Completely ghosted. after 2 years. hurts very bad.

[Ruby Slippers]

Feel better soon!

[dangerous]

I think there are only two options for you OP (after you get over your illness of course):

1. Move on, as you seem to be doing, lean on friends and family, but guard yourself against her appearing. but the not knowing might lengthen the self doubt etc.

2. Face it, and drive over there. Take a friend to support you. See for yourself then move on: closure. Do not go with the hope of reconciliation, but purely to confirm what a spineless person she is. You sound strong, so I suspect this may be the best course of action for your peace of mind, then you can move on quicker.

[Michael Golowyn]

I can understand what you are experiencing as I've been through it many times before.  And as much as it sucks, it's going to be the best thing that's happened to you, and you can thank her later.  But all the best advice in the world won't help you to realize that when the emotions are running sky high in your mind and body.  What most don't realize is that a breakup grief or any form of grief for that matter, whether its from death, divorce, breakup etc is a symptom of withdrawal.  You are withdrawing from an addiction, and the addiction is in the form of being infatuated with the 'nice' and 'good' things you can remember experiencing with and associating that person, and blind to the downsides.  It's proven that the same areas in the brain light up with activity when someone is experiencing 'heartbreak' from losing a partner as with someone experiencing withdrawals from cocaine or some other powerful narcotic.  So it's no joke, and it's worth breaking through to the other side, sooner rather than later, otherwise it will start to put us on a downward spiral if not addressed.  I can dig the study I'm referring to up if anyone is interested, but for our purposes the quickest way to move on from this feeling is to negatively appraise the relationship.  I'll elaborate below.

Because at the moment you are seeing more positives than negatives about a relationship with her.  This is usually caused by infatuations about the things you miss in them because you're conscious of the good aspects of them, and blind (read-unconscious) of the 'bad' aspects of those things you miss in that person.  This creates an imbalance in your mind causing the polarity for the emotions (energy) you're feeling to come up.  To neutralize the emotions you need to see the actuality of the situation and not hold the relationship with her on such a pedestal - which is your current reality, as this is a distortion of actuality based on our biased perceptions.  To get the negatives out of your subconscious and into you're conscious awareness requires some work but the feelings of heartbreak and grief wont only subside but, done properly, will leave you for good (until the next pretty thing that comes along of course).  So stack up the negatives of being a relationship with her to your own life and anything that means alot to you, and keep going until you start to see the grip of heartbreak start slacking off.  Eg.  there were fights, misunderstandings, confusion, frustration, sacrifices from receiving the 'good' things in the relationship.  Identify them, each and every memory.

The next step is to pay attention to who starts showing up in your life providing you with the things your ex used to provide.  The things you missed in her, are still in your life but have been fragmented out into the many people already existing and new people showing up in your life and in your awareness as new connections and opportunities.  In the least she has given your life back - embrace it.  The more you pay attention and appreciate the great new things you are getting in all these other people in their new forms, as they appear and have since the moment your ex took off, it will restore the balance to your mind and you wont be missing them anymore or reaching for a rebound, or any other quick fix because you'll see you life is complete and you're surrounded full of love already as it is.  

There is much more you can do but I've given you alot so far and should get you a long ways to moving on in the shortest time possible.  Goodluck.

 

[CTAtlanta]

Thank you for the well wishes, all.  Went to the hospital today for Covid test...I feel like pure sh#t.  Massive headaches, nonstop terrible congestion/coughing, etc.  Will get results back in 3 days.  Since my daughter tested positive it's likely I have it as well.

As Michael alludes to, I'm starting to get to that anger stage.  No longer am I sitting around swooning over how fantastic it was 24X7, but now I'm starting to recall the bad things, too.  I'm not suggesting our relationship was bad, because it wasn't...but it wasn't perfect either...and seeing through the rose-colored lens helps me to regain myself a little.  I still hope that it works out, but for my own sanity it's sometimes easier to recall that there were some not-so-great times, too.  Maybe it's just me performing reverse psychology in myself. 

Hope all of you are staying well.

[Wiseman2]

Wishing you and your child the best. Glad you are seeing the situation more clearly.

