Should I send a card or not?

[xero]

Hey everybody I'm new here. Just looking for input. Here's the backstory:

 

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Last February I started dating a girl who broke up with her bf of 2 years and immediately started a casual relationship/friendship with me. We were fooling around a couple times before she dumped her bf which she regrets. 2 weeks after we started our thing she dumped her bf. After about a month I fell for this girl. I told her I loved her a while late and a little while later she returned the words.

 

She lived in my dorm down the hall, so she just started sleeping my room for the rest of the semester. Things we pretty wonderful until the week before her graduation. She had gotten tickets to the campus dance and didn't bother to tell me she was going - let alone invite me. She apologized for being selfish. Then a few days later she graduated. The next morning she took me to the airport so I could live at home for the summer. The last words were "I Love you".

 

Well things dropped off on her end, she stopped contacting me as much and was reluctant to say I Love You.

 

So in July she dumped me but left the door open, said she just wanted to not worry about anyone else for the time being and focus on getting a job.

 

I came back to school in August and would run into her. She took me shopping once since I don't have a car here. So then I couldn't take it after some time and in September I waited for her after work (she parked next to my dorm every day). I was depressed and acting out my emotions. I told her I loved her and wanted to work on things for about 45 minutes. She said let's get ice cream next week.

 

I was pretty excited! So the next week came and she emailed me and said she got a new job and had to "prepare" and didn't know if she'd have time to get ice cream but that she'd let me know. I took this as BS and was really destroyed. I got crazy and started digging for information wherever I could get it. I found out she had started talking to another guy a few days prior, texting him all day long and all night. I was doubly destroyed.

 

I took a cab to her house but she wasn't home so I went to her older sister's house nearby since it's a bad neighborhood. I told her sister the story and decided to just go home. She took me home and told my ex what happened. The next day I told my ex to come over to talk to me, she did. She denied talking to any guys (but the next day admitted to it). But she maintained that she was not getting involved nor sleeping with anyone.

 

I went to counseling here at school b/c I knew I was acting a little drastically.

 

The next day we exchanged emails. She was angry because I was digging for information and being invasive, rightfully so. One email said "have a good year". I told her I didn't think we should talk for a few months. She replied with "I'm reluctant to say I'll want to talk to you then, this is my last communication, I'm sorry."

 

She says she didn't love me, it was just infatuation. But she was sleeping in my bed nightly for the entire semester, went on birth control with me, and multiple other things not associated with mere infatuation. I ended up talking to one of her friends once about her and he said he had been seriously concerned about her well-being multiple times. She lives with her alcoholic father and had a major episode with that her first year of college.

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This was last September and I have had no contact since. But for some reason I'm still stuck on her. Minus her issues she's unlike anyone I've met and is exactly what I want in a partner (minus the dumping part). It's been almost three months now. I don't want to call but I considered sending a xmas card since she won't be forced to respond or anything. But she'll also know I'm thinking about her. I have no idea if she's seeing someone or anything but she keeps flying through my head lately. I've dated around and it's not the same. I watched the movie Swingers and got the message that "I can't do anything to make her come back" but is that completely true?

 

Should I contact her in any way?

[carhill]

Personally, I'd pass on the card and continue dating around. This is normal. She knows you haven't forgotten her. Your experience with her started a bit unhealthily and IMO you were a bit of an ego feed for her which is now concluded. I'll be curious to hear other's opinions.

[xero]

Yeah, I'm pretty aware it started unhealthily, boy am I. I'm just glad she's not working across from my dorm anymore so I don't run into every few days.

 

As far as dating around I'm just not into the people I meet. The bad part is they are all too young for me since I'm an older student. I had originally planned on moving to this part of the country after graduation this year and working here to be with her. But now I'm not sure what I'm doing so starting something with someone else seems like a bad idea.

 

What do you mean by the ego feed is concluded? Just that I'm not kissing her butt anymore? Perhaps that's the best thing that happened? She used to ask me over and over again why I like her so much and what I see in her. So yeah you're onto to something there.

