Moving on.

[downriver]

Hello,

 

Kind of a long post here.

 

I have a couple issues that I have trouble letting go. I've been in a long distance relationship with my girlfriend for a little over a year now. We've been together for a total of two and half years.

 

We recently got back together as a couple a month and a half ago after she broke up with me because of GIGS (Grass Is Greener Syndrome). She wanted me back and I took her back. I knew what I was doing and kept my distance, keeping it slow.

 

To get to what's bothering me, the fact that she believes in platonic relationships is weird. Personally, I think platonic relationships only work ONLY if you're not in a relationship. I remember a year ago, her guy friends and her girl friends would cuddle and be really close platonically. This was the first time I ever encountered this type of relationship, but I trusted her enough to let her do whatever.

 

However, she has a childhood guy friend who's had the hots for her for who knows how long. When my girlfriend and I become a couple, he kind of drifted away from both of us because he was also a good friend of mine.

 

Throughout the year, he and I stopped talking and gradually drifted apart. Our values in friendship is completely different. And I guess it's also because he is jealous of me. Earlier this year, before we broke up for a month, she visited him and other friends at USC. She goes to UCSD, he goes to USC, and I'm currently attending community college working on transferring to UCSD. She stayed with him because they're close friends. He offered her his bed while he was going to sleep on the ground, but my girlfriend insisted that they just share the bed. She thinks of him as a little brother, at least that's what she's always told me.

 

BUT, that night, when he went to sleep beside her, he kept saying how attracted her was to her and how hard it was for him to resist her. Apparently, they were tickling each other and being playful. He was being flirty but she only flirted back to the extent of tickling. But you know, she just thought this was all platonic. During the night, he tried putting his arm around her while they slept. I don't remember if my girlfriend told me that she pushed him away. I'm pretty sure she did. But he tried making moves on her, but she didn't do anything back. During the night, she randomly woke up and felt his hands hovering around her body... as if he was trying to caress her breasts and her butt. At this point she didn't move because she was terrified of what might have happened if she just pushed him away. I guess she values their friendship that much and didn't want to lose a place to sleep. Now this guy is terrible at friendship. My girlfriend always complains to me that even though they consider each other as best friends, he's never that good to her. He listens when he rants, but most of the time he's never there. She feels that only she does what a good friend would do. The next morning, she was getting to leave because of what happened. He called her to come back to bed, but she just told him she was going to leave.

 

This was a couple weeks before our break up. She told me everything. To this day, I still cannot forgive him for doing that. I cannot get over that fact that she didn't do anything about it. I would confront him about it, but he'll probably pull something like "Oh it's between me and her, you're not involved." He's said that to me before when they had an argument in high school. We were still a couple at that time. But in retrospect, she was my girlfriend, so I had every right to defend her or help out in some way when things aren't looking so good.

 

Anyway. Another issue is that she's still close to him to this day. He still compliments her on how cute she is and all that crap, but she doesn't reciprocate. What pisses me off is that she doesn't push him away. I mean, I guess since it's long distance, she just takes it in when I'm not around. And that scares me because at this moment, I want to keep myself busy because I've done so much for her. I know she's done stuff for me too, but in terms of affection and love, I'm displayed it in the most. I've visited her almost 7 times in the past year and I have always pick up the phone whenever she calls me. I always text back whenever she texts me. When it's vice versa, it's not the same because she's a lot more busier than I am. I'm a transfer student so I have plenty of time whereas a student at a four-year university like herself is definitely busy. Especially since it's our sophomore years in college.

 

I'm scared that if I keep myself busy in the hopes that she starts to reciprocate more in the relationship and not leave it in the back burner, she might instead go looking for intimacy and affection from this guy friend and making the excuse that it's all platonic. I think it's a TERRIBLE excuse.

 

Also, a few weeks ago, I helped my girlfriend set up her gmail account with outlook. I did too much digging and stumbled upon a chat between her and her guy friend, saying very dirty things to each other. It was during the time we were broken up, and when I confronted her about it, aside from the argument that I broke her trust since she entrusted me with her account info, she said that the chat happened because she was denied something that day. She was to go to a party to have fun with friends but it didn't work out, so she was denied a party. So she wanted to make up for it by going a little crazy with her guy friend. She says that it was when we were broken up so it shouldn't even matter anymore. I try to convince myself that as well, but it's always in the back of my head. And it comes up to full thought whenever i go on facebook and see ANYTHING about this guy. He was a good friend of mine before I met my girlfriend, but his values are so ****ing wrong. He's a good guy, but what the hell? That's my girlfriend you *******. Just because I'm farther from her and you're closer, doesn't mean you can try to steal her from me. Just the thought about everything right now just pisses me off. I don't want her to lose him as a friend because she values it. I want her to be happy. Is this some sort of sacrifice that I have to make? WHY do women have to go to that extent to make up for something they've been denied of?

 

It's all conflicting to me now. Recently I've been there for her and good to her. So has she. But there are still times where she's not really emotionally available because she has a ton of other things to do. But I've gradually made myself unavailable. I want to make myself more interesting and attractive to her because there are times where we don't have much to say and she'd rather talk about herself than me.

 

I don't know what to do. Should I just say "forget it" and do my own thing? Let her come to me? I just hate this cat and mouse game sometimes...