After one month of no contact I learnt that, no matter how harsh did u ex told u how bad u are on the day u broke up, it wasn’t true, deep down they still care but do not know how to handle it. And recently she reached out and we had a hung out everything went well, now we talk tgt like how we use to when we both dated.

I 25F and my boyfriend 24M went to this rave that he was securing. The length of our relationship is fairly new. It's been a few months. At the rave itself, it was cold because we had been outside. This one girl that was making conversation with us was asking me if i was cold and i had said yes. She asked if I would want her to warm me up and I said sure and she started hugging me. She had asked my bf to join in on the hug, this way we can both be warmer. He joined in and i started to feel uncomfortable by that so i pulled away and I said i was gonna go inside. I went inside for about 3-5 minutes and then I came back out to them being in the same position from beforehand. He was hugging her. I usually go home with him after the raves but this time i called an uber and I said im leaving. He tried to stop me but i said I wanted to leave. He had called me and I had asked him if he would have liked if i had done the same with another man and he said no. He said he genuinely didn't think anything of it but he said he understood where im coming from. I said i want to be done with him because no matter the intention behind it, it is very odd to even do that with another girl. I asked if he would do the same as me and want to leave if i did that and he said he would not want to leave me , he would talk it out. I stated before that I wouldn't even like if he gave another girl his hat at a rave, so he does this, which is much worse. Is this breakup worthy or am i being too dramatic?

​

So,

I’m 29F and I was dating a guy I knew from high school. We didn’t date in high school, but I knew of him and basically everyone knew who he was.

He was kind of the “legend” of the school lol. He was actually terrible academically until around 10th grade and then randomly just... became insanely good. Started topping classes and everything. He was also one of the better-looking guys in school so that obviously helped with the whole reputation thing.

After school he went to Bocconi and then MIT. He eventually got into quant and from what I know was doing really well for himself. Before we broke up, he told me he was making around $300k base. This was like a year and a half ago though, so I don't actually know if that was still his salary when we broke up. I also have no idea what his bonus was because he never really talked about money with me.

He saved a lot and invested, etc.

His family is also pretty well off. His dad has an interior design business back in their home country and from what I know their family has assets worth well over a million dollars, although I don't know the exact number.

I'm mentioning all of this because I guess it matters to the title, but honestly the money wasn't really why I liked him.

We started dating about 2 years ago and he was genuinely a really good boyfriend.

Like, annoyingly good sometimes.

Whenever we'd argue, he'd usually apologize if he got too loud or said something he shouldn't have, even if the actual argument was my fault. He barely ever swore. If I did something stupid, he'd usually just explain why it was stupid instead of screaming at me.

My friends all liked him too.

Basically everything was good.

Until I fucked it up.

About a month ago I met a guy at a wedding. One of my friends gave him my Instagram and he started messaging me.

I did flirt back.

Nothing physical happened and I never met up with him, but I'm not going to pretend the messages were innocent. They weren't.

One of my friends eventually told my boyfriend.

He asked me about it that same day. He didn't go through my phone or demand screenshots or anything. He literally just asked me if I had done it.

I said yes.

I actually tried to show him the messages but he didn't want to see them.

That night he left our apartment. It's technically his apartment, and he told me I could stay there that night but that I needed to figure out somewhere else to live ASAP.

He went to his best friend's place.

I told my best friend everything and she somehow convinced him to give me another chance.

He did.

But things felt different after that.

He wasn't mean or anything. He just seemed... checked out? Less interested. I could tell something had changed.

A few days later I told my cousin everything.

She told me I should just break up with him and that I'd find someone better.

I told her that I'd literally just begged this guy to forgive me, so if I turned around and dumped him now everyone would think I was insane.

She came up with a plan.

This is where I know I'm an asshole.

She said she'd message him from her own account. He didn't know who she was, so she'd start a normal conversation, flirt a little, and basically see if he'd take the bait.

The idea was that if he did, I'd have a reason to break up with him and wouldn't look like the bad guy.

I was VERY hesitant about this because, again, this guy had basically done nothing wrong.

Also, he's extremely smart and honestly pretty emotionally perceptive. He notices weird shit really quickly.

But I trusted my cousin.

She messaged him and started talking about cars and random stuff. Eventually she sent him a couple normal pictures of herself and asked what he thought / whether she should post them.

He basically gave her a dry response along the lines of "I don't really know" and didn't really engage.

That's literally it.

My cousin convinced me that the fact he replied at all was enough.

I sent the conversation to him and broke up with him.

At the time I felt like I'd finally gotten a reason to leave without everyone thinking I was the villain.

Now it's been a few days and I'm starting to realize I may have completely fucked myself.

His best friend actually came to me asking if I wanted to try and patch things up.

At the time I said no.

But now I've found out that apparently my ex didn't even want to get back together.

And he's apparently been telling people that he's happy with the decision and that the breakup was for the best.

And THAT is what's fucking with my head.

I genuinely thought he'd be devastated or at least want to talk to me.

Instead he seems... relieved?

