family. 5 years of my adult life (I’ve been with her since I was 20 years old). We’ve shared so many things, been there for each other in both good and bad times. I think that’s why I’m in this mode.

To me, it’s like my mom had just done a terrible thing, or someone else form my close fmaily would have. I might be angry at them, I might not speak to them for a while, but they would still be my family, my mom would still be my mom no matter what and I would never stop loving her.

It’s the same thing with her. She’ll always be part of me. I suppose my heart is just not ready to let go.

This is made worse by the fact that still I haven’t had any contact with anyone. No one’s aorund and won’t be for several weeks. I feel so damn alone. I don’t have anyone with whom I could talk to, with whom I could shed a tear or two, or three…

Luckily I managed to hook up my computer as quickly as possible and read all of your advice, and type this response. Someone said I shoudl keep busy, and I’m doing that, and this helps in that reguard as well.

Much thanks to everyone!

33

I hate to say it but I think you’ve made the wrong move.

In these situations I’ve usually ended the relationship by sending the girl out the door and never giving a second thought to them. But then again I don’t really have deeply close emotional relationships like lots of people.

But, in this situation you have a few options.

If you decide that you really love her and are willing to forgive her transgression, you CANNOT leave her to “think about it.”

I’ve noticed that women have a certain need for emotional companionship, eventhough she is the one to have cheated on you, unless she’s completely heartless she is probably emotionally distraught over the whole thing as well.

And who is she going to go to for comfort? Not you since you’ve left, but the other guy. And that’s where, ultimately and forever, you will lose her.

I don’t know when you moved out but you need to go for a more direct approach. Give her time to think and she’s gone.

34

Just want to mention that if you do get back with her, be ready for some counseling. This is something that could eat at you for the rest of your life. My wife and I are working through it, been over a year now, but there isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think about it and remember the pain.

35

I’ve been coming to grips with the fact that my 5 year long lovely relationship with my ex boyfriend is over. It took me a long while to even begin to grasp that. It was the same thing though… this person is your life, your family, your constant. This person has shared your life and youve shared theirs. Letting go of something like that is so so not an easy thing to do. It hurts. Its damn confusing as well.

I’m not going to sit here and tell you to let it all go. And im not going to tell you that trying to win her back is the best thing to do. It doesnt matter what I tell you, you are going to do what you’re gonn do.

My advice is this… live for yourself, not for her. She doesnt make you who you are, nobody does. Ive made the mistake of living for love and forgetting to love to live. May sound cheesy but its something to think about. Good luck, be good…take care.

36

Kinthalis, do you have any updates on how things are going? I’ve been watching this thread and thinking about ya, man.

Adam

37

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=274298&goto=newpost

Adam, try this post. He was updating…I would like to know hhow things are going since this one too…