After lurking for a while, here goes:
My SO and I didn't make it. I moved away recently -- not so far away, but far enough that it magnified the problems we already had. Let me explain.
We nearly broke up before I moved. We'd been stressed about scheduling for a while -- we work opposite hours and have had trouble making time to see each other. It's caused a lot of problems, resentment, and passive-aggressiveness over several months. One party always feels like the other isn't considering his or her needs enough. So he posed the possibility of breaking up a few weeks before I left -- for the first time. Which made me explode. I was in shock and angry.
I said nasty things like, "I'll never date a guy with low confidence again. They leave me on the side of the road," and "You should just leave." And so he left -- snuck out of my apartment in the middle of the night. I woke up that morning terrified. I took the train to his apartment, hysterically crying. We decided to go on a break, at which point I had a panic attack and said I was afraid I might kill myself. I calmed down. I was able to talk to him enough for us to decide to go on a modified break, to give him space, but to regroup. For a few weeks, we were tentative. I was working really hard to make it right again. I was on trial. I kept trying, showing him I could be better. It worked. We were both putting in more effort, and things were going to be OK. Before I left, we said, "yes, we are going to try to make this work." That was enough for me.
This was also when I started seeking treatment again -- for the first time since we started dating three years go. My depression was untreated for our entire relationship (health insurance! LOL what a joke) and it dipped into some codependent places I swore at the outset that it would never go. But he always picked me back up and never resented me for it. We bounced back every time and were stronger because of it.
So the treatment, along with the edge-of-cliff moment that showed me a glimpse of life without him, jolted us back to reality for a few weeks. I moved, and we were making it work. He came down for a lovely visit. Things seemed to be on the up, getting much better with each passing day. The distance was, actually, making the heart grow fonder.
I went back to visit over this past weekend, and we had another fight -- spurred on by the dumbest thing. But it led to an extended, drawn out conversation about whether this was going to work, full of accusations couched in the rational, "I feel" language of two smart American kids who can communicate their emotions but are afraid of confrontation and hurting those we love. We both cried. We said we were sorry. We said we loved each other. I sobbed into his shirt. He bought me tissues.
I had to catch my bus, so he came with me in a taxi. We held hands. We said I love you. We kissed. We acted as if all was normal.
What I realized on the bus ride back: he was never going to end it. We would have continued to have these terrible, painful conversations every time one of us visited the other. He was too scared to hurt me. We're both too scared to be single. We both knew we needed to end this pain, because it was only going to get worse with time -- with the realizations that we weren't giving each other what we needed. I needed more commitment from him; he needed more freedom from me. Being apart put our weaknesses on full display. We just can't reconcile them right now -- there's too much standing between us. Admitting defeat -- who the fuck wants to do that?
So yesterday, I called him on my lunch break. I had a feeling it was the break-up conversation, but I wasn't sure. I said, This is just so fucking hard, I sometimes wonder if a clean break is the right thing. And he said, Yeah, I think so. I think so. And then we both said, This fucking sucks, it feels like a third party is pulling us apart. It's just not the right time. But I love you, I love you. I'm going to miss you. And he said, I don't know how to break up. I said, I know. I said I'd always be there for him and vice versa, but I said that I can't go halfway, and that if we're breaking up, it has to be cold turkey for a long time. And he said, OK, I'll let you dictate when we contact each other again. And so then I said, Well, here goes. And then we said Goodbye.
Here I am. It's been less than 24 hours. I'm in shock. It's been three years. We talked about marriage, kids. Our families are each other's family. Nothing uncovered, nothing not shared. No boundaries, for better or worse. We were the same person in so many ways. We spoke our own language. We lived together for almost a year at one point. I can't imagine my life, my reality, my daily routine, anything. Anything without him. I just have no idea how deep this grief will take me. I feel...adrift, at the base of a huge mountain of emotion that I know I won't be able to scale. I'm so fucking scared. I'm alone in this new place.
I'm posting here because I thought some might relate, but also because I don't really know what else to do. I'm sorry to unload in my first post, but hell, what else do I have to lose. I am trying to have faith in this process, and faith in myself to get through it, but it's very hard right now because I haven't even dipped into acceptance of this reality. I keep thinking I want to call the whole thing off. Or text him. Or tell him I'm thinking of him, or that I'll love him or the rest of my life, which is true, and that I want us to hold onto the hope that we can be together in the same city soon. I know that talking to him will reopen the wound, and we'll end up right back where we started. But I'm just not ready to close him out. What we had was...immense. It can't be over.
Anyway. Grateful for any words of wisdom at all, or book or movie suggestions. I'm grateful that anyone actually read this far. I don't want to hear, "It gets better." I know it does eventually (it took me a year to get over my last break up). Right now, I don't want it to get better. I want it to get undone. I want to believe what is impossible.