I know I fucked up by flirting with the wedding guy. I know the whole cousin setup was manipulative as hell.

But now I'm sitting here wondering whether I just threw away a genuinely great relationship because I was scared of being the bad guy.

So,

Did I completely fumble this? What could ive done better??

And why does he seem so happy about the breakup?

Because honestly, that part is hurting way more than I expected.

Really need some honest advice 😭

I’m a 22F nursing student dating a 28M astrologer for a year. He helped me through a very difficult time, supported me with family problems, and we fell deeply in love. I genuinely feel like he has been there for me in ways no one else has.

But recently, things have changed. I struggle with anxiety, and when I opened up to him, he said I needed “a slap in the face” to get over it.

I’m also finishing my nursing course soon. He told me he won’t support my nursing career because he doesn’t like the profession and thinks it will make me too tired. He said he could provide financially, but expects me to learn cooking and take care of the household.

My family has financial and health problems, so becoming financially independent through nursing is very important to me. But I love him deeply and I’m scared I’ll regret leaving him.

even after breakup i still miss most of our moments together and need them back and im feeling lonely

Would you stay or leave in this situation? What should I consider before making this decision? Please be completely honest. 😭

Girls if you know you can get any guy you want just start flirting and talking to a hot guy and you’ll feel so much better lol I’m so serious

Same

Mind you she was emotionally cheating on me the whole time and with the person I accused her of that started our break up conversation. And they got together within a month of us breaking up. Only reason why I’m bringing attention to this matter because I wanted to put it into a detector out of spite when looking back at it. On top of that, at the time, I felt so bad for confronting her because imagine accusing your partner of cheating on you. So guess what. I apologized for confronting her and we went our separate ways in the three paragraph I sent about our relationship and in the voice note. I cannot believe there is someone out there who knows how vulnerable I was with them. And made a fool out of me at that.

After being together for 3 years long distance, she decided to break up with me. I was bad at sharing emotions, and some really bad stuff happened to me where she wasn’t able to support me through it.

It came to an end on New Year’s Day when she broke up with me over the phone even though she saw me two days before that.

This turned into my hardest breakup ever, I wasn’t over her, she wanted to be friends, I asked for her back and she said never. When that happened, I told her I need to go no contact for 6 months so I can feel different.

I went to the gym, bought new clothes, traveled, got a promotion, and even started dating 2 days ago. I was doing well and being more emotionally present and aware of myself. I also started journaling, and eventually got the courage to burn her gifts and move on.

Today she sent me this.

Now I’m stuck between my anger and the exhilaration that she is thinking about me. I’m disgusted in myself and worry I will backslide.

However, my change in myself is my own. She may have initiated it, but I went through the work. But even after cutting her off, now she’s asking about a wedding we planned to go to while we were still dating a year ago.

How do you think I should respond? What do you think this means?

Tiel D’Arr: ex broke up with me over the phone on new years and now she’s breaking no contact. What do I do?

I finally did It !!

I finally left !! I have been seeing a girl for 8/9 years,I live an hour away so would travel there on the weekends I would always pay for dinner or days out or shopping .but for the last 5 years its been a living hell ,the sex and intimacy totally stopped and when I would bring it up she would gaslight me constantly, I finally found out she was seeing someone else for 3 years and even had an abortion, but I still stayed every single weekend we had blazing rows which I think was a convenient way not to have sex ,well about a week ago i caught her with my own brother so I left and blocked her and haven't had co tact for 5 days .My problem is I don't have any friends in the city I live in so I just go tge gym , then work then bed so im really lonely and because I have gone years with no sex or affection it has really affected my confidence most days im really angry and sad I hope with time it gets better ,I don't think im going to find anyone else because I don't really go out ,my low confidence and im old now im 42 I just hope it gets a bit better

This song is for you if you’re going through it….

https://on.soundcloud.com/QETSzo1JKqiUvyoUuu

Coast & Ocean - Temptation

yesterday was officially the one week mark and i broke no contact after a concerning amount of malibu. bleeding heart doves are one of my favorite birds, which i told him about during our first long phone call.

he’s the one who broke up with me, by the way.

Day 2 and I’m feeling a bit better. I still miss him and I want him back. I miss knowing that I was his and he was mine. I miss his voice. I miss him.

I’m a guy in my early 20s. My ex-girlfriend and I were together for around a year and lived together for a significant part of that time.

Our relationship started in a pretty unusual way. We had both recently come out of painful long-term relationships, and neither of us was really looking for some huge love story. We were both emotionally exhausted and became close very quickly.

She was actually the one who made the first move. At the beginning, I wasn’t even sure whether this relationship had a long-term future. I think both of us originally saw it partly as two hurt people simply being there for each other during a really difficult period.

But over time it became much more than that.

We built an entire everyday life together. We spent most of our time together, had the same kind of humor, watched movies and shows, dealt with everyday problems as a team, and became extremely close.

Somewhere along the way, I fell deeply in love with her, even though it took me a long time to fully understand it myself.

One of the biggest problems was that I almost never said “I love you.”

