Post breakup ramblings
It is past 5 AM as I write this and I am unable to sleep.
She initially brought it up last weekend, right after a date night with fancy dinner and concert. I reacted very, very badly. I got no sleep that night and the next morning we continued the discussion which ended with, let’s try to make this work and check in on our feelings in a week.
We couldn’t really talk throughout the week because her long time friends were getting married this weekend and she was one of the groomsmen. One of the issues she had with our relationship was my codependency on her - not the first time this quality has been observed by her. Part of what I had hoped sparked another chance was talking about all the things I have actively been doing to break free of that. And that aside, it seemed correct to allow her to participate in the wedding plans without worrying about personal life drama.
Check in finally comes Sunday night and I hear what I had feared to hear. I am much better with my reaction this time. I still don’t understand the final (to her) reason why she thinks this won’t work out. For context this is her first romantic relationship. This is not my first but my previous ones were… I’ll just say that I just said yes to suitors even though I didn’t have strong feelings for them. For both of us we were unsure of a lot of things - sexuality, romance, all that, and it was something we’d both find out together. When she came to the conclusion that she is somewhere on the aroace side of the spectrum, I was okay with that. (I think a year ago I posted on Tildes talking about my experience as someone on the ace spectrum.) Her final conclusion is that she feels I could do better with a partner that accepts me for who I already am and can also show it better. I can’t convince her that wanting me to be more confident in myself isn’t changing me, that I don’t need all these things people expect in most relationships. I’m still a little upset that she mentioned the friends’ wedding vows and how she felt she could never give that to me. I don’t see why she thinks my happiness will be greater, because I am telling her that I would be content to just do things with her that current society typically only associates with couples - buying a house, chores, cooking for two. (I know roommates exist and they participate in such things sans maybe purchasing property. but I guess I want the long term feeling of safety over uncertainty.)
Pause: I believe that she doesn’t need a reason at all to end things. I can be upset and bargain but at the end of the day if she feels we will both be happier this way, that’s that. The door is open regardless.
Recognizing that, I still just feel… empty. I moved across the state to move into a new apartment with her. My only friends/aquaintances here are through her. My friend groups are all online, though I did reconnect with some high school friends after over a decade of not keeping touch. But I’m not close enough to most of those online friends to even talk about this to, hence typing it out into the internet void.
I also resent this claim that someone else can make me happier. I’m not saying there aren’t other fish in the sea, but I had never been in the market for fish. This was someone I met online 5+ years ago who I vibed really well with, who I asked out because I didn’t want this to end. It typically ends when they find a romantic partner or another person to talk to who currently shares the same fixation as them at a point in time. I’m not going to go out of my way to find someone who can fit that very particular mold. I already have plenty anxiety as it is because my mold feels alienated enough from society’s expectations of what a long term committed relationship should look like.
I don’t know why I can’t just sleep. I’m fortunate that living situation is not an issue. This is such a first world problem. It is almost 7 AM now and I’ll be getting up to feed the cats and tell her on her way out to pilates that I’d like for us to continue discussing when she’s back, which I hope she is open to.
Actions speak louder than words when people act certain ways and don't want to explain themselves
It sounds like you could eventually get back together but right now she wants to know what other relationships could be like before she commits to something more.
I think you should prepare to end things amicably or at least pretend to so that the loss of you as a potential partner feels real. Maybe she'll come back but maybe she won't.
It's not a first world problem, first off. People all over the world go through breakups, and no matter what their situation is, it sucks for everyone. If you're barely scraping by living under a dictatorship, being broken up with sucks just as bad as it does if you're filthy rich with no other problems in the world. It's something we're hard wired to struggle with, and it never feels good.
Secondly, from what you've described, it sounds like you've made a lot of compromises in what your ideal relationship looks like in an attempt to get this woman to stay with you. Compromise is a necessary part of all relationships, but it's always a matter of degree. Too much compromise can mean you're giving part of yourself away, and sacrificing your happiness for security. It's not a recipe for long term contentment.
