Almost to 5 Months NC...How I'm Doing.

[radrluv72]

Hi folks...been a while since I posted so I thought I would pop in for a status report.

 

Believe it or not, for a short while I had actually lost count of how long it had been since I implemented on my ex...just had a look at the calendar. On Friday the 20th, it'll be 20 weeks...5 MONTHS. And what a long near-5 months it's been. And to tell the truth...I wish I could say that I'd progressed since the last time I posted, which was in the early part of April. At that point, I thought my ex was just about due home from his deployment in Afghanistan--who had broke up with me (out of the blue) 2 days before he left to go overseas. When I last posted, I had lunch that day with an old business colleague of mine who I had caught up on the matter of my ex, who flat out said that my ex was most likely going to call me when he came back based on what had happened during the time we were together and how things abruptly ended when my ex freaked out on me.

 

Well, I'm about 99.9% sure that my ex returned home from his deployment the weekend of the 7th...so he's been home for a little over a week. Has he contacted me? No. And let me be clear, I'm not hanging any hopes on the fact that now that he's back that maybe during 5 months in the desert, he started to miss me and started contemplating the possibility that maybe he royally screwed up something incredible. I do think however, towards the end of his deployment, he started to get lonely, and I'm quite sure he was thinking about how to get his rocks off when he got back to the States. This is an educated guess on my part, namely because during the last month he was overseas, I had accidently made note that he was suddenly active on the personals again...the same dating site that I had met him on last September. But here's the point regarding this segment of my post...whether he's here or overseas, there was always a way for him to contact me. Because of the nature of the breakup, I'm quite sure he's not contacted me and still continuing not to contact me because he knows how badly he hurt me...and I'm quite sure he feels an immense amount of guilt that it's just easier not to deal with.

 

On that note, that leads me to where I'm at in my effort to heal from being...well, broken. There have been a few fleeting interests in terms of new men, but after a couple of weeks, the guys stop calling...kind of like cutting the head off of something and have something new pop back up in it's place. One vague interest replaces another...and probably what's most shocking to me is how much I just don't give a damn. I used to be a person that took a thrill in flirting & getting to know someone new...now I just have apathy over it. It's not because I don't want to meet someone new--I really would like to. I'm dying to meet someone how who piques my interest like my ex did. But then quickly I realize that I'm looking for someone almost exactly like my ex...and then I realize that after almost 6 months of being apart, that yes...I still love my ex as much as the day I realized that what I was feeling for him was love. And even after all this time of NC...I still want him back.

 

It's such a double-edged sword on how this whole NC thing works...the purpose is to heal. Heal, yes...I think for the most part I've done that...but I don't think that I healed correctly. There's a massive scar left. The day that he "broke" me...there were pieces of me that were scattered away...maybe shattered to the point of not repair. Kind of like a glass bulb Christmas ornament...you can glue it back together just so, but there are small pieces that you don't know where the hell they went. And even though you've done your best to put the whole thing back together and the glue seems like it'll hold, it'll never be the same shiny, pretty thing it once was...you can see the cracks and the holes. I may not have my pain anymore...but there are definitely cracks & holes. I may have to come to the point of accepting that they'll always be there.

 

I still intend to carry forward with NC, and I hold no hopes--or my breath--that he may reach out in the near future to contact me now that he's home. He left me, I didn't leave him. And as much as I still love him & want him back, I will not enter back into communication with him unless he comes back wanting to reconcile. No breadcumbs, no friendship, no maybe's. I know what he did what he did to me--I probably have a better understanding of why he ended things than he does. Only he can fix his own issue of his utter lack of confidence in himself when it came to being in a relationship with me. That being said, my only regret is that I never got to tell him what he really was to me...and that he was the most multi-faceted, wonderful, kind-hearted person that I had ever known. He was my prince and he was beautiful. And sometimes I wonder if I had been able to tell him before he gave up on us, freaked out & ran...if maybe that would have made a little bit of a difference and given him the confidence that I would have stayed faithful while he was away. I guess I'll never know.