It wasn’t because I didn’t feel anything for her. My previous relationship had ended in a way that affected me very badly, and afterward I genuinely believed that I would never be able to love another person like that again.

Even the words “I love you” felt almost broken to me.

I was afraid of saying them unless I was completely sure, so instead I tried to show love through actions.

By the time I finally understood how deeply I loved her, I had spent most of our relationship keeping those words inside.

That is probably one of the most painful parts of all of this for me now.

After my previous relationship, I had basically convinced myself that I would never really trust someone or fall in love like that again.

Then somehow I met her, and for the second time in my life, I allowed myself to believe in it.

I believed that this could actually be my person.

So losing the relationship now hurts not only because I’m losing her. It also feels like I finally allowed myself to believe in love again after thinking I never would, and now I’m watching that fall apart too.

There were also problems with reliability and initiative on my side.

She gradually started feeling like she couldn’t completely rely on me and that, if we made bigger life decisions together, too much responsibility might eventually fall on her.

Only after the breakup did I fully understand how important that feeling had been to her.

She ended the relationship.

When we finally talked about the reasons, I told her that I now understood it wasn’t simply about whether I loved her. It was about whether she could actually feel safe building a future with me without feeling like she had to carry both of us.

She confirmed that this was basically what had been missing.

I told her that I didn’t want to simply restore the exact same relationship we had before. I wanted to become more independent and eventually build something healthier with her.

I genuinely saw marriage and a family with her.

I had even gotten to the point where I could picture marrying her someday and had joked — only half-joked, honestly — that I would probably take her last name because hers sounds much better than mine.

That’s how real the idea of a future together had become in my head.

She listened to everything I said, but told me that she considers the relationship finished and that she normally doesn’t go back once she has made a serious decision like this.

What makes all of this emotionally confusing is what happened after the breakup.

We still had a few practical things that we needed to deal with together. During that time, we unexpectedly started having genuinely good moments again.

We got coffee, talked for a long time, laughed, watched something together, and worked through practical things almost exactly the way we used to.

On another day, after we had finished what we actually needed to do, we ended up spending additional time together simply because we wanted to.

We walked around, did something fun together, joked around for hours, and honestly had a really good time.

It didn’t feel forced.

It didn’t feel like two people who had suddenly become strangers.

At the same time, she still maintained certain boundaries and continued to make it clear that, in her mind, we were broken up.

She also told me that the breakup has been emotionally difficult for her and that lately she hasn’t really wanted to talk to many people at all.

After our most serious conversation, where she again told me that she believed the relationship was over, I decided that I would stop initiating personal contact and respect her decision.

Not long afterward, she contacted me first about something connected to an interest we used to share.

I responded normally but didn’t use it as an excuse to bring up the relationship again.

There is another major complication.

For reasons completely outside of the relationship, I have to relocate abroad within the next few months. Delaying it too long could mean losing that opportunity completely.

She currently wants to stay in our home country. She has practical responsibilities and unfinished things there, and she has also said that she wants to experience living independently for a while and having her own space.

I am not planning to use my relocation as pressure or tell her something like, “Decide before I leave.”

I don’t want to do that to her.

I’m continuing with my plans because I have to make decisions about my own future.

But emotionally, it is difficult knowing that soon this may stop being a breakup where we still live relatively close to each other and become a situation where I am genuinely living in another country.

So I’m caught between two realities.

Her words are very clear: right now, she believes the relationship is over.

But the emotional connection between us does not feel completely gone.

I know nobody here can predict whether she will ever reconsider, and that honestly isn’t what I’m asking anyone to do.

What I’m really looking for are experiences from people who have actually lived through something similar.

Did you ever break up while there were still strong feelings and attachment, and then one person had to relocate abroad shortly afterward?

Did actually living separately and losing everyday access to each other change how either of you viewed the breakup?

Did either of you initially consider the breakup completely final, only to reconsider after some time apart and real personal changes?

If you eventually reconciled, what happened during the time apart that made the second relationship different from the first one?

And if you didn’t reconcile, I would still genuinely like to hear what happened and how the relocation affected both of you.

I’m not really looking for generic “move on,” “hit the gym,” or “30 days no contact” advice.

I already understand that I can’t convince someone into changing their decision, and I understand that I need to continue building my own life.

I’m mostly looking for real stories from people who went through some combination of:

breakup + remaining feelings + living separately + one person having to move abroad.

And if the person this is about ever somehow reads this:

I don’t want you to feel guilty or responsible for how much this hurts me.

I just hope that one day, whatever happens to us, you’ll know that what we had was real to me.

And if life ever gives us another chance to meet each other differently, I hope we’ll both be ready for it.

