AIBU? And if I am...is it ok to occassionaly be?

[definitelymaybee]

I sort of know IAMU before I ask, but for some reason I feel really angry and wanted to get some opinions.

I was with my BF from May 2014 to December 2014. It was a bit of an unconventional relationship because when he met me, I was pretty broken up after my fiance was caught cheating and didn't want to go out with anyone. He was very persistent and said he just wnated to be friends, maybe take a walk sometimes and he became a really good friend to me. He was always there for me and after a few months we did become a couple.

I'll openly admit that while we got on great and were very close that I was just not ready for a relationship and he kids / to be together and make a life.

I made a decision in December to relocate because it was best for me to move back closer to my family as my wedding was now off and this meant leaving the new BF behind. He wanted to discuss coming with me but I didn't want him to give up his whole life for me.

So I moved in December and the first 3 months or so we carried on seeing each other, talking regularly, I visited, he visited and he remained my best friend. We were openly dating other people as we knew the distance meant it could not work long term. He did keep saying he wnated to marry me, and suggested again moving down and I told him it was best to wait a year to be 100% sure before he made such a big decision.

Anyway, very suddenly he met someone else, started dating her and witin 8 weeks if proposing to me, he's now in lovd with this other girl. He now never texts me, never calls, when I went back there last time he didn't even make an effort to see me or ask how I was and I just feel like I was meaningless to him which re-enforced how my fiance made me feel. It's like I was just forgotten suddenly.

I KNOW he said he wnated to marry me and move with me, but what I wnated was for him to be consistent and prove himself over time and he ended up forgetting me like I never existed.

I am not in love with him, I don't think I ever was TRULY in love with him but did care about him enormously and probably felt like he was my best friend in the world. All of a sudden he doesn't want to know me really at all, and when I questioned it he told me I got "more than most friends" and admits he thinsk this woman might be "the one" and finds nothing odd about the fact that he said the same to me a few weeks ago.

Pics today on FB of him with the new woman, walking on the beach with a love heart drawn in the sand with their initials. EIGHT weeks after he proposed to me?

AIMU to be really hurt and pissed off? It's not that I want him, I don't, or that I want him to want me...I'm not that childish...it's just that he's made me feel like everything between us was never real or true and that I was as easily replaced as a pair of socks.





I made a choice in December to relocate

[definitelymaybee]

I just go so angry I unfriended him and feel really ashamed and like an idiot now :(

[Offred]

I KNOW he said he wnated to marry me and move with me, but what I wnated was for him to be consistent and prove himself over time and he ended up forgetting me like I never existed.

No, you aren't being unreasonable at all. Fortunately for you I think your behaviour has been absolutely the perfect way to deal with a man like this and you are right to feel upset.

Unfortunately you got involved with a future faker who is highly likely to be insecure, needy and abusive. Fortunately only your feelings got tied up with him and you had the absolutely astonishingly brilliant sense not to tie your life up with him before he showed his true colours! Well done!

Have you ever read the website baggage reclaim? Good starting point I think!

[Offred]

Unfriending him and being angry is good too I think! As is being hurt and upset at being treated badly. Just stay away from him now and carry on being your own best friend as you have been throughout. I don't think many people would have been as strong and as sensible as you after a bad break up when targeting by a shitbag like you have been.

[definitelymaybee]

Thanks offred

The thing is, he wasn't abusive, or nasty and he's a lovely gentle man.
The thing though is that he just wnated marriage / children and wanted it too quickly with me when I was not fully over the last relationship.

It feels so disengenious that he claimed to love me so much, then all of a sudden loves someone else.

I can't help just feeling so hurt and fucking used. After going through a fiance stopping loving me overnight and him helping me through the grief of all that it seems incredible that he did the same.

If he was here he'd say "I loved you, you didn't want me" and technically he'd be right so I've no right to say a word but how someone moves on so fast is hard to believe.

His feelings can't have been genuine and I am just SO distraught over it because it was so hard for me to trust another man after fiance and I feel so let down.

