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Relationships

Worst Christmas Ever...wondering if it'll ever get better

87 replies

officeworker · 26/12/2014 19:53

Hello,

I'm following on from my previous threads about my break up with my partner, it's been two and a half months now and I've just gone through the worst Christmas of my life. I know people have it a lot lot worse than I do, but right now I just need a bit of hand holding about how to get through this period of the year.

He left me and our home at the start of November, the tenancy ended at the end of November and we've both moved back home (I'm 30, he's 27). The reason for our breakup is mainly because I betrayed his trust, lying about something irrelevant, if I'd have told the truth in the first place it'd have been fine, but to him once the trust is broken then that's it, you can't get it back. I'd been trying my hardest to show I'm a good person for three months afterwards, but he just decided he'd had enough and left.

So since we moved out we've had periods of not talking, which going from speaking all the time to nothing has been awful for me. Since the tenancy ended he's been on WhatsApp, sending me messages about the final rent payment. Sometimes I get upset and am really just pleading back to him, other times I try to be as hard as I possibly can. It transpired he'd blocked my phone number (I didn't realise) and that was why he was using WhatsApp. He only goes on it to message me. On Monday, we had another discussion about the landlord, which went into another who was at fault for our breakup. I told him I knew I was, that I have to live with that guilt every single day and that I hope he meets someone who makes him happy as much as that hurts. He replied with a message saying he'd had the most fun with me that he's ever had with another person. That's the last I've heard from him.

Now that it's Christmas I've been distraught, I've cried every single day and pretty much ruined my families Christmas by being so miserable. I miss him all the time. I didn't message him at all, he goes on WhatsApp for a minute or so each day - I'm sure it's to check I haven't killed myself! I just can't even force a smile. I have nightmares nearly every night about him breaking up with me and when he left, my mind is overthinking the WhatsApp activity and him appearing to check up on me. On Christmas Day I sent a video message in the style of the Love Actually cue cards, telling him that I'll always be there for him, he didn't reply. But went on WhatsApp again. I wish he would just text, he doesn't drunk call, he doesn't text. So I know he's over it and I wish to God I could feel the same.

For the past four days each day I've just drove and drove usually on a 75 mile round trip to be on my own and get some space. Yesterday I saw a guy trying to jump from a motorway bridge and realised someone always feels worse. I'm seeing my counsellor on Monday so hopefully it'll help but I just feel like I need to get all of this out...typing on here helps. I just want to be over it like he is. It hurts so much.

Apologies for the long post.

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KindleKind · 26/12/2014 20:03

I'm sorry you're in so much pain. I'm feeling particularly lonely and shitty today.
I wonder if that guy did jump from the bridge. I feel for him.
My insides are in knots and I'm trying to allow myself to feel the pain without letting it completely overwhelm me.
I'll be glad when today is over.

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Fairylea · 26/12/2014 20:14

Christmas always makes things like this 100 times worse. You feel like everyone else is having a wonderful time and there's a huge pressure for everything to be "perfect". I think 2.5 months after a break up is the worst time in the world emotionally. You're right in the thick of it but I promise you it does get easier. (My ex dh left me for a girlfriend he had before me he'd found on Facebook! Upped and left in a 2 week period and dd nor I ever heard from him again, she was 6).

I think what might help is to block him on WhatsApp and whatever other social networking sites you have him on. You're just tormenting yourself with it all.

Don't think about the future, it can be very overwhelming. Just literally think about one step at a time. And it sounds ridiculous but make sure you eat regularly even if you don't feel like it. You need to keep your blood sugar levels even in times of stress otherwise it can make you feel so much worse.

Things will get easier. I know that is so cliché but I promise it will. You are very young and life will move on.

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officeworker · 26/12/2014 20:29

Christmas is a time of a million memories, I remember last Christmas Day counting down to when we would see each other in the afternoon and this year I just wanted to call or text and know it wasn't the best idea, hence the video. I know he's unblocked my phone number again, and on WhatsApp as we do need to communicate until the final payment for the house is sorted out.

We're not friends on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram, I took that decision after he'd done it a few weeks before and then readded me. The reason at the time was because I was on my sisters hen party and he didn't want to see me getting over him online. Which was totally the right thing to do.