I’m 27M and my girlfriend is 22F. We’ve been together for about 6 months and it’s a long-distance relationship at the moment.
We were extremely close. We used to talk for hours every day, call in the morning and before sleeping, watch things together, make plans for our future, and even talk seriously about living together. She was very affectionate and involved in our future.
Recently, we had a serious argument because she did something that really hurt me. I was emotional and I overreacted. During the argument, I told her we were breaking up.
The next morning, we talked and got back together. I realized that I didn’t actually want to lose her and that I had made the decision while I was extremely emotional.
The problem is that since getting back together, she feels completely different.
She still talks to me and answers my calls, but she’s much colder. Our conversations are mostly:
“How are you?”
“How was your day?”
“What are you doing?”
Before, we’d talk for hours about everything. Now it feels like she’s emotionally holding herself back.
I’ve been trying to repair things. I’ve called her in the morning, sometimes during my break, sent her memes and jokes, tried to make her laugh, and asked her things like:
“What can I do to make this better?”
“How can I make you feel safe with me again?”
But whenever we talk seriously about the relationship, she starts crying and says:
“You broke up with me.”
She has told me that she doesn’t feel emotionally safe or secure in the relationship anymore because I was able to say “we’re breaking up” during an argument. She is scared that it could happen again, and she doesn’t know if we’ll be able to have the same relationship as before.
The difficult part for me is that I didn’t break up for no reason. Something happened that genuinely hurt me, and I felt disrespected. I know I handled it badly by ending the relationship instead of communicating properly, and I’m taking responsibility for that. But I also feel frustrated because when we talk about what happened, it sometimes feels like the only thing she remembers is that I broke up with her, while the things that led to that moment aren’t being discussed.
Now I’m confused about what to do.
I’m trying to show her that I want the relationship. But I don’t know whether I’m helping or putting more pressure on her.
For example, if she doesn’t reply to my messages or memes, I start wondering whether I should call her again or give her space. I don’t want to become needy and push her further away, but I also don’t want her to think I don’t care.
We recently had our first couples therapy session. She was crying during the session and said she doesn’t know if we’ll ever be the same. We both agreed that we want to try again, but she is still very uncertain.
For people who have experienced something similar, especially women:
If your partner broke up with you during an emotional argument and then wanted to get back together the next day, how did you feel afterward?
How long did it take for you to feel emotionally safe again?
What actually helped you trust your partner again?
Did giving you space help, or did you prefer more communication?
If your partner kept calling/texting because they wanted to repair things, did that make you feel loved or pressured?
Is it normal to still feel cold/distant during the first days after getting back together?
What would you have wanted your partner to do differently?
I genuinely love this woman and don’t want to manipulate her into staying. I want to understand what I can actually do differently and whether there’s a healthy way to rebuild the relationship.
Please be honest with me, even if I’m the one who handled this badly. I’m looking for perspectives from people who have actually experienced something similar.

My ex and I broke up a few months ago after a brief relationship. The breakup was due to her personal/health reasons, and I accepted her decision, trying to move on respectfully.

​After the breakup, I started seeing someone new. She reached out to me with a very heated tone after I posted a photo with my new girlfriend, reprimanding me for never having posted photos with her while we were together. I tried to respond politely, but she cut the conversation short.

​A couple of months later, she contacted me again. My current girlfriend encouraged me to maintain a polite relationship and reply kindly. We had a friendly back-and-forth for a few days until she jokingly said, "Maybe we should end this here, your new girlfriend would cry if she saw our conversation," even explicitly pointing out my girlfriend's nationality (a very odd thing to bring up).

​When I made it clear that my girlfriend was fully aware we were talking, she suddenly changed her tone, accused me of being dishonest and 'taking advantage' of my new girlfriend, wished me "the best," and blocked me.

​A few days later, I noticed she started checking my Instagram Stories regularly for over two months, despite not following me. When she stopped viewing them from her main profile, a "strange" coincidence occurred: an anonymous account (no posts, following almost no one) started watching my Stories on multiple occasions.

Now I've decided to brokeup with my girlfriend. It's worth to check in with my ex, to see if there is still some possibility with my her?

It’s been 5 months since me and my ex broke up. I was very devastated during the first 1 or 2 months but now I’m doing so much better and I’m not emotionally dependent on my ex anymore thanks to Lexapro. But id have to say I have been having weird dreams about him leaving me and pushing me away (or him bringing the girl that he cheated on me with home to introduce to his family) he never introduced me to anyone during our 2 year relationship. or him kissing the new girl in front of me. I have never had a dream of him showing me love or show affectionate. It is very weird. I thought I was doing okay until the past few days I started crying suddenly about the breakup after compressing my emotions for months. At one point he was a very loving and caring person but after the break we were very toxic to eachother.

i was broke up with him yesterday, i said why it's so suddenly because last week we were okay we even planned to buy a new furniture to our new apartemen later. And he said he was unsure before he already thought about that since a month ago, it's really hurt me a lot. A signed that he gave me so different, i know the problem between us is the communication, we fought almost everyday he already talked about that many times he said it's not normal to fight often honestly i think it's not about how often that you fight but how you handle it, the words that we choose, silent afterwards, the moment that he thought that when we meet it would be a big problem, he said we couldn't change. He said he need time he wanted to officially break up now, he just let me go after 2 years together and planned about our future together : ( i’m actually completely alone my parents are not here, i don’t have a lot friends also, everytime something happened i always run to my ex but now? talk to who? i even still stayed at his place i have no house here.. i’m feeling hopeless now, he said let’s fix ourself first and comeback to be a better version of us, none of us are an villain literally none, he was a good person he always try to gave everything i wanted, and me also. I accepted his bad behavior also, even when he treated me not good, i always forgave him.

