confused about relationship
December 9, 2012 11:52 AM Subscribe
First relationship ended a few months ago – still confused and would like some insight/opinions on the whole thing … long story inside
Short history: We first started dating in 2004, the last year of high school. We were already close/best friends, and he (let’s call him T) started developing feelings for me. I was interested in someone else, but knew that that person didn’t return my feelings. T was the logical, rational choice, as we were both introverts and had similar interests, and I did have a crush on him before, when we started high school. Over time, my feelings/attachment to him grew. We stayed together throughout the 4 years of undergrad, and in 2008, he moved with me across the country when I started grad school. This summer (2012), we separated (I suggested it, although I was more the dumpee – which you will understand later) and moved out. So, altogether, we dated for almost 8.5 years and lived together for almost 4 of those years. After the breakup, we stayed in contact, and even reconciled for 3 weeks – nothing changed, so no surprise, we didn’t work out. He was no longer interested in being together, and for a few weeks afterwards (Oct-Nov 2012), he became extremely cold, even cruel. We no longer keep in touch (he said that talking/seeing me makes him feel angry and upset), and I don’t think we will ever meet again.
What really confuses me is his anger towards me. In summer 2010, he started grad school and developed a crush on an undergrad in his lab. Over time, and despite me asking him not to get close to her, he became close friends with her – to the point where he told me, shortly before we broke up, that she was his best friend at work (she stayed to do grad school in the same lab finishing her undergrad degree). He would text her quite a bit, apparently throughout the day (while he would hardly text me). The day we broke up, he said that he developed feelings for her that were inappropriate for a friend, and that his feelings were there for some time. In fact, he told me that the feelings he had for her were as intense as the feelings he had for me, 2 years into our relationship, when they were the strongest. I was pretty devastated… but the icing on the cake was a few days later, when he went out drinking with her (and some other people from his work). He came home at around 1:00am, completely drunk and near passing out. He was apparently vomiting for some time. While he was drunk, he was crying and told me how he would be the happiest man alive if she would only return his feelings, and that he would follow her anywhere around the world. When I said that his happiness is his own responsibility, he told me that nothing mattered without her and that he wanted to die because she didn’t reciprocate his feelings … despite all of this, I helped him recover, since I felt obligated (and also we were still living together and it would be awkward if he died of alcohol poisoning …). I don’t think I’ve felt as much emotional pain in my entire life as I did that night … the next morning (I guess she was drinking a lot too?) she sent him a text message at 8:00am saying something about the lake (we live by a big lake) looking nice to swim in, so he stumbled out of bed in case she was going to swim in the lake still drunk. He was going to confess his feelings (but apparently she sent the text to everyone at work so his chance was gone).
So, after all this, and after keeping me around as a backup for about 2 years, I don’t understand how he can that angry at me. I asked him, and he said that it was because I used him for all the years together, and that I never loved him. But I felt like I did grow to love him …. He said that I never did anything to make him happy – I wrote him love letters and gave him cutesy gifts and what not, but he said those didn’t matter as what he wanted most was mindblowing sex, and I never gave that to him. I naturally have a lower sex drive (he could have sex multiple times a day/everyday), and over time, his nagging at me for sex really dampened my already-low sex drive. Near the end, I had almost no sexual desire for him, because I felt like he was probably imaging the other girl when we had sex …
Anyway, any opinions/input would be appreciated! I’m just really confused by the whole thing … and it was hard for me to condense 8.5 years of history and I didn’t really know what specific things to put here, as it feels like one giant mess to me. I’ve just been trying to improve myself in the months since the breakup, but I’m very anti-relationship right now, to the point where I wonder if maybe I’m just meant to be alone? I’m not sure I can trust someone like that again, and I feel like my faith in love has been shattered, since the ex certainly said he loved me, etc, for almost 6 years… and then he completely changed. I also don’t get how a person can change like that – he was sweet, sensitive, kind …. Then in the last 2 years, it was all about him and my feelings didn’t matter. He became selfish, arrogant, condescending (he even told me after we broke up that he had to “dumb down” his English to match my level, since English is my second language) and generally just a disgusting person…
Short history: We first started dating in 2004, the last year of high school. We were already close/best friends, and he (let’s call him T) started developing feelings for me. I was interested in someone else, but knew that that person didn’t return my feelings. T was the logical, rational choice, as we were both introverts and had similar interests, and I did have a crush on him before, when we started high school. Over time, my feelings/attachment to him grew. We stayed together throughout the 4 years of undergrad, and in 2008, he moved with me across the country when I started grad school. This summer (2012), we separated (I suggested it, although I was more the dumpee – which you will understand later) and moved out. So, altogether, we dated for almost 8.5 years and lived together for almost 4 of those years. After the breakup, we stayed in contact, and even reconciled for 3 weeks – nothing changed, so no surprise, we didn’t work out. He was no longer interested in being together, and for a few weeks afterwards (Oct-Nov 2012), he became extremely cold, even cruel. We no longer keep in touch (he said that talking/seeing me makes him feel angry and upset), and I don’t think we will ever meet again.
