LookingToImprove

This is really lovely and universally true. Honestly, its what caused me to be too much for her during this time. I had hopes/expectations around certain things that didn't pan out and was left disappointed as a result. Great words to live by, and I'll work on remembering this in everything that I do. I know it at my core of course, and mostly live my life that way, but being human, I do get caught up in hopes and expectations at times, especially when it comes to a new relationship with someone I see so much potential in. But life is unpredictable, and I think its all about "being water" as Bruce Lee said, so that you can roll with the punches as they come. It's hard, because I love this woman, and she has chosen to shut me out of her life because I became to represent stress and pressure for her at an incredibly overwhelming and painful time of tragic loss. I wish I could remove that pressure and stress association she has with me so she would let me back in. Is there no way to do that at this point?

I sent her a book on grief called "It's Ok That You're Not Ok" last week, and it arrived to her today. I had included a note: ""I heard this book is helpful. I hope you're doing okay. I'm thinking about you fondly, and hope you are finding some peace during this difficult time." She still hasn't contacted me. I have an email I want to send to her to try to remain in her life without putting any pressure or stress on her. I really care about her, and don't want to lose her because of one bad day where I was weak and self-centered: "I hope the book on grief I sent you is helpful. I’m reading it (and a bunch of other things on the topic of grief) and it's helping me better understand what you’re going through. It sucks so terribly what you’re being forced to endure and I know you have nothing to give right now. My hope is that there is a way I can respect the time you need without adding any pressure or stress on you, and still remain in your life, because you mean the world to me. There would be zero expectations on you. I would not need anything from you. I know I can keep my own damn plate spinning for myself so you can focus on keeping yours going. You've got a lot on it, afterall. I’m here for you if you need me for anything during this awful awful time. I PROMISE I won't add to your stress while you process the worst pain a person can endure. I would ask myself every step of the way whether anything I did or said contributed to YOUR needs. "Would this make her smile? Would this improve her life? Will this ease her pain? Will this make this difficult time easier? Will she find this delicious?" These questions will be what motivates my actions or inactions towards you, should I be so lucky to be readmitted to your world. Thinking about you," On the one hand, I know that if she wanted to be in touch with me, she would reach out. I guess I should follow what I've said in the email and not reach out since I guess it doesn't contribute to HER needs, since she's demonstrating she doesn't need me in her life. But I know I can enrich her life during this hard time. I miss her a lot and don't want things to be over.

Thanks everyone for responding. Unfortunately, I wrote her a lengthy email after her email to me, and in it I took full responsibility for my self-centered behavior, and identified why it happened, and how I'm going to work on myself. In that email I mentioned that I realized I was grieving the loss of our budding relationship, such as it was. I see now how that would make her feel guilty. It seems like the main thing that makes these situations hard to reconcile is that the person going through the intensely dark and traumatic grief tends to associate the person who is broken up with with the awful feeling of the grief, and also has a lot of guilt around not being able to show up in the relationship how they'd have preferred to, and feeling like they've let the other person down. I wonder if there's a way that I can absolve her of that guilt, and make it so we're able to start things over down the road without a negative associations of what she went through. Surely this is possible, as some relationships survive these kinds of things. Years ago, I dated a woman who's mother died in the first few months of our dating. In that instance, it strengthened our bond, and we survived it. I know everyone grieves differently. I really want this to work out with this incredible woman. The only thing I can think to do is to be strong and work on myself so when she's ready again I'll be better equipped to be what she needs in difficult times.