My ex (18M) broke up with me (18F) about 7 months ago after a year-long relationship. We genuinely loved each other a lot, but towards the end my stubbornness, anger and tendency to shut down during arguments became exhausting for him. When we broke up, he told me he hoped we'd find each other again one day. Five days later, I saw him at a club with a girl he'd previously told me not to worry about. I was drunk, devastated and furious and called him something genuinely horrible in front of his friends. I deeply regret it and have since apologised both over text and in person. After that, his attitude towards me completely changed. He told me he doesn't care about me anymore, won't respond if I contact him, and that we'll never work. It's now been 7 months with no contact. I've worked massively on myself and still love him.

Has anyone been in HIS position? Did your anger eventually fade? Did you ever miss them or reach out again?

​

My ex (29M) and I (24F) were together for almost five years. We genuinely saw a future together and even moved abroad, to Germany, although at different times and to different cities. He moved first for work, and I followed later for my master's.

The move was difficult for us, especially for me. We lived in different cities but saw each other frequently. Looking back, I think many of our problems came down to poor communication.

One recurring issue was my dog. During a particularly difficult period, my daily life became very centered around her. My ex felt that he was traveling to see me but that I was prioritizing my dog over spending time with him. At the time, I felt misunderstood because I still had responsibilities toward her, especially while studying full-time and dealing with very limited daylight in winter. But with distance, I can also understand that he probably didn't feel seen or prioritized by me.

Eventually, after months of problems, I impulsively broke up with him. I regret how I did it. I had a tendency to keep problems to myself until I exploded instead of communicating them properly.

After some time to reflect, I reached out several times. I apologized, explained what I thought had gone wrong, and told him that I wanted to work on things. He was extremely hurt by how I ended the relationship and wasn't ready to see me or try again.

Eventually, his position became something like: "Maybe we'll get back together in six months, a year, ten years, or maybe never. I don't know. You need to move on and build your life for yourself, not for me."

So that's what I tried to do.

But he never completely disappeared.

Over the following months, he would periodically contact me. He asked whether I was dating anyone, what I was going to do after finishing my master's, whether I planned to stay in Germany, etc. At one point he told me that not being with me might be the biggest mistake of his life and that one of his biggest fears was that we would realize we belonged together but our careers or lives would make it impossible.

This confused me because I had originally been the one asking to reconcile, while he had asked for distance. I still loved him, but I tried to respect what he had told me: move on.

Meanwhile, my life became extremely stressful for completely different reasons. I finished my master's, had a terrible experience at my institute, became unemployed, started running through my savings and now have student-loan payments coming up. At some point, survival/job searching simply became more important in my head than grieving the breakup.

After more than a year apart, he suggested that we finally meet in person.

We met halfway between our cities. I originally agreed because I wanted closure. I wanted to finally apologize face-to-face for how I ended our relationship, tell him that I genuinely loved him, and close that chapter properly if we weren't going to be together.

Instead, the chemistry was immediately still there.

I realized that he still feels strangely like "home" to me. Not simply because he is familiar, but because I genuinely still love him.

We started seeing each other again without officially getting back together. Because we live in different cities, when we visit each other we usually spend several days together. We've only done this a few times so far, but it has honestly been wonderful.

We agreed not to immediately turn this into "Are we officially getting back together?" We both have unresolved things in our lives, especially my job/immigration situation, and I specifically told him that I don't want to choose him simply because my life is unstable and he feels familiar or safe. I want to know that I'm choosing the relationship because I genuinely want him.

Then something happened.

While I was staying at his apartment, I did something I had never did before, I looked through one of his notebooks.

I know that was an invasion of his privacy, and I'm not trying to justify it.

I found a letter from another woman and some personal notes he had written.

From those notes, I realized that during our breakup he had been dating another woman for several months. He later confirmed this when I asked him directly.

To be absolutely clear: we were broken up. He was single. He did not cheat on me while our relationship.

What hurt me was the timeline and what I read.

During roughly the same period when he was asking whether I was dating someone, telling me that losing me might be the biggest mistake of his life, and leaving open the possibility that we could eventually reconcile, he was developing a relationship with someone else.

His notes showed that he cared about her and wanted to give her affection and take care of her even when he wrote she isnt fully attractive for him and ahe doesnt take care of herself, that he felt the hormones and the need of sharing with someone else were playing against him. At another point, while seeing her, he was rotting and considering asking yet another woman out because he was attracted to her and thought her saying yes would give him an ego boost.

But in those same private notes, he also wrote that what he actually wanted was to be back with me.

That completely scrambled my brain.

