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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

I don't love you anymore . . .

112 replies

BlueistheColourIthink · 22/04/2011 01:59

My other half of 2.5 years arrived this evening (long distance) and uttered the immortal words of "we need to talk".

All boils down to a kiss last week where he didn't feel the spark anymore. This added to the fact that he doesn't miss me anymore and doesn't love me anymore. We talked for hours, he's just left. I explained that I felt all relationships go up and down and that surely there must be something else, but no, apparently not. There is a girl at work who he quite likes but nothing else and he doesn't want to go out with her. I've said lots of stuff, some of it quite nasty and some of it quite pathetic.

Has anyone had any experience of a relationship ending this way? On either side?

Blue

xxx

OP posts:
ohmyfucksy · 22/04/2011 19:05

I think it is entirely possible just to end a relationship with someone because you don't feel it's going anywhere. Maybe he had been feeling this way for a while. I don't really see why it is so likely he is seeing someone else. I have dumped people in the past because I just don't really like them that much anymore. 2.5 years is quite a classic time for it too - lust has usually worn off by that point and if there's nothing more substantial underneath it people lose interest.

It is possible just to get dumped. The boyfriend isn't always shagging someone else.

MuthaHubbard · 22/04/2011 19:09

had the same happen to me....together over a year, told me out of the blue he wasn't sure how he felt anymore...blah, blah, blah. he finished it over the phone and i never had any contact with him since. i was shocked and hurt at the time as it was all so sudden and wracked my brain as to what i'd done etc, etc.

of course i found out later he'd started seeing someone else and they are now married. if he'd just told me he had met someone else would have saved me all those times wondering what i done wrong/what was wrong with me.

agree with solid/wwifn etc in that he is seeing this 'girl' - or if not her there is someone else in the pipeline.

sorry - know it feels crap x

SpringchickenGoldBrass · 22/04/2011 21:14

Sometimes it's meeting a potential new partner that makes someone realise that an 'ok' relationship has run its course or isn't good enough any more. Again, this is something everyone is entitled to do, and decent people put an end to the old relationship before embarking on the new one. There is no evidence that this isn't exactly what this man has done.

BlueistheColourIthink · 22/04/2011 23:41

Yup I think there's some truth in that. I just can't comprehend why it's all come to a head in as short a time as a week. Why just 24 hours before he said he loved me lots and then this. Of course he's entitled to do that, and I wouldn't want him to be with me without wanting too.

I'm just trying to understand something I realise I probably won't understand. Can't stop myself from questioning it. Though I have managed not to text or call him.

OP posts:
SpringchickenGoldBrass · 23/04/2011 00:31

Blue, it doesn;'t mean you did anything wrong or are unlovable or anything like that. FWIW it's probable that when he said he loved you the day before he was trying to convince himself, but after thinking about it some more, came to the decision that he didn't feel happy enough in the relationship to want to continue it. This sort of thing just happens sometimes, particularly after the two-year mark - someone is in a perfectly OK relationship (nice partner, no abuse, no issues) yet has always had this slight feeling at the back of his/her mind that the partner 'will do'. And then encounters someone else and realises that though the relationship is pleasant, it is not one that the person really sees as a lifelong commitment. That's when the ethical person breaks up with the perfectly nice partner as quickly and kindly as possible.

TDada · 23/04/2011 08:05

Hi Blue - I think that your DP is now getting his spark from the girl at work but he subconsciously wants you as a fall back. ALso, he may subconsciously enjoy having power over your emotions.....makes him feel desirable......validates him in his own mind such that that girl at work is reachable. Don't let him.

I am sure that he did love etc. but he has no grit. Most of us see/meet very attractive people, people who we get on with really well and could have had relationships with but if you and he are in a monogamous relationship then it is a bit fickle to run off everytime. Probably why it isn't such a bad thing to "run around" with multiple relationships when you are 20 years old.

MigratingCoconuts · 23/04/2011 08:22

in the end,OW or not is really irrelevent to what he has done here. I know that is a massively hard thing to come to terms with and it is important to need some sort of explanation that makes sense to you.

I agree with others about why he might have told you he loved you... but, behind the front, he has probably had doubts for a while. The bit I find hard is that he then could have told you...to give you the opportunity to work them out. The shock of it for you is unfair. However, he decided he wanted out and has decided there is no point in giving the relationship a chance. And that is where you were given no choices in this and why it has been such a shock.

It may be 'kind' of him to end it but, if the relationship had ever been important to him, he could have tried to let you know sooner that he was struggling

Xales · 23/04/2011 10:15

I am sorry you are hurting. His ending the relationship doesn't mean you did anything wrong.

It may be that being introduced to your daughter in the last few months and making plans to move in together and be a family have made him realise that is not what he wants. Fortunately it is only a couple of months your daughter has known him and so not as huge a loss to her as if he had been a part of her life for the full length of your relationship.

