Just curious but did you see his pic on the online dating site?

I think (and I'm not expert) that you are just a normal woman and are over-analyzing the situation. Have I mentioned before that I HATE being a girl? I don't think most guys feel like we do. They just don't get how their actions/words can affect us.

This is my advice to you - write the email. Don't send it. Keep it. If he keeps contacting you, send it. If he is THE ONE, he'll be there 12 years from now like kerala's husband. If he's not the one, just think what God might have in store for you when you do find the one!!!

I'm in the process of learning to be happy being single. I don't see an end in sight, but I know it's there.

I'm a quote junkie so I'll leave you with this: Believe in yourself and all that you are. Know that there is something inside you that is greater than any obstacle.

Thanks AGG and Prissana, my gosh, some of your posts made me cry a bit, and I am in the office!!!!!!

I know you guys are right. My head and heart are not in sync though..., well that's not even true, my heart even knows that it is over. I am a pretty proud person too (I'm not proud of that, lol) yet if I REALLY want it, I go for it, I call up my XBF just to let him know that I still love him, sounding totally pathetic...., so obviously no matter what character flaws he may have, the fact he was okay letting me go, that's the answer right there.

Milkshake,
I am shaking my head because I feel like you are not listening to us. We know what we're talking about! If you continue contact with him, you must want more heartache, what you've gone through already is not enough.

Some people continue emails/phone calls because they want to ease their guilt and want to let you down easy, or maybe they enjoy your company but not to the point of actually marrying you. It doesn't matter, you KNOW moving on is the thing to do and you KNOW no contact is what you should be engaged in! Yet you continue to do what you want to do, not what you know is the right thing to do. Let the man go! Don't make things worse on your child by dilly-dallying with this man!

Have some self-respect! If you continue throwing yourself at him, he will have LESS respect for you and treat you WORSE! Don't you get it? Don't be easy for him! And don't try to manipulate him or change his mind/heart! You aren't right together, let it go! Something I have learned is, some people will treat you worse the more you give instead of appreciating you, it's as if they view your love cheaply. Save it for someone who deserves it and will reciprocate.

Do NOT send the email. Just do not contact him at all. Come here and write instead. Call up your best friend. Anything but contact him.

Milkshake, he's not right for you. He sees something about the two of you that doesn't work for him. Therefore, as much as it stinks, you need to move on.

Get out of the house. Meet new people. I'd also suggest some better self-talk here, rather than "I am so in love with XBF!" I'm thinking "Wow. I must be bored right now because I really want to connect with that idiot." Or "I want a shoulder to cry on... I wonder who will listen to my pity party for 10 minutes."

It's best not to feed your obsession.

Milkshake, This was in my Divorce Care email yesterday. I thought about you when I read it.

God wants to meet you right where you are now. He is never surprised or appalled by anything you have done. He wants to ease your lonely heart today.

Prissanna, I do hear you guys. What I was saying is that "I already called him over the weekend just to let him know that I was still in love with him, even though I can be very proud too, so no matter how proud my XBF is, if he REALLY wants to, he would have told me so already". So I was not implying that I was going to call and tell him how much I love him again.

Thanks for the quote. I need lots of encouragement these days just to let time pass by. Thanks for thinking about me. I know you have gone through a lot too, I read your story, and it amazes me how you can stay strong despite all the mess and hurt and heartache and sadness and injustice.

Last night and this morning I kept telling myself that 'sooner I accept the reality, the better off I am'...., I am working on it!

Greengables,

>> "Wow. I must be bored right now because I really want to connect with that idiot." Or "I want a shoulder to cry on... I wonder who will listen to my pity party for 10 minutes." >>>

I love this! YES, the fact I can afford thinking about the person who could not even say ILY in 5 years tells I should be adding more of dance classes to my schedule

You guys really rock! Okay, are you guys willing to share the secret of staying strong when you have those 'moments'? I mean, I actually do have very busy life, which I am extremely grateful for. My 9-year-old keeps me very busy, and my social life is pretty busy too usual. I know I should be spending more time with my friends, etc., and I booked a nice vacation with my son and my friend's family with a young child in March, which I am very much looking forward to. I am trying to fill my schedule and occupy myself. But I still have those moments, which weakens me fairly easily. How do you fight that?