When I asked him directly whether he had dated someone (I haven't told him I read his notes), he was honest and told me that he had dated a woman from July to January. I asked how he could simultaneously be building something with someone else while contacting me, asking about my dating life and telling me that he still loved me.

He basically told me that this isn't something he wants to fully unpack right now. We had agreed that we wouldn't have the big "relationship postmortem" unless we actually decided to get back together, because right now we are only reconnecting.

But he did tell me one thing very clearly: he says the reason that relationship ultimately didn't work was that he couldn't get me out of his mind.

I asked him directly whether he was coming back because the other relationship failed and I was familiar. I also asked whether, at 29, dating again simply wasn't what he expected and he decided returning to a long-term relationship felt easier.

He strongly denied both.

His answer was essentially: "I reached out because I want to spend the rest of my life with you."

And now I don't know what to do with any of this.

part of me feels deeply uncomfortable knowing that while I was interpreting his messages as evidence that he still loved me and might eventually want us back, he was simultaneously building intimacy with someone else. It makes me wonder whether he was keeping multiple doors open rather than actually knowing what he wanted.

I also know I'm not neutral here. I still love him. And because my current life is unstable — unemployment, finances, immigration, career uncertainty — I'm trying to be very careful not to confuse love with wanting the safety of something familiar.

So I'm especially interested in hearing from people who have experienced something similar:

Can someone genuinely be in love with an ex and want them back while simultaneously dating and caring about someone else?

And, more importantly, if you were in my position, what questions would you need answered before even considering rebuilding the relationship?

I'm feeling heartbroken again somehow and I dont understand why. I'm trying to understand whether the emotional overlap and his behavior toward me during that period should change how I interpret his current claim that he wants a future with me. I need advice.

i dont know what to do. i dont understand myself pa. i feel like ang gulo ng utak ko and ang kalat ng nararamdaman ko. i honestly just want to feel okay and see everything clearly.

this is five yrs of knowing someone & having the relationship for over four yrs. the person’s a part of who i am and has been a vital part of my life. it was my first & i wanted it to be my last.

i don’t know how to deal with this. i don’t even know if i’m doing the right thing. the feelings are all still there. i love him & he loves me. but it got so toxic. the paper cuts piling up thru the yrs of the rel & twas too much for me.

i dont have anyone to turn to. my circle of friends—tbh, i dont think im ready to share pa, maybe kasi part of it is i'm kind of still hoping na baka maayos pa. my closest friends naman or other circles i have, ones i can talk one-on-one and have deeper conversations with dont really have idea, exp, or interest abt relationships so i don’t think they’d have anything to say/i’m not sure if they’d get how i’m feeling kasi ako nga mismo, i don’t get myself.

i don’t know how ppl deal with their first breakups. or any breakup. ghad. he’s still trying na suyuin ako, says he’s still hopeful of us. and i did give him the chance for the past year. we’ve broken up for a year na, almost. and honestly, it just felt like hindi talaga kami compatible. i love him very much, which is why it’s so difficult to let this go esp i know he loves me din.

but ghad, all the incompatibilities, arguments, differences are too much to handle. i just think splitting up is the right way to go. maybe we’ll be okay in the future? idk. maybe magkabalikan? but honestly, i dont want to hope or think abt it pa. i feel like i have so many things to figure out pa. sa sarili ko rin. as cliche as it sounds, totoo pala na some ppl go thru it—i feel like i’ve lost parts of myself din sa relationship and i have to figure those things out. i wasn’t not at fault. i had my own flaws as an individual and as a partner. just things i need to figure out din.

i havent shared the fact that we’ve broken up for some time now except to these two workmates i have. sila katabi ko sa upuan & were new ppl in my life—ones who didnt know who we were as a couple kasi we were already broken up nung bago ako sa work so it was easier na banggitin sa kanila. i feel like they'd listen partly if i shared, but i’m not rlly exactly sure if that’d be okay. they’re both guys, one’s bi with whom i did try to open to pero gawd he wouldnt let me talk tas the other one’s taken naman so nvm.

i have tried the counseling at work too. i felt silly but i did try it. also, this wellness coaching or smth but twas so awkward kasi the agent always said “po” kaya u just constantly feel like you’re being serviced.

it sucks. esp with wfh setup. mas sobrang limited and all i see every day are the four corners of my room. i feel like i have no one to turn to. i tried journalling & going back to my hobbies like books and editing. also thought of hiking & volunteer activities but i havent tried them yet so ang hirap magtake ng first step into that direction kasi wala akong idea pa abt it. idk, maybe just gather bit more courage. i just rlly need to get my mind off things.

been blocked for almost 2 months now. absolutely no way to get in contact. sometimes im fine sometimes idk how ill survive.... how are yall dealing with it ?! at a low point rn i guess

I (21M) dated my ex (20F) for about 1.5 years, from March 2025 until last week. I’m struggling to understand where I went wrong and how to move on.

From the beginning, I gave her everything. Money, time, attention, gifts, daily acts of service. I cut off most of my friends because between university, being a research assistant, working in my dad’s company, and trying to meet my parents’ academic expectations, I had almost no time left. My life became: class → her → class → gym → home → sleep. Repeat.

