I’ll try not to make this too long. I was going out with a man for just over a year. It was fairly volatile and I kept breaking up with him every few weeks or so. I hadn’t got over my ex boyfriend who I’d been with for 8 years and who had been my only real relationship and a very deep intense one who I’d loved very much. Also my new boyfriend was sometimes selfish and insensitive and I generally felt it wouldn’t work. However we always kept trying and looking back I do just think more than anything it didn’t work because I wasn’t in the right headspace for a relationship then. Anyway he broke up with me for good at the end of July this year. And I was devastated. I spiralled into a deep depression.
I think for me it wasn’t just him breaking up with me but it signalled the ending of my other relationship and I was forced to process a lot of stuff that I had buried deep down. I spoke to him twice afterwards and he was king and sympathetic and listened to me but explained it just wasn’t going to work and he wanted to move forwards not backwards.
Since then I’ve been having psychotherapy and it’s been really helpful. I’ve started to move forwards very slowly and although I’m still very down and feel vulnerable about lots of things I’m also taking very baby steps to try and get through everything that’s happened in my life.
Out of the blue about 3 months later he messaged me a very nice message asking how
I was, hoping I was ok and asking to be friends but said he understood if I didn’t want to or I needed more time. I thought about it for a few days and then decided a polite but distant relationship might be good as we work in the same industry and I thought maybe he also wanted to smooth things over as it’s not a big industry and we know very many mutual people. Since then he messages every few days and is very chatty. I had an event this week I needed to go and my colleague dropped out last minute and my ex boyfriend offered to come - this is not unusual as the event was directly related to a project we’d both worked on together - it’s the first time I’ve seen him since we broke up and we got on very well. And it just made me feel very sad. It seemed clear to me he just wants to be friends. And although I’m not even sure it would work being with him again I’m also not sure I can just be friends. I feel quite confused about the whole thing.
I suppose I’m jusy wondering why does he want to be friends? We both have friends and it’s not like we need another friend in each other really. I think he may have told a mutual colleague that we were better as friends. I’m slightly guessing that from something he said. But I guess I just don’t understand why he wants to be friends unless his romantic feelings are completely dead. Which they must be.