I will NOT check my emails till the end of today so that I will not even have a chance to get sad not seeing emails from XBF.

I knew you hadn't called him again. But I do know that when we do stuff that we feel stupid about later, it keeps popping up in our heads for months to come. Believe me, I know this from experience.

How to cope? Generally I shove thoughts out of my head as soon as they pop in there. I went back and read ALOT of the threads in this section that I thought applied to me. It helped to see that I wasn't the only person who has ever obsessed over someone. It also helped to read advice about not being ready for a relationship. I never realized how complicated the whole process was. Perhaps if I had have known, I would have done better with picking my first mate you know?

I have started trying to connect with my friends more. I pushed a lot of them away for a long time but thankfully they didn't get offended. I have an internet job as well as my regular job so I have plenty to do. I am starting a few home projects in the next month or so and I am looking forward to that. I hope to whip my yard back into shape this year. I have to MAKE myself go outside at times. Part of being depressed means you want to stay inside I think. I have started making myself go to both church services on Sunday and I'm amazed at how much better I feel for doing that. I've gleaned some wonderful/encouraging info from being there.

Have you ever heard of Pinterest? I'm addicted to that. It has craft ideas, humorous things, fashion ideas, etc. It's where I get a lot of my quotes from. I save them to my phone and re-read them when I'm feeling like an idiot. I have little inspirations posted all over my window at work that I read and re-read depending on how I'm feeling. I listen to praise music when I'm in the car so I don't have the silence to think. I keep telling myself 'You were given this life because you were strong enough to live it.'

I think it's wise for you to check your email one time a day. It shows strength on your part.

Pinterest, I have never heard of that. I just googled it, but unfortunately here at work the site is being blocked. I will check it out at home later.

I have a lot to do too around the house, I need to complete a painting job done (not myself, I will hire someone -;), yard needs to be improved, and potentially one of my bathroom remodeling. I need to yank some strength to motivate myself to go through off of my 'to-do list'.

I know, when I do not have my son around over the weekend, if I just stay in, that's a really bad idea. This weekend I am throwing a baby shower at my house, so at least that will keep me busy one of the weekends. Then I may get together with the guy I mentioned in my earlier post (the one who is very nice but somehow I am not attracted to). Or I wonder that will only make me feel even lonelier. It's hard to believe I can fall in love again...., it takes a long time for me to really like someone.

I have lots of post-it notes on my monitors too, to remind me to stay positive and of the great stuff I have in life. I'm embarrassed that other people can see them, so I write them in my mother language - hee hee, the advantage of having my secret codes

Now I am actually getting upset. How dare, XBF to waste my precious 5 years! If he did not think we would go anywhere as a couple, why did he waste my time and continue to date? Why he complained that "I" did not love him enough??? Why he made it sound like "I" did not show my love to him and complained that I prioritized my son??? All this time, "HE" wasn't really thinking of marriage anyway!

I am losing some faith though... many people I have met claimed they are 'happy' in their relationships, but when I really have serious talk with them they all revealed issues and complaints in their relationships. When I was going through divorce, I joined this group at church. It was like a divorce group, but the purpose was more to 'rebuild', 're-strengthen' marriages for those couples who were going through tough time. Anyway, I was assigned to this group and the head of the group was a �happily� married couple. They were the leaders and consulted with us with problems. Later on, the female leader (the wife) and I became friends personally, and found out that SHE and HER HUSBAND (they appeared to be so happy together!) had major issues and they were at a verge of divorce.