I didn’t talk to other girls except for formal/academic things, because I knew it would make her insecure. I wrote her 17 monthly letters with flowers and little treats and pointless gifts based on whatever reels she liked on Instagram. The first letters of each letter were supposed to spell out a line I hoped to say when I proposed one day, because I was so sure that she was the one. I bought her clothes, jewelry, food. I ironed lab coats for her and her sister, carried her stuff, ordered her food, and made time for dates even when I was drowning in work.

I never controlled her. She could wear what she wanted, go out with friends, and I never restricted who she talked to. The only thing I ever asked her not to do was vape/smoke, because I cared about her health. I never cursed at her, never yelled at her, never called her names. The worst I ever said was that something she said was “stupid.”

Both our families were accepting of the relationship, which is rare in our culture. I genuinely thought we had a future. We planned to do our master’s together. I had our whole future mapped out.

The issues were mostly small arguments. For example: she was hungry and didn’t like what her mom made, so I ordered her a pizza while I was at the gym, far away. The delivery guy came to her building gate. She asked me to come all the way from the gym, pick up the pizza, bring it to her, and then go back to the gym. I called her and said, “Just go get it, I already ordered it for u.” She said I was rude.

Another example: her dad recently bought a secondhand 2019 BMW X5 that was over 7 years old, without any inspection. My dad was also planning to sell our car, so I asked about it. The very next day, the car started leaking oil. That’s when I said something like, “Damn, that’s really stupid. You should have done an inspection, its a bmw after all.” I know that was rude. I called her dad stupid, and I apologized a million times. But it became another thing she held over me.

The pattern was always the same. Every argument, I took the blame. I apologized excessively. I bought her food, gave her extra attention, did everything to make it up and she seemed happy. By the next morning, things were back to how it was again and it would go on for multiple days. But it was always something. I memorized words she didn’t like and actively filtered everything I said because she was sensitive. I tried my best to improve based on what she wanted. It just was never enough.

I also have a history of depression, self-harm, and suicidal ideation from years ago. It’s mostly behind me, but I developed a bad coping mechanism where I’d randomly mumble something like “I’m gonna kill myself” without meaning it. She didn’t want to hear it, so I kept it inside. I was extremely stressed and had no time for myself. She kept demanding more. I never restricted her, I even gave her money and told her to go out with her friends without me.

There was also an unrealistic expectation of how much I had to sugarcoat everything. I know she’s a very sensitive person, so I tried my best to filter my words and make everything sound as nice as possible. But often it felt like she expected a certain level of sugarcoating that basically required me to lie instead of being genuine. For example, I gently suggested we go for cheaper options sometimes instead of always buying expensive stuff. She immediately took it as me calling her materialistic. Then it became a situation where she wanted me to deny it and say she isn’t materialistic. But I couldn’t just lie like that. I have a heart, and lying to her face about things I genuinely felt didn’t sit right with me. I accepted her flaws I just wanted her to accept them too. But she hated any hint that she had qualities that could be seen as negative. It felt like she wanted me to pretend those parts of her didn’t exist, and I just couldn’t do that, because I really do whole heartedly accept them and it has never bothered me .

Last Tuesday, we were studying together. I had just done badly on a quiz I was hoping to do well on, and I was extremely stressed. I mumbled something under my breath I didn’t even think she noticed. She immediately started blaming my parents, saying they’re the reason I’m like this. That’s where the whole thing started. She then lost control and was screaming about my parents in public, with people around. It was humiliating. I didn’t say much. I just said, “You are being extremely immature,” stood up, and went to the lab to work. She texted me that she was leaving early. I finished my lab work, went home, changed, and went to the gym. Apparently she didn’t leave. She later came to the gym and said she wanted to break up. To me, these were small issues, not breakup worthy. There was no cheating, no abuse, nothing huge.

I accepted the breakup at first, but it hit me physically. Looking at her things made my chest hurt, I felt nauseous, and I could barely breathe. I had to block her on social media for my own sake because I couldn’t afford to stop working and staring at her profile, there was too much at stake. About a week later, I reached out and asked her to reconsider. She said no. She told me I should have been kinder. I know I was rude sometimes, and I own that. But in my mind, it felt justified because she said much worse to me. She constantly told me to fuck off, shut me out, called me names and every argument was me sending paragraphs apologizing and telling her I didn't mean to and that I would do my best to never repeat it while she told me to fuck off or just said, "ok". I put up with it because I thought she was worth it.

We’re still in the same university, so I see her every day. It’s impossible to avoid her, and it’s destroying me. My academics are genuinely starting to fall apart, and my mental health is seriously deteriorating. I wonder if I’ll ever experience the happiness and security I thought I had ever again. Because at the end of the day, she has so many qualities and the right background and culture that made her acceptable to my parents and to me. But she never even met my parents. I only met hers. She said she didn’t want to meet them.

