Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Flip

1 2 3

Original poster

To be crying over a photo of a man I haven't seen in nearly 20 years?

52 replies

deluxetruffles · 04/06/2018 12:33

I just saw a photo of a man who I last saw when I was about 24. It is a photo of him now. He looked lovely and it made me burst into tears. I never properly went out with him but he was in love with me for a long time during our teenage years and into our twenties. I was aware of it and everyone else around us knew. We were good friends and then stupidly slept together once and it became awkward and strange and I think I pulled away. He is married with three children and I am divorced with a child. I have no intention of contacting him but just spent the last half an hour crying in front the computer screen. I didn't realise how much I miss him and how much I feel that I made a huge mistake. Am I the only one that this has happened to>

OP posts:

RedLily84 · 04/06/2018 12:37

I don’t think you’re crying for him per se. Don’t be harsh on yourself OP. You’re crying for something that has never happened and neither are you to know what life with him would have been.

Plus social media always seems lovely - everyone puts up their best photos etc.

Don’t think about him any further - you have your own life to be getting on with - he’s gone. What you might have had - never was - and who is to say it would have been happy?

Look after yourself

Original poster

deluxetruffles · 04/06/2018 13:09

This photo of him was not on social media. It was a photo of him at work. I know he has had another life for a long time but I am having very unreasonable "he was mine first" thoughts.

OP posts:

halfwitpicker · 04/06/2018 13:12

I hear ya OP.

I have a pic of a bloke who I knew a while back which I sometimes look at. Makes me feel sad/miss him/regret a few things really.

halfwitpicker · 04/06/2018 13:12

FWIW it's not online, it's an actual paper photograph.

QueenAravisOfArchenland · 04/06/2018 13:14

What stands out from this story is that you could have had this man any time you wanted in the past, and you always said no.

I don't think this is even a tiny bit about him. I think you're mourning something about being younger, and/or having someone uncritically, undemandingly in love with you.

What's going on in your life right now? Is your relationship in a good place?

QueenAravisOfArchenland · 04/06/2018 13:15

Oops, I missed the divorced bit, sorry.

Fatted · 04/06/2018 13:19

It's probably been a cry about what could have been and where you are with your own life right now, instead of feelings for him.

Even now, I still remember a lad I met in uni. He'd asked me out and I turned him down for a stupid reason secretly hoping he'd ask me again and he never did. Every now and then I think to myself what would have happened if I'd accepted. I always day dream about this wonderful life I could've had (mainly where I didn't go out with the rat bag I did in my last year of uni!). It wasn't until a while ago when I was going through a rough time when I realised all the good things I had done in my life since then I wouldn't have had if I'd gone a different direction when I was younger. But also, who's to say it would have been any better with him? I might still be in the same place I am now.

But I understand where you're coming from. Having been there, I do think it's probably more grieving for a life you could have had rather than the man.

candlefloozy · 04/06/2018 13:20

It recently saw "the one that got away for me". I am happily married and considering having my second baby. But seeing his has wrecked havoc on my feelings. I remember being younger and so head over heels and dreaming of our perfect future together.
Reality is, we would have been awful together and broke up pretty soon. At least that's what I tell myself!
I think the idea is always better. When I was single I often thought about him and I really missed the idea of us. Now I'm happily married I don't. It's nice to remember those feelings from back then but sometimes when you may be craving being with someone you love it feels worse knowing it could be you.
Sorry I've waffled. I don't think I've even made sense but I do think things happen for a reason.

DistanceCall · 04/06/2018 13:21

You were not particularly attracted to this man or in love with him, OP. If you had pursued a relationship with him, it would have ended pretty soon, or it would have been bad.

I think you're displacing your feelings about other things onto him, as a fantasy. He's not the opportunity you missed. He's someone you used to know and you weren't very keen on, that's all.

MyOtherUsernameisaPun · 04/06/2018 13:21

I think you're just feeling a totally normal nostalgic yearning for the past and who you were then and the opportunities that were available to you.

Have faith in the decisions of your past self - this guy was in love with you. If he had been right for you it would have felt right, not strange. It's not really about him, it's about imagining a different life when things are a bit rough.

You aren't mad or unreasonable - Just having a normal human reaction

NotTheFordType · 04/06/2018 13:34

I don't have any good (or bad!) advice, but I'm sending you a big un-mumsnetty (((hug))) because it sounds like you need one.

Zaphodsotherhead · 04/06/2018 13:36

I know he has had another life for a long time

It wasn't 'another life' for him though, was it? It was just his life. It didn't work out with you, he moved on, he's living his life.

Everyone's right, you aren't mourning him, you're mourning the life you thought you'd have, that didn't turn out as you'd dreamed it would. We've all done it. If he'd been so fantastic, you'd have been together already, but it wasn't.

Look ahead, not back.

