Pottig Posted January 13, 2017 Posted January 13, 2017 OK I won't go into too much detail because there's a lot of it. I posted my issue a few weeks ago on here but I have another issue now. It's been almost 4 weeks since my girlfriend (22) and I (23m) broke up after 16 months together. In a nutshell, she loved me and I loved her. She was doing a teacher training course to train to be an English teacher which she was so excited about. But unfortunately the course didn't go well at all and she became crushed and defeated, confused about what she was going to do next. As a result, she broke up with me against her best wishes because she knew she needed to "find herself" and spend some time alone. I asked if we could work it out but she said she couldn't give me an answer. A week ago I was thinking about her and asked her friend how she is doing. This is the first contact I had had with her since the 20th December (aside from a simple Happy New year text). I had been doing reasonably well at moving on at this point. She told my ex that I had asked about her and my ex came and messaged me. She was really cold towards me. She told me that she was doing "fine" but that I need to move on and hoped I knew we would never be more than friends. This took me aback slightly as it was totally unlike her. I told her that I was moving on but I just wanted to know where I stood. She said the breakup wasn't what she wanted but it was just "how it turned out." I believe it was a safeguard against her raw emotions at the time; in being cold towards me she was making sure she didn't fall back into comfort toward me. Anyway, since then I have been doing well at moving on. I have had work experience this week which has kept me occupied and I have been going to the gym with friends etc. As for her, as much as this pains me to say (and as cruel as it sounds since I only want the best for her), I can't imagine she's doing as well as I am. We were deeply in love with one another for 16 months and nobody stops loving/thinking about someone in less than a month. She is back to normality now at her part time job and she lost touch a fair bit with her friends at home, meaning I was a big part of her social life. We didn't smother each other (we live an hour apart) but I meant a lot to her. But now she has lost me, and I think she is realising that I am filling my time and the hole left by her better than she had hoped she would have herself, especially since she broke up with me. So a few days ago I noticed she blocked me and then (strangely) unblocked me on Snapchat. I assumed this was because she noticed I was just looking at her stories (she had looked at a few of mine but had stopped looking at them more recently) and didn't want to feel like I was hovering. But yesterday I saw she has deleted me from Facebook. She hasn't blocked me, but she has deleted all my friends too, and hers have deleted me. However, her profile is still public and I can still see all her photos and posts, and mine is public for people to see anyway. I was wondering what you guys think her reasons for this are. At first my heart sank, but then a few moments later I was smothered by this relieved feeling. I still love my ex, and I find it extremely hard to believe she doesn't still love me (she said when she broke up with me that she never stopped loving me, she just couldn't handle a relationship). I would take her back if she assured me she was in a better place, but as it stands I can begin to feel myself standing on my own two feet again. She is a strong-willed girl, but she is easily broken by negative things. She rarely posts on Facebook and doesn't post many Snapchat stories. My guess is she's struggling to move on and needs to delete me to stop herself from checking up on me. My good friend - who is experienced in this area - believes that this shows she is thinking about me enough still to want to try and get over me. If she had got over me and moved on already, she wouldn't have gone to this effort. As for another guy, she isn't with one. She was so honest when we broke up. She just can't manage a relationship now. At the very least there's a rebound, but honestly I don't think she has anything left to help her move on. Since New Year's with her friends she's likely just been back at her part time job and spending a lot of time alone. On New Year's Day she and her friends did write up a list of resolutions each, and my ex's had the usual "learn a new language/learn a word everyday/learn an instrument" crap on it. But she also wrote that she wants to teach English abroad and move to Sweden. A bit drastic I think, but emblematic of this "finding herself" phase she is going through. What do you guys think? I should say, since the breakup I have been commenting on other girls' stuff on Facebook. Not always in a flirty way, just about stuff we're interested in. A girl I know went to see a Shakespeare play the other night, for example, so I commented that I had been to see one in August (with my ex, incidentally). Perhaps it is this sort of thing she has seen that has made this too hard for her to cope with. I hope she is doing OK, but to me everything points to her struggling more than I am to work on herself for a while.
basil67 Posted January 13, 2017 Posted January 13, 2017 Yes, she may be struggling to get her life back on track. Being without a long term partner does take a lot of adjustment. But the fact that she's doing it tough does not equate to her wanting to try again. I would caution you against analysing why she deleted you on FB. Yes, it can be done because we need emotional space to get over them. But it can also be done because we really don't care to hear about them anymore. Or even because when we look at their profile we have moments of "Ick, what was I thinking?" Or because they are out dating and don't want exes on their friends list. It could be any of these reasons and another 10 more. I'm glad to hear that you're doing well. Keep moving forward.
Author Pottig Posted January 13, 2017 Author Posted January 13, 2017 Yes, she may be struggling to get her life back on track. Being without a long term partner does take a lot of adjustment. But the fact that she's doing it tough does not equate to her wanting to try again. I would caution you against analysing why she deleted you on FB. Yes, it can be done because we need emotional space to get over them. But it can also be done because we really don't care to hear about them anymore. Or even because when we look at their profile we have moments of "Ick, what was I thinking?" Or because they are out dating and don't want exes on their friends list. It could be any of these reasons and another 10 more. I'm glad to hear that you're doing well. Keep moving forward. Thanks. Most of the over-analysing has passed now. But this was just a strange time for her to delete me. I had not contacted her for over a week and it's been almost 4 weeks since the breakup. She did say that we could remain friends (not that I wanted to just be friends) and that we'd stay in touch when we broke up. Although this could have just been her softening the blow for both of us. As I said in the post, the dating other guys thing isn't logical to me. She loved me very much, but this wasn't enough to override what she needed to do for herself. She needs time out of a relationship. It's only been 20-or-so days since we split up. I can't imagine she's got to the point where she's moved on enough to say "I don't care about him anymore," which is why I think she's done this whilst she works on herself.
basil67 Posted January 13, 2017 Posted January 13, 2017 Of course the whole "working on myself" could also have been a line to soften the blow. While you may see that she needs to work on herself, it doesn't mean she is actually doing so.
Author Pottig Posted January 13, 2017 Author Posted January 13, 2017 Of course the whole "working on myself" could also have been a line to soften the blow. While you may see that she needs to work on herself, it doesn't mean she is actually doing so. It could have, but in hindsight I'm sure it wasn't. She was completely devastated and confused when her career choice came crashing down on top of her. I can only imagine how she must have felt. Things like that seem to have a very negative effect on her. Like she said, it wasn't what she wanted. It took her a month to build up the courage to end it with me. We loved each other and had a great thing going. Yes it's a possibility she doesn't really need to work on herself and just said that to soften the blow. But I saw her change as a person thanks to her teacher training course and she was a defeated girl when she split up with me.
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