[WorraLiberty]

You both chose to date other people, so of course it was never going to last.

It was only a matter of time before either one of you got serious about someone you were dating.

It happened to be him in this case but it easily could have been you.

You were never meant to be together long term and I think you know that, because you could have chosen a long distance relationship, which in 2015 is much easier due to mobile phones and skype etc.

Just move on and try not to read too much into it. He just didn't happen at the right time for you.

[Offred]

^The thing is, he wasn't abusive, or nasty and he's a lovely gentle man.
The thing though is that he just wnated marriage / children and wanted it too quickly with me when I was not fully over the last relationship.^

No, he won't have been in your fairly short relationship and with you being clear you were independent and not 'his'. However this kind of immediate pressure for commitment from someone who is seemingly kind and gentle is often indicative of future abuse to come.

It feels so disengenious that he claimed to love me so much, then all of a sudden loves someone else.

That's because it was. It usually is when someone rushes in so quickly and then discards someone so cruelly. It is completely different to realising a long standing relationship isn't working.

He likely doesnt really see women as people, for whatever reason- the selfishness that comes with deep insecurity perhaps, therefore they will all be 'the one' until they are not and when they are not they will be discarded without a thought because it is All. About. Him.

You have had a lucky escape I think but I can understand why you are hurt and sad.

A good man will not rush right in with a proposal when he barely knows you but he does know you are vulnerable. A good man will respect your boundaries and will take things at an appropriate pace that you are both comfortable with. A good man would grieve for the loss of the woman he really believed was 'the one'.

[Offred]

You feel bad because he fucked with your head by heaping pressure on you when you were vulnerable. You likely felt a little blackmailed into committing even if you didn't and now you find out it was all a lie anyway.

He has issues and I think you've done really well and you shouldn't let him set you back.

[PurpleSwift]

I don't think yabu but I think it sounds like it's for the best. He sounds like he's really ready to be in love. Does he really love this new oh? Who knows. But he clearly feels as if he does.
You say you wanted him to wait and to prove himself to you. Where you also trying to prove yourself to him? It doesn't sound so. Let it go.

[Foogy]

I think you've had a lucky escape.

[definitelymaybee]

I think I knew we were not a right match. I think he wanted to get married and have kids and it was timing for him and like you say he was ready and maybe that was why it was so easy / quick.

What makes me so ragingly angry though is that he didn't stay close to me, and carry on being my friend. Beause for a whole year when I was broken and lost he hassled the heck out of me for me to let him into my life, telling me it was fine to be "just friend" and it was "obvious i needed someone" and he forced his way into my life and became my best friend and confidante and over time he very slowly gained my trust, friendship and more and ended up becoming a very important and much needed part of my life, and the very moment that he meets someone else i may as well not exist.

That's what annoys me, because if he geuinely cared about me, he'd still be calling and asking how I was. He'd still have time for me and he doesn't.

[mynewpassion]

He needed to end with you or have a little more from you. its been a year. He wasn't being fair to the other women. Since he wasn't receiving much encouragement from you, he decided to stop wasting his time that might go nowhere. He's giving more of a chance with someone else.

How long should he wait?

[Offred]

Yes, he just targeted you when you were vulnerable and the whole thing was just about him. You see it now where before he likely had you feeling guilty about not feeling able to give such a Nice Guy what he wanted.

I totally get this is not about you wanting him to not move on or jealousy but hurt at having been manipulated and pressured when you were already hurt.

[Offred]

You thought he was ok with being a friend when actually it was all a manipulation to pressure you into giving him what he wanted and now you feel betrayed for having shared your feelings and secrets with him.

[definitelymaybee]

No mynewpassion it wasn;t a year.

We split at Christmas officially. Last time we spelt together was May. We were still texting every day / calling regularly.

He all of a sudden meets her and i am forgotten

If it had been a year I'd not be upset. It was weeks.

