How can people be so thoughtless? How can people be so cruel?

[ganbare]

I always said it was like being struck by lightning..capricious, accidental, and completely life altering. I'll call her MG. Originally I thought "he" was a "she" who was lurking around my friend's blog who mostly attracted a bunch of nerd guys who exchanged ideas and opinions regarding technical matters in the computer world. But when I went to MG's blog there were pictures of sweet cakes with hearts adorned on icing and I began to suspect that we were dealing with a girl techie. So flirtations began on my friend's blog and I took the time to go through all the entries on MG's blog. I was attracted to her and sent her a short email..which led to her replying with a longer email. In the first 10 days we were sending each other 5 page emails. It was crazy. Within 2 weeks we officially were calling each other boyfriend/girlfriend and it was strange. MG lived in Malaysia and I was in Canada and we didn't even know what we looked like. I called up my friend on the blog where we met and asked him "Is it possible for two people who haven't met or don't even know what each other look like to fall in love?" His reply was "Do you think that blind people can't fall in love?"

 

In the first month for her valentines gift I created a personalized subtitles for "Slumdog Millionaire" which she adored and cherished . She said it was like going out on a date with me. But she is a muslim which means I would have to convert if I eventually wanted to marry her. (Required by Islam I might add and not something being enforced by her family) I told her that I was a free spirit and that I could not subscribe to any official religion but I would always respect her beliefs if she could respect mine. But she broke it off after 1 month because she knew she could never be with me since of my belief system. We were both heartbroken and after only 8 hours when she learned I had called my mother and cried she called me up and asked if I do believe in God. I said yes but I get to define "God" to fit in with my belief system. That was good enough for her and she took me back and I was elated that we were a couple again.

 

Due to me dragging my feet with my digital camera we went 3 whole months without exchanging pictures. Finally the fateful day came and both our hearts were beating. To our collective relief we both were attracted to each other physically so we beat the odds in that sense. I was proud to know that love can transcend boundaries and cultures. I was enamored with all the daily phone calls and videos and online chatting. Throughout our whole 1 1/2 relationship it was very rare to ever go more than 16 hours without chatting or some form of communication. She being a techie who was into freebsd (http://www.freebsd.org - basically it is an alternative Operating System like Windows, Mac OS X or Linux but for uber geeks) could log into my computer remotely and leave pop up messages on my PC and even shut it down remotely via her cellphone (with my permission of course)

 

The love and attention was amazing for me. I was on a complete high since I had someone who was focused on me 24/7. I would say too much attention and when either side felt slighted in the attention wars we would be sad. Not a very healthy thing I know. Our relationship was defined by periods of highs with regular "sad-ins" every week or two that would last anywhere from 1-3 days. Anything could set it off...I could have a flat tone on the phone...I could be playing video games while she was chatting with me and not paying enough attention to her. Once I was tired and not in the mood for phone sex. If I missed something on the phone she said if I was momentarily distracted she would be very sad. But I was a loving boyfriend who showered her with tons of attention. Whenever I was sleeping she would write to me in chat with tons of links to articles on the web and I would comment on every single one of them. We would talk on the phone and computer every day.

 

So over the next year and a half I got my passport and took a CELTA class so I could teach English overseas in Malaysia. I dragged my feet for too long and that was wrong of me. Originally it was only to have taken 8 months. In the last two weeks of my CELTA class she got her new dream job and she recognized the screename of her interview and future supervisor. It was a gentlemen that was a freebsd port manager who had come to Kuala Lumpur and my girlfriend was aware of this. When she realized it was him during the interview it worked out very well for her. After the interview she called me and was all gushing and emotional...like she had met her greatest idol...starstruck to say the least. I became sad on the phone but denied anything was wrong. But right after I got off the phone I sent her an email saying "Don't fall in love with him ok?" She said of course not and that she would never leave me for him or any other guy. I felt silly for even vocalizing this and never brought it up again.

 

Eventually the magical day came...the "One fine day" we had been talking about for ever. My CELTA class had ended and less than 48 hours later my plane was hitting the tarmac at the Kuala Lumpur airport. My girlfriend had already found me an apartment to live in the same complex she resided in with her sister, brother, and mother. Her family seemed very nice and I gave them them all the little presents that my girlfriend suggested that I buy for them. Mainly small Canadian souvenir gifts like pens, keychains, hats, shirts, cups, salt shakers, medallions, spoons etc. Her family was all present to welcome me and they served me an elaborate supper to mark the occasion of my arrival. It was all very thoughtful and nice.

