I'm brand new to these forums, so I suppose an introduction is in order. My gf and I met in January 2015 via OKCupid. She is in Iowa, I'm in Colorado, but she said when she saw my profile and how high a match I was (we were a 98% match, with tons of questions answered), she thought she'd contact me; she'd wanted to move to Colorado for a long time, she said, so it seemed like fate. We started talking on OKC, then switched to email, then text... and then she went AWOL for a couple of weeks, so I figured the experiment was over (this was probably in May 2015). I sent her an email, telling her I understood that it's hard to maintain communication with someone you've never met, and that I'd like to connect on Facebook, so we didn't lose touch completely. She responded, instead, that she'd decided she wanted to give "this thing" a shot, and get to know me better. From that point until we started our "official" relationship, we talked at least every few days, but usually for a few hours every 1-3 days.
This past February, she finally came to visit me (I say finally because she'd told me last September she had vacation time and wanted to come see me ASAP). I've never felt so comfortable around anyone in my life. We had 2 short days together before she had to head back, and neither of us wanted it to end. That said, there was really nothing romantic about the visit, despite plenty of flirtation in texting before. We just clicked; romance didn't really seem to be too important at the time. But the day after she left, we spent hours texting back and forth about how we'd each felt drawn to the other, and how the nature of our relationship had definitely changed.
Less than 2 months later, she started telling me that she'd never been the long distance relationship type, but was strongly considering having one with me. She brought it up twice, then one night, just sent me a cryptic text saying, "I've made a decision." The next morning, I saw her Facebook status had changed to, "In a Relationship". I texted her, and she said she was just waiting to make sure it was okay with me for her to tag me (I have her added on my Facebook profile that I use for my business, so she wanted to make sure it wouldn't look unprofessional). I did have to wait, because I needed to talk to my family; my last two relationship partners were so dysfunctional, they destroyed my relationship with my family, and it's taken me years to patch it up. But I did that within the week, and everything was official... Facebook official, anyway.
But that's when my problems started. Before it was "official", she would text me randomly throughout the day without my texting her first. She'd send anything from a cute emoji to apologies for texting me so often (but she "couldn't stop talking to" me). For about the first week we were official, she texted me every day, calling me "sweetie" and other cute nicknames, and putting in little hearts, etc. She'd ask me how my day had been, and seemed genuinely interested. We talked on the phone every couple of days, and she seemed to be so interested in everything I had to say. We did have issues those first couple of weeks, though; my mother was visiting, and she always puts me on edge, so not only did I have to divide my time, but I was also not in the best mood. Just a couple of days into the relationship, I found out my gf had been sleeping with other men while we'd been talking (from the time we met on OKC); I felt incredibly betrayed, because while I hadn't been celibate, exactly, I'd nearly been. But we got past that, and I thought things were going well.
About a month ago, though, my life started to take a downward slide. My business (I started a business about a year ago) hasn't been turning a profit, and after a failed attempt to secure an SBA loan, my bank shut down all my accounts out of nowhere, and with no explanation. Until a couple of days ago, in fact, I was facing the very real possibility of homelessness. But a month ago was when it all began, and I reached out to my gf for help... only to have her pull away more and more by the day.
At first, I thought she was being distant because she was busy; she has a 4-year-old son at home, and two older kids she has partial custody of, plus a full time management job, so I tried to play it off as not a big deal. But then she stopped texting me first, and when I'd text her, it would take her anywhere from 15 minutes to 4 hours to respond. Then, communication just stopped, for a couple of days. She didn't text, didn't answer my texts, but was on Facebook! So I'd post a cute meme or something on her wall, thinking she'd see it and reach out, but no. Her friends would "like" the meme, but nothing from her. Finally, she posted something saying her phone was out of minutes, but that people could reach her on Skype... and I'd been trying to get her to download Skype for weeks. I responded with hostility ("Oh, so NOW you have Skype?"), and we didn't talk at all until the next day.
When we finally did talk, she was irate, telling me I had no idea how awful things had been in her life recently. She said she couldn't pay her rent or phone bill, her job was making her physically ill (from the stress), and if she couldn't pay her rent soon, she'd be homeless. This was all news to me! Nothing she'd told me previously would have indicated that any of this was going on with her, so of course, I felt unjustly blamed for my own upset. We talked a few days later on the phone, though, for a couple of hours, and I thought we'd worked things out.
However, she just continued to be distant, and went AWOL again, for a couple of days. I finally texted her and said, "If you need space, I understand, but I have no idea what's going on, so I'd really appreciate a little info" or something akin to that. She told me she'd just been incredibly stressed and hadn't been talking to ANYONE lately, let alone me. She said she would call me the next day... but of course, that didn't happen, nor did it happen the day after that. That Friday, I received news a relative had died, and it hit me pretty hard for a few reasons. All I wanted was to talk to my gf, even with all the tumult we'd been experiencing. I texted her and asked if she had time for a call. She was on her way to pick up her older kids for a 2-week visit, she said, but could talk on the way.
