Heartbroken over a short relationship, is it possible?

[RespectfullyAlone]

I found this site in the aftermath of a short relationship. I think they hurt more than long ones sometimes because typically the break is the first "negative" aspect of it. You are in the honeymoon stage where everything is fun and BOOM!, gone. In longer relationships there's usually some angst or annoyance that precedes the break, even if only temporary, but in short relationships you only see the other person's "best" and you see a ton of potential that isn't realized. And there are few things worse than unrealized potential.

Describes what I am going through right now in the aftermath of being left instantly by my ex. Things were perfect at least for me. Great communication, amazing chemistry, fantastic sex, the whole experience was amazing. The first and only negative was her cold feet email leaving me 2 days after I was last with her, whilst I was overseas. But as it turns out she had feelings for someone else who she had been seing (don;t know to what extent yet, flirting on skype maybe, or a full on physical relationship), that she had never told me about. Thus she either cheated on him with him, and I never knew that until afterwards, or she was just in a flirty contact mode with him, then bailed on me to go back to him and then they took off 1000 miles an hour into a currently intense relationship.

 

 

I don't know how much the length of the relationship really matters if you are into that person. You tell yourself that the person you are with is perfect and that you love them. They usually tell you the same things. So when it's over, it hurts whether it's a year or a few months. I think that the way the relationship ends has more of an impact. If we were cheated on, it hurts much more than if it was a breakup that was a bit more mutual/ended on "better" terms.

For me the pain stems from getting to a point of attraction, affection and love. In some relationships this never full happens, in others it takes time, and in my recent one, it only took a few weeks. Once I'm at that point I love someone, the intensity of those feelings has no bearings on how long I have been with that person. The only difference is the amount of life experiences shared with them.

 

 

Ugh, this rings so close to home.

 

I met a guy in April, but from the time we met, dated and broke up it was only 2 months. I had a ex boyfriend who I dated for almost 4 years and I was over that relationship and healed within 3 months. I mourned over the short relationship for longer than it lasted!

I will mourn this short relationship of mine for a considerable amount of time. Way more than the actual relationship. I'm not crazy when I say this, but know most people just think you're nuts for revealing this. I wasn't in a little crush relationship, it was heavy, intense and we both loved each other. Sometimes you know right away whether you want to be with a person for life or not, other times you're not sure and you stay together until you figure that out. I knew right away with this girl.

 

Went out with my ex for 2 and a half months (end of June to mid September) before suddenly out of the blue she left me for my 'friend.' It really cut me up and I'm still not fully over it yet.

See above what happened to me. It sucks, and hurts so much as I feel had she not already been a relationship with the guy she left for me, we would have had a great future together.

 

It is quite possible.

I met my heartbreaker in early May. Granted, my experience had not even turned into a relationship. It was more of a touchy flirty friendship. We went on a date once, stayed nights together, cuddled each other to sleep, had deep conversations, occasional drunken sex, then boom. He tells me he has no feelings for me.

 

I'm not sure why he meant more to me than other guys I had been official with for years, he was just different. He was a good listener, he was never boring, he was open and honest (at least I thought he was), he was a good father, and he made me feel things.

 

He gave me butterflies when he texted me, my knees went weak when he kissed me, I would sit there next to him in anticipation, silently begging for him to speak more, because I loved everything he had to say and I wanted to know everything there was to know about him. He was the first man I had ever felt a genuine sexual attraction for. Up until him, I had only slept with my boyfriends to be a good girlfriend, but I actually wanted to be with him.

 

 

So yes, I believe you can be completely devastated over the loss of someone who still had that new glow to them. In fact, I think in some cases it hurts worse because you didn't even get a fair chance to get to know each other, as opposed to, my last relationship for example, where I knew everything about him and I ended up hating 3/4 of it. I took it more as a burden off my shoulders than a heartbreaking loss. The only thing I miss from him is the company.

I've gone through many breakups and have never felt the despair and devastation on this level with any of my previous ones. I truly felt I was going to be with this girl for a long time.

 

Agree with na49!

 

The depths of your feelings for someone can certainly be impacted by time, but that isn't the only factor. We've all dated people who were nice and fun, but could never be a life partner or for whom we would never have significant feelings, no matter how much time elapsed. Then there are others who were special even fairly early on...they just triggered something in us.

 

We simply connect more meaningfully with certain people, and do so faster than with others, whether that's a romantic connection or a platonic one.

 

I've had casual acquaintances I've known for over a decade, but they don't mean much, and never will. For whatever reason, my closest friends and I connected almost immediately, the level of (platonic) emotionally intimate sharing was there almost from the outset, and the level of effort and energy invested was large. When a misunderstanding arose, the effort to resolve the issue was swift and significant. Same thing in the workplace. Some people remain acquaintances at work and nothing more. Others become best friends, often despite very minimal contact at work.

 

So time can be a bit of a red herring. Besides depth of the connection, off the top of my head, other things that impact how a breakup affects you:

1. Dumpee vs. dumper?
   
2. Significant sacrifices made. Compromises made that a person didn't really want to make.
   
3. Whether you saw and accepted (rather than denied or ignored) signs that a breakup was inevitable.
   

 

No doubt there are others.

 

What exactly prompted the question?

Bingo. It may not be love at first sight, but you know right away there is something special about this person. With the right person, you can make more progress in a relationship in a much shorter time, than longer relationships with people you don't quite click with, but are not ready to throw in the towel.

 

I understand what you're talking about. My last ex and I were together for 4.5 years, yet after we broke up I was over him in about a month.

 

A few months later I developed a crush on another guy. It was just something superficial; I barely knew him, yet when he rejected me I was CRUSHED (hah, my crush crushed me).

 

Here's what I think the difference is, in my opinion based on these experiences. My long relationship falling apart didn't break me very much because of two core reasons. 1) I had gotten a chance to know him inside and out over those 4.5 years. I knew what the good and the bad of him and the relationship were, so it wasn't a surprise that we broke up. I knew what the issues were and what they could be. 2) The relationship had been going downhill for months, so when the clean break happened, I had already had a long time to 'mourn' if you will. It wasn't a surprise.

 

With the new guy, both elements were missing. I didn't know him, I only had the fantasy of him, which meant that all I could think about was 'what if it could've worked out? What if we WERE perfectly compatible?' I didn't know him and he didn't know me - for all I knew he could've been my soulmate. Not knowing hurt. And second, there was no period of decline. It was only stedily going up, getting more attached, feeling more lust then boom, gone. That's a shocker and it hurts.

 

Anyways, that's my take on it

 

Perfectly describes how I feel. I might add my ex told me she loved me very early on, and even said it was ok if I wasn't feeling it yet. Once I felt it however, and then said it, I was so comfortable inside saying it as I was truly feeling it. And then BOOM, it was gone!

 

i wonder if there is a better chance of getting someone back after a short term relationship rather then a long term one. And will having NC work? its just all so confusing.

I would love to know the answer to that as well. For me I have to remind myself that even though I was lied to and she was interested and probably with this other guy she left me for before whilst with me, I saw firsthand that she did fall in love with me.

 

I choose to believe that those feelings are still in her heart somewhere. She obviously hasn't dealt with them, as she bailed on me and ran back to him. Maybe someday they will resurface. And at that time, despite her feeble attempts to give an explanation as to why she was leaving me, which were all diversions anyway, as the reason was later she said she was still thinking of this other guy, I believe and hope those feelings for me will be mostly all nice and happy thoughts. We didn't fight, I didn't make a scene on my last phone call with her. While I was sad and tried to get her to change her mind, I left it at that and it's been 13 days of pure NC.