Why do we still love those that don't love us?

[dumbass2]

After 4 months I still feel that I love my ex. She is on a dating site and I see that she might be seeing someone now for at least the last few weeks. I have have gone out but have not met someone I feel anything for yet. She seems happy and I'm miserable. My misery is self inflicted. I can't stop thinking about what she is doing or thinking. Why do I care so much about that? We would never be able to get back together...ever. I can tell myself it wasn't working and I should have been the one to break up months earlier but I didn't. She obviously does not love or care about me any more, so why do I? Maybe it's just not having someone constantly in my life right now? Is that just what I really miss? Maybe I don't really lover her any more? I wish I knew. Maybe things will get easier months down the road. I want to see her again. I want to talk to her again, but I don't.

[scobro]

What you are experiencing is attachment to your ex still.I am at 5 months and I got severely betrayed by my ex but I still feel like I love her still but I know its just attachment and loneliness.I don't even want another woman right now its not my style to jump in and out of relationships and I got laid more in mylate teens early 20s to last me 5 lifetimes (professional touring heavy metal band guitarist).

So now in my early 40s having sex isn't why I would want a relationship.My ex on the other hand is 50 and acts like a 16 year old high school girl in heat.She jumps into bed and relationships like she is changing her socks so some people deal with breakups like that.To me they never really heal or take time for themselves and thats why their relationships never work out its always a rebound or casual sex.

I still miss my ex like you do but know going back wouldn't work.She cheated on me 3 years ago and called me when that relationship didn't work and 2 years later it happened again so most people don't change their true character traits.

Hang in there it gets better it sucks for me too as I don't have a lot of friends to hang with she was pretty much the person I was always with but Im fine being alone for now.I may even do a complete move across the country just to reinvent myself. Thats whats great about breakups you can really focus on yourself and your life.If i was you just go no contact and pretend she is dead and move on with your life.When you find yourself thinking about her just be aware and tell yourself its just the mind doing this because of the attachment I had with her.Mine was 5 years so it takes a while to completely get over it but you do.....good luck!!

[scobro]

I also still have the constant anxiety pains in the stomach!!

[Sad26]

After 4 months I still feel that I love my ex. She is on a dating site and I see that she might be seeing someone now for at least the last few weeks. I have have gone out but have not met someone I feel anything for yet. She seems happy and I'm miserable. My misery is self inflicted. I can't stop thinking about what she is doing or thinking. Why do I care so much about that? We would never be able to get back together...ever. I can tell myself it wasn't working and I should have been the one to break up months earlier but I didn't. She obviously does not love or care about me any more, so why do I? Maybe it's just not having someone constantly in my life right now? Is that just what I really miss? Maybe I don't really lover her any more? I wish I knew. Maybe things will get easier months down the road. I want to see her again. I want to talk to her again, but I don't.

 

I could have written word by word what you have written. I feel the same, I think the same. Additionally I was cheated on, lied and had a brutal break up.

 

I got severly bruised and lost my self respect, ego and dignity. So please don't go my road. Think of your self respect and think for your self respect you don't want to talk to her or want to be with her. This will help in you getting away from this feeling. Don't rush to find someone, it will happen when you least expect it.

 

I have started running as a hobby - suggest you pick something as well. Things will happen and you will feel better.

[dumbass2]

I could have written word by word what you have written. I feel the same, I think the same. Additionally I was cheated on, lied and had a brutal break up.

 

I got severly bruised and lost my self respect, ego and dignity. So please don't go my road. Think of your self respect and think for your self respect you don't want to talk to her or want to be with her. This will help in you getting away from this feeling. Don't rush to find someone, it will happen when you least expect it.

 

I have started running as a hobby - suggest you pick something as well. Things will happen and you will feel better.

 

I've tried, but she called me about a month ago now and weeks before that and hearing her voice was hard. It might of been hard for her two, hearing my voice because we hadn't talked in months, but she just called for herself to see what I was doing and if I was seeing someone. I kept telling myself it meant more that, but now I see her with someone else recently and it's like getting whacked by a 2x4. I am doing things but this contact every so often from her sets me back. My friend says she will still try if things aren't going well for her or she'll just want to know if you are seeing someone. She doesn't know what she wants and will probably be going from short relationship to short relationship and might need someone in between in times of loneliness.

 

I have to stop thinking about her. I do go out and do things with friends and work. I don't think I've gone a single day in 4 months without doing it and some days are down right obsessive.