What ensued was utter madness. It started out with her asking about my relative, me telling her a bit, and her just saying blankly, "I'm sorry." She sounded like she couldn't have possibly been less involved in the conversation, and really didn't say much. I'm the type to try to fill the space, so I just started talking about how stressed I'd been with everything lately, and how she and I really needed to talk about what was going on, because I didn't need even MORE uncertainty in my life. It devolved into her telling me we needed to break up, because "obviously", all she was doing was hurting me. I finally ended up talking her out of it, because she continually maintained she was trying to "save" me from her... but I haven't felt okay about things since.
It's now been 2 weeks since the near-breakup, and her communication has been spotty, to say the least. In the midst of all of this, my phone starting having issues with not sending texts to hers, so I started feeling like she was ignoring me, which drives me nuts. I kept my cool, though, and yesterday, finally, I think the issue was worked out with my carrier. Over the past 2 weeks, she has texted me first only twice--- once when I'd posted on Facebook that I was having a great time at an amusement park, and another time when she wanted to let me know how sexually frustrated she was feeling (we've been together 2 months, and she's already frustrated??). Every other day, it's been me texting her, and her responses have been brief, with none of the affection she always used before we were even together. I tried to chalk it up to her having all 3 kids at home, but she dropped off the older ones last night, and was supposed to call me tonight, as it's been over a week since we've talked on the phone. So I waited... and I waited... and there was no text, no call. At 6pm, I finally texted her, asking if we were still going to talk tonight. Nothing. An hour passed. I thought maybe her phone was out of minutes again, so I jumped on Facebook... and it said she was online. So I texted, "Hi," and a minute later, I got a text (not a Facebook message response) saying, "Hey." Just "Hey." She has NEVER been so short with me. I asked if something was wrong, and she said she wasn't in a talking mood. I asked if something had happened, and she said no, she just wasn't feeling talkative.
So now I'm just feeling like I spent over a year in a fantastic long-distance quasi-friendship with a girl who, when she finally got me (because boy, did she do a lot of chasing over that year+), decided she no longer wanted me. I have no clue what to do now, as texting her too much will seem clingy, but I have no idea what she's thinking or feeling. A month ago, she was telling me that she saw marriage in our future (I felt the same). Two weeks ago, she said she was shooting for moving out here in January. I don't get it. I know this is a mammoth post, but I'd really appreciate any advice people could give. This is the first LDR I've had in 16 years, and I really feel, at this point, like if I can't just move to Iowa (or at least stay there until she can move to Colorado), this thing is dead in the water.
This past February, she finally came to visit me (I say finally because she'd told me last September she had vacation time and wanted to come see me ASAP). I've never felt so comfortable around anyone in my life. We had 2 short days together before she had to head back, and neither of us wanted it to end. That said, there was really nothing romantic about the visit, despite plenty of flirtation in texting before. We just clicked; romance didn't really seem to be too important at the time. But the day after she left, we spent hours texting back and forth about how we'd each felt drawn to the other, and how the nature of our relationship had definitely changed.
Less than 2 months later, she started telling me that she'd never been the long distance relationship type, but was strongly considering having one with me. She brought it up twice, then one night, just sent me a cryptic text saying, "I've made a decision." The next morning, I saw her Facebook status had changed to, "In a Relationship". I texted her, and she said she was just waiting to make sure it was okay with me for her to tag me (I have her added on my Facebook profile that I use for my business, so she wanted to make sure it wouldn't look unprofessional). I did have to wait, because I needed to talk to my family; my last two relationship partners were so dysfunctional, they destroyed my relationship with my family, and it's taken me years to patch it up. But I did that within the week, and everything was official... Facebook official, anyway.
But that's when my problems started. Before it was "official", she would text me randomly throughout the day without my texting her first. She'd send anything from a cute emoji to apologies for texting me so often (but she "couldn't stop talking to" me). For about the first week we were official, she texted me every day, calling me "sweetie" and other cute nicknames, and putting in little hearts, etc. She'd ask me how my day had been, and seemed genuinely interested. We talked on the phone every couple of days, and she seemed to be so interested in everything I had to say. We did have issues those first couple of weeks, though; my mother was visiting, and she always puts me on edge, so not only did I have to divide my time, but I was also not in the best mood. Just a couple of days into the relationship, I found out my gf had been sleeping with other men while we'd been talking (from the time we met on OKC); I felt incredibly betrayed, because while I hadn't been celibate, exactly, I'd nearly been. But we got past that, and I thought things were going well.
