Saw her today...memories flood, it's har

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-04-2006
Saw her today...memories flood, it's har
10
Tue, 03-13-2007 - 11:19am

Hi All,

Just a post seeking insights, words of encouragement, or thoughts.

My story is in other posts needless to say that we met through a social dance club. We were friends for 2 years, then 18 months of an intimate relationship where there was lots of push-pull from her, distancing, erratic behavior, finally we just stopped seeing each other leaving many things undiscussed. But we continued being friends, seeing each other, calling, joking, nick-names---all the same familiar intimacy leading me to believe that we would find a new direction.

Suddenly 3 weeks ago---at the gym, she casually mentions that she hasn't been dancing because she's now got a "serious" bf. Some here say that's her right. I felt the way she acted it was deliberately manipulative but whatever.

I've been hurt ever since. We've had a series of email exchanges that have gone from her saying I was wonderful, we had wonderful chemistry, I was a rare find who she loved being with...to her saying she found it hard to talk to me, that a relationship with me was hopeless---the two extremes and the blaming I see signs of commitmentphobic behaviour as outlined in Steven Carter's book. She's got every right to move on. But I hadn't realized that someone could move from one serious relationship straight into another that quick. It's hit me hard. Some of you have expressed differing opinions on that, but it how I feel.

Anyhoo....I go dancing every Tuesday and have since that bombshell 3 weeks ago. But today was the first time she came in--alone. I was overcome with emotion.

This was where we met. This was how we became close. Too many memories, too many emotions. Many people knew we were a couple, some don't know we're not. I didn't want to see her. NO CONTACT NO CONTACT. As she entered, I discretely collected my things, and left. Some people were a little surprised. I said I had to go.

I came home and sat with my emotions. I felt angry, sad, a sense of loss, grief for a lost friendship, sad at the memories, longing for the things we'd never do, disrespected by some of the things she said to me. Just plain bad.

Being "friends" with someone you're still in love with is a losing proposition. But now NO CONTACT is hard. I hate that I had to leave but the thought of seeing her, of someone asking questions, of me possibly saying something I shouldn't was not worth the risk to my self-esteem and hurt feelings.

Any comments?

iVillage Member
Registered: 02-05-2007
Tue, 03-13-2007 - 11:44am

Hi walawala,


Everything you feel is normal.

Avatar for northwestwanderer
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Tue, 03-13-2007 - 1:19pm

It sounds like taking a break from that particular venue for a while would be a good idea. Are there other venues where you can go dancing, or do you have another activity you've been meaning to try?

You're basically going through the post-breakup grieving process now--you postponed it by trying to stay friends. So it's normal to be feeling the things you are.

Sheri

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-04-2006
Tue, 03-13-2007 - 1:21pm

Thanks Itwinflame,

Yes, journal writing, reading books, reflecting on my role in all this and what I can do to avoid it in future.

I desperately want to move on but I never realized how big a role she played in various parts of my life. That club is a big part of our lives, I was president last year, we worked together on it. The question: "How could she move on with a complete stranger?" keeps nagging at me. Why the curtain call? She said she wasn't going anymore because of her new Bf. now she comes out. Is there any meaning? Too many questions, no real answers. I don't entertain any reunion fantasies---I'm too realistic, nor would I want her back into my life after the way things have unfolded.

There is also a small part of me, my self-esteem that feels "Am I unlovable?" Why would she move on so quickly if it was so "special"? I'm reading He's Scared She's Scared again which offers great insights into some of the reasons.

Some people on this board didn't think it was a CP relationship. But on reflection, the way in which she pursued me at the start and the more I resisted, the more she insisted. It had that "perfect" tone. Then when I became involved and in love suddenly she started distancing. There was the "I want to get married" push-pull. But she never left, it seemed like a kind of distancing technique and when I pulled back, she came back.

Anyway, I'm venting here in cyberspace so I don't write an email. I've deleted her number so I can't call, I don't have it which is good.

I'm goign to delete photos. But there's a part of me and I'm sure many others that has this thought in the back "What if I'm wrong? What if it's all a horrible misunderstanding and if we just talk..." But in the email exchanges we've had her main concern was that I didn't think bad of her for starting up with another guy. There's no hint at any sort of reconciliation. It's still too fresh.

The best thing I can do is disappear and demonstrate that she's no longer a priority in my life and that I'm moving on. But NO CONTACT is for my healing. She may or may not feel bad. I'm sure she'll find some way to rationalize it "Oh he's over-reacting..."
But that only insults my feelings, so having discussions, email exchanges, even "sightings" like this evenings....only prolong the healing.

Still I am healing. I ran the half-marathon, I've got great friends including female friends, I lead a fairly active social life and made sure during this relationship I never left my friends. So i'll get through this.

Thanks for all respondents for your support.

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-04-2006
Tue, 03-13-2007 - 1:29pm

Hi Sheri,

Yes, there's different venues during the week including Thursday, so I'm sure she won't go then.