[xero]

Okay I read those threads and I guess the answer is to continue NC. With that solved any other insight by anyone should be handy for me. This is a really horrible time for me to be worrying about this crap. My senior projects and finals are almost due at my school, which is very demanding (ivy league).

 

Thanks.

[carhill]

She says she didn't love me, it was just infatuation

 

Conclusion....

 

How much older?

[xero]

The thing with her was that she would say things that weren't true to control me. The biggy was "I never want to date you again". Later she admitted she just said that because she didn't want to give me false hope.

 

I'm a little confused with the NC thing though. A card with my name in it isn't really the same as calling her or emailing her a message. Hmmm.

 

I'm 25, she just turned 22 in September. He bday was a few days after the last day I talked to her. I made her a pastel drawing which she said she'd hang in her new cubicle.

[carhill]

It's pretty simple. Her negative words are her truth. Can you accept those negative words and be a supportive friend? If not, NC. It's for your health

[xero]

It's hard to accept them as truth when she herself admitted she didn't mean it. I'm referring to her saying she didn't ever want to date me again.

 

What she said about never loving me was said when she was really pissed off at me so...I've learned that what people say is sometimes a bunch of crap and not indicative of potential realities. It may be true she wasn't in love, but that she never loved me, probably not. Based on actions alone.

[carhill]

IME, being married for nearly a decade and being twice your age, negative words are truths, whether they be intellectual or emotional truths. I implore you to believe them. Absent serious unilateral positive words and actions to the contrary, I would accept them, much as my emotions might tell me to have "hope".

[DSM-IV Tom]

Honestly?

 

You deserved it. You cheated with her when she had a bf. You deserve everything you get. And you did get it.

 

Did you think of yourself as so high and different that she would cheat WITH you, just not on you?

 

Come on, open your eyes. You're in (or outve) college, time to wake up. What goes around comes around, and it did.

[xero]

I never said she cheated on me. I'm sure she never did. We stopped doing anything after it happened a couple times because we knew it was wrong until she broke up with her bf which she was already, at that point, planning on doing. Two weeks went by where just hung out and nothing more. She only saw her bf one day per week on the weekend and she told me I gave her the courage to end what she had wanted to end for some time.

 

So yes, it was a bad sign that she did it, and she felt bad about it. We talked about it. But no I don't really feel THAT bad about it. Shoulda waited a couple weeks yeah I know that. I know it was a mistake but it was far from the biggest issue we faced. Their relationship was already over with and two weeks after it happened she told him it was.

 

So I say psychologist Tom your post doesn't quite apply.

[DSM-IV Tom]

Sorry my friend to come off so harsh but you did something that warrants no kindness or compassion. And the mere fact you admit you knew it was wrong, yet you continued in the act for some period of time, further shows you disregarded your morality.

 

She did things behind her bf's back. She did it to him. So she would (and probably did) do it to you.

 

Is that SERIOUSLY a girl you want to fight over? That's the girl you want?

 

Ever heard "Once a cheater, always a cheater"? That's 90% true. 9/10 guys or girls will continue cheating if they have done so already. Because they lack the ability to either understand or care about the possible consequences of their actions. Possibly a lack of empathy.

 

I am being so harsh with you because it's exactly what you need. You need to cut her immediately from you. Rip the ties that bind, burn the bridges now. She probably cheated on you, and the fact you're telling yourself she didn't, will only prolong the pain.

 

Understand?

 

Cut off all contact. Delete all pictures. Erase her number from your phone. Change your phone number if necessarily. Delete her from your facebook/myspace if you have either. Erase everything. Delete your entire myspace/facebook if there are comments from her.

 

Save yourself. And don't ever cheat with someone again, or this will happen again. And again.