New Year will be worse, as we spent the whole evening in watching films and laughing and this year I'm going to be on my own, I don't want to go out and ruin everyones time together. I wish I could be happy. I try to eat, and I sleep ok but the nightmares are awful. I still sleep on my side of the bed and have his t-shirt he left me when he moved out under a pillow next to mine. It's actually heartbreaking. I just keep thinking he's fine and having the time of his life without me, it's horrible. He goes drinking, sees his friends, has all his family and I've never been back to the shopping centres we ever went to together. I wish I could feel better, I really do. The only person who cheers me up a little bit is my sister, but yesterday we all watched her wedding DVD for the first time and it was just more memories as he should have been there. She's a newlywed so busy most of the time and I hardly see her, not like she understands but at least she can make me laugh occasionally.

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HanselandGretel · 26/12/2014 20:36

Sounds like you are carrying a lot of blame and burden and he is happy to let you feel responsible for the breakup. Don't be so hard on yourself, if he was so inclined he could discuss things properly with you, instead he's distanced himself. Perhaps he had been thinking of ending it and you gave him an out? Sorry you feel so bad but it will lessen in time, be kind to yourself.

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noseyfrog · 26/12/2014 20:49

He didn't end the relationship because of one fib. People don't do that and it's cruel of him to let you think as much.

You are going through a loss. A big loss. Feel everything and be kind to yourself. After a while you'll realise it hurts less.

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officeworker · 26/12/2014 20:52

I know I'm completely to blame for our relationship ending. There's a million things I could've done differently and we would have still been together today enjoying Christmas together. Once the trust is gone then he's right, he can't get that back again. We'd break up and make up so many times I felt like he was the boy who cried wolf, then when it actually happened for real and he left I was distraught. I thought we'd be together forever and grow old. I thought we'd do so much together and it's all gone.

In my heart I keep thinking maybe he'll change his mind, maybe he will come back and text or call. But I know in my head it won't happen.

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ButchCassidy · 26/12/2014 20:53

Be kind to yourself. Christmas can be such a hard time of year. Your op sounded so sad.

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officeworker · 26/12/2014 20:57

I am sad, my Mum even told him so when he text her because he couldn't get any sense out of me about the landlord. And he replied with that it's been hard for him too! It hasn't, he's just living his life free of me. I just wonder if the whole relationship was even real, how can he be so fine when I'm not at all.

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Cantbelievethisishappening · 26/12/2014 21:12

I know I'm completely to blame for our relationship ending. There's a million things I could've done differently and we would have still been together today enjoying Christmas together. Once the trust is gone then he's right, he can't get that back again. We'd break up and make up so many times I felt like he was the boy who cried wolf, then when it actually happened for real and he left I was distraught

To be frank, this sounds like a nightmare r'ship and you are well out of it. What on earth did you do to warrant all of this? Is it possible he wanted out and is using this 'terrible loss of trust' as an excuse?
I really think you need to go NC. He seems to be really revelling in the drama of all of this especially the fact that you are feeling dreadful about it all. I wonder how he would react if you stopped all communication.
Why do you still need to be in touch with him?

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ButchCassidy · 26/12/2014 21:15

It can't all be your fault. Don't put all the blame on yourself.

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IsabeauMichelle · 26/12/2014 21:18

Could I ask what was the nature of the thing that you lied about? Because I think he's being really horrible laying the blame on you for that, when it's very possible that it was just good timing.

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IsabeauMichelle · 26/12/2014 21:18

For him, I mean. If you were as in love as you say, then one little lie wouldn't break you up.

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officeworker · 26/12/2014 21:18

We're not in touch, only occasionally as the landlord seems to keep getting in touch with him rather than me to sort out the final rent payment. Honestly he isn't playing head games, he doesn't speak to me at all. That's maybe why he goes on WhatsApp to see if I've been on. I'm sure he'd have expected a million texts from me over this period and I haven't.

We were looking for our summer holiday, deciding on where to go. Paid a deposit and then it came to the week the balance was due, he'd paid his half weeks before and I couldn't afford it. I'd took a chance on being able to and couldn't. So when I told him he cuddled me and said it's ok, within two hours he'd decided he hated me and could no longer trust me and it went downhill from there. And lots of little instances of me being annoyed about the amount of time we spent together, I wanted more than he could give me as he had so many other commitments.

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IsabeauMichelle · 26/12/2014 21:20

OP, that's utter crap imo. Who finishes with someone they love over that? And has a complete turnaround in 2 hours? Bullshit.

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officeworker · 26/12/2014 21:21

His Dad also had a stroke (we think) the week before we broke up. That morning I was there for him, I took food to the hospital and whenever he needed me to collect things or pick him up, or see his family I would go and do it as that's what being a girlfriend is to me. That weekend he was texting me saying how much he loved me, and missed me whilst he was in the hospital.