There's also a big performance coming up in 2 weeks and I asked 2 very cool female friends to accompany me so that should be fun. If she's there, well, maybe I won't feel so bad in that sort of company.

But the grieving is hard. I don't want to rush into another relationship. This was 2 years of friendship, 18 months of relationship. Then...she runs off so quickly to another thing. Classic. I had prepared for this, but I guess it's one thing to prepare, but when the actual scenario unfolds, I was unprepared for the depth of my own feelings for her and the loss I now feel.

I do have a full life, friends, good job, organize things. People wouldn't necessarily think "Walawala's depressed". But I'm doing a good job at coping.

Yesterday I was doing great. I received her waffling, defensive lame email and thought "Who is this person?"

Today, my mood has shifted to one of remorse and despair.

Tomorrow, I'm sure I"ll drift between acceptance to hope to despair back to acceptance.

Healing from these push-pull relationships is never easy. While I did pull back, the depth of my feelings for her and for this relationship were greater than I thought.

I see this as a "curtain call" because she doesn't normally come out Tuesdays and suddenly she did. What could she be expecting? To reject me if I asked to dance? Or hope I'd ask her and it'd be like old times for a while?

This is why NO CONTACT is so vital. Even in that brief glimpse of that "curtain call" I'm kind of venting and upset.

Thanks for listening. Your insights are extremely helpful and supportive Sheri.

Avatar for northwestwanderer
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Tue, 03-13-2007 - 1:41pm

I'm glad to help.

One recommendation I would make is that you block her email from emailing you for the time being--I didn't realize you were still in email contact. Have you told her you need to take some time with no contact to heal? If not, I would send her an email saying that, asking for her to respect your need for no contact, saying you'll be in touch again when you're ready to be friends, and then blocking her.

She may just have expected that you could interact as friends at the dance place if you haven't told her of your need for no contact. But since I don't know what you've said to her about that, that's all speculation.

Sheri

iVillage Member
Registered: 02-05-2007
Tue, 03-13-2007 - 3:44pm

Hi again,


Some answers:


::Why the curtain call? She said she wasn't going anymore because of her new Bf. now she comes out. Is there any meaning?


This could be for a few reasons... she changed her mind, a friend told her she shouldn't give up something she really likes doing, shouldn't stay away just to make things easy for you?


::The question: "How could she move on with a complete stranger?" keeps nagging at me.


and


::There is also a small part of me, my self-esteem that feels "Am I unlovable?" Why would she move on so quickly if it was so "special"? I'm reading He's Scared She's Scared again which offers great insights into some of the reasons.


Good thing you are re-reading the book. You may never understand it because you don't think that way.

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-04-2006
Tue, 03-13-2007 - 7:56pm

Hi Sheri,

Yes, I had told her that I could not be her friend now or perhaps ever, I had written her that I had found the way in which she told me about her new bf and the "please don't tell anyone" part was insulting, insensitive and I couldn't be with her. Finally 2 days ago I had written that I was upset and it was time to say "Goodbye".

It's the classic breaking of NO CONTACT and is also classic of those CP curtain calls where they don't want to be with you, but they still continue responding to your emails so they're part of your psyche.

So I had written a polite but firm note saying Goodbye on Sunday which she did respond to, then she shows up.

Coincidence? Maybe Curtain call? Maybe. Maybe some combination of testing the waters. But the fact it upsets me is only evidence that leaving that quickly was the right thing to do.

But Sheri it's hard to just cut someone out of your life like that after knowing them for that amount of time.

It's not in my nature to be mean. I'm quite a fun, funny guy. Perhaps that could have been what lead to her taking my good nature for granted. She still claims she had no clue that I'd be upset she'd moved on so quickly. And that is the cruelest cut of all.

Thanks for the support anyway, anything else you can add is always appreciated.

I think I'm doing the right things now. It just feels like work doing them. Leaving the soiree is not something I would normally do but I felt it was best for ME to do and I"m focusing on MY feelings about this not hers. I really don't know what she feels---perhaps bad, perhaps nothing. But the point is my feelings count more than hers right now, maybe not something she's used to.

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-04-2006
Tue, 03-13-2007 - 11:49pm

hi!

Thanks, but there's no short-cut to healing or acceptance. I bounce thru those stages on a daily basis. It confuses me. There were no answers from her other than some waffle about wanting to get married and have kids. But from the facts and behaviours its a kind of smoke-screen. In her last email there was some acceptance that she never actually tried to work it out or find a compromise or discuss it. Then she blamed me saying she didn't want to pressure me and thought I'd get annoyed.

But it completely contradicts the earlier email message of our "special" connection, that I was one of the few people in the world with which she shared such "chemistry" and that in all our disputes we always found a way to resolve with good humour.

It's the sort of rationalizations and justification of her exit described in He's Scared She's Scared---one minute she's putting our relationship on some dreamy pedestal, but when pushed on it, she immediately gives the opposite response. It's confusing and for me destructive.

She's also very concerned that people don't see her as running to another relationship. Again that's the opposite of what she told me 4 weeks ago about having a "serious" bf.

