getting weaker and weaker, not stronger
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| Tue, 02-28-2006 - 10:13am |
sorry for this long and annoying post, i desperately need to vent. i've had a terrible week dealing with my break-up and just got a phone call from my counselor saying that she's very sick and can't come to work today. i needed my appointment so badly today, and now i feel like i'm about to go over the deep end.
i feel like i'm not getting any better from my break-up. if you see the thread about "it's been 3 weeks and i'm desperate", it'll explain everything. i truly just don't know what to do with myself anymore. i'm doing all the "right" things: working, turning to friends, throwing myself into my schoolwork (i'm a senior in college), going to therapy, going to the gym, reading...it's distracting for a bit, but the pain is so real and cuts so deep. it's just not stopping.
more than three weeks later, my appetite still isn't back, my sleeping is awful, and i'm constantly plagued by obsessive thoughts...who is he with? what is he doing? does he miss me? when will he realize that he's made the biggest mistake of his life, and come crawling back to me? why is he OK? how can he sleep at night, knowing that he caused another human being so much pain?
we have two classes together at our college, and since the campus is small, have run into each other several times. just when i think i might be doing a bit better, just SEEING him (even when there's no contact) is enough to push me right to the edge...days i see him are awful. just being near him, seeing the face that only a month ago i was holding in my hands and telling i loved and now having to be total strangers is absolutely, positively unbearable. why isn't he feeling the same things? why is he ok? we spent two wonderful years together. we were supposed to get married, start a family, open up a business together. i grew so close to his family. then boom...everything, over night, gone. i'm left to pick up the pieces.
it is so hard having to see him. we pretend as if we don't see each other, but every time we do i get a rush of panic, anxiety and devestation. this is the man i love more than anything in the world; there is nothing i wouldn't do for him. and he just threw me away. woke up one day and realized he didn't love me anymore.
this is so, so hard. i can't stand it. he left me when i needed him most. i'm so empty and alone. i feel like half a person, because my whole heart and soul is now gone. i hate seeing him. i hate that my roomate and his roomate are in a great relationship that is constantly rubbed in my face. i hate that my roomate gets to go over their apartment all the time, and probably knows a lot of things about my ex. i hate that we don't talk anymore, i hate that he's now a stranger, and i hate the emptiness i feel in his absence. i hate the person that i am without him. most of all maybe, i hate that he is OK...that is is moving on with his life, full steam ahead, while i have to force myself just go get out of bed in the morning.
i know that life isn't supposed to be fair, that somewhere in this misery there is a lesson, and that the person i'm supposed to be with is out there somewhere. but this is just unbearable. i feel like the limits of my very being are being tested, and i'm not ready to rise to the occasion. it is just setback after setback, triggered by the smallest thing. the thought of him with another girl makes me want to vomit, yet i cannot get an image of him happy with another girl out of my head. i'm just so miserable.
please, please help me to get through this. how much more time am i going to hurt? my life has been turned upside down and completely altered. i feel like i'm nothing without him. please help me.

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Oh, I'm so sorry for the pain you're going through. That must have been tough to find out your counselor had to cancel...I know there are some weeks when I *really* need to talk to mine, so I can totally empathize. Does she have a colleague you can meet with instead?
Your situation is tough because even though you're not talking to your ex, you're seeing him and that is enough contact to impede your recovery. I know there's nothing you can do about it, I'm just telling you that so you understand that it's going to take you a bit longer to get through this because you have more reminders of his existance than someone who can avoid their ex altogether. However, even with that unavoidable contact, this *will* pass, in time. It's hard to say exactly how long, but more than a handful of weeks, *especially* since you have to see him. Hang in there, keep seeing your counselor, keep doing all the other things you're doing, and keep posting and letting us know how you are. It *will* pass.
Sheri
I agree that seeing him is what is impeding your recovery. But why not turn that around to your advantage? When you break up with someone, it's human nature to focus on all the good things about the person, the things that made you fall in love with him. Instead, why not try focusing on his flaws? He HAS to have them. We all do. Look at him and really SEE him, not as some guy you've put way up on some pedestal but as a human being. Try to see him as unattractive, as someone you don't need anyway, as someone who is not deserving of you. During the process of falling in love we tend to convince ourself that everything about them is cute, from the way they comb their hair to the way they clip their toenails. It's ridiculous how much we ignore all the bad things. So the best way to fall out of love with someone is to reverse that process and with you seeing him every day, you have the luxury of being able to do that. Look at him and just think, "YUCK." Remember, you DO have power over your mind and your feelings. Take control of your brain again and force yourself to change the way you think. It can't hurt to give it a try???
