Something a little bit different: I just broke NC, and I don't regret it

[heartbroken1996]

Hey guys,

 

I've been maintaining this thread: (http://www.loveshack.org/forums/breaking-up-reconciliation-coping/breaks-breaking-up/553574-sudden-break-up-ex-already-another-guy-i-m-absolutely-crushed) for the past couple of months here, so you can read my story if you're interested. But I wanted to give an update, and I think this deserves its own thread in case anyone is in my position.

 

Up until now I had been clinging on to some hope that my ex was going to come around, and that her current boyfriend is a rebound. I'm not going to go into detail because it isn't relevant, but I texted my ex to clear something up that I had learned about earlier today. This led to a phone call, and this phone call resulted in a systematic crushing of all of the hopes that I had been hanging on to - the hopes that were preventing me from properly moving on.

 

Never in my life have I spoken to a woman who was so indifferent and so cold, let alone one that just a couple of months ago I was discussing marriage with. But her ability to maintain the conversation without cracking even once has convinced me that right now she fully believes her story, and is fully invested in her new boyfriend. Knowing her, the latter is probably going to be short-lived, but another will come after him, and another, and another, and none of them will be me.

 

Saying I'm unhappy with this information is an understatement - I'm devastated. But for the first time in two months I feel like I'm not clouded by a false hope, and I have the closest thing to this mythical sense of "closure." And, contrary to what many around here say, this closure did not come from inside of me, but - indirectly, at least - from her.

 

Now, my situation is not your situation, and I am not saying that you should break no contact. But I do think it's worth remembering that no contact is a guideline, and not a universal law. If you have been in no contact for months like I had and were not moving on adequately, the possibility might be worth considering.

 

Now that any shred of hope I was hanging on to is gone, I'm here for the long-haul, and I'm going back to no contact for real.

[Blanco]

I've found that after a decent amount of NC, say, a couple of months, that first contact can often be a nice reality check. You're reminded that you've probably been thinking of the person and relationship that no longer exist; not the person and the situation that presently exist. For some, that first contact can be the wake-up call that, yes, it is over.

[marky00]

 

Never in my life have I spoken to a woman who was so indifferent and so cold, let alone one that just a couple of months ago I was discussing marriage with. But her ability to maintain the conversation without cracking even once has convinced me that right now she fully believes her story, and is fully invested in her new boyfriend. Knowing her, the latter is probably going to be short-lived, but another will come after him, and another, and another, and none of them will be me.

 

 

Sorry to open up a can of worms and play Devil's advocate but you can't be 100 percent sure what is behind that perceived indifference/coldness.

 

I mean.. she may have given you the killer blow to help you move on, so ironically she may actually care if you know what I mean. She knows she cant say she cares because that will just lead to false hope and more pain.

 

Also if she is in another relationship, as much as she would like to try and smooth out the break-up with you, she probably feels like she is being dishonest with her new partner.

 

I agree with you that NC for the long-haul is the best bet. One day, maybe in a year or 2, you might find out she cared more than you think.....but your not likely to get to the bottom of that now.

 

I think after reading this... I probably wont make that call after a few months more of NC. Somehow... I think i'm better off living in an ignorant bliss that she still cares a little and feels somewhat guilty about the break-up. At the end of the day, no human on earth enjoys breaking someone's heart, even your apparently selfish and cold Ex.

Edited November 24, 2015 by marky00

[heartbroken1996]

I've found that after a decent amount of NC, say, a couple of months, that first contact can often be a nice reality check. You're reminded that you've probably been thinking of the person and relationship that no longer exist; not the person and the situation that presently exist. For some, that first contact can be the wake-up call that, yes, it is over.

 

Absolutely, this is exactly how I feel. I'm not happy at all, and I learned some things that have made me furious (she has been showing all of our conversations post break-up to her new boyfriend. Not cool). But all this has done is confirmed the person that she's become.

 

Sorry to open up a can of worms and play Devil's advocate but you can't be 100 percent sure what is behind that perceived indifference/coldness.

 

I mean.. she may have given you the killer blow to help you move on, so ironically she may actually care if you know what I mean. She knows she cant say she cares because that will just lead to false hope and more pain.

 

Also if she is in another relationship, as much as she would like to try and smooth out the break-up with you, she probably feels like she is being dishonest with her new partner.

 

I agree with you that NC for the long-haul is the best bet. One day, maybe in a year or 2, you might find out she cared more than you think.....but your not likely to get to the bottom of that now.

 

You may be right, and some of this has crossed my mind. Despite the conversation, I know that she still cares about me to some extent. She does want me to be able to move on. But she wants nothing to do with me, ever again.

 

Now, she's in a brand new relationship. This relationship is in its honeymoon stage, and it began right after she got out of a fairly long term, serious relationship with me. Is there some degree of denial here? Probably. Is it a rebound? Maaaybe (though she claims she was 100% over me for the last 3 months of our relationship). But right now I need to not do what I've done for the past two months and ignore these questions. If she comes back I'll think about it, but I'm not expecting it anymore.

