Limbo Land II

[jzoom]

I can't change the past, I said it and all I can do now is move forward. Do all I can to take care of myself and let her be. She ended up coming by for the stroller. I just said hi when she came in and told her where it was; she got it herself and I offered no assistance. I then asked if she wanted the kids gifts since she was here and she said another time. I just said ok and after she left said they (her and OM) were taking the oldest kid away for his bday and she would rather me give the gifts. Once again, I just said ok. I didn't salt why she didn't want to take the gifts and didn't ask anything about her plans for the day.

I'm 30 & not originally from the area. Met my ex-W while I was in college and we stayed in area. All friends were hers/mutual and went with her at divorce. After that I was on my own working my butt off. Pretty much all I did was work and sleep. When workload lightened just a bit is when I met ex-gf. Due to unforeseen circumstances living together was rushed.

I made some friends between divorce & ex-gf but they don't live in town. I don't like exercising but I'm doing some now. Not into sports. Cooking is ok but my budget doesn't allow for creative meals. TV/movies/books work sometimes but then my mind wanders to those times we were snuggled up watching a movie or talking about books. So then I sit there reminding myself she's gone, don't worry about it, and enjoy the show.

Even though I had just finally gotten my schedule at work to something more normal and reasonable (I had wanted it for the past two years but also so that I could be home more with her & the kids to work on things without being so stressed) I have put out applications for part time jobs. Not that I really want to do it but it would keep me busy and help me with my financial situation.

I did find a mingling group nearby that meets every Wed night. Went last week and I'm going to go this coming week. I was much better being around ppl like that.

[AnotherStander]

At this point I tell her that if she isn't going to sleep here again and work on things with me then she needs to get her stuff out. She says she's going to work on it. I tell her that way we both can move on with our lives without worrying about the other and it was nice knowing her.

This part was great.

I tell her that I'm sorry I made her miserable, that I made mistakes and lost a special woman, and I hope she's happy in her new life.

I think you've already told her this several times before, didn't need to say it again.

On the call I told her that I still care about her and the kids and I want them to be happy. I told her that if fully moving out, moving on, and being with somebody else is what she believes will make her happy and is the best for the kids I support her.

Good job on this too.

I told her that if she ever changes her mind, even in a year, to not be afraid to talk to me. I said that I couldn't make guarantees that we would get back together but that I wanted to keep the lines of communication open in that regard, I just didn't want her to fear approaching me if she wanted to get back with me.

You don't want to leave her with the impression that you're just sitting around waiting indefinitely though. I think you somewhat recovered by saying you weren't offering any guarantees, so overall this was not harmful.

When I told her that was everything she just started telling me about how much she's working her two jobs, isn't getting to spend time with the kids, is struggling with money, and said she didn't want me thinking she was ignoring me. I told her I understood, I know how it feels to work that much, and that I didn't think she was ignoring me.

I'm just telling you this so you know the difference, but what you did here was not validating her emotions. You do not want to tell her you "know how it feels" because you're implying that you've suffered the same or worse problems than her. What you want to do instead is validate- ask her something like "that sounds frustrating, is that how you feel?" Then if she says "yes" you say "I can hear that you're frustrated, I can understand why you feel that way." When you respond that you know how something feels, you're minimizing what they're going through and you're also making it sound like you're ignoring their feelings (IE, stop right there because I already know how you feel).

I told her that if she needed food at work she could ask me to drop it off.

Then I told her that if she needed help with the laundry she could bring it by the house.

These are just pandering. Don't make yourself available to her fetch-and-call. You want her to know that you are moving on with your life with or without her. You're no longer her errand boy. Show strength and independence from now on.

And let that be the last time you contact her. You've way, way, WAY over-pursued her. You've said everything that can be said at this point, anything more is just beating a dead horse that's already been beaten to a pulp. So let that be it. Any conversations from this point forward whether by phone or text should be initiated by her and your responses should be extremely minimal. If you want to have any chance of getting her back then she has got to learn to miss you and that will take months of little to no contact.

