to be feeling so heart broken and let down by this?

[blueballoon79]

I have been in a relationship with DP for a little over a year now.
We don't live together but see each other about three nights a week and call each other every day.

I'm very much in love with him and things are going well (or so I thought) and he tells me he loves me and cares about my children (from a previous relationship) a great deal.

We'd known each other as friends for years before we started a relationship, but when our relationship started he was in quite a bad place emotionally. He'd had a breakdown and lost his job due to this.

He's fine now and has often told me and his family that he wouldn't have coped without my support.

All fine and good, until last week when he told me totally out of the blue that he plans to go travelling in June this year for a few months and if he gets the opportunity he plans to live there.

He said he told me early rather than just disappearing in June because he cares about me and loves me a great deal and so that I can decide whether to end things now or else wait until June when he goes!

I was extremely upset about all of this and he couldn't understand why. He says it's something he has to do and although he may come back after a few months, he doesn't want me hanging on waiting just incase he doesn't come back.

He told me that he doesn't view our relationship as serious as we don't live together or have children together and we're not married. He also told me he doesn't see us being together in the future.

I'm so desperately hurt. I didn't realise he felt this way as before he's told me how much he loves me and how he won't mess things up and how nobody has ever fulfilled him like I do.

If he loves me so much then how can he just pack his bags and go with the hope of never returning?

blueballon he used you as we carers of our disabled children can be a bit vulnerable. Horrid, spiteful actions. x

My love, you are a good person, a good, kind, decent, honest person who is there for the people she cares about.

He is not and never will be.

You deserve a whole lot better, good looks are not enough in the long run. One day he will be old and alone.

Expect him to start messing with your head when you tell him to bog off. His ego will be crushed and you will probably start hearing the "I love you" crap again.

Except this time you know it's ALL ABOUT HIM.

Blueballoon - he cares for you but not enough to stay for you. I can understand your feelings of intense sadness. He wants to keep you until he goes and you know that whether you stay with him until then or not you will have a very hard time getting over him. Will your hurt be greater if you continue to see him? Would you be hoping that he would change his mind and decide to stay? It sounds as though he will not. I can't decide whether or not he is using you, but at least he has been honest. Sorry you are going through this.

How are you Blueballoon? Did you see him yet? x

I rang him and told him I needed time and space to think. I told him I'm too confused and hurt to be making any decisions now and just need some time to myself.

I've been trying to just get on with things, but I can't stop thinking about him and feeling horribly miserable :(

Well done OP. You're doing the right thing to stop seeing him. Of course you feel hurt and miserable - you are grieving for the end of your relationship. Stay strong xx

Just want to add my support blueballoon. You sound like a lovely, giving person and you deserve to be treated better than this. I'm sorry, but how dare he say he's sick of hearing about your troubles!!!

Please stay strong, get some rl support, spend time with people that will give you the strength you need to pull away. So sorry you're feeling miserable

He won't stop ringing me and sending me messages over Facebook. I'm ignoring his calls, but his messages are saying he loves me and doesn't want for our relationship to be over and that he probably won't stay to live abroad and will only be gone for a few months in all likelihood.
I just need for him to leave me alone. :(
I feel so miserable about everything and I've messaged him back on Facebook asking for him to stop trying to contact me and give me some space.

Yeah, have been out with people like this- they besically use you to drag them up from their pit and then when everything's going well for them they think they're too good for the likes of you. Tell him to fuck off and you hope he spends all his pathetic travelling experience with diarrhea.

basically, not besically. I don't even know what that is.

Stay strong blueballoon! He's realised now that you've got a mind of your own and you're standing up for yourself and your DC and doing what's right for YOU (which may not be what's right for him) and he's scared now. Hence all the messages and calls. A man like this is desperate to be the one in control of everything and once he realises that you have taken control of your life from him, then his insecurities kick in.

Please understand that if you take him back at this stage, it's likely the same thing will happen all over again when he goes off travelling again and you'll be hurt again and left wondering what he's about and where it's all going. Stay strong now, stand your ground. The hurt you're feeling now will eventually fade, but not if it's a wound that is half-healed then ripped open again by his actions.

