Really scared of meeting him

[onegoodthingplease]

Having a bit of a mini-breakdown here if anyone can help. I have had lots of normal relationships in my life and met people both in the old fashioned way and online.

A couple of years ago I was badly hurt for the first time in my life by a man . He had been so nice / lovely and after 3 happy years together with him being a great partner and stepfather to my two children, he'd asked me to marry him and transfer with him and his job overseas, which we did, leaving everything behind.

He disappeared with another woman 15 years younger than me from his ofice a year later, with absolutely no sign, leaving me nothing but a text message and he never spoke to me again. He just disappeared leaving me in a rented house with no way to pay the next month's rent.

I did not even have my own bank account and our wedding was booked for the year after, so I ended up having to borrow money to get a flight home and lost basically everything and was in such a shocked and bad state emotionally that it has taken forever to get semi-back on my feet.

I think I just lost the will to live somehow and stopped taking care of myself at all or doing any of the things you should do. Like claiming benefits or sorting banking. It was just like I could barely muster the energy to breathe.

I am sorry if all this makes me sound weak. I never saw myself as weak, but this situation just took everything I had from me and I had been so careful all my life, making considered decisions that I just could not forgive myself.

I have been dating in that time, but not with anyone I felt had real potential so it was more of a distraction than real relationships and just the odd night out here and there.

I have come one leaps and bounds though, and feel a lot better, stronger, happier and am more in control of my life. Almost 3 years has passed now and I feel ready to begin again.

I met this one man online who I have been talking to every day for nine months and we have become very close. He was overseas for work for a year and he is close to coming home and the understanding is that we like each other and want to have a relationship.

I just feel so terrified.

I really like him, he is fantastic and he makes me feel so happy I wake up most days smiling.

I almost can't breathe this morning from being so worried about him coming home.

Part of it is the worries of rejection, if after all this time he does not fancy me, or if he is disappointed in me and part of it is the worry of how he might hurt me.

Can anyone just talk to me. I feel so lost

[NotTheFordType]

You don't sound weak at all - you've got yourself and your two DC out of what must have been a very scary situation - left with no money and no income in a foreign country. You've got your life back after that and carried on being a good parent. You might not have always had all the paperwork in order, but single parenting is bloody hard and there's always stuff that gets left!

Do you feel like you're ready to properly date again? I'm wondering if you've latched onto this guy overseas because knowing he wasn't in reach, it felt "safe" as you could not get invested and therefore couldn't get hurt. Now he's going to be here and it's all a bit real?

[BolshierAryaStark]

Of course you're wary, what happened to you must have been extremely difficult. Kudos to you for coming through it the othee side-it will have you stronger.
Take it one step at a time, try not to have too high expectations & remember he's lucky to have met you. Don't let your past experience spoil your future, you deserve happiness -take it.

[onegoodthingplease]

thank you so much for writing back to me.

Yes, I did speak to him / let him in because he was a safe distance away and that felt doable.

Although, in the process, this person has come to mean the world to me and now I am faced wit the reality that I have to give this a real try and in the real world and I am just so frightened.

Part of me is "normal" and there's another part just saying horrible things to me, like "he will run off too" or "he won't fancy you, you're too fat" or "good things don't happen to you". At the root of it, after all this therapy and all this healing a little part of me feels a bit worthless because of what XP did.