Advise Needed: Together ~6years, Apart 7 months, Help me, Please

[PuffxOxSmoke]

Dear Helpful Stranger,

This is a request for help. Please, I'd really appreciate it if you could spare a few minutes of your time and give me some advise. I'll try to be as brief as I can:

I am daily more and more paralyzed by my intense feelings of longing for my ex-girlfriend; I need advise or at least some suggestions and input as to how I should best proceed.

7 months + 1 week ago: I broke up with GF, after being together for the last 5 years and 8 months of my life. There were a few main reasons; I'll try my best to summarize them here:

A. We were never had very similar interests/hobbies. (me - snowboarding, hiking, relaxing at home; and GF - career focused, shopping, and going out at night).
B. We always had very different personality types (me - spontaneous, relaxed, and living-in-the-moment; and GF - planned ahead of time, ambitious, and driven for the future).
C. For practically the entire length of our entire relationship, I constantly had a certain amount of doubt about us. -- In other words, because we had met when we were so young (me, 17, her, 16), I never had a chance to date anyone else, and thus felt unsure if she was the person that I wanted to be with the rest of my life. (This was compounded by reasons A & B).
D. Sadly and MOST unfortunately of all, our relationship was long distance (~4hrs drive apart). Approximately, on average, we saw each other only once every two weeks. This last reason caused me uncountable nights alone, wishing I was with her, longing for her touch -- NEVER seeing her as much as I wanted nor needed.

So 7 months + 1 week ago, my psyche had come to a critical point. And now, months later I can clearly see how I had no other choice than to leave her. My heart just couldn't take the torture of missing her and being so seemingly different from her; not even for another minute. I felt I had to go and I knew 100% that I was making the right decision.

But was I really? No! It was just that I had no other choice at the time; I was simply at a breaking point. The whirlwind of negativity that I had built over the past months and years took a heavy toll on my logical mind. My thinking at this time was almost completely biased. And sadly, my flawed biased thinking led me two make two choices in succession, that equaled our break up.

My resentment towards missing GF slowly spiraled into me hating her job too. A VERY ambitious woman, GF rose to the top of her class in college and managed to get one of the few coveted investment banking analyst positions available. Upon graduation, she wanted to move in together with me in the city and start her 80+ hrs/week prestigious career. Pessimistically, I told her that the city was everything I didn't want -- it was too crowded, and dirty, and polluted, and the air was bad, and you can't see the stars at night, and I didn't know anyone there, and it was EXPENSIVE, and simply put: NYC was not where I wanted to live when I graduated college. And possibly most importantly, the central reason I would be moving to the city seemed empty -- i.e. why should I move to NYC to be with her if she was going to be working so much that I would 'practically never' see her? Wouldn't that be just like we were still long distance? I couldn't deal with another day of long distance.

But what a load of BULL?! Not even once did I give fair consideration to the wonderful things the city had to offer me. A Bikram yoga studio only a few blocks from our apartment; a myriad of socio-cultural events every day/night; a very close proximity to my brother living in Brooklyn; great restaurants; night life; --- the list seems to go on and on. And furthermore, how could I have over looked finally being able to realize my/our/her ~6 year long dream: WE WOULD HAVE BEEN SLEEPING IN THE SAME BED TOGETHER EVERY SINGLE NIGHT.

Alas! I couldn't see it from that perspective back then. All I could see was the dirty city I didn't want to live in, with a girlfriend who I wouldn't get to see. On top of all this, I hadn't found a post-graduation job yet. This tremendously worried GF who expected (of course) for me to pay 1/2 the rent each month when we moved in together.

So in March of 2009, 3 months before our break-up, with GF putting a lot of pressure on me to find a job ASAP, and all this BS biased thinking in my head, I told her we wouldn't be living together upon graduation. Smashing our dreams. I want to cry just thinking about it.

Over the next couple months things only got more frantic. Both of us were about to graduate college in May. Having already eliminated the possibility of living with GF, I slowly but surely, systematically came to the decision that we needed to separate -- take a break at least -- for a while.

WHY?! - Because I felt I'd never see her and I was tired of constantly missing her. Because I have a few doubts about us. Because I didn't know what else to do. Because I thought it was the right decision. ------ I was biased. I was confused. I was stupid.

I can't understand why I turned down the option to live with her, finally realizing OUR DREAM of living together.

It's been 7 months + 1 week. I miss her. I miss her on a daily basis. I think about her. I feel her in my heart. I think about the life we could be living right now. I think about how I haven't called her since we broke up.

Which brings me to the point of this whole story: Should I call her? I want to SOOO badly. I don't know why I don't yet. I think a big part of me resists it because I'm terribly scared of her rejection. I'm worried that she won't even talk to me because I've cut her out of my life in such a big way for the past 7 months. Like a confused and hurt stubborn-idiot, I keep putting off calling her. I didn't know if I could take it. I just didn't know what to say if I couldn't tell her that I still love her, that I still miss her, that I cry thinking about her because my heart LONGS for her love.

