New Relationship Concerns

He needs to get help & CHANGE before eber giving him the time of day now.

Yes, it went smoothly at first because you were doing the relationship on HIS terms. SEX, FUN, & NO relationship demands. Then when you starter to put normal relationship demands on a relationship that had ALL the actovities of NORMAL peoples exclucivity, you found out who & whst he really was. Good thing ypu talked about it because it brought to light EXACTLY where he was coming from & WHY he never mentioned exclucivity to you.

Wise move to leave this. You really need to do the work on yourself that you didnt do after your lsst relationship. Doing that will put you in a better place to attract a better class of guy..

Just a thought, he was the kind of guy who was out there wanting sex without the committment of an exclusive relationship & you gave it to him (even if you wanted it yourself) If you hadnt been so fast with the sex, he probably yould have not had any interest in you because you wouldnt have provided him the ONLY thing he wanted in a relarionship along with fun. It might have been OBVIOUS early on what kind of guy he was if you hadn't been so willing to give him the ONLY thing he really wanted....just something to think about. Yep sexual freedom has its drawbacks too.

I am so glad he was honest. He respects me enough to not want to hurt me like that. He even said as much. It was out of caring and concern for me.

You're really reading into this, I do believe. We cannot interpret his actions. No one here witnesssed our relationship or him within our relationship. This is all conjecture at this point about what he wanted, what he was doing with me, and what he is thinking.

I know he misses me. He said this today. I know he is hurting. he doesn't like this aspect of himself and wants to figure it out. I respect and applaud that.

Once again, I am being chastised for having done things "wrong" -- I did things as I wanted to do them. So be it. So I went into another relationship -- so what?

Enough with the analysis and projections.

He is not that bad of a guy. He has a problem and admits to it. He knows he needs help with it.

I might close this thread. Thank you so much to all those who have been supportive.

I am extremely emotionally raw right now.

Oh yea? it was because you asked him about if the relationship was going to become exclusive. He knew thats NOT where he wanted it to go, he wanted ststus quo. IF you hadnt said anything, would he have told you that or did it come out because he didnt wsnt to lie & get himself involved in a relationship that he really didnt want. He was protecting himself from your relationship desires...dont paint him as being do selfless & only thinking about you....get REAL with what was really going on reading between the lines. I know everyone wants to see people eith rose colored glasses when they do something thst hurts....makes it feel better but that is NOT always the REALITY of the situation either.

I really don't appreciate your tone, or any of your responses on my threads. Please do not argue with me. I am closing this thread. I really don't need this. Please stop replying.

Give it few days and you’ll feel much better. It sucks but look at the positives here. You are getting better in recognizing when something is wrong for you. You addressed and figured out in less than two months that this isn’t right. You are getting better in recognizing red flags early on. Pat yourself on a back. It might not feel like it now but you are a winner in this situation. Focus on that.

Thanks, Divine!!! All very true!

Having spoken to you about this more extensively, I feel like he was pretty up front with you when you brought up exclusivity. I disagree that he would have kicked you to the curb if you hadn't had sex with him. He doesn't sound like that kind of guy. It sounds to me like when the question was brought up, he was pretty honest with you about this problem he has with commitment. He could have lied, but he was honest. There's nothing bad about being honest with what you want and who you are. He didn't take advantage of you.

You were having a casual relationship to start, and then things kept going and you wanted to be exclusive, so you broached the topic. He wasn't ready for that. So you ended it. You did absolutely nothing wrong here. You didn't miss any red flags. You didn't do anything to yourself. Sometimes people don't fit together or aren't at the same place emotionally. It happens. It doesn't mean either one is a bad person or did anything wrong.

I have talked with you a lot. You have a very strong identity and sense of self. You know who you are, you have self confidence, you know what you want. You can take as little or as much time as you want between relationships. It's not like you're jumping from man to man because you need them as a source of identity or because you fear abandonment.

I also don't think it's necessary to "be alone" for any period of time if it's not beneficial. People do that after long relationships when they've lost their sense of self or need to figure out what makes them happy. That is not the case with you. You were with your deadbeat boyfriend for a year; that's not that long. Sometimes the best thing to do, in fact, is get up off the dirt and start throwing fast balls again.

You're doing fine, kid. Don't let other people's judgments get you down. Everyone has opinions, but there's no right or wrong way to live or love. Do what makes you happy.

Seesaw

Seesaw, thank you. I really appreciate the time you took to write such a supportive, thoughtful and uplifting reply in my defense. HUGS.

You are reading the situation accurately and thank you also for your kind words about me. I agree that he was simply being honest with me when posed with the question.

He was no villain in this matter, so for some others, there's no reason to vilify him, or judge me for having gotten into a relationship after my breakup, or for having had sex with him early on. This was for fun to start with. Then it evolved into something a bit more deep.. a lot more deep.

I respect his honesty. I am not hurt by his actions -- I applaud him for respecting me enough to tell me.

I am disappointed that it had to end, but it did need to end at this stage. He did not use me. He cares for me and told me yesterday that he loves me.. that his feelings are deep and very real. I believe him. He is not just feeding me BS. He is just as upset about this ending as I am.... he wrote to me yesterday, on his initiative, telling me this.

