So my boyfriend and I met in May of this year. I hadn’t been interested in a relationship but he won me over. This is during COVID times so we talked a lot on the phone and texted as well. We had an amazing connection and our communication skills were unrivaled. Every morning he would tell me how much I meant to him. A month after we met, his father fell sick. He leaned on me a lot and we thought he was going to get better. Before his father had fallen sick, he had told his father about me and how happy he was to have me in his life. His father eventually passed away and he was devastated. He continued to lean on me through it all. During this time we were starting our relationship so we would work out the little kinks of getting to know how another person works. Never arguments with us but rather in depth discussions and debates about how we wanted to be treated as this was my first serious relationship and his most important one (in his words). We put in a lot of work together but throughout this I noted that some of our discussions didn’t need to occur if he hadn’t been so emotionally sensitive due to his father. And he owned up to that often.
Some background: During the time he was also homeless (living with a friend’s family) and jobless (he was interviewing for a well paying job though). He had a complicated love/hate relationship with his mom and although his dad didn’t raise him, in his last few years they got very close.
He eventually got the job and visited me for two weeks before moving to a new city for the job. (It would only be a 4 hour drive from me). The two weeks were absolutely amazing, he met my friends and I met his. We were still going through some kinks though. We planned to see each other again in a month for my bday and when he left he told me he needed to use the month to get his emotions in check and finally process the trauma of the last few months. He said needed some space communication wise but wanted us to be together. I agreed even though not talking as much made me sad. We discussed it in more detail a couple days later and he once again reassured me that he wanted to be with me but needed space. He also said that he didn’t trust himself to believe he could handle everything. At this point I got a little unsure but we talked through it and he told me that us being together was the priority. We eventually got into a routine of talking for 45 minutes almost every evening and I felt much better and so did he. Told me that he was truly happy with life entirely for the first time in months. We began truly planning his next visit for my birthday which is coming up. Talked about presents and the night before the end, he said he missed me and couldn’t wait to show me his new place in the city.
The next day, I called him to chat and he broke up with me. Said he needed to be alone to get a handle on all his grief and issues with his mom. Needed to process through the stress of not having a place to live or a job. Said that he couldn’t bridge respectfully caring for me and having romantic sexual feelings (something we had discussed before and decided that it was just due to timing. We had started off strongly with romantic feelings, then came to deeply care for each other and just needed to bridge the two. It had clicked for me once we normalized talking everyday after he left but not for him apparently). He also said that he was putting caring for me above taking care of himself. And that he needed to be selfish and not ignore himself just because he didn’t want to hurt me. And that he didn’t have the tools to be in a relationship. Said he thought my presence would fix him because he was so happy with me but he needed to fix himself.
I was angry at first. Didn’t understand why it took him so long to figure it out what he needed. Why he reassured me so many times that I shouldn’t worry, he was just figuring himself out. I felt so blindsided. I also didn’t understand why he didn’t express the desire to revisit us after he took the space he needed. Not that I would be waiting around but to at least say if he reached out, please hear him out. I asked him why he didn’t say that and all he said was I understand and I’m sorry. Said he still cares deeply for me.
My female friend was shocked and urged me to reach out to him in a month. My guy friend says I shouldn’t reach out at all. If he wants me, he’ll call. I’m leaning towards the middle. Reaching out in December just to check on him. It’ll be 6 months since his dad passed and 4 months since we broke up. I want to get back together but I understand that I need to come at it from a friendly, low maintenance angle. What do you guys think? I was originally gonna follow the my guy friend’s advice but I reread some of our texts messages today and remembered all the love and trust and care he showed me so I decided I wasn’t gonna fully let him go with trying to talk once. Also. I blocked his social media for my peace of mind regardless.
*a couple days after the breakup, I sent him an email. I asked him not to respond. I had been making cute voice notes for everyday we were apart after he left. I was saving them up for when he visited again. I put those in the email with a note on what they were and why I sent them. Nothing angry, nothing crazy. I did tell him I was blocking his email though (we had a shared calendar for planned visits and Netflix account. He had canceled both and I got notification emails each time so I decided to just block him. But I sent the email before blocking*
