Thank you for checking in on me. I am feeling a little bit better now, but I had a conversation earlier with my friend M (the 60 year old psychologist) that was really ... devastating???
Basically he said, "I do not want to be harsh and I could be wrong, but I think that B has always been ambivalent about you. Even though you think you resolved & evolved through the initial issues, those were just "flareups" of his ambivalence that has always been there. You did not want to see it, because it didn't match with what you wanted to see. The problem is that you want to be closer to him more than he wants to be closer to him. That has always been the problem between you and it still is the problem, and as long as you want to him back, it will prevent you from reconciling. You totally tipped your hand, he completely knows that you want him, and he was sending a very clear message that he does not want you to come closer and he does not want you to have hope. I don't understand, why do you want someone to be your husband, who doesn't know whether or not he wants to be with you? Why are you doing this to yourself? Why don't you just be friends with him? As long as you are still strategizing, he will be able to smell that, and it will repel him. You can't accept that he doesn't want you, because then you will think that you are unlovable. Why are you doing this? You think he is opening up to you, but it is just easier for him to open up to you when you are not in a couple relationship and you only talk once a month and you are so far away. Is what you're feeling actually love? Or do you just not want to let go?"
I didn't even try to defend myself. I just listened and tried not to cry.
I feel so terrible... part of me wants to refute every point that M made. He isn't in a relationship, and hasn't been in one for a long time, and hasn't ever pulled off a reconciliation, so why should I listen to him? Also, he has met B, but really doesn't know him, so what does he know? He probably just wants to protect me from hurting, etc, etc. Or, maybe B was just facing a custom-made crisis a la Passionate Marriage, and fled, but that's not how most people think about things, including my friend M, who just interprets my situation as "you two are incompatible".
Another part of me is trying to soak up what he said, and it is really devastating. Do I have a pattern of not being able to see when the people who are close to me don't want to give me what I would like to share? When I was in high school I sustained a relationship for 1 1/2 years with someone who WASN:T EVEN INTO ME, and the whole thing was completely fueled by my own fantasy and stubborness. I thought I was so over and beyond that. I really thought I was doing a good job of not being controlling, and now I feel like I totally blew it by trying to push to see him sooner, like I thought I was accelerating the process (DUH, BAD IDEA) and now we have rewound to... before 5 months of NC. I mean, what am I supposed to do now? Not contact him? Do another 5 months of NC?
I was so proud of what I had with B, and I thought he was too. I thought that he really loved me, and wanted to share his life with me. Did he never "choose" me? Would he ever choose me? Is that because I suck to be with, or because (like passionate marriage) he needed to grow up and choose ? Was I completely delusional for those 5 years that I shared with him? Was I totally blinded by my own self-serving desires and insecurities? I thought I had released control... Am I still as controlling as I've ever been?
Luckily I had plans to spend tonight with another friend, T, here in Boston. I told her a little bit about it, and she said, "how can he know? He wasn't there."
((((Essie))) thank you so much for posting to me. I am at such a loss right now. I just spent.... 13 1/2 months trying to reassure him I was innoccous, and now I completely freaked him out with what I thought was a harmless invitation. I don't even know if I should try to see him in January. I sort of feel like if he wants to see me, he should make it happen. Dammit, why doesn't *he* come to see me where *I* am??? I also feel like I blew my shot at actually getting advice for him about my career, now I even wonder if me continuing to bring that up was a form of pressure on him. ??(#$#*($&@????????
((((Kalni)))) I think you probably agree with what my friend M said? I don't think it is positive that he tried to set boundaries with me. Because it means that I pushed him far enough that he needed to push away from me. I don't know how I would handle an open discussion. Even if he said something really hurtful to me, I know I don't have to take it completely at face value.... I've read a couple stories on the boards where the WA says, "there is no way, this is totally over" and then within days they say they want to reconcile.
I don't think he explained to me his feelings because he wanted to get closer, I think he explained them to me because he wants to push me farther away. And how much farther away can I go? I really do not know what to do.
