It has been a rough year and I haven't updated or been around because... I guess I was embarrassed and upset, mostly. Things have not been straightforward, or logical, or really favorable at all for a long time.
To say that things are resolved now would not be honest, but they are moving. I promised to give you an explanation when I was ready, and now that we are making progress, I feel it's an acceptable time to share.
I didn't realize I didn't make this post public, so for some background, you should read this post first.
So... we went on break after I left Peru to come back to the states... but we kept talking, pretty much non-stop. I was under the impression that we were working towards being together again in the near future after he started therapy.
Turns out he did not see things the same way, because only a month after I left (so around mid-October), he started dating the girl in the aforementioned post, but he neglected to tell me this until poop hit the fan in December when I posted happy birthday on his facebook wall (which I was unofficially "banned" from posting on since the break started) and he came rushing home to do damage control so she wouldn't freak out and think he was seeing me behind her back (which... he kind of was, because we were still talking pretty much all the time?).
I wanted to kick him out of my life so bad for deceiving me like that. I wanted to. But I couldn't.
We spent rough couple of months rebuilding trust and talking about the situation over and over. He told me that when I left in September, he thought that would be the last time he'd ever see me because he didn't think I'd wait around for him to stop being stupid (okay, those last few are my words, not his). We didn't have a plan to close the distance or anything and he's dumb and is apparently more afraid of commitment than he realizes because he refuses to use any visa that requires marriage or the pretense of marriage as a pre-requisite.
This was, of course, while he continued to date her, suggesting frequently that he was going to break up with her or that their relationship was ending, and him complaining about how annoying she was and how she didn't care about things. On a slightly-positive-but-stemming-from-a-really-bad-negative-so-is-it-really-a-positive-if-it-comes-from-that? note, he has acquired a new-found appreciation for me and the things I do as a result of dealing with her, and he's seeing things he took for granted and understanding his own behavior a lot better.
Occasionally he'd say he loved me. I felt so insecure, though. I hated myself for loving him. I wasn't allowed to post on any of his social media or contact him by any means other than Skype. It was ridiculously unfair and I was getting fed up with it. He kept saying he wanted to leave her, though, and eventually I convinced him to take his phone to the bathrooms and check his emails there during the day so we wouldn't have to go 22+ hours in between 1-2-hour conversations.
What's kind of sad is now that we're a lot closer and he's had time to re-evaluate, he said he realizes now that things would have been so much easier on both of us if he'd not been so stubborn about visas and we'd just gotten married while I was there. Gee, it only took a year of emotional trauma to get him to realize that... but at least he's finally growing up a bit and getting real.
In... March or April, I think, I started opening up to my friend at work about my relationship problems, and this changed... pretty much everything. My friend, who is a super-friendly Colombian post-doc married to a lawyer who lives in DC, mentioned that J could come here on a student visa if he was enrolled in an English language program, and there's is a language school about 5 minutes away from where we work that one of his friends is currently attending.
How did we not know this before?? J has had dreams of getting into graduate school, but his score on the TOEFL is just below the minimums most of his schools require. Even if things didn't work out between us, it would be a great opportunity for him to improve his English enough to raise his score.
J has wanted this for years. He wanted to be able to come here, meet my family and friends, and do things the "right" way (asking parents for permission to marry, etc) before getting married, which was the basis for his opposition to the K-1 and CR-1 visas. He wanted to do something productive besides marriage because he was too proud to do otherwise.
Anyway, this completely turned things around for us. I proposed the idea to him and, to my surprise, he actually went for it! We started doing research into how to apply for a student visa and what the requirements for the school would be. Since I'm going to be paying the deposit, though (no comments from the peanut gallery on him "using" me for a greencard, please, if you've known us for long enough you know that this is a bona-fide relationship), I told him that I wasn't going to enroll him in the school until he broke up with her, because I was sick of being disgusted by his relationship with her and sick of her in general.** That's fair, right? If I'm going to put my ass and money on the line for you, the least he could do is break up with her, right...????