Edited August 9, 2014 by dumbass2

[dumbass2]

She has no idea of the pain I am going through. I suppose she might think that I just didn't care about her any more. It was very difficult to really not fight hard for her. I accepted her decision. She broke up with me and didn't act like it. She made it so much more difficult for me. I want to send her a text, but I know she wont response. I want to call her, but I just know she wont answer or return a message. I don't want show that I'm still weak. She has moved on. I've been trying to move on for months now. I want to try and force myself into her thoughts. I want her to go through at least a little of what I am. I want her to hear my voice so at least I'm in her head, maybe just a little. I continue to torture myself by looking at the photo of her and the new guy she is starting to see. She looks happy with him. I wonder if she really is. Why the hell do I still care?

[Reels]

I feel the same too, but soon you will have to hear your brain.

 

If something is gone and you have already attempted, you should take a long break or just give up.

[Jewels7]

Ah I just posted a question about this and then saw your thread. Wish I had some meaningful advice to give you. just hang in there that's all I can say. Take one day at a time and find a way to escape your pain some. For me it's reading.

[MajorOak]

You're attachment is for the old person you once knew, they are no longer there they left a time ago. As soon as you are aware of this fact you will start to move on. Another revelation for you, you are no longer the old you either, you will be amazed how you come out of this.

[Trimmer]

You're attachment is for the old person you once knew, they are no longer there they left a time ago.

This is a huge point that you really need to focus on. You are remaining attached to the fantasy of what you had - or believed you had - before. I bet when you think of your love for her, it's all wrapped up in an image of "what was", "what we could have been", "the way things used to be..." right?

 

The thing that's keeping you stuck is that by staying attached in this way, it's like you are having a substitute relationship with a fantasy, which understandably slightly lessens the pain, but it also unfortunately allows you to avoid grieving this loss completely. It's a defense mechanism - kind of a combination of denial (that it's truly over) and bargaining (if I do just the right thing and make her see, then maybe...)

 

To break the cycle, you need to come to fully understand that this relationship is completely over. As MajorOak puts it she is no longer the person she was, and she will never be again. That person is gone. That person is part of a memory, and there is no going back. Full realization of this will hurt, and you will grieve, but for as long as you continue to deny it and keep bargaining your way around, it's going to be death by a thousand cuts - and each fantasy thought you have will be a cut.

 

An upside to all of this, as MajorOak also astutely points out, is that you are no longer that person from past memory either. Not only do you need to move on, you have the absolutely awesome opportunity to move on, move forward, and continue developing the person who you will become next.

 

Keep your focus on the future - an honest version of it - where she is not a part of your life, and you are looking and moving forward. You need to do everything you can to sever your ties to her. Release your connections. That is very clear from this passage:

 

She has no idea of the pain I am going through. I suppose she might think that I just didn't care about her any more. It was very difficult to really not fight hard for her. I accepted her decision. She broke up with me and didn't act like it. She made it so much more difficult for me. I want to send her a text, but I know she wont response. I want to call her, but I just know she wont answer or return a message. I don't want show that I'm still weak. She has moved on. I've been trying to move on for months now. I want to try and force myself into her thoughts. I want her to go through at least a little of what I am. I want her to hear my voice so at least I'm in her head, maybe just a little. I continue to torture myself by looking at the photo of her and the new guy she is starting to see. She looks happy with him. I wonder if she really is. Why the hell do I still care?

Because you still get some masochistic comfort from that continuing connection, and there's a part of that denial/bargaining part of you that just won't let go quite yet. You must take control of it, be very intentional about cutting all your connections to her, and start yourself moving forward.

 

Caring what she thinks of you is a connection to the fantasy, and it is hurting you. Break it - let it go.

 

Wanting her to understand you or feel your pain is, again, understandable, but it is a connection to her, and it is hurting you. Break it - let it go.

 

(Here comes a whack with a 2x4 in the temple...) Where the hell are you seeing a picture of her with her new guy? Defriend and Block her on FB (Do BOTH, they are two separate things, and each one has different effects) and whatever similar release and block moves you can do on any other "social media." Take her out of your contacts list on your phone, or better yet, change her name to "DoNot Answer" so that comes up if she should ever try to contact you this way. If you're a moderately clever computer guy, you will know how to set up an Email filter, either at your server, or on your local client, so any Email from her would be dumped straight to trash.

 

Don't bounce anything back, don't send a final goodbye message (Neither "F.U." nor "I.L.Y." nor anything else.) It doesn't matter the effect any of these things have on her, because all of these things are for you. Even if she hasn't, and is not going to, contact you, do them anyway as a statement to yourself of a commitment to cut the connections and move forward.

 

For me, the most powerful metaphor I could keep in my head during that hellish time was: stop looking back (i.e. cut the connections, break through the denial and bargaining, grieve the loss) and start looking and moving forward (stop caring or trying to affect her in any way at all, live your life for yourself, and start becoming the next version of you.)

