I can't move forward and it's driving me nuts

[AntoniaB]

I'm starting a new thread because my feeling of being stuck has persisted now for a month or more. I'll try to be brief and just am here to ask for advice.

XH and I are not in any contact at all.

My psychiatrist and family and friends have all agreed (and I agree too) that my biggest problem is not being able to visualize my future with anyone but my XH, and since he's unavailable entirely, and because he did so much damage and has no remorse, it seems totally pointless to be holding out for him. So I move on with my life. I agree with that.

I have moved on in every way and am doing some great things and taking care of myself. But my connection to him seems unbreakable. It doesn't matter that I don't "need" him anymore to rescue me. It doesn't matter that I am now supporting myself in every way and have a good life. I am still deeply irrevocably connected to him and still love him despite everything. I love the him I knew, of course, as I don't know him at all now nor do I have any contact with him, and friends have stopped telling me anything about him. It's like he does not exist at all.

My doctor told me that until I can learn that there are other fish in the sea, I won't break this tie to him and I'll be stuck. So on her recommendation, I joined eharmony for 3 months. My subscription is about to renew and I want to cancel it. I have been matched with 200 men at least. I have to FORCE myself to interact with them. I don't find any of them attractive at all, physically, as I'm sure I'm looking for one who looks like XH. I find some compatible, yes. So I've gone on 2 dates with guys who probably are "right" for me in more ways that XH and I were for one another.

But I feel nothing. I treat the date like I'm just meeting a new colleague at work. I have good conversation and I laugh. Then on my way home, I feel like I have betrayed my marriage and my XH. All I've done is TALK.

I feel very stuck. I feel like I want to enjoy life, and enjoying life certainly means having romantic fun relationships and dates. I also feel like I am sabotaging myself from doing this, and for what? To pine for and think about a man who is gone, who did the most unimaginable thing to me. Who burned EVERY bridge to me and my family and friends. And I know that if he came back, that he is NOT good for me, because there are tons of ways I never grew or cared for myself in that marriage that I do now. I think in many ways we brought out the worst in each other.

But I can't get him out of my head, and I am sick of it, and what in the heck is the point? What is the point of having a finite amount of time on this earth and having this absurd level of connection to someone that is unbreakable when he has clearly moved on?

I think part of the problem is that in the divorce, I got everything (I paid for it, but I got it). I am in OUR house, on OUR land, where EVERY item in the house was OURS but for some things I've bought since. What does he have? A handful of pics in a new apt. He has virtually nothing to remind him of our life. I have it all. Sure I've put everything with his face on it away, or even pics of places we've been. I've rearranged my house a hundred times, I've painted, etc. But he's still "here." And I know these are just things, he's not in them, he's in my HEAD. And because he's in my head, I can't move on.

I feel like I've regressed a major amount to where I'm back to thinking of him almost all the time. And I'm back in depression, and I'm back in that area where I think I need to give up and that scares me.

I am trying SO hard to move on and I can't. And I don't understand the point of carrying this torch for a "dead" man, and I feel convinced I will carry it for the rest of my life.

So...please advise me what to do.