When to Quit?

I know he did... but it would have been nicer if he'd been honest with me all along instead of letting me think--and saying things that made me think--we might be able to go back to how things were, or that at least I would remain a close friend in his life. I've always told him I'd rather be hurt by honesty than happy with a lie, and by his own admission he was dishonest with me a few times about his feelings and his thoughts about where we stood with each other.

I do hope he and I can be friends again at some point, but that point isn't now. The only problem I'm having is that I have one of his amps and one of his guitar cases, and he has my laptop, and I'm going to have to see him again to trade that stuff back if nothing else.
 
I'm sorry it turned out this way. I can't understand people letting new loves dictate who they can be friends with. I do think he was trying to be honest and also to not hurt you but is confused and/or unskillful and failed at both. I hope you find ways to be kind and take care of yourself better than your significant others have.

Leetah
 
The new girlfriend hasn't told him he can't be friends with me... because he hasn't told her that he *is* friends with me yet. He's afraid to tell her because he's afraid of how she'll react. So he's the one saying "I want to still be your friend, but I don't know what she'll think about it."

He's definitely confused, and he's been hurt enough in the past that I don't think he knows how to handle things in the right way. He fumbles around trying not to hurt anyone including himself, and ends up failing miserably.
 
Hi KC43, I'm really sorry to hear what happened with S2. My first thought is to cut off all contact including the band stuff. But you may not want to go that far. That's okay, it's totally for you to decide. I just think he's pulling further and further away!

Please try not to lose faith in men/humanity. There are still good people out there. Considerate people. People you can count on. I know it doesn't seem like that right now but I encourage you to believe it's true. Everyone needs to have some hope in future happiness.

With much sympathy,
Kevin T.
 
I wonder what it would be like for you to try to have a close platonic friendship, maybe with a woman, so that it would never be sexual for you.
 
I've had close platonic friendships. Even with S2, it wasn't about the sex as much as it was about the emotional connection. We had sex sometimes, but not since May, and before then it didn't happen every time we saw each other (which was once or twice a week). Sex isn't the issue. Being lied to and having my trust betrayed by the one person I trusted completely is the issue.

And I've never been able to have close friendships with women; I get along a lot better with guys. My closest friends, including the one I referred to as Best Friend a few times in my blog thread, have always been male, and there hasn't usually been any sex involved in those.

This thing with S2 isn't so painful because of sex. It's painful because I cared deeply for him, and he said he cared deeply for me, but he was dishonest with me a few times lately and now it seems like he would be willing to completely cut ties with me if his new girlfriend told him to.

Kevin, the band thing has been something I've enjoyed, and if he and I can be friends, I would want to continue with it. It started solely because he suggested I learn to play the bass and was impressed with how fast I learned, and then I told him I'd dreamed since I was about 4 of being up on stage singing songs I'd written. He wanted to make that happen for me. If he and I can salvage a friendship, I would still want to do that, and honestly I can't think of anyone else I would want to do it with. Especially after the songs we've co-written.
 
Well, then, the band thing is a keeper (I hope).
 
It occurred to me that whether we continue with the band or not...and even given that I need to give him back his amp and he needs to give me back his laptop... I was so upset that I deleted his contact info from my phone. I think I still have some emails from him, so if and when I'm ready, I'll have to get hold of him that way.
 
So sorry you're going through this. Stay strong. Hugs

I appreciated your advice to me in my thread.

xx
 
So sorry that it didn't go well for you. :(

Wow - one date and now they're in a relationship. That's fast.

I think that you have every reason to feel fucked over and hurt by S2 - but, I wonder is it possible for you eventually to start to reframe your thoughts around it? Rather than seeing it as him not valuing your friendship enough, see yourself as backing off to help him build this new relationship and move on with his life. I wonder if it is possible that if you saw yourself more as a caring, compassionate person who is willing to do what she needs to in order to let somebody she loves have the life they want, that it may help you to feel better about yourself and about your future.

