A
male
age
41-50,
anonymous
writes:The girl I was dating ended our relationship about two weeks ago. It was short-lived, the beginning was intense, and then it seems she hit a plateau (I learned later), while I was on cloud 9 and so happy to finally find somebody like her. Sometime in between, we confessed our feelings for each other. She said she loved me, and I told her I fell in love with her, hard.About a week later, it slowly started to go downfall, for no specific or obvious reason. Eventually, she decided to end things. She kept me in a gray area (from my perspective it was) for about two weeks. No clear breakup, no clear 'no', I was probing and she was semi-responsive. A straight 'no' would have avoided many lost hours of sleep... anyway, today I decided it was time to talk in person since the breakup. She said she found me great on paper, but after a while, did not end up connecting emotionally like she wanted to. WTH? How can you tell a person you're not connected to them and yet love them? (She's 30, mature, is not novice in relationship, nor is she commitment-phonic.) After a long walk without much said, I was about to leave when she grabbed me for a very long hug (15 min), kisses, and just something very sweet. I was overwhelmed by feelings, confused, and yet I knew it was over - at least this page is.The feedback I was looking for is: does any of the above make sense? The emotional disconnect despite self-proclaimed love? The 'involuntary' stringing along? The longish physical goodbye? What should I make of it? I want to move on, but loved this girl so much... somehow, as weird as it may seem, that meeting gave me the beginning of a closure. But I'd like to know, for people who went through similar stories (from the side of the dumper or dumpee), what happened? how did you move on and past the sense of potentially great relationship ended prematurely?Thanks all.
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reader, anonymous, writes (18 April 2013): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionLetting go is hard. I've been doing some thinking on my personality, and while I now see better the type of decisions I make and how I react to things, I have no idea where it comes from and why I'm like that - feeling vulnerable in relationships, giving or not giving my love on the spot, among others. My rational brain would like let go on demand, I understands the uselessness of rehashing things (what did it bring me so far but suffering?) and yet, I am incapable of adopting another attitude.
I'm going to check out this book, thanks for the pointer SVC.
Thanks both of you :)
A
female
reader, So_Very_Confused +, writes (17 April 2013):
 OP Thank you for the follow up!
The only thing that changed from my scenario was an additional two weeks or so… and that is still WAY TOO SOON for declarations of love.
Many people have the problem of catch crash and burn…. They fall in love VERY quickly and out just as fast… I have seen it more with men (in my readings) than women. Women tend to be more cautious with feelings but respond to the actions of the male so that if he thinks it could be love and he pursues her full throttle she reacts to that… then when he backs off (or in this case she backed off) reality hits for everyone.
You will move on, the problem is you want a REASON for what happened and there really isn’t one… the ONE thing I can ASSURE you is that it’s NOT ABOUT YOU. Rule ONE for relationships with someone who does something that you do not understand: IT’S NOT PERSONAL. I know it makes no sense to think this but trust me.
Seriously this is the hardest thing for folks to accept, that a person who they thought was theirs is now behaving “badly” and they wonder what THEY did. And THEY DID NOTHING.
IF you are up for reading a book that will explain this better I strongly recommend Dr. Judith Sills book “A Fine Romance” It’s available in Paperback and not very expensive. It was a bible for me in my early 30s of dating life.
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A
female
reader, HeresBoo  +, writes (17 April 2013):
 Thanks for the feedback :) good to know you're moving forward with a positive attitude.
I find I really struggle with letting to of people too, and the trick is just to not go back to them when you get that urge, it won't make you feel better xo
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reader, anonymous, writes (17 April 2013): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionThanks for your kind words.The timeline was: we met online, met IRL about 1 week later, it went really well for the first 4-5 weeks, then down the next 2 weeks. No specific reason. She lost interest, according to her.Short-lived, but not as short-lived as SVC says. You may be right, it may have been infatuation... I don't know, I'm still trying to digest this. My personality is that I can get attached to a person I like very, very fast (I've been very binary/black or white in my relationships so far.)I want to and will move on, it's just harder for me than many people, I think... My introvert+touchy/feely+rational(always looking for sound reasons) personality is not the best suited for this kind of challenge.
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A
female
reader, So_Very_Confused +, writes (16 April 2013):
IF I am reading this correctly, you met ONLINE (on paper) and connected that way. Then you met in person.
“about a week later” so let’s say you met online and then met in real life and for about a week it was WONDERFUL and INTENSE and then she started backing off…
DO I have this timeline:
Meet on line (week one)
Meet in real life (week two) and it’s all good
Things start going downhill (two weeks after meeting online and one week after an intense whirlwind romance of a week) and she drags it out for two weeks.
So you knew her between online, one week of good and two weeks of lousy for what FOUR WEEKS? Yes this is very short lived
Basically she jumped the gun but after she met you she found there was NO CHEMISTRY and sadly this happens frequently with online meetings… it all looks GREAT on paper but it never works out in real life.
In addition, anyone who jumps in head first and immediately gets intense with someone and drops the L word FAST (less than 3 months IMO) is a huge red flag. There is no way EITHER of you could LOVE the other so quickly. YOU could see a way that maybe you could later on, but that’s not the same as actually being in love. Maybe she really does not know what love is yet.
A long hug goodbye does not mean anything important. Neither do kisses or tears. Breaking up is hard to do especially if you had hopes and dreams pinned on something and started as a flash in the pan….
Yes it makes sense to me. Neither of you are ready for a true adult relationship that needs the work and foundation necessary to fall in love, you both wanted to skip the hard part (the slow casual dating and getting to know a person) and just jump right to relationship. She said she loved you, you said you loved her, but you both knew each other for how long when these words were said? A couple of weeks? NOT long at all and not enough to fall in true love. Infatuation yes, limmerence, yes but NOT love.
I don’t know that she involuntarily strung you along since you didn’t give details.. Maybe she hoped you would just fade away. You say she was semi-responsive… perhaps you didn’t take her hints well?
Time will heal this for you and take away from this… guard yourself and don’t jump in so fast next time.
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A
female
reader, HeresBoo +, writes (16 April 2013):
I have not been in that particular situation but I have experienced a long term (3years) relationship go sour unexpectedly.
The best advice I can give you is to move on, and not let this fester. If she wants to follow you, let it be, but if not, you've moved on :)
She seems to like to dramatise. Not in the bad sense of the word, but she seemed to make the 'final goodbye' kiss very dramatic and movie-like.
Maybe she needs some reality? Maybe she's a player? I have no idea but until she sorts herself out, you should keep moving forward :)
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