[Offred]

You don't genuinely go from proposing to one woman and telling her she is the one to proposing to another who you also think is the one in 8 weeks. It's a reflection of insecurity and selfishness I think.

[definitelymaybee]

Yes Offred, exactly. I WANT him to be happy with someone else.

I just also WANT the feelings he claied to have had for me (which actually tortured me and made me feel horribly guilty) to have been genuine.

I also WANT my friendship which he claimed to be important to be treated as important.

Also if for him the version of "friends" that he gave me was based on him wanting to get into my pants and convince me to give him more then he;s a twat.

I trusted him as a friend. I feel used and betrayed. Really glad you understand, I thought everyone here would tell me to shut up and not be so selfish.

[Offred]

Well unless you are 12 anyway... I'm assuming he is a lot older than 12 OP!

[Offred]

I think it's ok for you to be angry and sad about that. I do think though that you should also give yourself a massive pat on the back for not giving in to the pressure!

[definitelymaybee]

He's 36!!!!

[Offred]

Yeah, so likely realising that young and fertile 20 somethings aren't as interested in him as they once were and he's feeling the tick of a biological clock perhaps. It's really no excuse. It is important that you do your best to find a good partner to raise children with not just anyone who has a uterus! Ah well, lucky escape for you and time will tell you that when the anger subsides about the betrayal.

[definitelymaybee]

Thanks Offred. I feel better for offloading all that anger and it's good to feel validated like these feelings matter.

Someone said earlier it could well have been me who met someone first - and yes it could- and I definitely would not have been writing love initials on the ebach and posting in on facebook. I'd have more respect. I'd also not stop returning his calls or speakign to him.

I do think he was selfish, I do think he probably "thought" he loved me (and probably only thinks he does her too) and his feelings are shallow and based on his biological clock. I just think if he was a truly good person then the friendship would have / should have meant more to him than it did.

Funny how diferrent men are when they want in your kickers eh? He could not have done enough for me before! Sending cards, singing me songs...

ha!

Dick head.

[Offred]

Not all men, just the dickheads!

I think you'll benefit much more from being away from him than you did from his superficial 'friendship'.

Treat yourself to something nice as a reward for keeping him at arms length long enough for him to move on and for not being hurt and bitter and incapable of trusting anyone.

And trust yourself in the future. You seem to have good instincts in relation to your own boundaries.

[however]

Bullet dodged. Well done you!

[BitOutOfPractice]

Sorry op I don't mean to sound harsh but I think YABU.

It seems to me that you want to have your cake and eat it. You don't want him but you don't want anyone else to have him either so you've strung him along since December with some morsels to keep him interested, all along knowing that you didn't love him and probably never would (by your own admission)

I'm not saying he has covered himself in glory either but I don't think either of you have.

Sorry. But if I were this man's friend I would have been telling him to move on because you were never going to give him what he wanted

Hope you're ok though. It all sounds like a painful mess

[definitelymaybee]

I know that's how it looks, but really...wasn't that at all. I told him from day one I could not give him what he wanted, and never strung him along to keep him interested.

What was happenning though was that I WAS slowly thinking in my head maybe there was some chance of a future, He was so damned convincing and such a lovely guy I felt defunct and confused over why I could not just feel the same. I missed him horribly when I moved and cried every night for weeks. i just felt deep in my core like something was not fully right and I wanted to be with him, just not to commit to him moving down here so suddenly.

For me, although I was not truly "in love" with him and wanting to get married, I cared very deeply about him and his part in my life meant the world to me. I felt unable to "move on" or properly date other people because of our situation and he led me to believe the same was true.

It's not that I wanted him to wait forever, it's just that I wanted to trust he extracted from me so painstakingly to have not been misinvested. I just wanted him to:

a) grieve me
b) not take his friendship from me after he made me value it
c) not have spent months making me feel guilty

I do know what you mean and bottomline is he should move on because we were never quite right, but I just wish he'd taken a bit more time and not stopped caring about me and treating me like he valued me.