About a month ago, though, my life started to take a downward slide. My business (I started a business about a year ago) hasn't been turning a profit, and after a failed attempt to secure an SBA loan, my bank shut down all my accounts out of nowhere, and with no explanation. Until a couple of days ago, in fact, I was facing the very real possibility of homelessness. But a month ago was when it all began, and I reached out to my gf for help... only to have her pull away more and more by the day.
At first, I thought she was being distant because she was busy; she has a 4-year-old son at home, and two older kids she has partial custody of, plus a full time management job, so I tried to play it off as not a big deal. But then she stopped texting me first, and when I'd text her, it would take her anywhere from 15 minutes to 4 hours to respond. Then, communication just stopped, for a couple of days. She didn't text, didn't answer my texts, but was on Facebook! So I'd post a cute meme or something on her wall, thinking she'd see it and reach out, but no. Her friends would "like" the meme, but nothing from her. Finally, she posted something saying her phone was out of minutes, but that people could reach her on Skype... and I'd been trying to get her to download Skype for weeks. I responded with hostility ("Oh, so NOW you have Skype?"), and we didn't talk at all until the next day.
When we finally did talk, she was irate, telling me I had no idea how awful things had been in her life recently. She said she couldn't pay her rent or phone bill, her job was making her physically ill (from the stress), and if she couldn't pay her rent soon, she'd be homeless. This was all news to me! Nothing she'd told me previously would have indicated that any of this was going on with her, so of course, I felt unjustly blamed for my own upset. We talked a few days later on the phone, though, for a couple of hours, and I thought we'd worked things out.
However, she just continued to be distant, and went AWOL again, for a couple of days. I finally texted her and said, "If you need space, I understand, but I have no idea what's going on, so I'd really appreciate a little info" or something akin to that. She told me she'd just been incredibly stressed and hadn't been talking to ANYONE lately, let alone me. She said she would call me the next day... but of course, that didn't happen, nor did it happen the day after that. That Friday, I received news a relative had died, and it hit me pretty hard for a few reasons. All I wanted was to talk to my gf, even with all the tumult we'd been experiencing. I texted her and asked if she had time for a call. She was on her way to pick up her older kids for a 2-week visit, she said, but could talk on the way.
What ensued was utter madness. It started out with her asking about my relative, me telling her a bit, and her just saying blankly, "I'm sorry." She sounded like she couldn't have possibly been less involved in the conversation, and really didn't say much. I'm the type to try to fill the space, so I just started talking about how stressed I'd been with everything lately, and how she and I really needed to talk about what was going on, because I didn't need even MORE uncertainty in my life. It devolved into her telling me we needed to break up, because "obviously", all she was doing was hurting me. I finally ended up talking her out of it, because she continually maintained she was trying to "save" me from her... but I haven't felt okay about things since.
It's now been 2 weeks since the near-breakup, and her communication has been spotty, to say the least. In the midst of all of this, my phone starting having issues with not sending texts to hers, so I started feeling like she was ignoring me, which drives me nuts. I kept my cool, though, and yesterday, finally, I think the issue was worked out with my carrier. Over the past 2 weeks, she has texted me first only twice--- once when I'd posted on Facebook that I was having a great time at an amusement park, and another time when she wanted to let me know how sexually frustrated she was feeling (we've been together 2 months, and she's already frustrated??). Every other day, it's been me texting her, and her responses have been brief, with none of the affection she always used before we were even together. I tried to chalk it up to her having all 3 kids at home, but she dropped off the older ones last night, and was supposed to call me tonight, as it's been over a week since we've talked on the phone. So I waited... and I waited... and there was no text, no call. At 6pm, I finally texted her, asking if we were still going to talk tonight. Nothing. An hour passed. I thought maybe her phone was out of minutes again, so I jumped on Facebook... and it said she was online. So I texted, "Hi," and a minute later, I got a text (not a Facebook message response) saying, "Hey." Just "Hey." She has NEVER been so short with me. I asked if something was wrong, and she said she wasn't in a talking mood. I asked if something had happened, and she said no, she just wasn't feeling talkative.
So now I'm just feeling like I spent over a year in a fantastic long-distance quasi-friendship with a girl who, when she finally got me (because boy, did she do a lot of chasing over that year+), decided she no longer wanted me. I have no clue what to do now, as texting her too much will seem clingy, but I have no idea what she's thinking or feeling. A month ago, she was telling me that she saw marriage in our future (I felt the same). Two weeks ago, she said she was shooting for moving out here in January. I don't get it. I know this is a mammoth post, but I'd really appreciate any advice people could give. This is the first LDR I've had in 16 years, and I really feel, at this point, like if I can't just move to Iowa (or at least stay there until she can move to Colorado), this thing is dead in the water.
Comment