 

But from there on everything went down hill. To my surprise my girlfriend said that the timing of her job was terrible. That she would be crazy busy and that we "should push the marriage down the road." She said "I can't believe I am thinking of deciding between a job and guy...this is crazy" and "You are such a nice guy...if you weren't you could hit me and make my decision so much easier" I felt this was crazy and bizarre and these were definitely break up lines. It led to a bizarre incident where we went out to eat and I told her "that she has to make a commitment or I have no business being here." I always thought we would take things slow...I would propose as she wanted me to when the time was right and we would take things from there. I was in no hurry but the way she was acting was not right. She was starting fights with me very easily about how she wanted a car even when I was being calm and rational. Eventually we got into a massive fight where I yelled at her and she was stone cold. Normally she would cry and I just wanted her attention so bad. I did something childish and inappropriate in a desperate attempt just to get her attention and she broke up with me.

 

I never did get her back. So here I was broken up after just nine days in a new country. It was my first time abroad in a foreign culture where many people couldn't speak any English. I was devastated and heartbroken. Strangely we did some kissing and hand holding and looking into each others eyes when we were officially "broken up." The physical chemistry was definitely there. It was very strange and confusing. After the breakup she had asked that I go back to Canada for six months and then come back to her when we had both somewhat "grown up." But she still kept on planning for me to populate my apartment with furniture and a stove. She said that she was not pushing me out and I was surprised that she cried when I told her I was finally leaving back to Canada. Her mother cried when I left and MG asked "Are we making a mistake?" and she sent me her last "I love you" from the back seat of the car via text message when I was being driven by her brother to the airport.

 

A month later I learned via facebook that she was having an affair with the guy who hired her. And everything clicked into place. I finally figured out that she wanted to leave me to start a new affair with her dream guy (freebsd person) but she didn't have the courage to tell me that. So she lied and said she would be busy with her job. I believe she just wanted to keep me around as a second option or backup and I was sad. I called her and said that she had cheated on me. She denied it saying that the affair happened after we broke up but I know that was not true. It explains all her strange behaviour. She was even flirting with him on his blog on the day I arrived in Malaysia. She once said during one our fights about how busy her job would be and then she turned toward me and said something which seemed out of place and puzzled me. "Too bad you didn't stick with freebsd..." I was thinking the job may be a freebsd job and yes...at one point many years ago I did install and use freebsd but how was this relevant to our conversation about juggling work with a love life? But in retrospect it made perfect sense....she was comparing her new freebsd boyfriend to a non freebsd guy like me....It all made sense in retrospect...it all clicked into place. I had been betrayed and thrown out like a used commodity. It sickened me thinking of all the love and effort we and her had both put into this relationship...how could she replace me like that? So easily? After all the work...after getting me an apartment..after telling her family that I was the one she wanted to marry.

 

I always knew that things may not have worked out. After all being with her in person was supposed to be the final test. But what surprised me is that I had been "replaced" before I even arrived...she had fallen in love with another man only two weeks before I was to leave for Malaysia.

 

Looking back I can see that I ignored all the warning signs. In the past I have been a judgemental person who sometimes see the world in black and white instead of navigating through the murky gray waters. I promised myself in the beginning of the relationship that I would follow this path as far as I could take it. And I did. I took it too far. I took it so far that I pushed down all the red flags. She had dumped her first boyfriend of two years for another man who already had a girlfriend abroad attending University in Australia. So she cheated twice in my opinion before she met me. First by sleeping with another guy while in her first relationship and second as the lesser cheat (for lack of a better word) by starting a relationship with someone who already had a girlfriend. And then she cheated for a third time with me.

 

I didn't like how she could be so selfish...even about small things. She didn't like to share chocolate with her neices and nephews...she said that she wanted to bring one of her friends to the airport so they could take a picture of us kissing for the first time but then she just wanted to get rid of her friend to spend time with me. She kept too many of the souvenir gifts for herself and I told her to spread them out more equally amongst her family. She wouldn't allow her younger neice to work out with her because her room was too small. I didn't like that at all. And she would always lie to me about her emotional mood. She would say she was fine when she was not and then justify it as saying that I already knew how she felt so it wasn't really a lie. But sometimes I didn't know and I would have to call her on the phone to see how she really sounded. Then when her tone of voice didn't match with her lovey dovey chat icons I had caught her. And she become emotionally unavailable for days at a time when she was sad. It was horrendous. I always felt emotionally abandoned during her "sad-ins".

