Day 29

There is a good friend of my company's who is a motivational speaker, he gives presentations all over the country and is from here in the StL area.  He lives very close to my office and comes in every once-in-a-while to talk to my company ... he also brings us pizza, so we all love him!  He was at our first User Conference and we had a really good conversation, and ever since then, his blog and inspirational messages have been a driving force in my life.  Anyway, he came in to give a presentation Friday afternoon, his message: put yourself out there.  I seriously thought he was talking directly to me (even though he has no idea about what is going on in my life).  He basically said that sometimes you just need to walk away, but other times, you need to look deep within, figure out what it is that you really want, and go for it.  He said that you cant predict how others will react to your actions, all you can do is be in control of yourself.  What everyone else thinks or does is really none of your concern, and it shouldnt run or ruin your life.

With this message fresh in my brain, it really forces me to evaluate my whole situation.  What do I really want?  

I wrote him an email.  I think I am going to send this one.  I have been spending all this time wondering how he feels and speculating about things, but why do that when I can go straight to the source and ask?  This is how I feel we got into trouble in the first place ... making assumptions that were completely wrong.  I just need to send him an email to let him know that I dont blame him for everything, that we both played an equally destructive part in the downfall of the relationship.  I realize that now, and with this fresh new perspective, I feel like this will be a good thing -- even though I still feel cautious because he could laugh in my face, or he could completely ignore me again, but if I dont put myself out there, Ill never know.  And I feel like that would be worse.

One month out (day 28)

I spent last night on the phone with some guy I met on match.  The conversation was dry, the guy was not a good talker, even though we had a lot to talk about.  It dawned on me that this is what Im in for.  A whole bunch of small talk with strangers who dont mean anything to me.  This is totally not what I want.  This week has been hard for me.  A lot of new things, new car, new match profile, new conversations, a new office.  I feel overwhelmed, like I need to cry.  There is something to be said for the comfort felt in the arms of someone who knows you so well, that they can calm all your fears with just an embrace.  On this 4 week "anniversary" per say, of the break-up that started this mess, I feel defeated.  I also abruptly cancelled my week long trial of match.com ... clearly I am not ready for this.


In spite of every bad emotion I went through, in spite of the countless times he let me down and made me so frustrated that I wanted to scream -- his voice always comforted me.  His calm and understanding temperament would make still my most delirious screaming, anger-filled rage.  I miss him so much right now, I dont even have the words.  The thought of having to start all over again with some stranger haunts me.  Im literally sitting at work in tears.  I still walk to my car everyday looking for notes he may have left me, thinking maybe today will be the day he will reach out again.  But today is not a good day for me, today I feel more heartbroken than I ever have.

Day 27

So, someone once told me that the best way to get over an old love, was to find a new love ... so with that in mind, I signed up for a free 1 week trail of match.com on Monday.  I havent really gotten a huge response, but I think its time to just kind of test the waters.  I guess if I can prove to myself that Im still a hot commodity (right, lol) that might give me the ego boost I need right now to continue being strong.  

Its been almost 4 weeks, an entire month without talking to him, almost 3 full weeks without contact -- but I still think about him all the time.  I wonder if he thinks about me and regrets anything.  I hope he does.  Those things he said to me, that email he wrote to me, those words will be burned in the back of my head for eternity.  Id like to eventually get an Im sorry out of him, tho I know the likelihood of that happening is small.  I have had this song Jar of Hearts stuck in my head.  Part of me wants to send him an email with nothing but a link to this song in it, and basically tell him to fuck off.  Its a pretty strong song, but I cant do that, Im not that person.  Besides, that would be pretty final.