Original poster

deluxetruffles · 04/06/2018 13:36

Gosh you ladies are wise. There is definitely nostalgia mixed in with this - absolutely. It is just that I got such a shock when I saw the photo. He was always cute looking but although I was very attached to him and had some sort of feelings towards him I did not want to rip his clothes off. The photo that I just saw made me feel completely differently. He looked very very attractive. He has certainly aged well. Unlike me.... I used to be very pretty but am very middle-aged now. I think some of it is the end of youth and the end of freedom and good times. I am not with anyone now and that is also no doubt a contributing factor. If I were in a happy relationship then I probably would not be like this. Although having said that, although I have not seen him since my 20s, we did keep in touch and he used to all me sometimes. The last time was when I was buying a house with my now ex-husband. I still used to get a thrill when he called. I think he was probably feeling nostalgic too.

OP posts:

lisasimpsonssaxophone · 04/06/2018 13:38

Wow, I could have written that word for word! I occasionally still dream about mine and always wake up feeling very odd for a day or so afterwards. When I was very unhappy in my last relationship I used to convince myself that he was The One and that I was meant to have got together with him instead of my shitty ex. Now that I’m blissfully happy in my current relationship I can see that we would have been awful together. We fancied each other like crazy for four years but we could never actually have a conversation without loads of alcohol!

dontticklethetoad · 04/06/2018 13:41

Oh Ive done this. Recently in fact. I'm happily married, dc etc, but it was quite overwhelming.

Have a good cry and move on. for you.

TheStoic · 04/06/2018 13:42

This might annoy you, OP, and I don’t mean it to...but literally every person I’ve ever known who has reached out to a married old flame first said ‘Of course I have no intention of contacting him/her’.

annandale · 04/06/2018 13:42

In the words of Jonathan Richman in That Summer Feeling, 'do you long for her - or for the way you were?... And if you wait until you're older - a sad resentment will smoulder...' I feel I could have written your post too!

Bananasinpyjamas11 · 04/06/2018 13:52

Nostalgia beware!

I get this too. A lot of roads I could have.. should have? Gone down.

Don’t worry, indulge your nostalgia, for a bit. Then get a great haircut, have a weekend away with a friend, and look forward!

Foslady · 04/06/2018 13:59

Totally normal reaction to me - it’s the loss of what could have been, how maybe you could have had your ‘happily ever after’........but didn’t.
When it happened to me it felt like I was sort of grieving for the life I’d always hoped for - stable with someone who loved me for being me. Have a cry, have a bar of chocolate, tell yourself he’s probably as dull as dishwater and find something about him to laugh inside at - a ridiculous reason why it wouldn’t have worked (my reason was he was too tall and I’d rick my neck every time I wanted a kiss!!!!!). Then think of all you have achieved with the life you have had, and how great your child is, and none of it is down to him.
Be kind to yourself in other words, it’s ok to feel like you have, you just need to close the book again

Dancingtothebeat · 04/06/2018 14:05

Liz Jones got together later in life with a man she felt the same about when she was the same about at the same age.

It all went horribly wrong. Mainly because Liz Jones is an insufferable twat. But y’know, still. Fantasies are just that because they stay that way. Reality would probably be awful and he’d leave his pants on the floor and never cook or help with housework and spend all weekend watching sport and ignoring the children and bore on about football all the time and be really shit at sex.

Dancingtothebeat · 04/06/2018 14:08

His wife is probably on here somewhere moaning about his lack of help around the house or her suspicions about him and a female colleague or his snoring or something.

StaySafe · 04/06/2018 14:11

Me too, found an old boyfriend on Facebook, he seemed to have had a gilded life and aged well, all the memories came flooding back, intense nostalgia - just about things like going over to the shop to buy him chocolate, avid conversations in The Turk's Head over a beer, how much I liked his mother and sisters. What really set me off was that his youngest daughter (in her 20's) was the spitting image, all black curls and blue eyes, just as he was. Brain says it wouldn't have worked, he was quite lazy, and found it difficult to commit, I wanted a professional career, not to be a farmer's wife. I soon came down off my little cloud of "what if".......

Hillingdon · 04/06/2018 14:12

Goodness me. I sometimes think of what I would have done if I had made different decisions i.e taken an old boyfriend back despite the fact we had broken up a few times already.

He was ready to settle down (he was one of the 'boys' for years!) and ultimately he dated the next women and married her so he definitely had his light on.

Its also is grief and a 'what if'. I had some contact media wise last year and his life sounded very nice. Mine hasn't been great this last year but I guess people do try and make out they live a perfect life.

Bekabeech · 04/06/2018 14:13

Umm just because he looks good in his work photo doesn't mean he looks that good in real life.
A good friend of mine looks great in most work photos I've seen (we're still in touch but he lives on the other side of the world so I haven't seen him for years). But then he posted one of him driving an electric car - and you could see the slight paunch etc. It made me feel so much better.
I have to admit DH looks pretty good in his work photos too, the background help and he makes sure they are taken when he's at his fittest etc.

mateysmum · 04/06/2018 14:16

I saw my long lost love that never was in the supermarket once - not having seen him for many, many years. It was weird. All the old butterfly feelings came back and lingered for days afterwards. Couldn't stop thinking about him. We've both been happily married for years, so it was a bit illogical but it just brought back all those feelings about an exciting time in my youth. I fell in love with him at first sight and perhaps that's something that never goes away.

Flip

1 2 3