He may well have more feelings for this woman at work. That doesn't mean he has done anything with her yet or had any devious intentions. Finishing with you means he can start a relationship with anyone he wants that does not make it an affair. It makes it his new relationship if anything happens. He may have decided she is the one and come to tell you face to face he doesn't want a relationship with you any more. Perhaps she said if you want a relationship with me you have to end your other one first?

He may just want to shag himself through the population of where ever he lives for the next few years.

It would have been very easy to string you along for a few more weeks/months as it was a long distance. Perhaps he has? No one but him any woman involved know this.

BlueistheColourIthink · 23/04/2011 12:37

Many thanks for the messages. His number has been deleted from my phone, his photo's, not his messages. Not yet. I really appreciate the messages on here so much, I have decided I won't answer the phone if he calls, though the more hours that pass the more I realise he may have just said that to placate me on Thursday evening.

For now though I'm doing my best to ignore the fact that right now we should have been wandering around looking for somewhere to live together. I'm not doing a very good job of it but I do know that this will pass and that I will feel better.

Tdada - the thing is I'm 30 and he's 37 and he told me he just felt everything was planned out for him, that he was wasn't ready to settle, that he wanted to be on his own. Then in the next breath it was that I wasn't the one. I think I heard every line going on Thursday.

SpringChicken - I'm ever grateful that he did the right thing, the ethical thing of course and thank you for your kind words (to everyone really). Hearing other people's opinions on this is really helping.

I suspect, like migrating coconuts, that he has been feeling/wondering about this for a while. I do agree that, the better thing to do would have been to talk to me sooner about it, at least then we could have tried to do something about it and I would have had some warning it was not heading in the right direction for him. Perhaps he has, like Xales says, been stringing me a long for a little longer than I realise, trying to make it work on his own. I could kick myself as I've been run ragged this last week and hardly made much time for the long phone ccalls we make, when he rang on Wednesday to tell me he loved me, I was in the middle of a debate with my 5 year old about bed time, I didn't tell him it back - I wonder if it was a test and I failed it royally.

OP posts:
BlueistheColourIthink · 23/04/2011 16:03

Emails deleted.
Text messages deleted.

I probably shouldn't have re-read some of the first. But I couldn't help me look at the ones from the last week. Noticed that there were less than usual - why didn't I up the anti?

Why do I want him back, why without realising it is my brain hatching ways of speaking to him and trying to get him back? Why do I want to get in my car and drive to him, right now? Why do I want to do all this when my heart is silently, but almost constantly screaming 'I hate you for doing this'.

OP posts:
MuthaHubbard · 23/04/2011 16:32

because you can't just switch off your feelings for someone - he has had time to slowly turn his down/off and you haven't........sadly it will take time

higgle · 23/04/2011 16:45

BICIT - Sometimes when a partner says something like "I love and miss you" it is a bit like using an affirmation - what they want to be the case rather than what actually is. Although it makes the split worse for you that he was sayng this on Wednesday and leaving on Thursday it doesn't mean that he ws being duplicitous, maybe it was a subconscious last attempt to make things right, when for him things never really would work. Hope you are feeling better soon - have you seen the "recently dumped" threads on here?

WhenwillIfeelnormal · 23/04/2011 18:42

You see, I think this is the problem when someone ending a relationship isn't entirely honest. The best spin I could put on this is that he has met someone new, doesn't want to two-time either of you and wants to do the right thing. But if that's the case, it would have been so much better to tell you that Blue because it would stop all this agonising about what you should and shouldn't have done. You're no doubt wise and pragmatic enough to know that if a new relationship is beckoning, nothing will stop it in its tracks and it needs to run its course. Hence, the sensible thing is to step away and rebuild your life.

You probably will never learn the truth of this, but I'd honestly be inclined to assume that at best this workfriend was beckoning and at worst a relationship had already started - and please stop thinking that if you had paid more attention or been more loving, you could have stopped this happening. Once this new relationship seemed like a possibility, the die was well and truly cast and nothing you could have done would have stopped the momentum.

There's certainly nothing you can do now, because I genuinely think this other relationship has got to run its course. It will be all shiny and new for a while, just like it was with you. Maybe it will stand the test of time, who knows? It won't be your concern.

It's possible that some of his doubts were about settling down with a ready-made family, but it would have been kinder and more honest if he had shared those thoughts with you, instead of delivering a bolt from the blue. And like I said in my first post, the thing that differentiates a relationship ending because of gradual loss of feelings for someone/genuine doubts and it ending for someone else, is suddenness.

This board has been full of threads over the years from people who hadn't a clue that there was any discord in their relationship, until they heard the immortal line "I love you, but I'm not in love with you" and IME, that generally means the person speaking the words thinks he's in love with someone else. Nothing else explains the shock, or the fact that lots of OPs didn't see it coming. It would be insane to think that so many posters had been living with their head in the sand for sometimes years and it is in fact a very cruel act to rewrite their relationship's history.