I relate to this song because it really tells my story, especially when she talks about broken promises.  That is exactly how I feel.  I think I am starting to get to the point where I could be ok with telling him to take his apology and shove it, but I feel powerless right now.  I still miss him, and even tho I am trying to move on, hence the match profile, I dont think I am quite ready yet -- what I *am* ready for, is an ego boost!  What better way to do that than with some cute boys doting on me, wanting to take me out on a few harmless dates?!  We'll see how this goes.  The last time I was in this broken up situation, a couple months ago, I went out on one date, and, poor guy, all I could do was talk about my ex.  Sad, I know.  Lets hope that past doesnt repeat itself!!?

Day 23

I keep having such mixed emotions about this.  One second, I am empowered, strong and am ready to move on.  The next second, I am missing him, crushed about my future without him and want him back.  I really dont know which way to turn.


I got my hair done yesterday and my hairdresser, God bless her, I dont know what I would do without her.  She is my connection to reality when all I want to do is live in la-la land.  She gives it to me straight and doesnt beat around the bush.  She has a completely outside perspective and always has good insight into why guys do what they do.  When things were rocky before, she actually confessed to me that this was was the happiest that she had ever seen me, and that all the smothering I was doing was driving him away, and that I needed to chill the fuck out.  Coming from her, that meant a lot, but on this day, I had a different story.  I told her about the note he left on my car -- her response was completely rational.  She said that he did that because he *does* want to hold onto me.  Of course he does ... why not?  I was giving him everything he wanted, fulfilling every need he had, and was doing it on his terms.  He had me, but at an arms distance, which is exactly where he wanted me.  Now that he doesnt have me there, he misses me.  So of course he wants to smooth things over.  She basically said that he was trying to take advantage of me, and I was like, HUH?!  Slap in the face.  So I left there in a great mood, totally convinced that I was not going to let him use me like that.


Then I went out that night.  It was my traditional Valentines Day dinner at Hooters with one of my  good friends.  After that, I got talked into going to the roller derby.  I had never been to a roller derby, and although I can see the draw, if you are a high schooler, it was a little boring for my taste.  At any rate, they had an anti-Valentines day party afterward, so we stayed there for a bit.  But being there just kind of made me sad and miss him that much more, so I left early to head back home.


I havent sent him the email.  I dont think I am going to, I kind of just like having it saved in my drafts folder.  I half want him (okay, not half, maybe 10%) to surprise me with a big "IM SORRY, IM AN IDIOT" apology tomorrow, on Valentines Day.  But thinking about it too much is certainly going to set me up for massive disappointment.  I dont really know how I would react to something like that ... ok, now Im thinking about it too much, moving on --


I have been strong, but everything reminds me of him.  Running, hot dogs, my stairs, my couch.  I look around my house and I see him.  That sucks.

Three weeks out (Day 21)

I wrote another email to him today.  --No, I didnt send it, havent sent it yet, dont know if I want to send it.  I dont want to be weak, but I want to know why he reached out to me and then let it fade away.  I feel like I am without a resolution, and above all, I NEED closure.  Dont quite know what I will do, hopefully Ill make the right decision.  The last thing I need right now is more regret ... or more rejection.

Day 19

Something has changed in the past couple days for me.  I feel like I am finally starting to separate myself from all the "together" memories that I envisioned for us.  I am learning to do things on my own again -- well, not really learning again, more like remembering how to do things without including him in every future plan I make.  Not gonna lie, it kind of hurts.  But I have decided that I need to move on.  Last night I spent a lot of time thinking back and remembering how many times he made me feel uncomfortable, how many times I sat back and cried because he refused to give me what I needed -- not because he couldnt, but because he didnt want to.  There is a big difference there.  I would outright tell him, THIS IS WHAT I NEED, and he would look me strait in the face, and say "no".  How can someone be so selfish?  It is hard for me to understand because I would have done anything for him, gone anywhere with him, made good on any promise I made to him ... and all he could give me was "no".


I felt like I faced so much rejection from him in those last few months.  Almost to the point where I was scared to contact him if I had something I needed to ask him.  Even if it was just something as simple as 'do you want to come over and hang out with me'.  Most of the time I just wouldnt ask, but if I did finally work up the guts to make the call, I would have to give myself a pep-talk -- to prepare myself for the inevitable "no" that was coming.  Feeling like I was always one phone call away from a "no" was torture.  I felt so much rejection from him, ick, I can still feel the pain.  