The next week he broke up with me. Turned out when I went to drop some things off at his parents (he wasn't in) that his Dad has about three years to live and can barely even speak. And he didn't even tell me at all.

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Vivacia · 26/12/2014 21:26

I'm afraid this all sounds a bit self-indulgent.

Are you finding the counselling helpful? Do you have "moving on" plans for the New Year?

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IsabeauMichelle · 26/12/2014 21:26

All this stuff you're saying is quite weird Confused He sounds like he had already checked out tbh.

I'm really sorry but I think he was looking for an excuse to end it. For whatever reason.

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officeworker · 26/12/2014 21:27

He did also say a few days ago he used to think I was the best person in the world until I let him down over the holiday and then the trust just went after that. I wanted more time together at weekends, he wanted to mess about taking his family shopping every Saturday.

I'd go to my families home for a couple of hours each Saturday, he'd always see his around lunchtime, and if he'd have done the same we'd have had most of the afternoon and evening together. Instead his cousin (who hated me because I took away her Friday nights with him) would make up shopping trips he needed to take her on and he'd do it. So he wouldn't be in till 6pm. We'd have no time to do anything, he'd spend all Sunday doing work for Monday so we had zero quality time. But he just saw it as me being jealous and possessive.

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DoubleValiumLattePlease · 26/12/2014 21:29

I'm sorry you're in so much pain OP. Really - it comes through in every sentence you write. But the reason he's given you for ending it is utter bullshit and beyond cruel. I think he's been wanting to end it for some time and was just waiting for something like this - something which in a healthy relationship would be worth a blush, a laugh and a promise to help the other party out. So make no mistake - this was not a healthy relationship. You don't sound in a good place and I think a period of time to regroup, heal yourself, start to believe in your own value as a person NOT necessarily as part of a couple - that's what you need. I agree with pp who say block him. Go NC. It's the only way you'll start to heal. Do it now and help yourself on the way to happy self confidence again.

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Fairylea · 26/12/2014 21:29

You have to stop blaming yourself. So you didn't save the money for a holiday deposit when you should have done? Seriously if that's the worst thing you've done in the relationship you are kidding yourself if you think that's a valid reason he should leave you. I agree with the others he had already checked out and used that as the reason.

Please stop being so unkind to yourself.

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saintlyjimjams · 26/12/2014 21:31

I'm with cantbelieve - sounds a nightmare relationship. Who wants lots of breaking up & making up? Far too much drama. Was this your first serious relationship? Don't do what I did when my first serious relationship broke up (wasted 2 years going backwards & forwards). God knows why. We're pretty incompatible.

Block him on everything & get out & about with friends. You're more likely to find yourself having a nice time if you go out than moping at home.

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bluebell345 · 26/12/2014 21:33

He might be upset for his father's situation.
He might be missing you, too.
It is hard to understand them.
he might be affected because of your wrong but he could give you another chance.
I think you did what you could do.
Leave it to him for 1-2 months, if he doesn't contact you move on.
A relationship musn't be difficult.

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DoubleValiumLattePlease · 26/12/2014 21:40

Sorry bluebell but he might be affected because of your wrong but he could give you another chance
No. No no no. It was a minor wrong and not in any way a matter that needs 'a second chance'. It was a small bit of misleading about a holiday deposit not an affair or failure to tell him she was already married. He's given her the piss-poorest of reasons for ending it because he's too much of a yellow bellied coward to tell her the truth. The point the OP needs to get to is understanding that she doesn't need him or any other man unless the relationship is sound and emotionally healthy.

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bluebell345 · 26/12/2014 21:47

sorry, I shouldn't say second chance, I should say he should ignore it.

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officeworker · 26/12/2014 21:48

For all of you saying to go NC, I don't text or call unless he does it first. When we text it's about the flat, there was a misunderstanding with the final month of rent and so the landlord e-mails him for some reason and then he tells me. Usually it descends into an argument about the fact I'm a liar over the holiday because I get upset and bring it up. Last time it happened was on Monday, and that was the first time I'd driven somewhere to get away from it all. I was sat in a service station on the A1 texting him for over an hour about it all and in the end I had to send him pictures of my bank statements just to prove to him I wasn't lying about money again. And he still didn't believe me.

But yeah, we don't talk. With the counsellor I've only had the one session last week, I felt great coming out of it but then afterwards I've felt flat. I think he bailed as well, but it was all so sudden, I really didn't see it coming. He also says he can't rely on me for anything, and when I helped with his Dad and stuff to him it was too little too late apparently. There's nobody else either, and I've also told him it's not as if I had an affair, and he says well I may as well have!

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