What really confuses me is his anger towards me. In summer 2010, he started grad school and developed a crush on an undergrad in his lab. Over time, and despite me asking him not to get close to her, he became close friends with her – to the point where he told me, shortly before we broke up, that she was his best friend at work (she stayed to do grad school in the same lab finishing her undergrad degree). He would text her quite a bit, apparently throughout the day (while he would hardly text me). The day we broke up, he said that he developed feelings for her that were inappropriate for a friend, and that his feelings were there for some time. In fact, he told me that the feelings he had for her were as intense as the feelings he had for me, 2 years into our relationship, when they were the strongest. I was pretty devastated… but the icing on the cake was a few days later, when he went out drinking with her (and some other people from his work). He came home at around 1:00am, completely drunk and near passing out. He was apparently vomiting for some time. While he was drunk, he was crying and told me how he would be the happiest man alive if she would only return his feelings, and that he would follow her anywhere around the world. When I said that his happiness is his own responsibility, he told me that nothing mattered without her and that he wanted to die because she didn’t reciprocate his feelings … despite all of this, I helped him recover, since I felt obligated (and also we were still living together and it would be awkward if he died of alcohol poisoning …). I don’t think I’ve felt as much emotional pain in my entire life as I did that night … the next morning (I guess she was drinking a lot too?) she sent him a text message at 8:00am saying something about the lake (we live by a big lake) looking nice to swim in, so he stumbled out of bed in case she was going to swim in the lake still drunk. He was going to confess his feelings (but apparently she sent the text to everyone at work so his chance was gone).
So, after all this, and after keeping me around as a backup for about 2 years, I don’t understand how he can that angry at me. I asked him, and he said that it was because I used him for all the years together, and that I never loved him. But I felt like I did grow to love him …. He said that I never did anything to make him happy – I wrote him love letters and gave him cutesy gifts and what not, but he said those didn’t matter as what he wanted most was mindblowing sex, and I never gave that to him. I naturally have a lower sex drive (he could have sex multiple times a day/everyday), and over time, his nagging at me for sex really dampened my already-low sex drive. Near the end, I had almost no sexual desire for him, because I felt like he was probably imaging the other girl when we had sex …
Anyway, any opinions/input would be appreciated! I’m just really confused by the whole thing … and it was hard for me to condense 8.5 years of history and I didn’t really know what specific things to put here, as it feels like one giant mess to me. I’ve just been trying to improve myself in the months since the breakup, but I’m very anti-relationship right now, to the point where I wonder if maybe I’m just meant to be alone? I’m not sure I can trust someone like that again, and I feel like my faith in love has been shattered, since the ex certainly said he loved me, etc, for almost 6 years… and then he completely changed. I also don’t get how a person can change like that – he was sweet, sensitive, kind …. Then in the last 2 years, it was all about him and my feelings didn’t matter. He became selfish, arrogant, condescending (he even told me after we broke up that he had to “dumb down” his English to match my level, since English is my second language) and generally just a disgusting person…
This post was deleted for the following reason: I'm sorry you are going through a hard time, but there really isn't a question here. -- LobsterMitten
The reason he's so mad is because his life is in a state of utter ruin -- he doesn't have you and he doesn't have her and he realized he screwed things up with everybody. Plus, he doesn't sound like a very nice person. In fact, he sounds like a right jerk.
So -- you. Move on. It will take a while to get over such a long relationship. Maybe even a long while. It's fine to be anti-relationship right now. But keep moving along. You will have thoughts of him -- try to make them as fleeting as possible. Get busy in many other areas of life, giving you less time to obsess over this dude. Eventually the thoughts will be fleeting of their own accord. They might even disappear. And you'll be busy, doing other things. And maybe you'll even be in another, better relationship.
posted by BlahLaLa at 12:03 PM on December 9, 2012
So -- you. Move on. It will take a while to get over such a long relationship. Maybe even a long while. It's fine to be anti-relationship right now. But keep moving along. You will have thoughts of him -- try to make them as fleeting as possible. Get busy in many other areas of life, giving you less time to obsess over this dude. Eventually the thoughts will be fleeting of their own accord. They might even disappear. And you'll be busy, doing other things. And maybe you'll even be in another, better relationship.
posted by BlahLaLa at 12:03 PM on December 9, 2012
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by Nomyte at 12:00 PM on December 9, 2012