Her thoughts, her feelings, her actions change from day to day and week to week. I was right to hold back but it still didn't change the hurt I"m feeling.

CP's come in different forms and that's what's confusing but in the end the outcome and patterns are all the same.

I'm almost certain there will be some additional curtain call--a regretful email, some late night phone call asking why I'm being so "mean" to her.

I breaks my heart to have to be so "mean" and ignore and cut her out, but it's a matter of emotional survival.

Steven Carter puts it very well in his "Recovery" chapter in He's Scared, She's Scared (anyone else reading this...BUT THAT BOOK if you're circumstances sound like mine!!) talks about the trap of getting caught up in your partner's conflicted behaviours and dramas---the calling asking for advice, or help.

It's hard to see what recovery looks like...it's easy to get stuck in "victimhood" and wonder "Why me?"

But I played an active role in this relationship. I had choices. I could have been more expressive, I could have left earlier and been more firm, I could have been more firm in what I expected. But as the "Passive CP" in this I accept that something in me wanted to keep it going. Some "hole" in my life enjoyed the "excitement" of having her "need" me.

I wrote in November how her behaviours were driving me crazy---getting her phone cut off, buying movie tickets for the wrong day, getting lost in a city she grew up in etc....but something about all that only dragged me in deeper rather than further. It's my time to understand why. That is the key for my inner-peace and recovery.

But ultimately it takes 2 people to make a relationship and one person to leave it. By leaving and jumping into something new, it threw my emotional equilibrium for a loop. "Saw the signs, wasn't right, I was stupid for a while..."

Avatar for northwestwanderer
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Wed, 03-14-2007 - 1:37am

If it were easy, this board wouldn't exist.

But you have to do what's best for you and right now, that's enforcing no contact. If that means you need to block her because she won't stop emailing you, then you block her.

I'm curious--do you see that you've been engaging in ambivalent CP behavior since you broke up with her? I'm not saying she's not, but she's not the only one.

Sheri

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-04-2006
Wed, 03-14-2007 - 2:54am

Hi Sheri,

Thanks and good question. I think I over-simplified my situation when I first wrote about the break-up in November.

It actually is more complicated to explain. Here's how it unfolded.

The relationship dynamic had been that I had been reluctant to get to the "next step" because of my fears of getting hurt due to 1) her rocky relationship history 2) her pursuit/panic style approach 3) her pushing for marriage commitment and break ups followed by getting back together.

Finally in October I said yes, we're in a commited relationship, let's travel, it's on.

Suddenly her behaviour changed again. She started to become more needy, insecure, calling several times a day, sms, crying, it was weird. Then the phone cut-off, the getting lost, the just plain nuttiness. I wrote here for advice on how to break up.

But that night, I didn't do it because we had dinner and I walked her to the dance studio to drop off a cheque and say goodbye before her business trip. I kissed her goodbye and left.

She sms'd back saying "Why did you abandon me?!!" Then she accused me of taking off on her. Then she wrote to apologize for over-reacting. When she got back. I had withdrawn. Then she withdrew. But we worked together on a big club project. So we never actually had "the talk".

Then over Christmas we saw each other, went out, talked about doing things, talked or sms'd every day etc etc. We didn't see each other as much but we were still part of each others' lives.

I was thinking "We're on a break".....then 4 weeks ago she let me know she was in a "serious" relationship.

Was my behaviour ambivalent? Perhaps. I think it more self-protective. But I wanted a long-term relationship. But even in her last email she admitted we never talked about things constructively, or tried to reach a compromise. Still there was no talk of a reunion.

So it's not so cut and dried and that's why my reaction to the news is so strong. I thought it was part of that sturm and drag that had become the norm in this relationship.

She pushed---I pulled, it went back and forth. We had a good rapport. We understood each other. But there was something about that pursuit/panic, the neediness that kept my boundaries and guard up. Was that interpreted as being ambivalent? Maybe.

In the end, the fact is we probably aren't right for each other because our communication styles and expectations are so different. I see her as withholding (she never even told me her age!!! Never introduce me to her parents.)

So yes, I was the passive CP in this relationship. Something about the chaos in her life attracted me. Throughout my life I've been the "fixer".

My parents had a rocky relationship and I was forced to babysit and look after my bratty brother while trying to understand and "manage" their conflicts. Big job for a 7 year old. I ended up without my own emotional needs being taken care of, my brother not appreciating me---how could he, he's 2 years younger? We were kids. But when that becomes your dynamic---it's a situation you naturally drift too because it "feels" familiar.

Breaking that pattern is not easy. I recognized it in THIS relationship and resisted. The more I resisted, the more she PURSUED... It takes strength to recognize we cannot fix our partners but we can work on our relationships if we understand ourselves better.

That is my biggest learning from this episode. Does it make it easier? A little. Am I still hurt? Yes---I saw her again at the gym today and we both looked away. This is how me and my former "best friend" are now.

I'm trying and working on it.