[xero]

It's actually a tad more complicated, as people are more complicated, than ANYONE can read in 5 minutes online. Some things happened prior to us just hooking up and me NOT knowing she had a bf...at first I had no idea (she hangs out with guys a lot, and never mentioned his name) and didn't realize she was leading me on or what I had in mind. One day she said, "My boyfriend..." I crapped a brick. It led to us distancing ourselves from each other. I was upset and she came into my room crying and saying she has trouble with boundaries from things that happened in her childhood. Then a couple weeks later she had told me she had gotten into a fight with her controlling bf, who, according to her wouldn't allow her to do many things and wanted her to check in every time she was somewhere else.

 

Then...we fell into each other's grasps. She cheated on her boyfriend...if I remember...on two occasions over a period of 2 days at the most, if I remember, before we both mutually decided to stop. I think I may have mixed it up earlier. She felt bad about it. We even talked about it after we broke up and because I told her I trusted her that she wasn't cheating me. She said "good, because I'm not, and I feel bad about what happened with xxxx"

 

So I'm ignoring your advice on this one. Sorry man. Thanks for the input but things are never black and white. But you are correct in that - No I do not want to date person with weird issues. I was hoping for some time that I could give her time to do some personal growth because she obviously needs it. But right now I'm not sure what's going with us. Perhaps she's still keeping me in the back of her mind, perhaps she doesn't care anymore. I have no idea. In my fantasy world she'd do some growing up and then come back to me all straightened out with some resolve and commitment for me....but I'm not holding my breathe for that one haha.

[DSM-IV Tom]

Sorry my friend, I only could give you answers and judgements based on what you had written at the time. Now that you've filled in the black and white with color, I can see you are more or less the victim of this one and I can tell you with a clear understanding of the situation you have presented, that you must run.

 

Run like the ****ing flash boy.

[xero]

Oh yeah, I know I got screwed. And she admitted to doing me dirty. But alas, she's not horrible girl. Just has some stuff to figure out in her life. Hell, she's only 22 and still living at home...barely got her first real job. I grew up kind of early so there was a deficit there. I think I mentioned this before. I ran into one of her friends at a bar one night and he was drunk so I asked him a question about her. I though maybe they had something going. Turned out my paranoia was wrong but he did say he had been "seriously concerned" about her well-being a few different times over the 4 years he knew her at college. Pretty sad, but it was nice to hear.

[xero]

Any other thoughts? Card/no card?

[DSM-IV Tom]

My brother. No card. Seriously, absolutely 100% without a shadow of a doubt, without the shadow of a shadow of the shadow of a shadow of a doubt.

 

NO CARD.

[carhill]

Keine Karte

 

Нет карты

 

Pas de carte

 

Geen kaart

 

Inget kort

 

IOW, no card

[xero]

Last night I went to an art show and one of my ex's friends was there. THE friend that was around during this whole thing. A while back I noticed she deleted me as her friend on facebook which was funny because her page is public. I've always been nice to her in person though. Last night she started talking to my friend I went with and she said Hi and I just stood there with them. Then this other girl I met recently who is a very pretty girl waved from across the room, when I waved my ex's friend looked to see who I was waving at. Then I talked to this girl for some time standing there next to her. It was nice because a) it saves face a bit and b) I hope she goes back and tells my ex I'm talking to a pretty lady. So after the girl left I was speaking to I sat down with my ex's friend and my friend until their conversation ended. She just said, "Bye" to me and left, didn't want to chat with me for sure.

[darnay]

It's my exes birthday on Tuesday. All I can say is sending him a card would be the last thing I would do. Why in gods name would I want to wish the man who trashed my life a lovely birthday..The same goes for Christmas!

[xero]

Divorce and being dumped by a young person not knowing what they are doing are a tad different IMO.

[xero]

So I just found out that my ex is telling someone else that she loves him. And the whole breakup was about her wanting to be single and "not involved" as of September. Hurts. Now I'm getting the urge to write a letter to her about the whole thing about her reasoning for the breakup and what she did wrong and how it could have went better.

[carhill]

Definitely write the letter.

 

Definitely do not send it.

 

It's really better that they eat a silence sandwich.

[xero]

Really? Because the whole thing about it making me feel better seems to be attached to her reading it.

[carhill]

You only think it does.

 

I wish some other folks would stop by and share their experiences.