Edited August 11, 2014 by Trimmer

[dumbass2]

Here I am on August 28th, 18 days later and still thinking about her, though not as much. I'm assuming she is off the dating site and now in the beginning stages of a relationship with the new man I saw her with in August. He is now in the position I was back in November last year. I wish I had it to do all over again. I've learned so much that I know I would act more like the way I normally am. I keep reflecting back on situations I did not handle like a man and I go over and over them and kick myself. Being with her turned me into something I am not, a wuss. I was a wuss around her and lost my respect and put her on a pedestal. I'm am more secure with myself now, as I thought I was before her and kick my ass for acting like I did. If I just stayed the same person I was before her. Oh, if only to do over again, I would probably be the one dumping her about 2 months earlier or else she would have stopped the crap and the relationship would have improved. Live and learn. I do still feel something for her and I shouldn't. So much I loved about her. So much that I didn't.

[mea_M]

After 4 months I still feel that I love my ex. She is on a dating site and I see that she might be seeing someone now for at least the last few weeks. I have have gone out but have not met someone I feel anything for yet. She seems happy and I'm miserable. My misery is self inflicted. I can't stop thinking about what she is doing or thinking. Why do I care so much about that? We would never be able to get back together...ever. I can tell myself it wasn't working and I should have been the one to break up months earlier but I didn't. She obviously does not love or care about me any more, so why do I? Maybe it's just not having someone constantly in my life right now? Is that just what I really miss? Maybe I don't really lover her any more? I wish I knew. Maybe things will get easier months down the road. I want to see her again. I want to talk to her again, but I don't.

 

Why, my honest opinion.. We don't love our selves enough.

 

Mea :-)

[Stsm5934]

Everyone gets through these things on their own timeline. Its hard to believe the advice other people give us where we're "in it", you just can't gain some perspective. I suggest following the advice and finding your way back to the person you were before the break-up or even the relationship.

 

Also Trimmer made a point that is extremely valid and I realize it the further I get away from being "in it". Holding on, refusing to let go, fighting for the relationship, it's all just this way of us maintaining the connection. But the connection is gone at the point the other person relinquishes it. While your still focusing on "her" or "us" you don't have to truly focus on you. What your going through right now is hard. But when we fall apart its a change to put ourselves back together in a better way.

[Missy0724]

Yes, what everyone is saying is SO true. And it really depends on each person, how long it takes to get over someone. Once you have a few or more relationships, and failed relationships, under your belt, it does become a bit "easier" in a way? Still sucks every time...but you learn with each one, and also as we age and mature, hopefully understand more about love as an "addiction" and that there are chemicals: dopamine, seratonin, etc. released into our brains, when we are in love, when we are attached to another in a romantic way. We become to depend on that. Those "feelings".

 

And once the provider of the "love drug" is gone, removed from our life, we actually go thru withdrawal. It's no different than withdrawal from any other drug, alcohol, tobacco, etc. SO SO hard, and physically and emotionally crippling... And it takes TIME for those chemicals to settle down, to leave our brains, for our brains to rewire itself.

 

Some people, depending on their personalities, if they are an addictive type personality, or not, or a codependent person or not, will heal at different rate. Some can heal in months, some take years. Some people NEVER get over an ex. I personally do not understand that in many ways, because I do believe many things are in OUR power, our CHOICE to over come, if we do the work, find the answers...Why suffer?

 

But everyone different... Just give it TIME and most importantly, vent, journal, come here and share, be with caring and supporting friends, family, keep busy, get out and EXERCISE. That really works to cut back on the stress! Do things you enjoy! LOVE YOU! Take care of you. That is your job. Not to take care of anyone else, or be concerned about this person you are no longer with, who dumped you. (if that is the case)

 

Take back YOUR POWER. Why pine for someone who does not want to be with you? That is a waste of your precious energy...and life is too short and precious, if you really think about it. Put your energy and thoughts into YOU, your life, your activities...make yourself happy. And happiness will come to you...in time...

[Polak]

Just give it TIME and most importantly, vent, journal, come here and share, be with caring and supporting friends, family, keep busy, get out and EXERCISE. That really works to cut back on the stress! Do things you enjoy! LOVE YOU! Take care of you. That is your job. Not to take care of anyone else, or be concerned about this person you are no longer with, who dumped you.

 

Take back YOUR POWER. Why pine for someone who does not want to be with you? That is a waste of your precious energy...and life is too short and precious, if you really think about it. Put your energy and thoughts into YOU, your life, your activities...make yourself happy. And happiness will come to you...in time...

 

Along with Trimmer's rock solid advice (I would actually call it wisdom, go back and re-read his post!), this is very true. Time is your friend in this battle, but you have to put in the effort. Stay busy! And yes, exercise does wonders for sure. There is a whole world out there for you to take advantage of, no need to dwell on your past. You've got this!