I have had a similar experience - partner I'd been with for a decade and I split up. We were each other's best friends. We promised to stay friends. He met somebody new about 3 months after we split. She wasn't comfortable with him continuing a friendship with his ex so we both backed away from our friendship.

It was horribly upsetting and I felt very lonely - I had very few friends I could call on back then. I felt worse at that point than I had done during our actual break up. So whenever I spoke to people or myself about it I said that I was glad to see my ex with somebody, that I'd been afraid he would end up alone when we broke up, that I could understand his new girlfriend's nerves and that really, her desire for us to avoid each other is pretty normal. I said that I wanted him to be happy and that we weren't making each other happy.

It helped. I carry no resentment toward him and more importantly, I carry no feelings of not being good enough myself. Instead, I see myself as strong and compassionate - and I use that situation as some good evidence for seeing myself that way. I also don't carry anxiety about people eventually fucking me over because I don't see that situation as one where I was fucked over.

My ex and that girlfriend are now very happily married and have a child together. They visit my area sometimes and see mutual friends so I sometimes get an update.

IP
 
I don't think it's all that uncommon for a new partner to be uncomfortable with with that person being friends with an ex.

Count me among those that think he was trying to let you down easy. He cared/cares for you and didn't want to hurt you but he also didn't want to be in a relationship with you and I think he told you that. He may not have been honest about his reasons behind it but the reasons behind it don't really matter.
 
I am happy that he found someone, and I told him that. This is still very raw, so it's going to take some time to shift the thinking. But also...yes, I know he didn't want a relationship with me (or at least wasn't sure). The problem is the dishonesty, including that he never actually did say he didn't want a relationship with me, he said he couldn't handle one right now and was open to going back to one later, his willingness to throw away the friendship entirely, and the fact that he hasn't told her I exist, even as just a bandmates, which seems dishonest toward her.

And since he hasn't told her I exist at all, he doesn't know whether or not she's uncomfortable with me, and said he's afraid to tell her because he doesn't want to upset her.
 
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Hmmmm, he does seem to have some problems with honesty.
 
KC43 said:
And since he hasn't told her I exist at all, he doesn't know whether or not she's uncomfortable with me, and said he's afraid to tell her because he doesn't want to upset her.
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That's pretty fucking pathetic, if you assk me. He's too afraid to be himself? Does he think she doesn't stay in touch with anyone she's had a relationship with? I mean, he's a grown-up, right?

Ugh, after one date.
 
Never fails to astonish me that people who don't want to hurt loved ones by telling them the truth end up hurting their loved ones even worse. And he is just going to repeat this pattern with the new lady.

I'm sorry KC43.
 
nycindie said:
That's pretty fucking pathetic, if you assk me. He's too afraid to be himself? Does he think she doesn't stay in touch with anyone she's had a relationship with? I mean, he's a grown-up, right?

Ugh, after one date.
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Personally, I believe that he may not have told her because he isn't planning to keep things as they are. I don't think he plans to tell her that there is a person who he was in a relationship with and still sees regularly, etc. I think he is planning to scale it back to something less involved and less of a distraction/threat from his relationship with her. I also think it's highly possible that it hasn't just been one date with this woman. Even if he has and it's still early days, perhaps he knows that he would not be able to pursue this relationship in the way he wants with the relationship between KC43 and him still simmering away.
 
It has only been one date. After she asked him for the date, he told me when they'd met, which was only about two weeks ago now. It was a day he took off from work to go to the beach with a group of friends, and the friends introduced them. But I believe they were talking extensively between that first meeting and the date, and even though when I saw him on Wednesday he said he didn't know if he wanted a relationship with her, I think they either already were in some kind of relationship based on their conversations, or he'd already decided he wanted to be.

