[neptoon]

I'm having a little trouble coping with the break-up between my ex and me. We haven't talked since December and we're not friends anymore. We were together for all of 5 years and we lived together for 3 years.

At the time, I knew I had fallen out of love with him although I still loved him very much. Our relationship didn't end with a monumental fight -- we just called it quits one day. Actually, he called it quits on me but then it bounced back and forth with him saying that the relationship wasn't really over but I had found a condom in the place after I moved out and it lead me to believe that he had someone else and was probably seeing someone else on the side just before we were broke up. But I was able to confirm nothing, as the condom looked like it was there for a while and a while back we were using condoms ... I don't know and it doesn't even matter anymore whether or not he had someone else at the time.

During the relationship, he was my best friend -- he was the greatest friend I ever had because we were so alike in our interests. As time wore on, I grew to love him on a platonic level and the sex went downhill because I just didn't want to have sex with him anymore. I wanted to have children but I didn't want to have them with him because I didn't think he'd be a good father or husband. I never wanted to marry him and I knew that long before the relationship ever ended.

I had initially thought I never wanted to be married at all. Then, at the 3.5 year mark in the relationship, I got another job and met the most wonderful man. I didn't have an affair with him. I never cheated on my ex. I dreamt about this man all the time (it was a recurring dream involving kissing him just once), even after he left the place where I worked with him. I couldn't stop thinking about this man. I liked many things about this guy. This man made me want to get married and have kids.

So, when my ex broke up with me, I let it go because the relationship had transformed into something that I wanted to be platonic. Whether or not he had cheated on me doesn't matter to me anymore.

4 months go by and I still kept dreaming about that guy I worked with. I wanted absolutely no one else, I could think of no one else. It was almost 2 years since I talked to him. For all I knew, he could've gotten married, had kids, etc. etc. etc. But the one kiss dream kept occurring. I got fed up with them and decided to settle the matter once and for all in my head so I looked him up and called him. If he was married or with someone, that was it and I'd have just backed off and at least known it wasn't meant to be. It took me forever to work up the courage to call him but when I did and we met for a drink a week later, I found out he wasn't with anyone and, almost 8 months later, I'm still with him. I love him on a level that I've never loved anyone. Our interests are different but I respect them and he respects mine.

But sometimes I still have this ache inside from missing my ex. I think about the good times and I start crying. It's not that I ever want him back but I sometimes feel like a part of me died with that old relationship. I cared for him a lot as a person and friend and he taught me a lot. I had never been so close to any person before. He hurt me a lot at the end and said/did a lot of things that hurt. My ex grew into someone I didn't know.

Why do I still feel hurt about my ex and how can I stop it from ruining the relationship I'm in? I need to trust but sometimes I start thinking that if someone who was as close to me (as a friend) as my ex had been could hurt me like that, I find it really difficult to put that trust in another person. How do I overcome this in my mind?

[estakado]

Hey there:

Have you tried to write a letter [not to send] to your ex and get all of your thoughts and feelings down? I mean just write everything down and get it all out. Sometimes it works to physically see how you feel and it will validate all of your emotions that you are going through.

Another way would be to see if you can contact your ex, but that might be bad because the answers that you seek may not be the ones that you are looking for/agree with.

Have you talked to your new bf about this? sometimes another perspective helps in these things.

[neptoon]

No, I didn't talk to my new bf about it b/c I'm a bit afraid he'll misinterpret it to mean that I want my ex back. I've heard that's a big turnoff and that guys generally don't want to hear about ex-bf's so I haven't talked about it with him.

I've tried writing letters that aren't meant to be sent ... I've written so many.

My ex won't talk to me anymore because I started seeing someone and because he said his friend and his mother told him to do the no-contact thing. A few moments before I told him that I was seeing someone else, he told me that he missed me too as a friend and that he wanted us to be on somewhat speaking terms, despite what his mother said, even though he didn't want a romantic relationship anymore. I told him that was cool and that I just started seeing my current bf and he started crying.

It hurt me to hear him cry and I didn't understand it -- I thought it would be ok to tell him because he said he didn't want a relationship anymore and I thought maybe he was relieved the relationship was over like I was. He kept emphasizing how he didn't want anything romantic anymore and I had felt the same way about him for a while so I thought maybe he was verbalizing what I was feeling bad about saying. He kept saying how bad and guilty he felt about hurting me and breaking up with me but I didn't want him to feel bad about it anymore because he just did what I lacked the courage to do.

We were on ok platonic speaking terms until I told him I was seeing someone else. I think it's more that I feel inner conflict that he was my best friend and he hates me and I don't understand the reason why he hates me.

[estakado]

Hey neptoon:

From reading your posts, it seems like you need to fully give yourself time to move on as well. This means just to let go of any guilty thoughts that you have about your previous relationship. Try giving yourself a break about it for 1 day and try not to think about it at all for 1 day. If 1 day is too big of a stretch, try just a block of 4 hours, then gradually build that block.

Again from reading you posts, yeah it was a bad breakup [what breakups are ever good right?] and it seems that at 1 point your ex was on top of the situation but never expected you to move on with someone else so fast, so that could explain why he was crying and why he needs No Contact to try and heal. I dont think that he hates you. You and him talking to each other opens old wounds.

On his end, if he didnt feel like doing something the very least romantic or any work at all then he shouldnt complain about the decisions being made. I mean from my point of view, if I was dude, I would at least make a effort if the decision was made to try and gain the relationship back whether it was a friendship or relationship decision.

Yeah, stop beating yourself about this one, you deserve to experience some guilt, but not the kind of guilt that stops you from living you life.