Steph
Okay, lizzy, the first thing you need to do is stop calling him. Immediately. If you really want to win him back, you HAVE to give him the space he needs and you calling him is not going to help. If he wanted to talk to you, he knows your phone number. With every day you disappear from his life, he's going to wonder more and more why you aren't calling, what you're doing, if you're moving on. The second thing you need to do is get back out there. You've had your time sitting in the dark mourning him, now start to get back to your life. Set small goals for yourself -- maybe go for a walk around the block at first, then have lunch with a friend. But sitting around the place you shared together looking at all the things you shared together and drowning in the memories is not going to do you a bit of good. The third thing you need to do is quit blaming yourself. His need for space is something that is coming from inside, probably from the pressure of marrying someone and spending the rest of his life with her. That's a perfectly natural reaction and if more people did it, there sure would be a heck of a lot less divorces in this country. So give him his space and time to think and know that if he does come back, your relationship will be much stronger for him having taken it. AND, in the meantime, why don't you take some time to think about what you really want? Do some things you want to do, enjoy your single life, make sure that marriage is what you really want.
Steph
Thanks for the help. I'm not calling him, and haven't since the breakup. The temptation to do so has waned, since I don't even know why I'd call him in the first place...we have nothing to discuss, pretty much all unfinished business has been finished, and he's made it perfectly clear through his words (during the breakup) and actions (NOT contacting me, getting on with his life) that he's done with me.
I'm just having a roughhhhh time facing reality, since the reality is my worst-case scenario. I know he's not coming back, yet I pray he will. I want him to feel bad for what he's done, to be miserable like me...I've gotten rid of any and all physical things that could possibly remind me of him...He's got ALL his stuff back and then some...The reminders I have left, though, are the worst: memories of the best 2 years of my life and the realization that they are over, and the constant reminder of seeing him 3 times a week (minimum), even without the contact it's unbearable. His roomate (who dates mine) is constantly over my apartment (as he has a right to be, I know), but I can't help but miss my x even more when the roomate is here...They are best friends, and it's so uncomfortable.
I need my final semester to be over so I can just graduate, move, and try to forget about this nightmare.
Sorry...I was responding to northwestwanderer -- the girl who says she does call all the time. I got the names mixed up! But...I couldn't help but wonder. Instead of spending all your time wanting him to be miserable, how about focusing on you being happy? Isn't that the best revenge? To go on with your life, meet new people, experience new things. Think of this as the chance to start over. And then if he does come back into your life and you still want him, you'll be able to accept him as the new, improved you?
Steph
You are right, and I know it...It's just the matter of convincing my heart to believe it. I just can't come to terms with the fact that he comes out of this mess seemingly unscratched, and that I am a complete disaster. I know that obsessing about what he's doing, who he's doing it with, etc. is self-destructive and completely, 100% useless. I just can't stop...I've been distracting myself, trying to visualize pleasant images...I feel like I'm a prisoner in my own mind, with millions of unanswered questions booming in my head. HOW could he do this to me? WHY is he OK? It just seems so...so WRONG. We were so in love (or so I thought) for 2 years. We did everything together, and thought the world of one another.
They say that moving on and making a great life for yourself is the best revenge in the world, and it is. The problem is, thinking about life without him makes me sick. I know time and positive thinking are key; I just wish I could fast-forward this months from now and have this hell be over.
Thanks everyone for listening to me vent!
Huh??? I'm not calling anyone!
Sheri
wondering about what the ex is doing, who their doing it with, and (most importantly) how the f*@k can they be just getting on with their lives in such a normal fashion when we are left struggling just to breathe?? is definitely my biggest struggle too. my ex told me about how she and a gf went out for a day in the city, riding the ferry, eating caramel apples, going to the pier etc etc etc. i was trying to be cool, but inside i'm like "great, i can't eat, sleep, and stop thinking about missing you...but your life seems peachy f*@#ing keen." HOW?? SO UNFAIR! i'm angry lots of the time too, just like you and for the many of the same reasons. at some point we will have to let this anger subside, and accept our current reality. as dismal and lousy as our new reality may really be. my only consolation with that prospect is that my life probably couldn't get much worse from here, so brighter days must be ahead at some point. i'm not ready to kick myself in the butt yet to make it happen, but i know *in time* *eventually*, i will. hang in there in the meantime. you are not alone.
best
~michael
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