The real reason for this is rarely longstanding relationship dissatisfaction, but rather that someone else has loomed into view. When this happens, it is much healthier to reason that this is not your fault and you couldn't have prevented it. It is also why some honesty from a departing partner is so much more helpful - it really does stop all the analysing in its tracks, because if someone is seduced by a new beginning, there is nothing his partner can do. You were not responsible for his loss of feelings and it's impossible to compete with someone new.

Once you start to rationalise that this was out of your control, you can stop beating yourself up and making bargains that will torture you. You have done some really empowering and helpful things over the past couple of days and you will come through this. It is much better to reframe this as he just wasn't good enough for you or your DD. Someone else will be, if you so wish it.

BlueistheColourIthink · 23/04/2011 22:25

Thanks, I really appreciate the replies and very lovely advice.

When he left in the early hours of Friday morning, he promised to text when he got back home. He did and out of habit I rang him, was about to hang up when he answered. I explained I'd only rang out of habit, he asked if I was ok. I said I was and then I said "goodbye". He said "don't say goodbye, say night night, and see you soon". So I did. He then said he'd call tomorrow or the day after. By my guessing it's the day after now. No call. I'd already decided I wouldn't answer so I know it makes no difference but no call . . . and it's getting to me. I know it shouldn't. I wish it didn't.

OP posts:
ohmyfucksy · 23/04/2011 22:32

WWIFN, I don't know why you are so insistent that it is his feelings for someone else that have ended the relationship. Not all relationships end because someone wants someone else. Tbh, 2 and a half years isn't really that long of a relationship. It is also the time where you have to either start getting serious or call it a day. I agree with whoever said that maybe, as you had introduced him to your daughter etc. he has realised that unless he ends the relationship he is expected to get serious. Not all relationships have a permanent future.

WhenwillIfeelnormal · 23/04/2011 23:10

Yes of course relationships end for all sorts of reasons. Usually there are warning signs though and at the very least for a couple who had been planning to move in together, some difficult and painful discussions about changed feelings. However, I have never personally known of an adult man (he is 37 after all) who ended a relationship suddenly without there being someone else. The word suddenly is everything.

WhenwillIfeelnormal · 23/04/2011 23:15

....and especially a man who mentions that "there's this girl at work" in his parting speech.

SpringchickenGoldBrass · 24/04/2011 01:25

WWIFN: But he still did the right thing in ending the relationship rather than telling the OP that he 'wasn't sure' and fannying around for weeks or months. There may be nothing at all going on with his work colleague, He may have ended his rleationship with the Op because he realised that the mere fact of his being attracted to the work colleague meant he wasn't sufficiently in love with the OP to commit to her fully.
Remember that that this was a long distance rleationship that had lasted a couple of years, and that's usually the time the an inertia relationship (this person is nice therefore I will date/shag him/her and there's no reason to stop doing so) either sleepwalkes into commitment -which later ends in the arrival of a new person who may be a more desirable partner) or ends.
I just don't think it's helpful to encourage Blue to see her XP as 'Adulterer! Adulterer!' when there is no evidence that he is such a thing, and when it remains everyone's right to end relationships for whatever reason, with the only responsibilities inherent in dumping someone being to be fair about division of assets and access to any DC, and to do so as kindly as possible.
And it is not clear whether his mention of the work colleague was spontaneous or only offered in response to the OP's question as to whether there was someone else.

Finallygotaroundtoit · 24/04/2011 07:45

No one said he was a shit but his behaviour has left the OP reeling;

Out of the blue he states he no longer loves her,when days before he said he did.

If he was already having doubts about the relationship why was he planning a surprise trip?
Her DD is young - was she included? Did he sort out childcare or was he 'testing' their relationship?

Then after unilaterally ending the relationship (2 and a half years remember - not just a fling) he encourages her to text & engages in phone calls instead of gently reminding her that they are finished - as someone else has pointed out he has had more time to get used to this than Blue has

He is entitled to have doubts and also to end it but it would have been nice to discuss his doubts (and wandering eye) but he ends it with no apparent warning.
My bet is he has already wandered. The reason for pointing this out is to try to spare Blue some of the pain & anguish she is going through now.

BlueistheColourIthink · 24/04/2011 08:02

Hello,

I'm not assuming that he was cheating. He did offer the information about the potential other woman when I asked if there was someone else. I think he was searching for answers to give me and grateful to have an answer to this one, as he didn't really have answers to any of my other questions. It really was like someone had flicked a switch inside him. He kissed me while I was crying, I think to test whether or not the spark had suddenly re-ignited. It hadn't and I didn't feel anything either. He had successfully managed to kill the spark for me with his words. Perhaps that was his plan.

