Feeling a bit confused right now

[gallantly]

I've been dating this HB10 for two and a half years now, we started dating when she was 17. 
Our relationship has been pretty much perfect along the way, and I've made sure of this, except for the last year when we had to do long distance due to studying in different areas. I still see her for two weeks every three months though. 

Problem is that as our relationship developed I felt that she felt increasingly bad about not being able to have a decent college experience and me being the only person she's had any sexual experience with and even dated to the extent we did.

I eventually saw that in her too and I couldn't go on dating her because we were at the point were we'd either move forward and get married or break up, and I am not about to get married with a girl who's always wondering how sex with other guys feels like and regretting not getting that in college.

In light of this, we had a few talks together and very amicably decided to take a break from one another. We split yesterday and we agreed that a semester from now, when I can come to her for a year to live with her and write my thesis at the same time, we'd give it another chance.

What's very confusing to me though is that everything in the relationship was going well. I made sure sex was great and interesting, even after the honeymoon period I still kept up our banter and overall flirtiness, constantly worked on improving myself, but now I have to break everything up and learn to live alone again.

I have no idea how to approach this. My goal is to get back with her a semester from now, and enjoy the time away from her to mess around with other women. But to do this idk if I should back away from her and cut contact or if I should keep talking to her occasionally as a friend to keep up rapport and make it easier to transition back and still keep her connected to me, which on the other hand would also make it harder on me to move on and be with other women and seem unavailable/not needy. Should I try to get her into an open relationship? That just seems like backpedaling and I've told her before I'd never do an open relationship, at least not with someone I'm already emotionally attached to.

Any suggestions here? How do I even approach this?

It's already hard for me to re-learn how to live by myself and rebuild my social and dating circle after a two year exclusive relationship, handle being mad at the whole situation and much less try to play this so it turns out how I want it to.

[JackZero]

Serious question...is this really what you wanted? I read this as if you knew a breakup was coming and this was a way of you protecting yourself from the inevitable.

[gallantly]

Apr 9, 2018 2:00:31 GMT JackZero said:

Serious question...is this really what you wanted? I read this as if you knew a breakup was coming and this was a way of you protecting yourself from the inevitable.

Oh definitely. I never wanted this but it was my decision, I had to step in. I just thought that she'd never do it herself because I managed to maintain our relationship very well and I never fucked up so I guess she felt too guilty to ever break up too.

It was innevitable in the end. No matter how good things go, you're not gonna go ahead and marry the first person you have sex with and get into an exclusive relationship with them for life, you'll always wonder no matter how good things are. And waiting any longer to do anything will just make it worse in the end. Especially if I ended up marrying this girl. She'd either spend her life wondering, or cheat on me with someone else down the line when it's way worse.

The problem is that everything just feels very counter intuitive. Everything was so good and now we're having to self sabotage this so we can both move on. Even if I don't want to do it, I need to for her and for myself. And also usually with any other girl I've dated before I've just not talked to them after and just focused on myself and they'd just come back in barely a week's time but by then I'd already have moved on so I'd just fuck around with them one last time and then fully move on with someone else. 

With her idk, I genuinely just want her to be happy and experience things and then we'll give it another shot a year from now. I just feel weird as fuck to stop talking to her, because I hold no hard feelings over this and we had and still have such nice rapport with one another it's hard to sabotage that. I still feel jealous and angry obviously because I'm only human, I just don't show it because I'm not an idiot. 

My options now are to either self sabotage this and step away from her and let her do her thing, and eventually risk losing what we have and the friendship and rapport we built together. Or keep talking to her as a friend, make it easier on her but harder on me to move on and not seem "needy" and scarce, and keep up our rapport (obviously less) until next year. But also risk letting her take me for granted and thing she can just come back to me anytime without consequence. This is a bit tricky really.

[JackZero]

I hate to be that guy that says that you need to move on from this, but you really need to walk away without intention of coming back. I believe that she wanted out, you picked up the signals and gave her what she needed without making her look like the bad guy in the situation. In a year from now the likeliness of you getting back with her is slim to none if she agreed to this. Her only problem now is explaining to you that she won't want to get back together when that discussion arrises.

You need to get out there and do things that you enjoy doing and everything else will start falling into place the moment that you can move on from this relationship. No need of wasting a year of your life hoping/expecting her to want to come back to you.

[N2thevoid]

Apr 8, 2018 23:26:22 GMT gallantly said:

I've been dating this HB10 for two and a half years now, we started dating when she was 17. 
Our relationship has been pretty much perfect along the way, and I've made sure of this, except for the last year when we had to do long distance due to studying in different areas. I still see her for two weeks every three months though. 