 

I know that I'll meet someone eventually. I guess I've had the luxury of not having to worry about running into him somewhere since he was overseas, but now that he's back I'm a little paranoid. I know his old haunts and they were never necessarily places that I frequented before we started dating, but it's a small world. I'm not as much worried about seeing him with someone else...but for some reason I worry about running into him if I was with someone else. I know that a key factor is his motivation to leave me was that he thought I was too good to be true--or maybe, too good for him--and I think he was constantly suspicious that there was always someone who was going to one-up him, even though nothing could be further from the truth. I loved him...I still do. And I've never cheated on a boyfriend, ever. I can't exactly explain why it worries me more to run into him someplace while I would be with someone else as opposed to vice versa...it just does.

 

Sometimes I wish I could be the same person that I was before I met him, when I felt complete. I don't know if I'll ever be the same person that I was before him. Whether it's a good thing or a bad thing remains to be seen. And while NC for the most part has done what it's designed to do in a technical sense...well, nothing is a perfect process, is it. NC doesn't exactly come with a "money-back guarantee". It is what it is, and there don't seem to be any alternatives to the matter without setting yourself back or wallowing in your pain. All I know is that I feel like I have post-traumatic stress disorder now...the aftershocks after the dust has settled on the battle. My ex has his denial and I have my reality...guess that's all that can be said for now.

[DollyGirl12]

You sound like you have a good head on your shoulders. You still have feelings and you admit that, but you also have a good sense of reality. My ex and I have been split for over 8 months now and I feel like it's only been a month or two since I really have started to feel normal again. I spent a long time wondering why he hadn't made any effort at all to apologize for what he had done. Logically I knew the reasons why, but the thoughts kept me in that feeling sorry for myself/anger stage.

You will get to that point that you once again feel complete. It takes time, but you are on your way!!

[wish it was a dream]

You need to start thinking of the bad stuff he did to you, it sounds like you are fantasizing about this "perfect" guy, and trust me he's not perfect by the way he hurt you! I think you still have quite a bit of healing to go and you can't do that by romanticizing him.

 

I'm 6 months in and I remind myself of the bad times. So i don't seem him in that angelic light like I used to and let me tell you it makes things so much easier.

 

This is just a suggestion for you to try and help.

[radrluv72]

You need to start thinking of the bad stuff he did to you, it sounds like you are fantasizing about this "perfect" guy, and trust me he's not perfect by the way he hurt you! I think you still have quite a bit of healing to go and you can't do that by romanticizing him.

 

But here's the thing...he never did any bad stuff to me. He never cheated, lied, treated me poorly...absolutely nothing. And trust me, I've dated enough men in my 38 years to know what it really means to be treated poorly. My ex treated me like an absolute queen, which was why the sudden breakup was all the more devastating.

 

My ex was never perfect...which was part of the reason that I loved him so much. He was physically awkward, a self-admitted literary geek. Despite being a pilot in the Air Force, he was a Hemingway freak, loved music, art, spoke French, was highly educated, and at the same time loved muscle cars, hunting, gin & cigars, always claiming what a redneck he was while pouring me a glass of Pinot Noir. Most men in my life have been pretty linear. But my ex blew me away with his diversity. He had his flaws just like anyone else, and actually wasn't perfect...he was just as human as anyone else. And I loved him for all of it.

 

I have a hard time in seeing the logic in getting myself to hate him for how he handled things. He was younger than me and clearly had some maturity issues, all of which I understood & accepted in going into a relationship with him. Hating someone for not having the tools to deal with something in a more adult manner--especially when you, as the dumpee, already know why--that's wasted energy. Hating someone just means you still care. Maybe if I was younger, I could, but at this stage in my life, it doesn't make any sense, especially when he was nothing but wonderful to me while we were together. So again, I knew what I was getting into, dating someone younger than me. So slighting him for actually acting his age--when most of the time he didn't--can't do it.

 

I know that it may sound like I'm romanticizing him, but everything I've said really was the reality of who he was. Between the two of us, he was definitely the hopeless romantic, while I was the realist. He was spontaneous, I was the planner. He was carefree, I was more grounded. Maybe it was a case of opposites attracting when it came to us...but whatever it was, he made me happier than anyone else ever had, without pushing or trying. And then it just all went away.

 

No, I'm not over it. The fact that I'm even still here on LS and writing about it, almost 6 months after the breakup, is proof enough.