My new normal (she has moved out)

[InnerStrength]

Grizz, our timelines are not too dissimilar. W and I lived together while separated for five months, and luckily I had gotten DR early on and we wound up sharing the bed again, cuddling, massaging, etc a couple of months in, with one incident of ML and a few other "less complete" sexual incidents. The first few weeks after my W and I moved out of the family home I had a great time, I was working hard and partying hard from my new bachelor pad, and even had my W coming for weekly sleepovers and so on, and then it hit me a few weeks into the physical separation. My PMA suddenly sucked and I was confused because I felt I had conquered outcome dependence months prior. I think it's part of the withdrawal -- even though I'd come to terms with the breakup, the disappearance of constant human contact and oxytocin is a bit of a shock!

What has helped me get back on track is going dim. W had six months of the new me, we got close again and even though she hasn't changed her mind, the animosity and anger she displayed at the start is gone and replaced by affection. Now I can be more confident that she will have something to miss -- if I'd disappeared at the start, her last memories of me wouldn't have been ideal. It seems, from countless threads, that the only way to remove the risk of being plan B is to take that option away from her -- she needs a startling scare that she could lose you.

Whether that is the path you want to take is a pretty difficult personal decision and one I am not qualified to advise on outside of sharing my experiences.

I would not ask what the touching means, etc. That'd be R talk and the advice is to let her start those no matter what. She'll tell you if she wants to date or reconcile. If you're going to continue the touching, just enjoy it for what it is. I was enjoying much more intimate touching with W than what you describe as recently as a few weeks ago, going back months, and here we are, barely talking for twenty minutes a week now I've dimmed down, and there is zero physical contact whatsoever -- not even greeting and parting hugs, because once those became an established part of our routine again she went back to waiting for me to initiate them as the man. We'll see if her initiating touch returns as/if her pursuing behaviours intensify.

And yes, this can be one of the harder aspects of going dim or dark when you've developed such a relationship; human touch fills a need, even though I'm more and more convinced that all it did was relay to W my willingness to be her plan B - it feels like progress but often isn't. I feel like there were diminishing returns at play; from less awkward conversation to snuggling in bed, it was all progress at first while I was still reviled, then disliked, then tolerated by W, and once we were in a good friendly place it just became unappealing, friendzone-worthy beta behaviour that I'd continue to put myself in that position with a woman who had rejected me.

But one thing backing off isn't going to do, IMO, is look like pouting. The expected behaviour is pursuit. The opposite of that looks like strength, and hopefully, like you might be moving on.