He didn't ring last night. Something my two closest female friends (who had met him on numerous occasions) were surprised about, but not something my best friend (who is male and had also met him) was surprised about.

The only thing I haven't deleted is his facebook profile. Part of what is holding me off there is his older daughter. I guess he probably hasn't told her yet, she is an avid facebook user so I'm sure she'd clock a sudden friend deletion and it doesn't seem fair (not sure why I'm worrying about fair at the moment) to not tell her why. Equally it's not my place to tell her.

Also - it's the last point of contact and one I'm not quite ready to get rid off. I only have his mobile number (sealed inside about ten envelopes thanks to bf, all with a motivational message as to why I shouldn't open them). Landline number for his flat, his parents are deleted. Email addresses will still appear in my "to" box when I type his name for a while but in time even the computer will forget those.

I do have things I want to say to him though. What really gets me is that we hadn't had any quality time in over a month together. Every weekend we had a commitment with friends or family in March and the first two weekends of April we were with each other and the respective daughter.

Also, in the last week I've been utterly knackered and busy with commitments of my own. One phonecall was 7 minutes long and I remember thinking "must make more effort to talk tomorrow". But he went to his mates (that was the night he rang me) and the next night he came through. I am concerned that he has made this decision based on flawed evidence because we just haven't had much time together lately and possibly have drifted a little apart. Which, I'm sure, is part and parcel of long distance.

The other possibility is that the looming moving in together, the 2.5 year commit or not to commit feeling just all proved too much for him. He's always liked a simple life. He told me, more than he mentioned potential, other woman that he wanted to be on his own.

The big hurdle for me is how quickly it all happened.

Thanks again for the comments. All so helpful and warding off the feeling of being so utterly alone all of a sudden. Of course I'm not, my friend is staying till Tuesday and I've already lined up things to do with other friends for the next two weekends. I know at some point I'll have to sit and face this on my own but I'm not ready yet.

OP posts:
TDada · 24/04/2011 08:33

Blue - I think a haircut/hairdo and an intense exercise can help a little in terms of feeling strong. I hope that doesn't sound trivial but it would be part of you focussing on you and feeling good about yourself....rising above "he man lacking grit an direction".

da55 · 24/04/2011 09:00

it hurts to hear somebody you have loved and accepted even though they are not perfect to tell you that they dont love you anymore.i always cry myself to sleep when i remember those words.i hope you get over it soon.

BlueistheColourIthink · 24/04/2011 09:00

Well funny you should say that! Just ordered £200 worth of new clothes from Next, just decided on new hair colour for when I ring the hairdresser on Tuesday and already hit the x-trainer I have in the utility hard - basically whenever I feel like ringing him or breaking something.

Trying v hard to not let myself thing about him.

OP posts:
Finallygotaroundtoit · 24/04/2011 10:16

Attagirl Blue! Stay strong - you deserve better

WhenwillIfeelnormal · 24/04/2011 10:46

SGB I said in my first post that it was to this man's credit that he ended the relationship rather than stringing Blue along, but as you often do, you appear to be underestimating both the meaning of this relationship to the OP (comparing it to an "inertia relationship" is very insensitive, it might have been nothing of the sort) and also, the value of honesty to the person who is being left behind.

Knowing the truth, whatever that might be, actually helps someone in Blue's position to move on, instead of wondering what she could have done differently. Perhaps you've never had a friend who told you that once it became clear there was someone else in the picture, it helped - but you also appear to be ignoring the testimonies of lots of other posters, on threads to which you've contributed, saying the same thing. The truth sets people free.

When you asked whether he was interested in someone else Blue, if he genuinely wasn't, he would have refuted it completely. Equally, if he was a manipulative deceiver, he would have insisted that there wasn't. What this man has done is given you the partial truth - mentioned the woman at work so that her existence is now on your radar, so that it doesn't come as too much of a shock when you find that he is in a relationship with her. I can find no other reason for him mentioning her.

Lest it is misunderstood, I am not saying that this man is a bad lot, but that he probably believes that telling lies by omission is the kindest thing to do - that it would somehow be crueller to be honest about what has caused this sudden change of feelings. And there's probably a fair dose of self-interest involved here too, in that he possibly didn't want Blue to think badly of him.

It's actually much kinder when breaking up with someone to be honest. That doesn't mean being tactless or insensitive, but it's the least Blue deserved, after a 2.5 year relationship in their thirties that was progressing to choosing a home and when children are involved and invested in their relationship. This was not a teenage romance or casual relationship and I think it's hugely insensitive to minimise its importance.

Blue I'm so glad that you're doing all the right things and leaning on your friends for support. I really hope you find out one way or another what really happened here, or that you reach a conclusion that will help you and stop you torturing yourself with questions.