So I have to ask myself, is that the person who I want in my future?  Do I really want this person in my life, in my childrens lives, in the lives of my family and friends?  I feel like I am holding on to this person who I envisioned in my head, whether made up or not, that person was very real to me.  The person who I thought he was, the person who he gave me every indication that he was when he was so far away -- was not the person he turned out to be.  I feel like I was seriously misled, I feel like that person is in there somewhere, but has disappeared, vanished into thin air on the plane ride from Berlin to StL.  I am grieving the loss not of the person who he is, but the person who I thought he was.  The person who I know exists somewhere within his current form, but has been suppressed at a time when I needed him the most.  If he could not return to that person, if he couldnt put aside his selfishness for just one moment in spite of seeing how hurt I was, knowing how much sadness he was causing me, then I dont want him in my life anyway.


I feel like I need to start accepting the fact that we wont be getting back together.  I feel like up until now, I have been waiting on some kind of resolution from him.  But why do I have to be the one to wait for him to tell me he doesnt want me?  I almost want to hear from him so I can throw it back in his face and say, "Screw you buddy!  You had your chance, I was willing to talk about it, was willing to work it out when you left that note on my car -- but you didnt do anything about it, you didnt do anything after that!?  You had my attention, but you have since lost it."  Im done waiting on him to tell me how to feel, I have decided how I want to feel.  I want to feel good about myself again, the way his alter ego made me feel just a year ago.  I have decided to stop letting his actions, or lack of actions, rule my life.  I need to move on.

Day 16

I have been reading articles and blogs on the web about relationships -- who am I kidding, I even purchased a few books on the topic to try to work through my confusion.  At any rate, this one article about Why Men Dont Listen to Women has left a big impression on me.  The article listed out reasons, obviously, why men dont listen to women --


In my relationship, I experienced all of the reasons listed, to some extent, but a LOT of: 

• #1 Its a Power Struggle
• #6 Demand for Rationality
• #7 Problems have to be solved

I am a very "Type A" personality, so the thought of giving up my sense of control, the power in the relationship, was very hard for me to handle.  It would be one thing if it were an equal division of power, but he had almost all the power almost all the time.  A good friend of mine shared a quote with me and I think it fit my situation perfectly, "The power in a relationship lies with the person who cares the least".  I think this is an amazingly powerful, and sadly true, statement.  I dont know how much he really cared if I stayed or if I went.  I felt like I was always just there for him when it was convenient for him, he rarely went out of his way to do something that I wanted to do when he didnt want to do it.  If he didnt want to do it, he just told me "no".  A theme that would repeat itself all the way to the end. 

He also always demanded that I be rational.  He was always very withdrawn when I wanted to talk about our relationship, and I think its because he expected me to come at it with a very rational approach -- you know what?  Im sorry, but feelings and emotional connections are not rational.  Rational theorys and thought processes cannot be applied to an irrational emotion.  The rational side of me says to move on already and stop this nonsense about wanting him back, he's not good enough for me ... but my emotional side says hold on with everything I have.  It is a constant struggle.  Although in hindsight, I never gave him the option to talk or not talk about it.  I always came at him rushing down a path that could not be stopped.  I should have given him the option, if I would have asked him when a better time to talk about our relationship would have been, he might have been more receptive.  Note to self: This is a MUST in the future.

Problems have to be solved, this was him to a T.  It goes along with his demand for rationality.  He always thought that the main reason for communication was to share facts that can be used for problem solving.  Sometimes problems dont have a solution, they just need to be voiced so the other person knows whats on your mind.  I always tried to appeal to this thought process tho, and when ever I had an issue, I would say things like, 'this way and that way didnt work, lets try another solution to solve this problem'.  It seems that when I used these rational words, he was more receptive, but it would only last so long before we fell back into the bad habit that caused the rift in the first place.