Now 7 months + 1 week after our break up, I want to call to her SO BADLY; More than anything else in the world I want to call her, but I feel incredibly scared of what might happen when I do. I STILL LOVE HER. And though I'm not 100% sure what our life together would be like, I feel certain that being with her would make me happy. Living with her would make me happy. I even feel like I could eventually marry her -- and love every second of being a husband and father.

I'm not sure of ANYTHING anymore in my life. But I do know that I miss GF. And I do know that she brought so much light into my life that it still illuminates my heart. I want to call her but I don't know what to say and I am scared.

Please help me figure this out. Any input is welcome. Thank you.

Sincerely,

A friend in need

PS - There is a LARGE party in NYC this Saturday that we were both invited to. It's at at bar/club/longue with 250+ people at least, and it's basically a reunion party for an organized-trip we on together. Should I go? Should I message her about this, asking if she's going?

[Neeko]

I think you should call. Im a little confused on how there was no cummunication at all during the split?!? Did she try to call at all??? My wonder and Im sure it urs as well, Where she is with this break-up ? Maybe you can start off with that, Call and ask how she feels about you now, and if shes moved on, and if she at all wants what you want; to rekindle and start anew together. Let her know that the only good thing to come from this break is the realization of where your heart really is. Also, as a girl myself, If I found out that you missed me and wanted to get back together BUT never called like u missed me during those long 7 months; Id be upset and torn. So consider an appology for that. Its seems like in spite of everything this is the girl u want to spend ur life with and im sure is worth the coming effort. Also the whole being different thing, come on. Her drive may help you, and your spontaneity and relax spirit may be a good thing for her. The ying and the yang make each other. Call her before the event and maybe the event can be the 1st date and if all goes well pick her up at her place instead of meeting up, like a real date. I hope all the best when you do call.

[smackie9]

Sorry that you miss her but you pointed out a crucial point. Long term relationships and I mean say 25 years down the road, you need compatability for it to survive. Things in a relationship do die down after about 7 - 10 years later. So if you don't have simimalr interests, you will eventually live separate lives. This usually happpens when the kids are all grown up and moved away. And so there you two are feeling like strangers.

The reason you miss her is because she is familiar, comfortable. Plus I'm sure things really would have been different if you had met someone else. It is very comon to want to fall back to the ex. Oh well that my perspective. It's up to you what you want to do.

[PuffxOxSmoke]

Thanks for the input, smackie9. I'll try to address what you mentioned.

First, about our dis-similarity: I feel like both of us wanted things to work out so badly that we were already beginning to grow more similar. She had already taken up learning to meditate, which is something she would have never considered if not for my enthusiasm towards it. The main thing that killed us was our long distance, something that was ironically about to end before I broke things off. I really do feel like from a large perspective we DID want much the same things and had many of the same values: family, kids, marriage, loyalty, happiness, travel, fun -- we both had already agreed that after this intense period of Investment Banking for the next couple years (2 - 5 years?), she would work less because we'd be more finically secure.

And secondly, about meeting someone else: I did. Only a month after my break up with GF, I started VERY casually dating NG, a girl who I had hooked up with a few times about 8 years ago. I did everything in my power to keep things casual -- that is, except for treating her in the same way I was used to. Basically over the next 6 months our relationship grew very slowly but surely into something more serious than I wanted. Two days ago, I met with her and broke off all contact, saying I needed space. I think the real reason is that I know getting back with GF has ZERO chance while I still even remotely see NG. NG helped me to move on in a way, but also impeded my progress forward. She was understanding, always very accommodating of what I wanted, and very nice and polite. But I never could really get into liking her, mostly b/c of thinking of GF. I think on some level still being with NG was and is why I've never called GF since our break up. Now, thinking back on my time with NG, I can't help but think, over and over, "Why was I ever with NG? GF was better in almost every way I can remember. Most importantly, I loved GF and still do. I do not love NG."

They say you don't know what you got till it's gone, but even when we were together I knew how special GF was. During the final year of our relationship I kept a diary; I read most of it last night and will try to read the rest today. It feels kind of strange to recall my past emotions and thoughts about her. In a bunch of the entries, I seem tremendously angry at her, or if not that, just plain lonely and sad. These entries portray her as someone I want to break up with, but at the same time dearly love; thus, I can't bring myself break up with her. Now, months AFTER our break-up and constantly thinking about how much I miss her, it feels odd reading a record of my past desires to leave her.

Something else telling of my true intent: I have been very regularly using Rosetta Stone, a foreign language learning program, to learn French. GF's entire family speaks it; And I think, on some level, I fantasize about one day calling GF and while speaking fluent French, asking her to be mine again. And hearing her say yes.

More input? Should I call her? If so what should I say? Should I go to the party this weekend or call her about it?

Thanks again to everyone.

Sincerely,

A friend in need

[smackie9]

Well the only thing I can tell you to do is to go back to when you broke up. Whatever it was that drove you to do it will still be there if you ever do get back together....those issues have to be carefully examined with a very open mind. Maybe go over it with a close friend to gain some perspective.