Vagabondchica Posted July 21, 2010 Posted July 21, 2010 The history: I met my ex 6 years ago on match.com. We had a platonic friendship for 1 year, then we moved to friends with benefits. This lasted for 3 years. Although somewhere in those 3 years, it felt like more to me. We took vacations together. We hardly ever fought. We had tons of things in common. Things in the bedroom were never boring. We have similar career paths and life goals. As far as I know, we never cheated on each other. His actions were that he loved me. But on a rare occasion he would say that we were just friends. So, now its been 2 years since we "ended it" (can you end a relationship that technically never was a relationship?) And I have tried and tried and tried to be friends with him. As I mentioned our career paths are similar (though we never worked in the same company together), and that's about all I can handle talking to him about at this point. What's really killing me, is that he met a new woman, and within a month he was official in calling her his girlfriend. I had 3 years, and was never called that. I know that a lot of it is my fault for letting it go on for so long. I would like to stay friends with him, but I can't seem to let go of this resentment (to him for just letting it go on for 3 years, denying any feelings at all for me....and to me for being so stupid) The resentment is tearing me up, and its ruining our friendship. I'm so jealous that this new girl doesn't have half the things in common that we did, and yet SHE is his GIRLFRIEND. I'm jealous that I have spent 6 years on him, and she has only known him for 4 months, but gets his undivided love and attention. I'm pissed that I have spent 6 years of my 20s loving a man who could never love me back. Im pissed that she lives over an hour away, and I live down the street. (The irony is that I actually think this girl is a pretty good person, and in a different time we may have even become friends) At this point, I'm pretty sure this resentment is the reason I cannot seem to date anyone now or since. I know you probably won't believe me, but I really do NOT want him back. Why would I want to be with someone who makes me feel like crap? I want some kind of public validation...I don't really know what this would accomplish, but I want him to admit in front of friends, that we were together once, in a real relationship. Or for him to say to me privately that he loved me once, he's sorry it didn't work out...yadda yadda. Anyways, I'm tired of the misery. I want to know how to forgive (in the context of: HE will never say sorry or admit any wrongdoing...I need to let this go for my own sanity.) Why am I stuck in this rut? In the last 2 years, I have met 28 different guys, (yes, 28!) and the best I got from two of them was a second date. I'm not ugly, I am a fairly successful entreprenuer, I have many people randomly tell me things like "wow! You have such a great energy about you!" So I don't think its that I'm unlikable, stinky, or in any other way repulsive. So I'm left with the only reason being this deep seeded resentment. Please, any advice...How do you forgive?
Gradschooler Posted July 21, 2010 Posted July 21, 2010 Vagabondchica, I've been there, done that. The only advice I can give you is to give yourself more consideration. Be good to yourself. You're halfway there when you say that you're fairly attractive and there's no other reason why your dates wouldn't go well. Train your mind to think like this : What will you get out of a public validation? You have decided that you do NOT want him back (and he doesn't seem to deserve you, from what you have written). So why hurt yourself more by setting up a temptation where he admits it in public and you feel drawn to him when you've decided that you have to move on? The more you think on those lines, your instinct of self-preservation will kick in and make you think straight, forgetting the resentment. You might not be able to forgive all too soon, but you can surely forget till the forgiveness is achieved Good luck!
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