[jzoom]

Thanks for the breakdown on things there AS. I took a break from the forum to work on me and it's been a rollercoaster.

I've been going to the Wed night get togethers and that's nice. Last Thur I backslid big time though and really pushed her in texting with a bunch of stuff; some pursuing, some cockiness, some sexual stuff. She responded just to try and get it through my head that she doesn't think about me, is happy where she is living and who she is now with. From my end, it was pretty much a total meltdown.

I thought about things and really accept that it's over. On Sat I texted her saying that I now realized this and just wanted to wrap up our outstanding business. That we can coordinate her getting the last of her stuff moved out and I'm looking forward to it.

She responded with some excuses and was trying to pick a fight. Basically saying that she couldn't believe I would say I'm looking forward to her getting out completely. I just didn't respond to it at all.

I was doing well, fighting off any lingering thoughts of her and looking at things rationally. Seeing how I can move on with my life and be ok and that I'll be better off with her out of my life. Really not focusing on winning her back at all. Having to keep in contact with her about some business matters but that's all I'm doing. She tried picking a fight with me Mon morning but I didn't let it escalate.

Now, today, I find out that my friend wanted to try and reason with her one last time. Asked to talk to her Sat night about things and wanting her to slow down. So they get together but then ex-gf brings along OM and says that anything my friend has to say can be said in front of him. My friend shut down at that point and just didn't pursue the matter, just chatted about other things.

I'm not happy with my friend and she knows this. I told her that it didn't help matters and that if she keeps doing it then it'll just keep looking like I'm attempting to use her for convincing my ex while I put on a nice show of moving on. I told her that when something is bugging her about my ex that she needs to ask herself if she would care if it were a stranger.

This made my day tough b/c I fear losing my focus of just taking care of myself. I keep thinking about this stuff now and my friend says that ex and OM are having some issues. So it plants that idea of "hope" in my head and honestly I don't want "hope", it does me no good.

Everytime I think about how I miss my ex I ask myself if I'm really missing "her" or "sex with her" and I'm also asking myself if I want a person like she is involved in my life...especially when I've almost got her out completely.

I did tell me friend to think carefully before attempting any other relationship talks with my ex. I also told my friend to not feed me any info anymore because it doesn't help anything.

I'm going to the Wed night dinner and hoping it'll cheer me back up and get me focused again.

[AnotherStander]

Last Thur I backslid big time though and really pushed her in texting with a bunch of stuff; some pursuing, some cockiness, some sexual stuff. She responded just to try and get it through my head that she doesn't think about me, is happy where she is living and who she is now with. From my end, it was pretty much a total meltdown.

You've done this so many times and the results have always been the same. Not sure why you were expecting something different this time. Have you heard that old joke about the definition of insanity- "doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results"?

I thought about things and really accept that it's over.

You've said that before too, but then you always resort to old habits. See if you can change it this time.

On Sat I texted her saying that I now realized this and just wanted to wrap up our outstanding business. That we can coordinate her getting the last of her stuff moved out and I'm looking forward to it.

That's one of your old habits right there, that dig at the end ("I'm looking forward to it"). You threw that in there to try to get an emotional response out of her. Stop it. Just keep all conversations with her on a business level.

She responded with some excuses and was trying to pick a fight. Basically saying that she couldn't believe I would say I'm looking forward to her getting out completely. I just didn't respond to it at all.

That too is "more of the same" behavior from you. You do something to get a rise out of her, then when she responds to it you shut down and walk away and act like "gee, why did she get mad?"

I was doing well, fighting off any lingering thoughts of her and looking at things rationally. Seeing how I can move on with my life and be ok and that I'll be better off with her out of my life. Really not focusing on winning her back at all.

I don't think you've ever gotten to that point. But you need to.

Now, today, I find out that my friend wanted to try and reason with her one last time.

