Day Two
Lots of emotions today with a intermittent floods of anxiety. I worked out hard last night and have to say that it seem to calm me for a few hours. I'm still trying to come to grips with what I am feeling. Is it loss? Is it regret? Is it ego due to the fact that I realize that I have been replaced? Is it fear that I won't find anything better? Is it just bottled up anger? I think that branch swinging may really be in a woman's DNA. This isn't my first Rodeo and I normally have a good, healthy impression of myself and can bounce back. I'm trying to figure out why this one has kicked me in the gut so hard and I feel like my confidence is at an all time low. Just before getting dumped and deleting it all, I scrolled through some recent texts and it hit home that she was not putting in what I was and in some cases, seemed to be replying just because she thought that she had to, even when she initiated contact. This is yet another warning sign for me to stash in my mind for the future. I hope that I can actually recover from this damage and actually relax in the company of a woman in the future.
I just realized how pathetic I sound. I'm also wondering if posting here is going to keep this in the forefront, instead of helping me to let go.
Nothing pathetic, man. This stuff is real and we have/had it happen to us. It stinks but it's also a fact of life.
Definitely go the self improvement route. When my first girlfriend relationship ended after five years, I was lost. Lots of doubt, regret and self-loathing in the time soon after. To take my mind off her, I did ANYTHING. I learned how to ride a motorcycle, cook, ballroom dance, hip hop dance, massage therapy, read what seemed like 1000 books ranging from self-help to history to fiction, rock climb, taijitsu, kung fu, stress reduction tactics, fix what was (mentally) wrong with me, cut hair (men and women's and even my own), tailor my own clothes, improved my self image by going to the gym and getting a new wardrobe, etc. ANYTHING!
There's so much you can do since you're free. It's sad to think of it that way BUT when I dropped all this knowledge and wisdom (collected over the 13 years since that first breakup) on my new girlfriend, she was ****ing impressed. I'm in a great (so far), new relationship now and I'm not misleading myself to think we'll be together forever but going through all this stuff before, I'm more readily equipped should I have to move on. I really like my new girlfriend but I'm also not delusional to think it'll be like this honeymoon period forever.
Go NC, man. I had to go soft NC on my girl now when she was acting up and true to form, the things I've read on this forum have happened and she reached out to me first (minus the attitude).
Stay strong.
