jaapowers Posted August 6, 2012 Posted August 6, 2012 I'd like to begin my thanking in advance anyone who actually responds to this with a comment because I tend to be long winded and detailed. If you actually read this post in its' entirety AND have a comment, you are awesome! Recently went through a breakup (obviously) and had gotten trapped in that bubble we tend to get trapped in when we are in relationships and whilst in that little bubble I moved to a new city and never really made friends before my breakup. So, I haven't really had the opportunity to talk to and get advice from many people. I'm not even sure where to begin. I began dating who I believed to be the love of my life nearly five years ago while I was in grad school at UNC-Chapel Hill. I was 31 and in my first year and she was 19 and in her Sophomore year of undergrad. I know, I know, it sounds crazy or like a lecherous older guy taking advantage of the naivety of a young girl but, honestly, I had no intentions of dating a teenager when I was 31. I began to back off when I discovered how young she was. But we kept talking, kept hanging out and I just kept forgetting how young she was. I look and behave young for my age so she kept forgetting how old I was. I often told people that she is a bit mature for her age and I am a bit immature for my age so we meet somewhere in the middle. Sort of like Andy and April in Parks and Recreation. We had an amazing relationship. We almost never fought. I mean, not even little daily squabbles. Nothing. We were always happy. When we had the problems I'll get to eventually it was a matter of a few hours of discussion and then that was it. The issue would be in the past. We were happy-go-lucky and in love right up until the day before all the **** hit the fan. We saw each other casually for about four months before making it exclusive, moved in together after about a year and a half (I wanted to be careful and wait even longer but circumstances ended up making it a good economical decision for both of us) then we moved to Boston when we graduated because I'd gotten a job here. Not a permanent job. I'm an actor and had gotten cast in a show here. Even though we were happy I had several reasons to believe that she might possibly cheat on me. First of all, though I didn't know exactly what happened I did know that she'd experienced some sexual abuse as a child. I knew that she'd began watching and being fascinated by porn around the age of 12 (normal for one experiencing sexual abuse). I also knew that the Summer before I met her she'd broken up with her first serious boyfriend and had gone on a rampage of promiscuity for several months. She has an extremely high sex drive and, if she had her way, we would have had a totally open relationship. She would have been cool with me messing around with other women. She never seemed to have a jealous bone in her body. She gave me every reason to believe that I was number one. She was just really curious about others physically and I accepted this as normal. I was curious about others physically. We all are while in relationships. We're human. Long story short, as great as our relationship was, I always suspected she could cheat on me. Sure enough, around June of last year, some suspicious stuff went down which led me to get nosy and read her journal. In retrospect, I don't think she was up to anything so I won't go into the tedious details of the suspicious activity. Suffice it to say I read her journal and discovered that she'd cheated on me about a year and a half prior to that time (which would have been two years into our relationship). It was with a childhood friend of her's whom she'd had sex with in the past though they never officially dated. Not only that but, according to her journal, she'd had real feelings for the guy right up until around the previous December (about six months before I read about it). After December it seemed that she'd realized how much she loved me and wanted me and that she'd realized that she was wrong about this other guy, all of this was in her journal. So, I confronted her about it. We had a long discussion in which we almost broke up. She admitted that though she was in love with me she was very curious about what she might have missed in the fun/partying category as a young woman who met her soul mate way too early. She assumed I'd be dumping her (she could tell from my behavior during the days prior to my confronting her that I must have learned about her cheating on me) and had already started looking for a new apartment. However, in this discussion, I forgave her and convinced her (perhaps naively) that this party lifestyle is not all it's cracked up to be. I'd been there. Yeah, it's fun to do drugs and go dancing and get crazy for hours at a time but that lifestyle also leads to a lot of ickiness and awkward situations and all kinds of bad things. We decided to stay together. We were immediately happy again. Believe me when I say this. She went out of her way as she had always done to show me how much she loved me. After my sister's wedding a couple of months later, I felt inspired and started thinking about marriage. I'd never thought I'd care about getting married and I still don't feel it's 100% necessary for a couple to be together forever. You know, the old, "it's just a piece of paper" theory. However, it was important to her and I figured that if we were together for five years or so then maybe that would be long enough to ensure that we could be together forever. I did NOT want to get divorced if I ever did get married. After some discussion and my telling her that I didn't know when the hell I'd have enough money for a ring she showed me a ring on Ebay that she liked that cost $100. It was kind