Now to be mean or anything, but it sounds like she just wasn't that into you for a while.... she checked out when she started talking to this guy. Don't take it personal.... I don't believe you did anything wrong.
I believe it was due to the fact that being a full time college student and working 50 hours weeks at a VERY stressful job, I was always tired when I got home from work at 9pm every night, just to have to wake up at 5am the next day to do it all over again. The weekends were my catching up on sleep time and she always wanted to go out and do things all the time and while I did go with her a good amount of the time, my guess why she left was because I didn't have ENOUGH time to satisfy her wanting to go out and do things. Thank you for your response!
Regarding the age difference, I am not sure that is as much a factor as the issue of her being only 19 and likely still figuring out who she is and what she wants.. I am in my mid 30s and thinking back to when I was 19, I know that a three-year relationship would've been a long time for me - I think you mentioned in another post about this that you two had been together for three years? You also mentioned that she lost her grandmother suddenly after an illness and that her grandmother was like a mother to her and so perhaps she is dealing with all sorts of things related to such a huge loss - and she just needs time away from everything that reminds her of that loss.. although you were there with her through all those difficult times, it could be that even though you were a great partner, it is too painful for her to remain in a relationship with you at this point. Honestly, since I don't know you or her it's really difficult to say, but I will say that if you can help it, try not to contact her and let her have some space. I could be wrong, but I think you'll find that she will find her way back to you eventually. And then at that point you will have to decide if you two are meant to be. Try not to beat yourself up with the what if's, etc., because it is very likely that you did absolutely nothing wrong and time will tell whether you two are meant to be or not.
Yes, it was 3 years. And yes, her grandmother was her mother figure. Even up to a few weeks ago, she would randomly start crying and getting emotional because she would have a dream about her or the thought of her would cross her mind and upset her. I would ALWAYS drop whatever I was doing and make sure to take care of her and make her feel better. I would think that she would want to be with me due to me being there at the lowest of lows (the day her grandmother died) and that I was close with her grandmother as well and helped to take care of her in her last days. Our relationship was far longer than any she ever had (longest before me was 9 months) and it hurts me so much to know that the new guy is only in it for sex. You should have seen the first few messages he sent her when they first met online, complete trash and vulgar. It kills me to think that she is going to give her body to him when all he wants is sex from her because he's a manwhore pig. His Facebook page has girls ALL over it, writing on his wall all the time, commenting hearts and smiley faces on his posts, I just don't get the appeal of someone like that. Especially when I'm the one with the degree and well paying job, not him.
It's her age.
I don't know how to say this without sounding like an asshole but what stood out immediately to me is that you allowed her to remove your friends from your life. Based on this I'm guessing she had a lot of influence in the relationship and after 3 years she got bored, hence her chasing after a guy that doesn't give a fuck what she wants.
Sorry if this is blunt, it's just how I read it. I could be wrong.. you're the one who knows her best.
Perhaps I didn't explain it well enough. My friends are the type who go out and party all the time (High school buddies + guys I met at the bar) and obviously having that kind of social life while in a relationship can easily lead to cheating if one were to get too intoxicated, plus she couldn't come because she isn't 21. So I sacrificed that scene and life so that I could devote more time to her and she as well cut off most of her friends. She hadn't hung out with many people at all throughout our relationship, and the ones she did were her females friends from school, and my sister, whom she was best friends with. And I don't quite understand what you mean by "...hence her chasing after a guy that doesn't give a fuck what she wants." Wouldn't she want to be with a guy who cares about what she wants and not a guy who won't listen to her? I was just a bit confused, so it would be terrific if you could explain that to me! And thank you for your response as well!
Not your fault OP. You sound like you've got a direction going for you with your degrees, so don't get too down about this whole thing and focus on being better at everything you're doing.
She's 19, probably going through the 'I want to explore (as a whore)' frame of mind. Unfortunately that's the era we live in. She'll probably flutter around different guys and then wind up panicing at 30 when she's still single, used up, and her looks starting to fade. Young women today really don't have their shit together.. I don't see any stable long term relationships in the people I know between 20-30, with the exception of my sister who is nothing like women her age.
Again, not your fault, and take it as a blessing.. she evidently wasn't mature enough for you and sounds manipulative in her behavior too, which is not long term relationship material!
You'll feel down. It's natural to have that emotional hole for awhile. Just don't believe the thoughts in your head that start to insinuate it was your fault. If she was unhappy she should have communicated to you. Sure, there may be things you could do differently next time, but if the other person doesn't communicate there isn't a lot you can do.
Chin up.
You could indeed be right about the wanting to go out and explore with guys because up to this point, she is 19 and she has only had sex with 2 people. (Me and the ex before me) But she had 2-3 boyfriends before him that she didn't let them have sex with her. And she was fairly mature for her age, it was just when something didn't go her way or something caused her anxiety, she would immediately become irrational and that's when the immaturity kicked in. She always held things in that were bothering her and then would EXPLODE at me random nights when I wouldn't expect it, so you're definitely right about the communication part. Thank you so much for your post!