[Michael Golowyn]

Hope you recover quickly, I wouldn't wish that on anyone, the Covid symptoms.  But it also makes sense, when we stressed, upset or hurting emotionally, our immune system gets overloaded trying to put out all the fires from the autonomic nervous system stress responses, leaving us vulnerable/exposed to all the viruses etc that are already.  

When my partner left suddenly a number of years ago I was in the same situation.  But fortunately I had knowledge training and tools at my disposal to pull myself out of the depression.   I was grieving the loss of what we had, what she provided my life and the future life we were going to live (fantasy), so I worked at dissolving that first by looking at all the things I missed about her and our relationship, got very specific, brought up each memory and asked myself - how was this aspect in her (eg intelligent conversations, connection, touch, etc) harming me and my life in those moments.  We went over this in the post above.  The method has its basis in the law of conservation and momentum (physics) which I wont go into just now, but just know there is a conservation of traits available to you in your life through time and space.  Noting is missing, you just need to look where the new forms are, and the new forms are a result of our values shifting and evolving, shedding the old forms and bringing in the new forms to match the 'vibration' of our new or evolving values, things in life that ave meaning to us.

Now, once you've gone all the way or a long ways towards dissolving the grief, there will be left over emotions and feelings such as anger, guilt, maybe shame associated with your ex.  As well as things you are attracted to or admire in them.  By the way our intimate partners are really only there to reflect back to us the shadow parts of ourselves.  The parts of us we cannot see in isolation, our conditioned hurts from our past (even childhood) that have been pushed into our subconscious.  So by working on our exes we are indirectly working on ourselves and more often than not bringing to the light of day aspects of ourselves and how we related to our parents.  I'm still working on stuff from about my mother and father through my issues with my current partner, so it will never stop, but there will be pauses and respites as we continue to grow.

I was angry at my exes coldness, for example.  So I dug up and found where I have been cold to people in my life in the same manner.  At first I couldn't see it but when I did and all the ex partners and to my parents how I've been cold over the years to different people, I was humbled alot and my anger softened.  Next I went to each memory of my ex being 'cold' and asked - how is her being cold  to me helping me get what I want in life right now thats meaningful to me?  Keep answering until you can appreciate her for being cold, a tear might show up, your energy will shift and soften towards her.  Do the same for anything else you either judging in her and in yourself.  

This will go a long way to restore some balance to your psyche and homeostasis to your physiology so your immune system can do its job and kick that virus out of your system.  Do what you can, I know it's not easy, and I feel you as I have been there.  

[TheFinalWord]

On 8/25/2020 at 10:02 PM, CTAtlanta said:

Thanks, MsJayne for the thoughtful response.  Under normal circumstances I'd agree with you.  However, this is not the case.  In fact, I even brought up the thought of marriage once in casual conversation not long ago and she shut it down immediately.  She's been married twice.  She said she only wanted to date for the foreseeable future, and was happy just dating.  I wasn't going to push it so I didn't bring it up again.

Friend, I am so sorry this happened to you! Ghosting hurts, but it hurts a lot when it seems to come from nowhere, from a person that you think loves you. I guess it's apparent why she has so many failed marriages, not that this help you. If she had any courage in her, she could tell you the situation had run it's course, or sorry we are going in different directions. Something. Just to disappear like that is so cowardly, no matter how you cut it.

I'm trying to rationalize this too, so in my armchair psychologist opinion, the disconnect here between the future, may have been a red flag. If you were talking about going to the next stage of marriage, and she was happy with never being married, she may have realized things were getting serious and she didn't want to go that route. Or as others have suggested, she did not see the distance ever closing and started to realize the relationship was not going to give her what she wanted. I personally do not think long-distance ever works unless a clear, specific date where the distance is closed is clear and in sight. Either way, that does not excuse her being a coward. But some people do not know how to break up. Some people go as far to intentionally cheat so their SO finds out as an easier way to break up. I know this is going to really hurt you and I would definitely recommend a therapist because you have been betrayed in a really deep way that is going to take a long time to get through on your own.

Edited September 7, 2020 by TheFinalWord