Problem is that as our relationship developed I felt that she felt increasingly bad about not being able to have a decent college experience and me being the only person she's had any sexual experience with and even dated to the extent we did.

Did the two of you broach the subject, and find some sort of common ground/mutual understanding? Or did you touch it, sweep it under the rug and continue forward unresolved? (my guess is it was more of the later).

I eventually saw that in her too and I couldn't go on dating her because we were at the point were we'd either move forward and get married or break up, and I am not about to get married with a girl who's always wondering how sex with other guys feels like and regretting not getting that in college.

Clearly you weren't on the same page.

In light of this, we had a few talks together and very amicably decided to take a break from one another. We split yesterday and we agreed that a semester from now, when I can come to her for a year to live with her and write my thesis at the same time, we'd give it another chance.

A lot can change between now and then. I wouldn't pin any solid hopes on your moving in with her in a few months. The fact you'd split means the relationship is basically done. Why? Nothing's being worked on. IF however, she determines life without you is worse than the prospect of not experimenting sexually then u'll know. Either way u'll have your answer and will have to accept that.

What's very confusing to me though is that everything in the relationship was going well. I made sure sex was great and interesting, even after the honeymoon period I still kept up our banter and overall flirtiness, constantly worked on improving myself, but now I have to break everything up and learn to live alone again.

Was it though? It sounds like a lot of needs weren't being addressed and the "going well" was surface. I also see you having put effort in to make it work. What would happen if you pulled back? Would she start putting more effort in or would things just wax and wane till they finally fade? Were you improving yourself for YOU, or to keep her and the relationship?

I have no idea how to approach this. My goal is to get back with her a semester from now, and enjoy the time away from her to mess around with other women. But to do this idk if I should back away from her and cut contact or if I should keep talking to her occasionally as a friend to keep up rapport and make it easier to transition back and still keep her connected to me, which on the other hand would also make it harder on me to move on and be with other women and seem unavailable/not needy. Should I try to get her into an open relationship? That just seems like backpedaling and I've told her before I'd never do an open relationship, at least not with someone I'm already emotionally attached to.

As Jack suggested, let go of that goal. It serves you no purpose other than to keep you tethered. It is a self-inflicted obstacle. It sounds as though the two of you are looking for other things, and the fact you're entertaining messing around with other women tells me clearly you aren't sure about the relationship either - this is just egoic attachment, not love. You're now trying to barter to keep her when she was never really 'yours' to begin with'

Any suggestions here? How do I even approach this?

I know its hard. But move on.

It's already hard for me to re-learn how to live by myself and rebuild my social and dating circle after a two year exclusive relationship, handle being mad at the whole situation and much less try to play this so it turns out how I want it to.

[R.C]

Jack is spot on right here. She wanted out without being the bad guy and you picked up on that. And props that you did, because this was always gonna end. The only difference is in how badly.
She's young OP. You could do everything right and she still would probably not be able to appreciate that for what it is. Not really her fault, she just doesn't have any grounds for comparison.

Sometimes you play it well and still lose.

You should handle this breakup just like any other breakup. Cut the contact and move on. Don't put your life on hold based on false hopes. You owe nothing to noone, so live as such. If she decides to reach out to you in the future, then make a decision, not now.

Despite a bad situation you still seem self aware, and that speaks to a person's character. You know the right choice. 


And a bit of blunt honesty for you OP. When or if she decides to reach out to you, you probably won't want her back anymore. 

[gallantly]

Apr 9, 2018 19:00:59 GMT N2thevoid said:

Apr 8, 2018 23:26:22 GMT gallantly said:

I've been dating this HB10 for two and a half years now, we started dating when she was 17. 
Our relationship has been pretty much perfect along the way, and I've made sure of this, except for the last year when we had to do long distance due to studying in different areas. I still see her for two weeks every three months though. 

Problem is that as our relationship developed I felt that she felt increasingly bad about not being able to have a decent college experience and me being the only person she's had any sexual experience with and even dated to the extent we did.

Did the two of you broach the subject, and find some sort of common ground/mutual understanding? Or did you touch it, sweep it under the rug and continue forward unresolved? (my guess is it was more of the later).

I eventually saw that in her too and I couldn't go on dating her because we were at the point were we'd either move forward and get married or break up, and I am not about to get married with a girl who's always wondering how sex with other guys feels like and regretting not getting that in college.

Clearly you weren't on the same page.

In light of this, we had a few talks together and very amicably decided to take a break from one another. We split yesterday and we agreed that a semester from now, when I can come to her for a year to live with her and write my thesis at the same time, we'd give it another chance.