of sweet, actually. She'd spent days looking for a really cheap ring that she liked because she didn't care about the money I spent on the ring. She just wanted to marry me. I wanted to give it another year (especially after finding out about the cheating), but she convinced me to propose and I did so a few days after Thanksgiving of last year. We'd been to her parent's place for the holiday and they had my parents over and they all met for the first time and really got along. The ring came in the mail and I did it. And, again, happy happy happy. Never any problems. Then, about three months ago or so, she began to seem a bit distant for a week or so and I asked her what was up. She admitted that she wasn't sure she was ready to get married. I convinced her it was cold feet. Then we were happy again. Two weeks later, she not only said again that she wasn't sure she was ready to get married but she also suggested we take a year off so that she could "sow her wild oats" and learn more about herself (she was only 23 by this point). She said that she wouldn't ask me to wait for her but that she hoped we could get back together after this year apart. I told her that wasn't going to work for me. Then I convinced her that the reason for her trepidation was probably all the stress in our lives at that time. We were planning a wedding and a move to New York, both within the next 8 or 9 months and with very little money to do it all with. I suggested we just say "**** it" and cut all the stress out of our lives by settling in Boston instead of moving and by not getting married. She loved this idea and, again, we were nothing but happy and in love. We also, at this point, began discussing boundaries we might be comfortable with regarding having a physically open relationship. She was actually suggesting I go out and get laid so that I could tell her about it. She thought that sounded hot. I wasn't comfortable with her doing the same so it wasn't something I was going to do. Anyway, there were some things we were both comfortable with. For example, a little making out at a club or something doesn't really bother me. Let her get drunk and have a little innocent fun. Going home with this person, though, not so much. Anyway, another two weeks later she went out with friends after work. I woke up at 4am the next morning and she was not in bed with me. I called and called and called and texted and texted. Nothing. I was up from 4am until 7am doing deep breathing exercises to calm down because I thought she might be dead. Finally, around 7am, she stumbles into the house and goes straight to the bathroom to vomit. I stepped in front of her to say, "where the hell have you . . . " and she just interrupted me to say, in the coldest tone I'd ever heard come out of her, "save it." After she slept for 7 or 8 hours I got out of her that she'd been running around the city all night with this guy from work. Just sort of walking around and making out throughout the city (personally, I think it was more than that but that's sort of beside the point). She basically told me she was done. She didn't even seem like the same person. Suddenly, she was just this cold, bitchy woman. For two weeks we had to live in the same house. I basically turned the living room into my bedroom and a lot of nights she'd stay over god knows where. Either with friends or the guy she messed around with, I don't know. She found a place to go and left about a month ago. During those two weeks there was some nastiness and weirdness on my end and understandably so. Eek, I've sort of hit a wall with my writing here. How do I tie this up? I could get into more detail here but I'm as exhausted with writing as you probably are with reading this if you've actually made it to this point. The long and the short of it is that she's given some mixed signals. Just before she left we became very civil and nice with each other. She seemed like her old self again. She said one day that she was serious about the whole, "year off" thing and then a couple days later said that she couldn't think in terms of getting back together with me if she was going to take time to focus on herself. I was pretty needy and pathetic those two weeks and gave her a lot of power which, in terms of winning her back, is not a great thing. But I've been good about not contacting her for the past month. She sent me a text letting me know she was thinking about me about four or five days ago. I want her back and yet I know that's probably not a good thing. I'm confused because I think that, as a young woman, she does need this time to find herself. However, I want to be there after she's had a year. I want her to come back. She claims she wants a year to herself but I'm afraid it's just to be with this other person. How do I remain in the picture enough so that she remains interested, knows she can have me back without me seeming needy and desperate and sustain that for a year? It's like I want to fight for her back but I also want to take that really slowly so that she gets this year to herself. I could get into the whole getting her back part more but I'm tired of writing. Thoughts? I know what kind of answers I'm going to get and I'm sure I'll agree with them. It's just that sometimes you need others to tell you the obvious. Or maybe I won't get the response I think I might. Do you think this is salvageable in the long run? GAH!! So difficult to explain every aspect of a relationship. There is so much more to go into here! But I'll leave it at this and maybe write a Part II later. In Part II I'll go into the mistakes I think I made in the relationship (even though she never cited them as reasons for leaving) and how I am changing for the better in these areas. God, this sucks dick.
