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Is it normal to feel really needy and sad upon seeing an "ex" w/ a new girlfriend


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Posted (edited)

?**

 

The guy I'm talking about isn't even technically an ex. In fact, I've never even met him in person.

 

It's a long story, but about a year and a half ago when I was more or less bedbound due to a health issue, I started talking to this guy who just happened to be in the same match as me when I was playing an online drawing game. At first, I just casually said, "You're cute" while we were playing the game because I figured what the heck, I'm never going to see nor talk to this guy again. Then later, he and I started talking a lot online. It turned out that he was working from home at the time and hardly ever left his house either due to a severe depression he was going through. So we both had a lot of time on our hands and were going through difficult times and more or less both just kind of "needed someone."

 

We spent several months talking to one another and having pretty sentimental conversations. You would have thought we were boyfriend and girlfriend had you read the conversations; I mean, we pretty much were except we lived in different countries (I'm in the US. He's in the UK.) I'd never met a guy I felt I could be comfortable being that vulnerable around, and part of me thinks I never will again. We started talking about how when we both had more money and were feeling better, we would go on all of these trips together and stuff, and one day, I told him that realistically speaking we would never be an actual couple because there were just too many things standing in our way (most significantly, he's tied down to the UK because his kids' mother lives there, and I can't leave the US because I'm studying to enter into med school here). I didn't want either of us to get hurt, so I thought it best to stop having those conversations and getting our hopes up. I told him I completely understood if he wanted to stop talking to me because I didn't want to be the chick who "friend zones" a guy that guys are always complaining about; I just didn't want him especially to feel like he couldn't go out and date girls he could actually physically be with because he was sitting around waiting for this girl across the ocean. He said he understood my wanting to be a realist and still wanted to keep me around as a friend...he described it as being my "pen pal."

 

Except after I said this, he seemed to get really distant and talked to me a lot less, and when he did talk to me, it'd be awkward because he said he didn't actually know how to talk to me like just a friend. Eventually, I deleted him off of Facebook because he hardly ever spoke to me anyway and wasn't there the one time I really needed somebody to talk to on the day I had an MRI to check if I had a brain tumor. I never heard from him again and just kind of went about my life for the next year and a half.

 

A few weeks ago, I looked at his profile and saw that he JUST started dating a girl. I didn't think it'd affect me at all to see him with another woman, but after sitting there trying to convince myself to not let it bother me for a while, I just started bawling. Ever since, I've been doing a lot of daydreaming about going on trips with him and cuddling with him and stuff like I used to do when we would talk about going on trips together and stuff. I feel so stupid because I didn't even have a real relationship with this guy, and I'm sitting here daydreaming about being held by him and stuff and sad that he's gone.

 

Is this a normal reaction, or am I just crazy? I keep telling myself to stop being so stupid considering I had never even met the dude, and I'll laugh at myself and not think about the entire situation for a while. But then several hours later, I'm back to thinking about him and wondering how I can bring him back into my life (I wouldn't actually try to contact him...I'm not that crazy, and good for him and the new girl if they're happy). Am I just being really pathetic, and how do I just erase him from my mind for good?

 

Edit*

I guess maybe it's worth mentioning that I'm 24 years old and have never been in a relationship before unless you count the pseudo-relationship I had with this guy. So I guess part of why I'm more emotional about the whole situation is that it's the closest thing I've ever felt to being in love and the only real frame of reference I have. I'd probably also feel less like I'll never find someone I'm so comfortable talking with again if I had ever had a relationship before. I'm essentially one of those forever aloner types...I didn't think I'd ever be able to click with anyone period until I started talking to him (and yes, I'm completely aware that I may have felt completely different had we met in person).

Edited by DoesThatMakeMeCrazy
Posted

Something great had happened and you let it go away. It's the chance you let go that's making you sad, not the guy. That's perfectly normal, having to regret somehting that could have led to something wonderful.

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Posted (edited)
Something great had happened and you let it go away. It's the chance you let go that's making you sad, not the guy. That's perfectly normal, having to regret somehting that could have led to something wonderful.

I think you're right. I know the entire situation was pathetic and going nowhere, and I think that's what I'm mostly upset about - the fact that when I found someone I felt a connection to for once in my life, it couldn't go anywhere because of various circumstances. And selfishly, I'm mad at myself for messing it up before we met in person because I've always wanted to go to places we talked about like London and have especially always wanted to visit such places with a guy I really liked. I don't actually think I want to be with him in the end; I think there are too many factors that would have caused us to not work out. I think I just wanted the experience of being physically with him and doing fun things with him for a while, which is largely why I had to push on the brakes and say "Hey, we'll never wind up together." I felt like not being upfront would've been selfish and akin to stringing him along; *I* knew we'd never wind up together long-term, but I'm not sure that he did. Part of me thinks he thought I would just move to the UK for him, but I knew it wasn't a possibility. I also knew that even if I could move there, I wasn't so sure that the fact that he had children and would always have his ex coming around because of them was something that would ever stop being weird to me as someone who doesn't even want kids. Just being honest there. It sometimes felt like he was looking for someone to step in and be a mom to his kids because he would always talk about how terrible their mom was and how she basically paid no attention to them, and I'm so not the woman to take on that role.

 

So I guess I'll just keep reminding myself of how it was impossible for us to ever work out no matter how badly I wanted us to until I get past this weird visceral reaction to him with someone else. I dunno!

Edited by DoesThatMakeMeCrazy
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