 

EDIT: Confirming evidence for your theory is that she made sure to really insist just how happy she is with this guy, how he's the best thing that's ever happened to her (waaay better than me) and they're going to have lots and lots of babies together. This kind of overcompensation does raise some questions for me, but I'm going to ignore those.

[marky00]

Yes your right. You need to ignore those questions.

 

I faced a very similar post break-up pattern.

 

I went NC of the bat for about 40 days or so and then re-established contact right in the middle of her honeymoon phase with her new bf. My gut feeling was telling me contacting her at that time was going to be super hurtful and counter-productive.

 

I left it for a couple of months maybe, so like 4 months or so post break-up and I felt like she was a lot more receptive. Maybe she was more relaxed because she felt I had accepted the breakup. She also said she had been fighting a lot with her new bf so she was probably less defensive about her new relationship.

 

Ur Ex may have already checked out of your relationship months ago but I still think when someone monkey branches (i.e. swings to new relationship), they don't get a chance to mourn the loss of the relationship in a healthy way. One day she will have to face the reality of what has happened.

[heartbroken1996]

She also said she had been fighting a lot with her new bf so she was probably less defensive about her new relationship.

 

Ur Ex may have already checked out of your relationship months ago but I still think when someone monkey branches (i.e. swings to new relationship), they don't get a chance to mourn the loss of the relationship in a healthy way. One day she will have to face the reality of what has happened.

 

See, this is the kind of hope that has been holding me back!

 

This was my guess at what was going on until tonight: My ex and I had a fairly nasty argument right before we broke up. In the heat of things, this lead my ex to break up with me, justifying her actions by pointing to lots of little things that had happened over the course of the relationship. After the breakup, she "monkey branched" into this rebound.

 

Now, based on some things that happened recently (see my other thread if you care) I was wondering if there was some internal doubt coming from her - some cognitive dissonance. I wondered if what she was doing was convincing herself that she made the right decision by demonizing me over and over until she took it to heart. I figured that lying to yourself like this can only last for so long, eventually it will catch up to her, and at the first sign of a crack with her new boyfriend she'll come crawling back.

 

This is the short version of the mental contortions I've been putting myself through until tonight. I still think that there's some possibility that this is going on (and I won't know until at least the new year when their honeymoon stage is over - it'll be 3 months at that point). But her story tonight was so consistent with what she's been telling me all this time, and she seemed so completely detached from me, that I think it's finally time I accept the evidence: there have been no breadcrumbs. No apologies. No reaching out from her. Her story doesn't contradict itself. There is no emotion when she talks to me.

 

I'll see in a few months, but for now I have to believe her.

[marky00]

Yeh I think to a certain extent, dumpers in some ways have to convince themselves they are making a right decision. This is when all the nasty comments come out.

 

Of course your Ex is going to do what she can in her mind to validate her decision.

 

P.S. It definitely hurts a lot when you see your Ex with someone new days after a breakup (in my case she had already started the new relationship b4 breaking with me). But in some ways, I think it would be more hurtful if she broke it off like she did to be single. I mean if someone chooses to be single over a relationship with you, then that speaks volumes that there is no feelings at all. The third party (ie new bf) does cloud what feelings might have existed which I think tends to lead to the extra questions.

[heartbroken1996]

Yeh I think to a certain extent, dumpers in some ways have to convince themselves they are making a right decision. This is when all the nasty comments come out.

 

Of course your Ex is going to do what she can in her mind to validate her decision.

 

P.S. It definitely hurts a lot when you see your Ex with someone new days after a breakup (in my case she had already started the new relationship b4 breaking with me). But in some ways, I think it would be more hurtful if she broke it off like she did to be single. I mean if someone chooses to be single over a relationship with you, then that speaks volumes that there is no feelings at all. The third party (ie new bf) does cloud what feelings might have existed which I think tends to lead to the extra questions.

 

I agree with you, for sure - I'm also really sorry about your ex cheating. I had suspected mine was, but after talking to her tonight I'm convinced that she wasn't. Maybe I'm naive, I don't know.

 

In my case my ex's reason for breaking up was that she needed to "prove to herself that she could take care of herself on her own." Now, I know this was bull**** for two reasons: 1) she's in a new relationship 2 weeks later and 2) I now know that she broke up with me because she just hated me. I don't really know where this falls on the spectrum of good breakup reasons to bad breakup reasons.

 

What I didn't mention in my initial post is that my ex made me feel extremely guilty when I spoke with her. I didn't give her the attention and affection that she needed until it was too late, and she made sure to really hammer this in. When we got together she was head over heels for me, but I'm so bad at expressing my emotions that I let the relationship slowly atrophy until she felt nothing. This realization is killing me right now, as it's starting to sink in. So, in my case, this breakup wasn't for her to be single, it was to be rid of me because I didn't start to reciprocate her feelings until it was too late.