I did unrequited love again and now I'm screwed

You can have passionate life affair with a woman who is age appropriate. It is a myth that only young people can be in love. We are very much in love like crazy and we are 50. And there is nothing old or boring about us at all. You can have passionate love storms with women your age. If young look is what you go for, many women look much younger than they are nowadays. I

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It might be helpful if you create some distance from her for a while, seeing her while you still feel like this would be a painful reminder. In time you'll find it easier to talk to her without going gooey.

It sounds to me like you've made big progress over reaching out to people since you retired, this is relatively new stuff to you, you're bound to make mistakes sometimes - the trick is to learn as we go.

Reading this thread has made me realize that I'm not alone in the "getting too attached too fast" issue, among other things. I thank the op for that, it's a mildly comforting realization.

I've been in your situation before, despite being only 17 I have had a continuous failed history with relationships. I would meet a girl, talk for a week or two with her and then boom - I'd be wanting more. Not in a "I love you after 2 weeks" way, but I have always found it hard to separate myself after I find someone who I see potential with. It's bit me in the *** many times (5 to date). I end up pushing these girls away because I came on too strong, too soon. The longest I've ever had a relationship was for a year and a half, and that ended after she cheated on me. Poor history for a young guy.

I also seriously relate to your situation of falling for someone of a different age - though my scenario is in reverse, and nowhere near as large of a gap (the girl I love is 23, 6.5 years older than I am). I will say, perhaps naively, that (even though things didn't work out for you with her) at least you have the freedom to pursue a relationship with WHOEVER you want to, for good or bad, and there are many people out there who you have yet to meet. I'm not so lucky - I've fallen head over heels for the girl I so desperately want to be with, and my parents will NOT let me be with her. I love her and they have banned almost all contact with this girl because of the age gap and their "preconceived" ideas of her (if you want more info on that and a sad story to read, check my thread on it). I guess I'm trying to say in a roundabout way that you've got so many options and opportunities before you, and that you can't let yourself get down too low. You're going to find SOMEONE who will suit you, but it may not be tomorrow. Chances are you'll stumble upon her when you aren't even looking, like I did with my girl.

Hope that makes sense and maybe helps a bit.

I'm envious young man looks like you don't really have a problem - you're very young and you've already had several relationships. I think you will be fine.

I don't know if I should stay her friend - she's pretty much cut off all communication. Not sure what the advantage is at this point.

No reason to stay friends under the circumstances. Especially since you want her romantically

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Oh, I wouldn't be envious at all sir - aside from the single long year+ relationship, the longest lasted about 3 weeks. You couldn't probably even classify those as "dating" or a true "relationship", they all blew up so fast. After the long relationship ended for me, I went a year and a half basically without anyone, feeling lonely and dejected and like life was so unfair all the time. I developed trust issues because she cheated, it amplified my anxiety and fear of losing everyone I care about. I actually believed that I worked better in people's pasts.

And now I'm in love with a girl that I simply cannot be with due to my overbearing, overprotective, life-controlling asshole parents. The one person I've felt strongest for in my entire life, and I can't be with her. That really sucks, when you KNOW that she is the one you want and she's the best for you, and you can't have her....

There isn't a need to envy me. I honestly envy you your freedom in life, and your experience borne of age. Life's funny sometimes, I guess, and unfair to the wrong people too. But you've gotta trust that one day everything will work out for you - if I didn't have that trust, I don't know what I'd be doing right now.

How is it even possible to have that many relationship experiences at 17? You mentioned "long relationship". How long could it possibly be? I am somewhat concerned that you are with adult now? Aren't you a minor?

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I'm talking from middle school to now, every time I ever tried to get close to a girl. The long relationship was 1 year and 3 months long, with a girl named Leah. We started dating in my last semester of 8th grade and broke up during 1st semester of 10th grade (she had sex with another guy at a party, F that).

I am not WITH her at the moment, we want to be but my parents are totally against it, without ever meeting this girl. They've taken it to quite an extreme, going so far as to tell me if I get with her even after I turn 18 in October (so what 8 months from now?) they will kick me out.

And when I say her I mean the girl I want to date now, who is the best person I know ^^

Ongoing saga - so I briefly ran into her and she was all smiles. I feel like I've gone to hell - this is so damn hard.

It will get easier with time. Be kind to yourself, you made a misjudgement, you can learn from this and move on.

Er, maybe I've missed something here in this thread, but so far, I've seen no acknowledgement from Macd about his fixation on these much younger girls. Therein lies the problem, imho. Have you even tried to establish friendships with women nearer your own age?

It's a matter of circumstance.