Ruby65 Posted August 6, 2012 Posted August 6, 2012 As you've already said, you know the response you're going to get here. It sounds like she just wants to be single. You can cling to hope, but you're not really getting any "mixed signals"..... to her, the relationship is over and any waffling she does at this point is just her own insecurity and wanting to set you up to be a possible Plan B in case her current plan falls through or she doesn't meet anyone she likes better than you. Improving yourself or trying to change to win her back..... never works. There's nothing you can do to CONTROL the outcome of this. All you can do -- in fact your ONLY chance -- is to walk away and recognize she's going to make her own choices and decisions. Focus on YOU, YOUR LIFE, healing and moving on. Institute NC and work on making yourself feel as good as possible. Keep posting here, there's lots of support available -- you're not alone!
GLDheart Posted August 6, 2012 Posted August 6, 2012 (edited) You did nothing wrong. Yeah, sure, you can nitpick some little details here and there. But, in the end, she was just too young for you. You guys made it work but as she grew up she began to NOT want to grow up. That's all it was. The "ring" acted as a catalyst. She is YEARS away from being the kind of girl that can settle down. This is tough to imagine right now but you will have long since moved on by the time she is ready. Again, this is just the natural course of things. I'm not a huge fan of the labels "G.I.G.S." but here on this board you will find that this pattern repeats itself many many times. Quarter life crisis is another way "it" is sometimes labeled. She will contact you again BUT it will just hurt you more. It will come at a low point on a day when she's been used or dumped or lost a job or whatever. She will get nostalgic and reach out to you for support. You, like most kind men, will tell her she's beautiful and wonderful. She will feel better and then give you a hollow promise to "stay in touch" and then she will fall off the map again. This will obviously hurt you. Good luck my man. This $hit hurts. I'd hate to say it comes with the territory of dating young girls... but it kind of does. Just tell yourself you got to enjoy her for all those years but now that chapter is closed and you have to move on. What's done is done. Edited August 6, 2012 by GLDheart
YorickBrown Posted August 6, 2012 Posted August 6, 2012 @jaapowers: I would also like to begin by also thanking you for posting this "case" of yours. We practically have the same situation, in particular, the age gap thingie...and getting involved with a "girl with a history" thingie too (to put it mildly). First off, it takes a special kind of man (well, a special kind of fool;) to some) to even begin and continue this kind of relationship. I mean, you (we) knew how this was going to end eventually right? But yeah, I know, you thought you could "save" her (read: change her) right? Big mistake there buddy. I'm not saying, it can't be done, Im just saying its going to take some kind of miracle and martyrdom on your part in order to pull it off....you'd have a better chance of getting nominated for an Oscar (or you may need to) Second mistake, marriage?!? Really?!? My ex and I kinda got into this stage also (after about a year or so of being a "couple") and I'm the one who got "cold feet". She..."they" are just not that type of girls (which they still are literally) that you get married to...Again, I'm not saying NEVER...but really? You're an actor....why the hell would you want to get tied down anyways?!? Look, I get it, it's the age thing right? You want to already play "husband" and "dad with kids" roles... Last but not least, do you really want to salvage the relationship?!? I'm actually quite "impressed" that you lasted that long in the first place after everything you had to put up with....the most I could do was year...(but then again, you're a "Hollywood" kinda guy;))...Look, you have to cut her loose, move away from her (I did with my ex) and totally cut off contact (put as much time and distance)....and as cheesy as this sounds, if you still end up together then you're really MFEO...but then, we all know that only happens in movies
Chi townD Posted August 6, 2012 Posted August 6, 2012 Dude! Stop being a cuckold! Have some self respect! You went from being happy and ready to marry the girl that you love to having her screwing other guys and rubbing your face with that fact! DO you buy condoms for her too? Dude, wake up! She isn't the girl you fell in love with! That girl is gone! The girl that's there is a girl that wants to party and lets other guys use her body! You deserve so much better! If she TRUELY loved you, then the idea of having someone else have sex with her would make her sick. She would feel guilt and remorse? Has she done that? NOPE!!! She just does it again and again....... Drop her, you deserve better and there are girls out there that would love and cherish the guy she's with. You treat a woman with love and respect and she will return it in kind. This girl isn't it. She wants her cake and to eat it too. You need to move out and go NC on this girl. Time to heal and move on.
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