Many of my friends have told me "we are very happily married" and have given me a lot of advice on my private life when I was going through divorce as well as going through this breakup with my XBF, yet two of my GFs called me saying "I want to divorce my husband!" one day. The other one confessed that �it is what it is, I am not going to divorce my husband, but I really don�t care about him anymore�. The other one said �when my kids leave the house, I will divorce my husband�. One guy who has pursued me for many years despite I turned him down many times�., he has said million times that �Milkshake, you ARE the one! You are such a quality woman�, and when he learned that I broke up with my BF he begged me many times to consider taking him as a new BF. Yet, the other day we were talking and he said something about this girl he is seeing � it is okay, I am not interested in him, so I wasn�t shocked or jealous, but I was puzzled. I asked him about her and he said �yes she is my girlfriend�. They have been together all these years when he was pursuing me. AND she is married. �Why have you been pursuing me then if you had a girlfriend? Or more appropriately, why are you dating a married woman, and also WHY do you pursue other woman while you have someone you are seeing?� He said �oh she is a fall-back plan, I really want YOU, but you haven�t accepted my offer so in the mean time I am spending time with her. The list goes on, but ALL OF THE STORIES totally discourage me. Why we cannot stay happily married? Is it just a fact of life that people would eventually get bored and take his/her partner for granted and other people/options start to look better?

Even my XBF. He kept talking about his friends with marital problems, he judged them, he criticized them, and talked how 'different' he was and we were - but inside he was secretly planning on ending our relationship. Not to mention my XH who is a pathological liar - till the day he dropped the bomb, he kept telling me how 'lucky' he was to be married to me and have our beautiful son and how he would do 'anything' for us - while he was chasing other women and ended up getting arrested and diagnosed with an SA.

What can I trust? I know there are many on this site who say they have happily recovered their marriages or they met someone and remarried happily - I really DO want to hear those success stories, but are they real? They are not telling us who go through the hard time just to cheer us up? Do they truly have happy marriages? I sure hope so, otherwise I would feel hopeless...

Girl anger is GOOD! Keep it up. Keep thinking these thoughts. Stay mad at him.

I have the same thoughts you do about if ppl are truly happy or if it is partially a show. One side of my brain wars with the other as to whether I can ever trust again or if should just resign myself to singleness.

When I first separated, I just KNEW I would never desire another relationship. Months later a nice looking guy that I like as a person but am not interested in as a date asked me out and my mind started thinking this might be fun (I haven't went with him - it's a standing invitation). That's when the war in my head started.

Another guy friend and I have talked about going out to eat together and going to the movies when our schedule allows - he's even talked to my ex-husband about us doing these things. That freaked me a bit but they work together so ... I think it would be fun, but because of the state I'm in, I just don't know if I should. Plus you can't control who you fall for and I'm not willing to mess up our friendship. He is a WONDERFUL person. I'm not interested romantically but ... I could become that way and then where would we be? He knows all of my crazy thoughts so he's going into this with his eyes WIDE open. lol We have a tentative date for the end of March. I plan on waiting to see how I feel then and re-evaluating.

I read stories like yours and the guy who posted recently about his GF going back to her ex and see/feel the hurt. The situation with my crush devastated me (and still bothers me at times) and we didn't even have a relationship. I don't know if it's worth it to even try you know? I had 17 years of hurt, it's time to be happy for a change. Then I read other stories and think awwww ... if only. So I feel your pain and indecisiveness.

Seriously. 50% of married couple ends in divorce in this country. Of the 50% remained (those who stay married), it sounds like 2/3 aren't happy. They just stayed together for the sake of money, kids, work, heath reasons, age, whatever.

This makes me feel that WE ALL try to get this 1/3 of 50%, which is a mere 16.67% share of 'happy marriage' pie. No wonder it's sooooooo difficult!!! There are then those who just cannot make the life-time commitment, who knows how many guys are like that (sorry, it could be women too but isn't it more common that guys are commitment phobia?), and there are those 'rich' men who would have multiple women...., so if say 20% of eligible men are either commitment phobia or players, then that would just leave us 80%, of which 50% goes bad and only 16.67% okay..., well 13.3%. 13.3% of us women may be able to get happily married. Yikes. I even hate the number 13, that's a bad luck!!