I also read a great blog on Communication, about how we are better at communicating with strangers than loved ones.  Why?  Because we assume that those close to us understand us and therefore make assumptions about how they will react to our conversation -- which usually leads to colossal misunderstandings.  We have no preconceived notions about strangers, on the other hand, and assume that they will take everything in context, will have no sense of humor towards our words and not have any understanding of underlying implications.  

I think I took our communication for granted.  It always baffled me that we were such good communicators when he was 5600 miles away, and when he came back, its like that communication went up in smoke.  We would make comments about how we were always on the same page, and we knew eachother so well ... but did we really?  When he was so far away, we were forced into strictly verbal communication, and when he came back, we moved almost exclusively toward non-verbal communication, and that was where the problem started.  We assumed the other one was on the same page, but we werent.  We took that connection we had for all those months when we were apart, and applied the same principle to when we were together.  But the game had changed, so the same rules did not apply.  I should have seen this.  


Wow.  Things are always so much clearer in hindsight.

Day 15

I feel like Im moving backwards.  The more I think about it, the longer it is since the break, the harder it gets.  Isnt this supposed to be getting better?  I feel like it was ok those first weeks, but now it sucks.  I miss him and I want him to be near me.  I miss his smell and the way he used to touch my neck when we were in the car or laying together, I miss the way he always had these crazy ideas for inventions that he would never make, but was just as passionate about anyway.  He is a deep thinker, has big dreams and is struggling to get there, just like everyone else -- just like me.  Trying to find their path.


What did he mean by contacting me??!  Was he trying to get my attention?  Mission accomplished ... now what?  Nothing?  I dont get it, I just dont get it.

Two weeks out (Day 14)

I really thought I was doing well, I really thought that I could be strong and handle this without being sucked back in ... but that note he wrote me is still weighing on my mind.  I sent him a text message.  -- it really wasnt anything except to say that I agreed with his note and that I wished it didnt have to come to this for him to want to reach out to me.


I dont know what I was expecting, I guess I just felt like I needed to tell him that I appreciated the note.  Maybe that was a bad idea, cuz in doing that, I put the ball back in his court.  But, I didnt hear back from him.  He didnt text me back, didnt call me, didnt leave another note on my car, nothing.  Again, I dont know what I was expecting, but I figured I would get some sort of confirmation, but I didnt.  And that ate at me, so I decided to take it one step further.  In all our forms communication (we had a few), one of the most effective ways was through pictures, so I took a picture of myself holding a picture of him with a tear rolling down my face.  It was genuine, I really was crying, and the picture conveyed enough emotion that I thought he would see how much hurt I was really feeling.  I also wrote just a short note about how I felt like this was all a dream, and that when I wake up, all this will be over and everything will be fine.


It does feel like a dream to me.  A really fucking bad dream.  I just really miss him.  There are so many things that I want to ask him and talk to him about, like if he knows anyone at the Cairo Embassy where all the fighting is going on, and how he is doing in school, I want to tell him that my daughter's new "thing" is to close all the doors in her room (the bathroom and closet) before she goes to bed -- something he always used to do ... random things that I think about throughout the day that I want to call and talk to him about.  I want to tell him about the drama with my car and that I am going to get a new one, I want him to help me find a car and make sure that I am getting a good deal.  He always took care of me, even though things were rocky, he still had my best interest at heart.  He genuinely cared for me, I miss that connection.


So now, all I can do is sit back and .... wait.  Wait for what, I dont know?  I dont really know why I gave him that picture, it has been something I have been thinking about for a while, doing something more impactful than just a note.  But im also afraid that I have given him back the power here.  It was so good to see him reach out to me, a first really, I wanted to put myself out there too, but in doing that, I have now allowed him to see my pain and now I have to wait.  I have a feeling this is going to be a loooong weekend.