No its really not circumstance. You consistantly look to these young ladies for attention, affection and some type of love and romance.. You choose this over and over.

Everyone has control over there actions, wants and needs. You just choose to stay in this never ending looping behavior.

I hope one day you can realize how to seek out a healthy relationship

I am 50 and I try not to date mean that are more than 10 or 15 yrs younger than me.

Personally,unless you are rich, a 40 yr difference is way too much.

It would be a circumstance if it was one young girl but everyone you like is always VERY young. It is not circumstantial. I have zero none zilch interest in 20 year olds no matter circumstances ( I know a lot of young people) yet you do one after another. So no this isn't circumstantial

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You choose the circumstance though. You have control over where you spend your time, and who you interact with and put effort into knowing. Unless you are a teacher then you can easily find ways to spend most of your day near people close to your own age.

You choose to encourage contact with young women. You choose to not tell them your intentions and hopes. You set the circumstances up to cause you emotional pain.

Well I think simply interacting with young people doesn't mean wanting them in certain way. Besides being a teacher I have second job that is unrelated to education. Most employees are very young. I spend large chunk of time with them, trained one last night. Under no circumstances at no given point I ever had romantic interest in any of them. And I do look and act younger than my age. Just spending time with young people doesn't mean one has to develop romantic interest in them. I can't imagine wanting to date 20 year old. The very idea is something to discuss with professional/ therapist etc

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Given my history any kind of interaction is welcome. I thought about it and I didnt really intend to develop feelings for these women I just enjoyed talking to them. They're young, okay, but I have a ton of catching up to do and I will always be grateful for whatever attention was given. Believe it or not I was drawing lines - in the back of my head I was thinking these people are too young for any physical attraction. Do I want children, a mortgage, college tuition, changing diapers at this point - NO! I'm not stupid, just lonely. Sometimes I forget how far down the road I am and I'm not going to have a lifelong romance at this point. I am a very dark individual because of my lack of aggressiveness in the love area. Something else l probably don't want to do is go through a long therapeutic process - I've done therapy and it didn't work. Am I going to guarantee that I won't do this again - no. If an attractive woman wants to listen to me than I'm not going to run the other way. I do have acquaintances my own age and to be truthful I don't have any romantic feelings towards them but it could happen. If the term perusing means occassionally sitting down and having a face to face and wanting to buy flowers every once in a while then I'm guilty. What did happen during these encounters was a glimmer of hope - that's more than I've had and although it was fantasy it was something. It's hard but I want these young women to have families and long partnerships. It's hard for me to be a good sport but I know that bowing out is best. At 61 I still don't know what's going on. I've lived alone forever and it might be the best thing. Thanks.

I have a friend who is taking advantage of a much older man for his $$$ right now. You sound vulnerable, and you have to be careful in this. Even women I know nearer your own age are out for a financial support, with romantic attachment secondary, just "prostituting" themselves for what they can get. I know this personally from hearing them talk.
I'm not kiddin' here. You don't want to be "used" that way.
This is not suggesting you will never find a love match, but don't be stupid. a 20-something is not going to fall "in love" with you.
Good that you are doing some soul-searching regarding your attachments. You are lonely, and that's understandable. Just don't be desperate.

I think talking about your issues here is in itself a good thing. Not because of the feedback which might make you feel worse at times, but because you crystallize the issue in your mind as you write it in precise words. Just don't let anyone drag you down, your history and personality aren't dark.

You said you have acquaintances, so why do you feel lonely then? Do you go out with them? and share activities with them?

Being alone is not a bad thing in itself, but it depends on how you see it. For me, I think most of my identity and character have been developed during my alone time, especially at very dark alone times. Even though I can live alone forever (I've done this for the last 14 years), hypothetically speaking, I don't want to, and this "I don't want to" causing me anguish and pain at the moment. On the other hand, many people choose to be alone and they are happy with it.

To tell you the truth this is a recent phenomenon - it's happened twice in the past two years. When I'm not tearing my innards out I'm usually okay with myself. In this most recent encounter, I didn't freak out until she actually said she was dating somebody new. I didn't even know she had broken up with her previous love interest. I guess subconsciously I hung around thinking that I might someday have a shot - pretty stupid considering my age. Well I guess I was less important to her than I thought. There was always sort of a safety cushion because I thought she had a boyfriend. I kinda thought the relationship was in trouble because when she talked about him it was usually in a negative manner. I'm seeing myself as more of a father figure now - although I wish I wasn't.

You're not a father figure to women who are in your general age range.

So I read some situations where 35 year relationships actually worked - now I'm more depressed.