I don't have a whole lot of advice for getting through this, because it's one of those things that just has to feel like shit for a while. If you can though, try to focus on the positives of being single. There are always positives, even if it doesn't seem like it right now, and even if this woman truly was amazing. What can you do now that you don't have another person's feelings and needs to consider?
What new adventures might the future hold? What types of people could you meet?
I would just caution you to be careful if you're trying to get her back. Don't sacrifice too much, and try to be certain that if she ever does agree to get back together it's not just a compromise to try to keep you happy, and it's not just because she's convinced she's settling for you. Understand that you're a human being who deserves someone that truly wants to be with them, and anything less just isn't worth it.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts - I'm really sorry that you're going through this. I think breakups are especially tough when you are the one being dumped, and when you don't really have any forewarning that it's coming - you don't know what to expect, whereas your partner probably has thought through this many times over the past weeks and months, and so what is fresh for you may be the end of a long and winding inner conversation for her, and so you are in different places on the processing journey.
I get the impression that your partner has wanted to break up for awhile, especially if she realized during your relationship that she's on the aroace spectrum. I have heard from people who discover new dimensions of their sexual and romantic identities that their perspective on people and themselves changes completely, and sometimes they need time and space to work through those new feelings. I think it's possible that your partner tried to forge ahead with your relationship and do right by you, but it didn't feel right, or she felt like she was doing things to make you happy that weren't working for her, or she just generally felt guilt or anxiety on your behalf because she's on the aroace spectrum and you're not. It may have been something you did, but very likely it just may have been that the two of you don't work for her now, even if you did before. And that can really hurt to hear, but sometimes two people grow apart. There isn't anything you can do, and there isn't a thing you can change or say that will make them change their mind - they're just done.
A week, in my opinion, isn't enough time to make a meaningful permanent change to a relationship, so I would guess that she was giving you a week to process the information (which isn't a lot of time), not a week to make a final opportunity to save the relationship. While I see from your perspective that you are willing to make things work and that you're ok with changing things to make her happy, it seems like the feelings she has while in this relationship - and in particular feeling like she's taking something away from you, or preventing you from being happy - are too much. At the end of the day, she is the one that has to be able to carry those feelings, or find a way to deal with them, and it seems like she's unwilling or unable to do it. If this is her first relationship, it makes sense to me that she might want to explore relationships with other people who know she's on the aroace spectrum from the start, and see what that feels like. If that's the case, she just wants that time and space and freedom to explore that, and there isn't really anything you can do. And it really sucks to hear.
Please continue to use this space to help process your feelings and share your thoughts - feeling socially isolated and also going through a major upheaval in a relationship are really hard, and the people here are really kind. Things are hard right now, but I hope things get easier with time, and you find comfort and solace in the days and weeks ahead. I'm sorry you're going through this.
I don't have a lot to add, but one thing that helped me when I was going through something similar many years ago was to "leave her in the woods." Simply: I walked out to a remote place in the woods and left all my pain in that spot. I think maybe I buried a piece of paper with her name on it, but you could do other symbolic gestures: carve her name into a dead tree, bury a memento, (safely!) burn a piece of paper with her name on it, etc.
I also screamed at the top of my lungs and wept. It felt great. And by "great," I guess I mean horrible, but it was cathartic.
It wasn't, like, a full recovery or anything, but it certainly helped. I think at this stage it's all about getting that pain out of your heart, and any way you can do that is good.
Sorry for not having anything to say about your explanations; all of that is kind of between you and her, and I'm afraid that your "Pause" moment of "she doesn’t need a reason at all to end things" might sum it all up. I know all about all of those kind of explanations, but at the end of the day, she wouldn't have ended it if it wasn't what she wanted. I could be wrong, of course, but that's what I take from your post. Sorry to say it so frankly. I hope you can start to feel better soon.