 

And eventually she did completely abandon me. She always said how it was so easy for me to break up with her but in the end she was talking about herself. She would get jealous about girls in my CELTA class but really this was a reflection of herself. She was the one who would go astray and choose another partner...I would never do this.

 

On our year anniversary I did freak out and I did break up with her. I had had enough of the emotional ups and downs and I just cracked up and threw away all her birthday presents in the trash. (Yes I know I lost it here) But later she called me up and was so happy on the phone. She hadn't read my email yet where I broke up with her. I was sad by her happy voice and regretted breaking up with her. So after three days we patched things up but I now know I should have broken up with her a long long time ago. When she broke up with me during the first month due to our religious differences, I should have just let it go.

 

But instead I pursued it. I got a severe case of tinnitus (ringing in the ears) in February 2010. It made me lose my mind and sanity for two months which I had to adapt to the sound. I subscribe to theory proposed by Kevin Hogan and Jennifer Battaglino that 99% of all tinnitus comes after a severe bout of stress, panic, or emotional or depressive state. The relationship was taking its heavy toll and I was so addicted to the attention and "highs" that I couldn't extricate myself out which any sane person would have done. My girlfriend was there for me then. She took off time for work to investigate ways to help and get me medication...she cried when I left to go down and spend time with my parents since she wouldn't be able to chat with me as much. During my darkest hour when the tinnitus was eroding my mental sanity she uttered words which infected my heart and gave me courage... "Don't leave me because I will never leave you." But this promise was written in pencil. It was wiped out and erased without a second thought when a better opportunity for her came up. I thought I had the most devoted girl in the world. But I was wrong. I was wrong.

 

It's been one day short of a month since I last looked at her boyfriends facebook profile. She was already in a relationship officially with her new guy (and supervisor) after only two months of having the interview with him. I feel very sad and used and angry. I ask myself "How can someone be so heartless..how can someone be so cruel?" I think it would be kinder to punch someone in the face than to enact this cruelty and suffering on someone who you are supposed to love. But I know it was not meant to be. Life does go on. I am slowly starting to smile again and I know that I was never meant to be with her. And I took things too far. And I compromised my own moral beliefs by promising her to become a muslim. This relationship was doomed from the start. But I can't get over the betrayal. How could someone who I thought loved me so much just turn off their emotions for me and replace me so easily. I could never cheat on another person. Life goes on. One way or another.

[ganbare]

Yes it is a bit long! As long as people read it I am happy.

[ganbare]

Thank you for welcoming me BiAxident. I've read a lot of insightful stories on this forum and picked up a lot of good advice..

[worlybear]

Hi there. I did read your post and would like to say IMHO you're better off without her! You've had a lucky escape- with her cheating history, the relationship was doomed anyway- be thankful that you didn't get married:o.

Keep looking and keep posting!

[TomerT]

If she is so into "religion" - I am curious how is her religion "allows" cheating and be so heartless ?

[ganbare]

@worlybear - Thanks for reading! I agree completely that this is a blessing in disguise. What happened if we were married and had children and then she got this new job and relationship? That would have been an utter disaster and would have turned into an international soap opera that I'm glad never happened!

 

@TomerT - The level of hypocrisy here is amazing. To my ex's credit she always said that she was never that religious and given that she was born into this religion she never learned to study it in detail. In retrospect I view her as a tribalist on many levels. She didn't want to buy a house from a chinese person because she wanted to support her own race. (Malay) And she was fiercely loyal to her freebsd club and in the end this totally worked against me. But it is amazing. The first thing she had to do when I arrived at the Kuala Lumpur airport was to go to the praying room for 15 minutes. And on this very day she is flirting with her new boyfriend and cheating on me despite the fact that I have come literally from the other end of the globe 12 time zones away. She was very good at following the little customs and rituals. I remember she scolded me for looking in her house for my wet laundry. I just wanted to take it and dry it at my place but she informed that I was being impolite for looking around someone elses house. Fair enough. But at that point in time I didn't realize she was cheating on me. I wish I could go back in time and say "You know what else is rude? Inviting someone from the other part of the world and cheating on them!" Oh well, now I'm just rambling!

Edited October 16, 2010 by ganbare