My SO and I didn't make it. I moved away recently -- not so far away, but far enough that it magnified the problems we already had. Let me explain.
We nearly broke up before I moved. We'd been stressed about scheduling for a while -- we work opposite hours and have had trouble making time to see each other. It's caused a lot of problems, resentment, and passive-aggressiveness over several months. One party always feels like the other isn't considering his or her needs enough. So he posed the possibility of breaking up a few weeks before I left -- for the first time. Which made me explode. I was in shock and angry.
I said nasty things like, "I'll never date a guy with low confidence again. They leave me on the side of the road," and "You should just leave." And so he left -- snuck out of my apartment in the middle of the night. I woke up that morning terrified. I took the train to his apartment, hysterically crying. We decided to go on a break, at which point I had a panic attack and said I was afraid I might kill myself. I calmed down. I was able to talk to him enough for us to decide to go on a modified break, to give him space, but to regroup. For a few weeks, we were tentative. I was working really hard to make it right again. I was on trial. I kept trying, showing him I could be better. It worked. We were both putting in more effort, and things were going to be OK. Before I left, we said, "yes, we are going to try to make this work." That was enough for me.
This was also when I started seeking treatment again -- for the first time since we started dating three years go. My depression was untreated for our entire relationship (health insurance! LOL what a joke) and it dipped into some codependent places I swore at the outset that it would never go. But he always picked me back up and never resented me for it. We bounced back every time and were stronger because of it.
So the treatment, along with the edge-of-cliff moment that showed me a glimpse of life without him, jolted us back to reality for a few weeks. I moved, and we were making it work. He came down for a lovely visit. Things seemed to be on the up, getting much better with each passing day. The distance was, actually, making the heart grow fonder.
I went back to visit over this past weekend, and we had another fight -- spurred on by the dumbest thing. But it led to an extended, drawn out conversation about whether this was going to work, full of accusations couched in the rational, "I feel" language of two smart American kids who can communicate their emotions but are afraid of confrontation and hurting those we love. We both cried. We said we were sorry. We said we loved each other. I sobbed into his shirt. He bought me tissues.
I had to catch my bus, so he came with me in a taxi. We held hands. We said I love you. We kissed. We acted as if all was normal.
What I realized on the bus ride back: he was never going to end it. We would have continued to have these terrible, painful conversations every time one of us visited the other. He was too scared to hurt me. We're both too scared to be single. We both knew we needed to end this pain, because it was only going to get worse with time -- with the realizations that we weren't giving each other what we needed. I needed more commitment from him; he needed more freedom from me. Being apart put our weaknesses on full display. We just can't reconcile them right now -- there's too much standing between us. Admitting defeat -- who the fuck wants to do that?
So yesterday, I called him on my lunch break. I had a feeling it was the break-up conversation, but I wasn't sure. I said, This is just so fucking hard, I sometimes wonder if a clean break is the right thing. And he said, Yeah, I think so. I think so. And then we both said, This fucking sucks, it feels like a third party is pulling us apart. It's just not the right time. But I love you, I love you. I'm going to miss you. And he said, I don't know how to break up. I said, I know. I said I'd always be there for him and vice versa, but I said that I can't go halfway, and that if we're breaking up, it has to be cold turkey for a long time. And he said, OK, I'll let you dictate when we contact each other again. And so then I said, Well, here goes. And then we said Goodbye.
Here I am. It's been less than 24 hours. I'm in shock. It's been three years. We talked about marriage, kids. Our families are each other's family. Nothing uncovered, nothing not shared. No boundaries, for better or worse. We were the same person in so many ways. We spoke our own language. We lived together for almost a year at one point. I can't imagine my life, my reality, my daily routine, anything. Anything without him. I just have no idea how deep this grief will take me. I feel...adrift, at the base of a huge mountain of emotion that I know I won't be able to scale. I'm so fucking scared. I'm alone in this new place.
I'm posting here because I thought some might relate, but also because I don't really know what else to do. I'm sorry to unload in my first post, but hell, what else do I have to lose. I am trying to have faith in this process, and faith in myself to get through it, but it's very hard right now because I haven't even dipped into acceptance of this reality. I keep thinking I want to call the whole thing off. Or text him. Or tell him I'm thinking of him, or that I'll love him or the rest of my life, which is true, and that I want us to hold onto the hope that we can be together in the same city soon. I know that talking to him will reopen the wound, and we'll end up right back where we started. But I'm just not ready to close him out. What we had was...immense. It can't be over.
Anyway. Grateful for any words of wisdom at all, or book or movie suggestions. I'm grateful that anyone actually read this far. I don't want to hear, "It gets better." I know it does eventually (it took me a year to get over my last break up). Right now, I don't want it to get better. I want it to get undone. I want to believe what is impossible.
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