**She is immature and unprofessional and has immature friends who stalk me on all my social media and report everything to her, including this website.
It took him FOREVER to do it, though, and I was pretty much getting to the point where I was jaded enough to let go if he didn't follow. And by forever, I mean like he was promising (not just suggesting) he would break up with her for about 3 months. I had to do some major arm-wrenching to get him to finally do it.
Essentially, what happened was I had been sitting on the price quotes from this language school for like 2 months without making a reservation, so they threw in a bigger discount offer after I asked if there were any more discounts available that expired like 4 days from when they made the offer. I told J about it and he really wanted to book it, but the other girl had night classes and stuff so she wouldn't agree meet with him in person until the weekend, which was too late. I was really fed up because for christ's sake, he sees her all day every day at work, is it really THAT hard to pull her aside for 10 minutes and tell her "I don't want to be in a relationship any more"?? I got so mad, and I'm not happy it had to come to that... but he finally did it.So right now we're kind of recovering from that, because she was being immature and posting all kinds of hurtful things on facebook about him so all her friends (esp. coworkers) would see and be on her side and he was upset by that and was taking out his frustration on me, saying he felt like I manipulated him into doing it when I wanted to, not when he wanted to, but like, honestly... it took you 3 months to break up with her while you kept me waiting on the side... come on...
Isn't it kind of ridiculous that I've now had to comfort my SO through a breakup...Anyway... we're sort of seeing each other again even though we have been for... like... months... he's just kind of in his grace period after breaking up with her so he has time to clean up his social media accounts and let things settle. Now we're preparing to apply for a student visa, so we'll see how it goes.
I agree with Snow that your strength is inspiring. I hope it's smooth sailing for you from now on.
My SO first moved to my country for a language course as well and not only did he learn the language really well, he also made lots of great and interesting friends! And then he got into an M.Sc. programme here!
I hope things turn around for the better for you two!
First, I would like to start stating the fact that I did everything wrong since the moment I told Rachel that I was not feeling the same anymore about our relationship. At that time-- and for about 1.5 years-- I was unable to realize and accept how unsure about the relationship I was. I have finally realized that I did not want it anymore, but I stayed in it because I was afraid of losing Rachel as a contact/friend.
I started going out with someone else at first, only as a friend, but then I started liking her. We kept going out until we kissed. I did not measure the consequences of my acts: I cheated and apologized right after, but then tried to use that as an excuse to run away from the relationship. After that, we talked so many times about what I did and how I was feeling, but I was still scared of losing contact with Rachel, so I kept lying. I even started officially dating the other girl without telling Rachel-- when we were on ‘break’-- and kept hiding everything about it, because I was scared the other relationship was not ‘as good as I expected’. The only condition the other girl always set was that I stopped lying and finished what I had with Rachel for good if I wanted anything to do with her, but I lied to her as well, since we barely stopped talking during the relationship.
I came to Rachel asking for comfort so many times when I was feeling down or my relationship was under stress due to the other girl having doubts about me not doing what she had asked me to. I was wrong comparing my new relationship with what I had with her, and it was wrong to promise Rachel that I would come back and make up for everything I had done. Instead, I kept digging the hole with more lies.
At some point-- after her second visit-- Rachel offered me to go there for an English course. It was a chance for me to get to visit a new country, and find a school for me to study later. I would also be able to see her, so she could give me a new chance. I only had to break my current relationship in order to qualify. I did not think that right either, and accepted immediately. I was already in love with the other girl, and hurt her as well with lies.
During the whole time, I lied to everyone about what was going on in my life. The last time Rachel and I talked, I promised her that I would not see anyone else anymore until we talked among other things. I only did that because I thought I had lost the other girl for good, and it would be ‘easy’ to take the chance Rachel was offering. I was wrong. I still loved the other girl and she also gave me a new chance. For the first time, I made a choice following my heart and not doing what is best for me.
I do not seek anything. I just had to finally let the truth come out and to stop lying. I want to stop being an immature coward and accept the consequences of what I have done. This whole thing was my fault, and no one else’s.