HUGE backslide. You need to stop talking to mutual friends about your R. They WILL talk to your GF and she will always perceive it as pressure and desperation. If you talk to mutual friends then talk to them about your GAL activities and how much fun you're having. If they ask about GF just say you've moved on and are concentrating on yourself.

and my friend says that ex and OM are having some issues. So it plants that idea of "hope" in my head

She's done with you for now, that doesn't have anything to do with OM. I wouldn't read any hope into their R problems..

[jzoom]

I really didn't expect anything different. And as I think about things I'm basically still just being passive-agressive and that maybe it's some defense mechanism on my part...piss her off so she really just gets away from me and I don't even have to do business with her anymore = i.e. internal excuse not to have to change.

Yeah, I'm not reading hope into anything. I don't want hope with her. I told my friend I don't want to talk about it anymore, that we can talk about anything "but".

I GALed last night and had an AWESOME time! Meeting lots of friendly people, talking, laughing, and flirting with new women.

[AnotherStander]

I really didn't expect anything different. And as I think about things I'm basically still just being passive-agressive and that maybe it's some defense mechanism on my part...piss her off so she really just gets away from me and I don't even have to do business with her anymore = i.e. internal excuse not to have to change.

Good, recognizing the problem is the path to stopping that "more of the same" behavior.

[quote]I GALed last night and had an AWESOME time! Meeting lots of friendly people, talking, laughing, and flirting with new women.

Excellent, that's what you really need right now to get that PMA going

[AnotherStander]

Sorry screwed up the quotes, that last post should have looked like this:

I really didn't expect anything different. And as I think about things I'm basically still just being passive-agressive and that maybe it's some defense mechanism on my part...piss her off so she really just gets away from me and I don't even have to do business with her anymore = i.e. internal excuse not to have to change.

Good, recognizing the problem is the path to stopping that "more of the same" behavior.

I GALed last night and had an AWESOME time! Meeting lots of friendly people, talking, laughing, and flirting with new women.

Excellent, that's what you really need right now to get that PMA going

[jzoom]

Thinking about the "I'm looking forward to it" part...it really wasn't something I did on purpose to get a reaction. It really came from a place of me moving on but in hindsight I can see how she took it.

I was really pissed at my friend. Sat night we were texting and some things were a little off and I thought I had done something to upset her. Then on Wed she confesses to me that she approached my ex without my knowledge. Asked my ex to talk about reconsidering things and my ex agreed, then pulled the "anything you want to say to me you can say to OM" and my friend felt betrayed.

Well, at that point I was just mad b/c I knew that didn't help matters. I did tell my friend to stop and look at it from my exes perspective; that I'm saying/doing this "get out and get on with your life and I'll do the same" and then you're going to her about reconciling - my ex probably sees it as manipulation that I'm putting on a "show" and asking my friend for help. I told my friend to really think about that before doing anything more and just told my friend I didn't want to hear anything about how my ex is doing, about OM, or anything else.



Yes, yes, yes! Oh it was great and I'm fitting in with this group. My confidence when I'm out with them is great. I'm relaxed and it just flows out of me. People just chatting me up and wanting to see me again.

Gonna share this...a bunch of us are talking about going to play laser tag. I had been flirting with my waitress and she's walking by and I ask her if she's going to come play laser tag with us. She asks me when and my response is, "give me your number and I'll let you know." She says "ok" and immediately turns, writes down her name and number and hands it to me.

Wow! Did that ever feel good. The people I was talking with are giving me praise and then a girl from the group I was chatting with gives me her number and well....nothing extreme with her but more fun I've had with a girl than I've had since last Aug.

[jzoom]

Well, I don't want to dwell on this...but when she opens up a checking account with OM I think that's a pretty clear indication that the door is shut and deadbolted.

[AnotherStander]

Well, I don't want to dwell on this...but when she opens up a checking account with OM I think that's a pretty clear indication that the door is shut and deadbolted.

She sounds pretty flaky to me, it sure didn't take her long to shack up with someone else, and now a joint checking account? Wow. And yet she still has most of her crap at your house. Not exactly a model of stability and smart choices.