He said we had a beautiful thing going -- I know he is going to miss what we had -- it was pretty magical. We both know this -- others (my friends) commented on how happy we were together when we were out dancing to our favorite music. We saw a video of us dancing and his comment was "we are so cute!!!!!"

We shared a lot of good times together.. he looked at me with looks of love. I could see it in his eyes. I believe him when he told me yesterday that he loves me.

So I know this is not easy. He poured out his heart to me yesterday. I don't think he's going to turn around and begin a man who.re fest in response, discarding me and moving coldly onto the next.

There's been a lot of interpretation on here about his motives, who he is, what he is doing and what he wants. And I think a lot of it has been off.

I know him... at least as far as you can know someone given the seven weeks we've been together. Him still being on the dating site after seven weeks, to me, simply just speaks to his ambivalence right now about a commitment.

Seesaw, I agree that there should be no specified amount of time that one needs to be alone after a breakup. It's individual My ex fiance and I had actually already broken up two months before the final one. It had been coming.

But this go around, I will take some time to be alone mainly because my heart and mind are not into dating again right now after this.

Some of the responses on here are making me more aware of my own replies to people and how they may come across. We must remember to be supportive and try to think of the situation from the poster's shoes and have empathy.

I learned in my counseling psychology graduate program that as a therapist, you start therapy from wherever the client is at in their progress or growth. That you don't just lead them down a road they are not yet ready for -- you begin where they are. This I think is valuable and we could all probably use this approach. I am going to try to remember this when I reply to other posters.

Seesaw, thanks again, and a BIG thank you again to all those who have been so supportive of me on here that I am not specifically mentioning. I deeply appreciate your kindness and support! It means to the world to me.

Don't blame yourself. People cheat. You didn't have sex too early on. If you want a non-exclusive EFF buddy, then thing would be fine.

Whatever works for you.

TY! I don't blame myself at all.

All good points!

I don’t think that anyone judged you though or said it’s your fault (if they did I didn’t see) but more like trying to help you with this and people were supportive. Maybe not supportive in the way you’d like but that’s a nature of online forums. It’s not the same as with face to face therapy or friendship.

Plus people might be triggered by certain things. I am fortunate enough to not encounter cheaters in my love life but others were maybe cheated on, so reading that someone routinely cheats on women/wife etc perhaps triggered people to respond certain way.

Frankly he isn’t member on here so we don’t realky have any loyalty to him. No one likes to see posters on here upset though. So concern is to help you, maybe not the way you’d like to be helped. But we tried.

Good luck with job interviews!

Thank you, Divine.

I would like to avoid any conflict with anyone so I won't comment fully or specifically, but yes, there was some judgement.

Most have been supportive, and yes, I understand that this may have been triggering to some. I disagreed with some of the interpretations of his behavior, that is all.

Yes, none of us like to see someone upset. We're all here to support each other and help each other as best we can. I appreciate that very much.

I am sorry that you were triggered and if I contributed in any way then directly apologise for that.

I know first hand how hard it is to write about a personal situation, and no we don't really know you or him just interpration from what is written.

Personally I felt concerned about you when I read some of the things you wrote, you just broke up with a man who sounded like he messed you around and hope you understand like as Divine says many of us felt protective of you over that.

Take good care Eve, and so sorry this thread triggered you.

Thanks, Sprout, and no worries, it wasn't you.

I totally get feeling protective of someone. I do too on here. We are all concerned for each other's welfare and that's the beauty of this site. It truly is wonderful to have such caring concern from those you've never even met in person.

And yes, we all have limited info on just what is written. I think it easy to create our own interpretations of those we don't know based on the limited info we receive.

Online is challenging! It forces us to communicate everything so clearly and to fill in the dots of the whole picture for all those that are trying to help. Actually, it really helps to improve one's written communication skills! LOL.

So, I am glad that I have interviews to focus on today/tomorrow to distract me. It is going to be a bit of a withdrawal process from him. We talked every day, or I mean we texted every day, and saw each other at least twice a week. This is going to be a bit hard. Plus, I have SO many pics saved of both him alone and of us together. I cannot even look at them.

I hid his status updates on FB so I don't have to see them. And I took down my match.com dating profile.

At least I am going out tonight to see my friends and hear music on my own, and tomorrow night, so I have some fun ahead of me too.

I am going to try and keep busy. I will make plans with friends for the weekend. Maybe I will look into some meetups for myself, as Divine suggested, with women.

Dammit. Another broken relationship. I am going to have to be strong now.

You can do it, Eve

Looks like you are getting it under control and taking necessary steps in healing. Good job

thanks, Purple, thanks Divine!

I feel sad, but I am trying to push it out of my mind.

The end of any relationship is hard, even if it wasn't exclusive. It is like a death. It's disappointing. The sadness will go away. Give yourself some time to be sad and grieve but keep looking. Be nice to yourself, most of all. <3

I think it is really important to communicate with your partner so you're on the same page.

Thanks, LE.

It is a death. I am on and off missing him and thinking of him all morning today. This may be harder than I thought.

We communicated yesterday but now we're not communicating since it's over.

At the beginning of a relationship too. I know you asked him was he talking to other women but did you tell him you wanted to be exclusive or did you just expect that sex meant you were exclusive?

Neither. I asked him about being exclusive and gave him the choice. I said either was fine.