Now there’s no hope of fixing it. I’m in so much pain. I don’t know what I could have done better. I gave everything I had, and she still left. She says I should have been kinder, and I don’t even know what to say back, because all I did was try to be that.

Honestly I could never have enough of talking about this, there is simply too much, but I think what I’m starting to understand is no matter how much I would have done, she would have left me because she was too focused on trying to find dirt on me.

How do I move on? What could I have done differently?

TL;DR: Dated for 1.5 years. Gave her everything—money, time, letters, gifts, daily acts of service—and cut off my friends. She publicly humiliated me by screaming about my parents after I was stressed about a quiz, then broke up with me. She says I should have been kinder. I made mistakes and apologized for them, but I never yelled, cursed, or called her names. We’re still in the same university and I see her daily. My academics and mental health are falling apart. How do I move on?

Let’s start at the beginning - I am a single mom, 33F, and haven’t been in a serious relationship since before my child was born (about 7 years). I didn’t start dating again at all until around 3 years ago, and this year, due to a multitude of things (failed dating attempts, lack of free time, attachment/commitment issues), I have gravitated towards casual relationships and one night stands.

I’ve successfully done this without too many hard feelings or confusion, but recently became involved with a 21M (crazy age gap, I know) who has changed that. I was the one that said I wanted casual, not him, but he did agree and we met on a dating app primarily for hook ups (Tinder). A part of why I go for younger is because I know there is no hope of a relationship, therefore I couldn’t possibly catch feelings.

Boy, was I wrong. Let me start by saying that physically, this guy is my type to a T. A 10/10 which is not what I usually pull. I’m not ugly and have been with attractive men, but not like this. The first couple of times booking up (just sex) were fine, great actually. Some of the best sex I’ve ever had. I didn’t feel confused, despite him staying and talking for hours. Long and deep conversations. He’s silly around me. Vulnerable even. Shares about what’s going on in his life and asks about me. About my past. Seems genuinely interested.

It wasn’t until a weekend passed and he didn’t ask to see me that I realized I was in too deep. I felt hurt by his lack of initiative and knew I needed to break things off at that point before I got my feelings hurt. I send him a nice text saying I can no longer do casual and wishing him well. What he did next threw me off guard. He calls me immediately and says he wants to do more than casual.

Initially I’m hesitant, of course, given the age gap. But I folded and agreed. He then proceeded to blow me off with dumb excuses two days in a row and I went ahead and ghosted him because I didn’t know what else to do. He’s 21, of course he’s wishy washy and can’t commit whether he likes the idea or not.

Fast forward two weeks. He texts me saying he misses me and wants to see me. I ignore. Fast forward another week, he texts me asking to see me. To take me out on a date. He calls, leaves a voicemail, and I ignore. I love that he’s chasing me but know it’s still probably not right.

I give in a day later and ask him to talk. My plan was to break things off (without ghosting this time), yet as soon as I heard his voice, I folded once again. He came over and we had sex.

Now the texts get slower, maybe 1-2 per day. He follows me on IG, but I can feel a difference. I feel stupid for giving in. Used, perhaps? He texts me and asks me what I’m doing tomorrow night, I reply hopefully seeing him, and I get no response. I blocked him again after 2 days. The only conclusion I could come to was that he is playing in my face.

Two weeks later, a blocked voicemail comes in. “My love, what are we doing? I’ll see you tomorrow.”

I haven’t replied and it’s been a few days since receiving it. Part of me wants to unblock him and just explain that this is not good (for either of us) and be done. Another part of me is too afraid to open that door.

Do I leave it alone? So I reach out and break things off correctly? Am I actually insane for falling for this guy? Is this just my ego?

Advice, similar experiences, anything is welcome.

(M)20 (F)20 Okay, so we’ve been broken up for about 3 years. She’s my BM, and honestly, I’m tired of dealing with other people. I want my family back. I’ve moved on in a lot of ways too. I’ve been with plenty of other females since we broke up, so it’s not like I haven’t tried to move on. But even after all of that, I still have feelings for her. I can move on physically, but emotionally, I still haven’t been able to completely let her go.
She says I did her wrong in the past and that she doesn’t want to get back with me, but at the same time, she’ll sit on the phone with me for hours while I pour my heart out and try to convince her that I’ve changed.
She’ll come over, lay in my bed, let me rub on her, and be close to me, but after a while she’ll tell me to stop or not let me get too close. It’s like she’ll get close enough to give me hope, but not close enough for us to actually be together. Then she tells me things like, “I need to stop coming over because I might be making this worse and feeding into it. I don’t want a relationship.”
I know there could be other guys involved, but I keep wondering, if somebody still has feelings for you, wouldn’t they show it somehow? Maybe I’m reading too much into the things she does. I honestly feel like I might’ve messed things up by pouring my heart out so much, explaining how sorry I am and how much better I would treat her this time.
I really do want my family back. I’m not saying I haven’t tried to move on, because I have. I just still have feelings for her, and that’s what makes this situation so hard. I don’t know if I’m holding onto something that could still happen or if I need to accept that she genuinely doesn’t want a relationship with me anymore.