Please someone, give some positive outlook on this whole 'happy marriage' animal...

I had a terrible first marriage and I am remarried for over a year now. I can honestly say I am happier than I thought possible. I also have a good friend who married last summer and she says the same thing. Both of us have kids/step-kids/ exes....but even with all of that we are still very happy. I have many many close friends who have good marriages and I do believe they are 'real'....not perfect but certainly real.

I will give you that marriage is under attack in our current society. It takes effort to keep a marriage strong.

As far as finding someone....I really like Dr. Harley's article on this site about compatibility. I found it very helpful and right in line with what I had discovered about myself over trial and error.

The Harley's have good information, but I'd also look around to some other sources as well since there are a lot of different aspects to compatibility.

My second marriage was perfect, but the relationship did have it's challenges. But the challenges were peanuts compared to how in sync we were. How could I remain mad at Mike when Mike was me to a large part? I couldn't. Our biggest spat lasted 3 days when Mike didn't speak to me beaucse he blamed me for his cat disappearing. He started talking again even before the cat showed back up. LOL.

Another secret? You know a lot better who you are after age 40 than do you before. Therefore, you choose a lot better.

I received the following email late last night from my XBF, although I did not see it till this morning. He sent it yesterday because he left for his business trip/golf outing today and will not return till Sunday. And I had mentioned last time I left a message that if I did not hear back from him before he leaves for his trip on Thursday I would assume he is �done�.

------
Hello,
I recently got a new computer at work and had to clean up and get my few personal pictures off of the old one that I had saved. The attachments brought a big smile to my face but also some tears. Yes, we have had so many great times and fun experiences and I write this shedding more tears. ==> <<He attached two pictures, one of him and my son, and the other one of all three of us together>>

At the end of the day this is all about you and me because at some point down the road DS will eventually be on his own. It is about each other's abilities to compromise on certain issues, how we truly feel about each other, and how we can agree to work out things down the road.

I have always thought that you are a smart and beautiful woman, a good cook and a great mother to DS. Unfortunately, I have never felt that I was to you a great catch and necessarily worth the added effort and that you would do nearly anything for your spouse, ie. me. Your comment about look what it got me with XH has always sort of seemingly been there. For me the most important things in your partner are feeling that the other person is your biggest fan, biggest supporter, nearly always on your side and will do nearly anything for you and not feel that it is a lot of work or too much effort. I never really felt that I got that from you.

I will always care about you guys and love the both of you. I treated DS as if he was my own son, probably the closest I will ever be to having a son of my own. I understand if it is better and easier for you to not have me anymore in your and DS's life although that comes with sadness also, but if you feel that is in your and DS's best interest then I guess it will have to be that way.

Love always,

XXX

It's ironic that this is the first time ever he said that he loves me.

How are you feeling Milkshake? Did this email help or hurt?

Thanks for asking Prissanna. It's mixed... For one thing, I was happy that he could not just ignore my request and responded by Thursday, even though he did not have to. For another, it is sad to see that we both have the feelings and are sad about the whole thing yet this had to come to this.

To me he is very clear that he sees no future with you. I do think he wimps out a bit by sort of blaming it on you (he doesn't feel likie you are his biggest fan) but then again maybe that IS his complaint and it is a valid one.

I hope you will be well now.

I completely agree with SmilingWoman. The email does show some feeling, but also makes it clear that there is no future.

Not like it's a surprise, because you did spend 5 years together and it did not work, so you already know that.

You still need to cut off contact, because I know that these kind of sad emails tug at your heart strings and make you think "no, wait, we can still be pals, no need for a clean break". That would be a mistake.

AGG

Marriage requires great effort and some people want to blame the other for all of their problems instead of looking for solutions and ways to make it better.

My late husband and I were very happy together, we had great communication, balance, it was wonderful. I felt he was my soulmate in every sense of the word.

Some of the things you cited here are some of the reasons I don't want to date, let alone marry. I'm not saying never, but for right now I really just don't feel like it. I don't want the drama, the heart break, the disappointment.