Hi C_K & OD & Ali--thanks for stopping by; great to hear from you all.
Today I came across some of W's old emails to me as I was looking something else up. I re-read some of them in the days and weeks following the ending. There seems so much caring and love and yet simultaneously absolutely no regrets or any sign of turning back. Hard for me to understand that if you do love someone a great deal, why you leave them...without any kind of trying. It occurred to me the other day that there really was no point in any of the discussions or correspondence where she owned responsibility for her own stuff in the R. nor for how much her decisions and actions have hurt me (and others). She never acknowledged--nor seems to understand--the degree to which she broke trust by holding so much inside for however long.
The idea that she loves me and yet just doesn't want to be with me is really painful still to accept. I try not to go down those roads but I feel like to be left in this way with no chance and no meaningful explanation is such a rejection...it's like it is so clear to her that things could never change to meet her needs. To me it's like she was in effect saying: "you're a great guy but I simply could never regain a sexual interest in you no matter what, so I'm leaving you to be with someone else who can do that for me". This hurts so much.
Although I don't know how things are for her, the fact is that if things were bad / difficult for her, there would have been some kind of shift, but the fact that she never wavered once in any of this indicates to me that things are better for her now without me in her life. I wish I could be in her shoes and so clear with it all.
I still feel lonely and quite heartbroken--the idea that somewhere in there she still loves me, but has nothing to give me except some distant "buddy" contact is really tough (or worse, warm and friendly pat-on-the-head contact). Especially since it seems she is open to / wanting / perhaps already in a relationship with someone else who she wants to give herself to, emotionally & sexually.