I've read through a good bit of this forum, and see that it is full of thoughtful and caring people trying to ease the suffering of people that come here for help. You're all amazing. Just a few months ago I met an amazing woman, and we hit it off right away. She soon discovered that her father's Parkinsons and dementia was taking a turn for the worst. I tried to be there for her as best I could, but she was really struggling with it. But our dates took her mind off things and we had a really great time together. We were totally in sync. But after about a month together, things felt out of sync one night, and when I brought it up, it was too much for her to handle and she needed to leave suddenly so she could go home and self-soothe. She explained to me the next morning that maybe she hadn't communicated just how much in crisis her world was right now. I felt that I was being self-centered and not realizing just how horrible her situation was. She said she didn't have emotional bandwidth to feel like she was coming up short for anyone. I apologized, and we were able to move past it. I left town for the weekend, and while I was gone, she found out that they were going to be moving her father from a psychiatric ward where he was being evaluated, to a nursing home, and she needed to be there for the move. She left before I got back. I offered to fly somewhere along her drive so I could help her with the drive and see her. She said no. I offered to go to where her family was to be with her, and she said no. She said that the process could take a long time, and if it did, we could rendezvous somewhere for a weekend. Sure enough, her father's condition worsened. I talked to her every day, and each day it seemed like things kept getting worse and worse. I sent her flowers, and we spoke every day. But I felt very distant from her, and as though I was being kept at a distance, which was hard. We made plans to rendezvous somewhere, but the morning I was supposed to fly, she called me very upset, and said she wasn't going to be able to go, because they felt her father's death was imminent and she needed to be there. I told her I understood, and supported her decisions. She told me she didn't want to lose me. Sure enough, after the brought her father home for at home hospice, he passed away the next day. My 40th birthday was the following weekend, and we had plans to meet somewhere to celebrate my birthday together. On the day she found out that her father would likely not make it through the night, she made sure to ship me some gifts she'd been compiling for my birthday to me. She ended up (understandably) canceling the trip to be with me for my birthday since her father had just passed away and she couldn't travel. I decided to take the trip anyway, and I didn't receive the gifts until I got back. We had talked about the funeral, and she asked me to buy a suit, and that I could wear one of her father's ties. I was honored. It meant a lot to me. I went out and bought a suit and got it tailored. The trip was a fun one, but on the day of my birthday, I woke to a Happy Birthday text from her, that I'm ashamed to say I felt came up short. She didn't call me. It was a short text that felt like the bare minimum, and I was upset. I called her, and on the call she told me she was leaning towards me not coming to the funeral. She didn't want to put me through the travel, and just wanted to get through the funeral and get back to LA. It really hurt me that she was disinviting me. Ultimately I know that it's about what she wants/needs, and not me. And I understand her not needing me at the funeral since our relationship was so new and that would be awkward circumstances to meet her family. But in the moment I was really hurt. I asked her, "are we okay?" and she said yes. I said, 'Okay, because your text this morning felt like the bare minimum..." She went on to explain how hard things are in her world, and how much pain she's in. And I said I know she went to a lot of trouble to send me the gift, it just was disappointing to be disinvited from the funeral, and not really be made to feel special on my 40th birthday. All of this was too much for her, and reminded her of the disagreement we got in when we last saw each other where she was made to feel like she was letting me down, and she just can't handle that right now. I told her she was right and that I was being self-centered, and that I don't want to have needs that she needs to worry about while she goes through this horrible crisis. I told her I didn't want to add to her stress or pressure her. She had to hurry off the phone because of family obligations. I was pretty miserable for the rest of the day. I texted her later and she didn't respond. So I texted her again asking if I could talk to her before she went to bed. She called me pretty late, and had been drinking with some friends. She was in a good mood though, and was being sweet. I should have just kept things light, but I brought up the conversation we had earlier that we didn't really get to finish. She said she didn't want to have a serious conversation right now, but I foolishly persisted and again brought up how it hurt me that she uninvited me from the funeral. At this point, I was adding to the stress of her enormous grief, and she had no choice but to end things with me. She said, "It seems like this is what you want..." I said, "Don't end things. I'm just being selfish on my 40th birthday. Aren't I allowed to have one bad day?" She ultimately said, "let's talk about it tomorrow." The next morning, I wrote her an apology email acknowledging that I was being enormously selfish and needy, and that she has enough on her plate to have to worry about me. When I flew home and received her package, I felt like the biggest idiot on the planet. It was 3 incredibly thoughtful gifts, and a very sweet letter that did in fact make me feel cared for and special. I sent her a text that I was feeling incredibly foolish and would do anything to repair the damage I'd done. It took her a couple more days to respond, but she finally did letting me know she doesn't blame me for what happened, and that its understandable that after so many plans got cancelled that it makes sense I'd be upset and hurt on my 40th birthday. She said that she realizes now that she is going through a horrible tragedy and needs time to get through it. That I have needs she's not able to meet, and that she can't show up to be my girlfriend right now. She apologized for not knowing this sooner. She said I've done nothing wrong, and in fact just the opposite, since I've consistently been there for her throughout this horrible experience. She thanked me for everything I've done, and said she cares about me. I wrote a long email response that addressed all of the things I did wrong, and how I'm going to work on improving. I told her I hope its not the end as I think there's something really special between us. I told her to reach out if she needs a friend, or for any reason. That was 5 days ago, and its the last we've interacted. She's going to be back in town in 1.5 weeks, and I have some of her things so I'm sure we'll talk and see each other again. I'm hoping that she just needs time, and doesn't want to close the book on me entirely. I want to let her know that I don't want to have needs that she needs to attend to right now. That I need to take care of my own needs and be better about that. I want to be able to support her and love her while she navigates this dark period in her life. Her email didn't feel like goodbye. She said she can't be my girlfriend RIGHT NOW. I hope there's a way to remain in her life during this, as I truly feel that she is the person I've been searching for, and that we are perfect for each other. Any advice and wisdom is greatly appreciated. Thank you.