She is extremely young and naive. She hasn't a fucking clue what she wants out of life. The reason she obsessively accused you of cheating is because she was, or would if she had the chance. When people blindly accuse others of things, it usually because they would do it/are doing it themselves. Take your new degree and get yourself a life, focus on that and not women. Let yourself recover from this, I'm sure it stabs like needles, I understand. Move on with your life, meet new women that make you feel silly for ever dating someone of such low class. Then, when she begs you to take her back because her little escapade didn't work out as she had hoped, it will feel good to laugh to yourself and say to her simply "Naw, I'm good".
I think phrasing it as stabbing with needles is quite an understatement.
I do, however, not have any faith that this "relationship" will last that long, just because it is a rebound relationship and he only wants her for sex because she has a great body. I think he'll either hit it and quit it or hit it as long as he can deal with her and will dump her when he can't take it anymore. Thank you for your post! It was really helpful!
Make contact with your mates and make up for ditching them. It happens when you get in relationships sometimes but never ditch them again. You might have luck there, you never know.
As for her- maybe nothing went wrong. Young peopke have short attention spans and are selfish. She was just thinking about herself and what she wants and not you.
Dont mope around her and dont gave anything to do with her.
One of my old friends whom I had lost contact with (He moved to Pennsylvania for work) is actually coming back for the weekend and invited me over tonight to have a few beers and hang out and catch up. I think it may help me dull the pain, if only temporarily. I dropped off a trash bag today before going to work that contained all of her belongings. Otherwise, she might have gone to my house while I wasn't there to take her stuff back and I would much rather she not do that, and I wouldn't want her to accuse me of stealing her belongings, so I figured that was the best way to do it. She wasn't home at the time, so there was no interaction to take place. I had texted her this morning asking if she wanted her stuff back, and I got no response from her. Only to have her "boyfriend" message me threatening that if I text her one more time, he will "call the cops and take me to court because his brother is a lawyer." And now he is texting me with smart-ass remarks and gloating about how she is his now and I responded with, "She is yours now, your problem!" And he tried saying something smart back but I've been ignoring his messages up till now. He knows she's going to do the same shit she did to me to him and he just can't accept it. I know it. Karma's a bitch and they'll both get what's coming to them. She's in for a hell of a rude awakening. Throwing away a relationship with a guy who truly loved her and had a successful future for the both of them carved out. Hell I even booked a weekend trip to Florida for her birthday which is in 2 months. Sucks that I'm going to have to cancel that, I was really looking forward to going.
Focus on yourself. To be quite honest the best thing that ever happened in my life was the end of my 6 year relationship. I always knew that I was codependent and that I was sacrificing a large part of myself for our relationship, even after we both got clean from opiates and had normal lives I was still too involved in a sense.
I would strongly advise you take this time to grow yourself. I have become such a better person in th 15 months since it ended. I went through normal periods of blaming myself, a false sense of security which was broken causing emotional stuff to surface (awesome because i grew a lot through it) and finally rediscovering the me before the relationship. Now I am way more into myself then ever before which means i radiate confidence and honestly dont care about what others think at this point.
I am a little older then you, just turned 30, but if i stayed with my ex neither of us would be the people we are now. I am still great friends with her and actually got her a job working in the office i do as a final help to her. She didnt have a job for 4 years while we were heroin addicts and could not get one regardless of how much different she was. Anyway I respect her a lot it was her decision to end us and honestly though i didnt know it at the time it was the best thing for both of us.
In time you will find that you are comfortable with yourself, that you can grow as a person, and that there are plenty of opportunities out there that are easier to take if you do not need to consider others. I also let my 4 year relationship, most of my high school, destroy me after that one ended. It can go either way but your only benefited if you help make you into the best you possible.
Thank you so much for your thoughtful response. I do plan on going to the gym after work. I used to go all the time before I met her and I had a pretty good body going. But once I met her, my gym time turned to 0. I don't think I even went once in those 3 years. Which has caused my body to lose some of the muscle I built up back then and lowered my self confidence big time. The thing that worries me most is that she'll just completely forget me. Luckily for you, you remained friends with her through it all and she didn't say anything to me about possibly being friends someday. I guess that could happen in time, who knows. I guess time will tell. I'm just going through complete mental turmoil. I had a horrible and vivid dream last night of them being in bed together, cuddling and kissing and then having sex. It was like he was defiling her because that's all he wanted from her, sex. And he finally won. He got me out of the picture and took advantage of a vulnerable girl who only wanted love. He is a really smooth talker and I believe that was how he was able to win her over. I don't know what he said since she never showed me the actual texts but I would imagine he would send her things negative about me and how he can do this better and that better than how I did them and it probably added up until she figured she would give him a shot, while not even thinking of the consequences of losing the successful and happy and safe and secure life that she could have had with me. I really did have that feeling last year that she would be the one I marry one day. There were several times where she talked about wanting to be a mom one day, and I know she would be a hell of a mom. She has a job right now working with kids ages 6 months up to 5 years old and she loves it. She has a passion for childcare and teaching them. Of course I wouldn't want to have a kid until I'm at least done with my master's program and have that degree and that we're moved out and into our own place. Ugh, even thinking about what we could have been is bumming me out right now.
However, thank you for your very insightful response.