As for being in a relationship after only one date... I was upset when we talked and can't honestly remember whether he said they were in a relationship or just that they were going to keep seeing each other. And based on my own experiences, even though it seems too fast, I can understand either one happening. Hubby and I were essentially in a relationship from the night we met, though we didn't declare it such until a few weeks later.

Max, I know if he and I stay in touch we'll be scaling things way back, and I'm okay with that. The friendship now would be him helping me with my writing (doing research for me, cheering me on, etc.), us working on the band, and occasionally going for walks or maybe hikes if his girlfriend is cool with that. He was emphatic about not wanting to cut me out of his life entirely, and while there's been dishonesty about other things, I think he was being honest about that. If I decide it's what I want, we'll still be seeing each other, but not as regularly and for very specific reasons.

But I think someone should tell their partner who their friends are regardless of the level of friendship or the past history. Especially since in this case, if he and I are rehearsing and recording our music for example, we would obviously be spending time alone together. That would look a hell of a lot worse to his girlfriend if he doesn't tell her, because if he and I are together in his apartment (where our rehearsal space and his recording equipment are) and she doesn't know who I am or why I'm there, it's going to be an obvious leap to her believing he's cheating on her with me. According to him, she's had that experience before, which is why he's reluctant to tell her about me, but he's going to make it worse if he doesn't tell her.

Opalescent, yeah... that's what I'm thinking. I think this is the first time he's been the one responsible for a break-up, based on what he's told me about his past relationships, and he knows how badly he hurt me. I can only hope that instead of repeating the pattern, he'll learn from this and do better by her. She doesn't deserve this kind of wishy-washy crap any more than I did. (I don't even know her name, but I kinda want to go off on him about treating her better...)

He's dishonest out of fear. Fear of being hurt, fear of hurting the other person, whatever, but still fear. And that's what really bothers me. When we met, he seemed like a strong, confident person, and that image has deteriorated greatly. I still love the S2 I met last year, but I'm not sure I even like the one I know now.
 
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Has S2 changed since last year, or is he just showing his true colors now?
 
I think he's changed at least somewhat. I would like to think I'm a better judge of character than to believe in the way he appeared at first and be THIS wrong...

The best--and probably weirdest--way I can explain it is that for the first several months we were together, when I pictured him in my mind, he always appeared as a warrior. Now he appears as just a sad, defeated man.

I can only hope I didn't have anything to do with that.

I know he's still trying to extricate himself from his first marriage. He's had to deal with family members telling him he should take his sons away from their mother so they aren't poisoned by being raised by lesbians, or some shit, and those same family members have told him he should institutionalize his younger son, who is autistic. That's been really hard for him; he's felt like he had no one in his corner.

I know he's had other stress in his life, some of which I know about and won't share, and some of which he just hinted at and didn't really tell me anything.

I know our relationship wasn't entirely easy on him, because I'm the kind who likes to talk out problems and he, like Hubby, prefers the "ignore the problem and it might go away" method. He was far more willing than Hubby to talk about things, but that doesn't mean he enjoyed it. He also struggled, by his own admission, with the realization of how bad my anxiety attacks can get. And I think he came to realize that he really wanted the partner-and-kids model, or at least wanted the possibility, which wasn't something he could have with me.

So yeah...as I've typed this, I don't think he's changed entirely, but I also don't think these are his true colors. I think what I saw in the beginning was more the real him, and what I'm seeing now is months of stress and fear piling up to bring out his worst. Even the dishonesty with me--and his not telling the new woman about me--is rooted in fear, both fear of hurting me and her and fear of being hurt himself if I couldn't or she can't handle the truth.

He said something the last time I saw him... I said he didn't have depression, and he said, "I wouldn't say that. I'm just not diagnosed." So I think his mental health is suffering with everything else going on as well, and he's not the type who's likely to seek help, unfortunately. Even if he isn't dealing with a mental illness, he would almost certainly benefit from at least short-term counseling to deal with the changes in his life over the past year or so.
 
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