A lot can change between now and then. I wouldn't pin any solid hopes on your moving in with her in a few months. The fact you'd split means the relationship is basically done. Why? Nothing's being worked on. IF however, she determines life without you is worse than the prospect of not experimenting sexually then u'll know. Either way u'll have your answer and will have to accept that.

What's very confusing to me though is that everything in the relationship was going well. I made sure sex was great and interesting, even after the honeymoon period I still kept up our banter and overall flirtiness, constantly worked on improving myself, but now I have to break everything up and learn to live alone again.

Was it though? It sounds like a lot of needs weren't being addressed and the "going well" was surface. I also see you having put effort in to make it work. What would happen if you pulled back? Would she start putting more effort in or would things just wax and wane till they finally fade? Were you improving yourself for YOU, or to keep her and the relationship?

I have no idea how to approach this. My goal is to get back with her a semester from now, and enjoy the time away from her to mess around with other women. But to do this idk if I should back away from her and cut contact or if I should keep talking to her occasionally as a friend to keep up rapport and make it easier to transition back and still keep her connected to me, which on the other hand would also make it harder on me to move on and be with other women and seem unavailable/not needy. Should I try to get her into an open relationship? That just seems like backpedaling and I've told her before I'd never do an open relationship, at least not with someone I'm already emotionally attached to.

As Jack suggested, let go of that goal. It serves you no purpose other than to keep you tethered. It is a self-inflicted obstacle. It sounds as though the two of you are looking for other things, and the fact you're entertaining messing around with other women tells me clearly you aren't sure about the relationship either - this is just egoic attachment, not love. You're now trying to barter to keep her when she was never really 'yours' to begin with'

Any suggestions here? How do I even approach this?

I know its hard. But move on.

It's already hard for me to re-learn how to live by myself and rebuild my social and dating circle after a two year exclusive relationship, handle being mad at the whole situation and much less try to play this so it turns out how I want it to.

You're very right about most of those actually. 

We never approached it before but I did notice it. In spit of this I still swept it under the rug quite a bit. This was completely my fault because instead of just associating it with the obvious inevitable problem I just thought I was either actually not giving her enough attention or too much attention and seeming needy or some other random shit and I just told her to give it some time and I changed up my frame a bit. It all came to a halt when the past month she started mentioning the stuff she sees her friends doing and that she's missed out on, and we explored stuff better then and then I just made that decision before it broke out into something bad.

I was definitely putting in effort for the relationship at one point but it was a bit of both because I did it for myself too, even if my main concern after a while was the relationship. Also at least from my perspective all her needs were covered, and I managed to bring her different emotions, I made sex interesting and satisfying, and I kept up a nice rapport with her while showing her I was doing stuff with my life and improving myself (even if it was for the relationship). But then again I have no idea if my point of view is skewed or not and I might be completely wrong and fucked stuff up along the way and not have realized it.

I am not only entertaining messing around with other women, I am actively pursuing it. But that is solely because I know that's the only way I'm gonna get over her and the best way to do so too alongside working on myself. It's no use for me to sulk and moan about this, it'll just harm me. I literally found myself late last night swipping girls on tinder and not even realizing why the fuck I was doing it because I had no desire for it, but I knew that it was gonna be good for me in the long run. Feels weird to say it but it feels bad going after other women because deep inside me I only want her but I know that's not gonna happen.

Either way, god damn you have all been so helpful, thank you! I desperately needed a third party's perspective on this because I was deep down still holding onto that possibility of getting back with her a year from now and I just didn't see things straight. Even though she was a great catch, holding onto this is just not going to let me move on and enjoy things with other women and make this whole thing an exercise in futility.

For now I'm just gonna keep minimal rapport with her. I've just been usually replying to her with friendly responses but not letting her have a conversation with me. Stopped looking at her snap stories or ig shit. I'm not gonna block her because that would seem like I'm being petty or some shit and I don't want that or that I even care really. I'm gonna move on with my life and see other women and work on myself and she will obviously see me moving on. I'll seem scarce and fleeting and moving on with my life without her then she'll decide if she wants me back or not instead of just seeing me as someone who she can just get back to.

Best part of this is that a year from now if she wants to get back, if I want it, I'll give it a shot maybe. If she doesnt then fuck it because I've made steps to move on ages ago instead of holding onto this uncertain thing while hampering my experiences with other girls.

I'm seeing her again in May because I have this big galla ball event and I had already invited her and gotten tickets for her so she's coming as my "friend" to it to not turn it into a waste of money or make myself petty and forbid her from coming. I think I should have moved on by then, for that I'm making efforts to see other girls, expecially with online dating shit. Might hook up with her but I have no expectations beyond that or really even want anything beyond that. 


Thanks fellas for everything, I'll try my best to follow your advices and I'll post a month or two from now on this just for anyone who's interested. Thanks so much again!