It's not fair on your DC to see this man coming and going out of your lives at his whim, so please think this all through and do what's best for you and them. Do not give this man's feelings another thought. At this point, the priority is you and your DC, not him.

Agree with all the other posters -- you are worth more than this, you deserve a better man than him, and you owe it to yourself and your DCs to hold out for someone who's worth your effort. This man doesn't sound like the one.

I'm really trying my best to stay strong, but finding it incredibly hard. :(
He has rung three times already today and each time my phone rings I feel physically sick.
I'm trying to just think of my children and think that even if I don't feel like I deserve better, they most definitely do.
He had an especially close relationship to my daughter and I don't want her feelings messed around with him coming and going.

Try messaging him one final time.

"The next time you phone/text/message/write/look at me the wrong way, I will be calling the Police"

or

"Which part of leave me alone do you NOT understand?"

Although what you've said about calling the police does sound a bit dramatic katie, I think what he's doing is getting that way.

You have every right to see or not see whoever you want blueballoon, and someone who doesn't respect that right is harrassing you.

I know it feels different when you're in/have been in a relationship with that person, but once you've said 'please don't ring me because I need time to think' it's not for him to choose differently for you.

I really do feel for you, it's horrible getting mixed messages. Treated like shit at the same as being told they love you, especially when you love the bones of them.

But you have to try and protect yourself from him, I mean in an emotional rather than physical way, nobody who loves you would even entertain making you feel the way you're feeling at the minute.

Blue - I don't think he's done any of this intentionally. I think he's just a bit of a mess himself. I don't think he knows what he wants - or rather he does know what he wants, but he can't have it. (You, travel, pub, kids, freedom - all together). It also sounds like he's very insecure.

It is totally over the top for you to be told to threaten to ring the police because he's phoned you a few times today. He loves you - he wants you, he's scared he's lost you and he's a mess.

Of course it's a reasonable choice to decide he can't give you what you need (stability) and for you to tell him it's over - but it's going to take a while for both of you to deal with that. You haven't been together very long, but you were both in it very deeply... it will take a while to detach.

You will get through this and you will be OK x

I messaged him last night and asked him to not try contacting me again as I won't answer anyway so it is a waste of his time.

I told him nothing he could say is going to make anything better or easier and that he's just dragging things on by continuously trying to contact me.

I received two phone calls this morning though, one directly after the other which I didn't pick up but were from a withheld number this time.

I know it will be him as he's done this before when I've been asleep on an evening and he's wanted to talk, he rings twice, nobody else does it.

I'm seeing a friend today and feeling a bit more positive about things, but just feeling incredibly lonely and hurt :(

Blueballoon, you sound a sweetheart and like you have been there for him so much, unfortunately now you do have to protect your own heart, as if you let him come back/dally around/go off again, it is going to hurt not only you but the children an awful lot (and he will go off travelling, make no mistake about that). I'm sorry you are going through this, it is a little like ripping a plaster off though, better done all at once than drawn out over a long time period with the same result. Turn to your friends and family as they will be there when he's off prancing around the world.

I just wanted to add my support OP. you have done the right thing. I agree with the people who say that this guy is an ego maniac. It's all about him. He liked having someone completely mad about him. Enjoyed that power and control. He told you he was moving away and dressed it up as giving you a choice but really it was just to prove to himself how much you loved him and make hums elf feel big by seeing how distressed you were.
This is all proved by the fact he does not respect the choice you did make as it did not suit him. FWIW I would be surprised if he does go travelling and he certainly won't stay there permanently its all just pie in the sky but he wanted to make it clear to you that he was keeping his options open. All the while expecting you to keep your options focused solely on him.
It is not a coincidence that he pulled this stunt when you started needing support. After all he needed to make it all about hm again.
Do not engage. Do not contact him. Stay strong.

I don't think you should feel used, OP.

He had just had a breakdown when you met & lost his job. You helped him back up, helped him 'fix' himself. He needed you at the time.

He just feels he needs something else right now, and although that leaves you feeling heartbroken etc, he probably can't help how he feels & is at least, being totally honest with you about the fact that he might now want to come back. He could have told you several months into his trip. He didn't. To me, that says a lot.