First off, thanks everyone for your kind words and support. It’s nice to know there are people out there who give a rat’s ass about my well-being.
I’ve calmed down since yesterday. H. and I spoke last night and had a perfectly nice and normal conversation, and have plans for tomorrow. So now I’m somewhere between one extreme (Oh my God, He’s the One) and the other (I Have to Break Up With Him). I’m at, I’ll Enjoy This for Now but He’s Probably Not Ready for a Relationship.
As I implied in my last post, H. and I are at very different places in the recovery continuum (if there’s such a thing). It’s been two years since my separation; the 9 months or so before that were pure hell, the worst of my life. At the point of the separation, I began to recover.
There were a couple of months of grieving, then adjusting to being on my own, then dating again for the first time in forever. More grieving.
I didn’t know what I wanted then. I was curious about dating other people and thought I wanted a relationship, but mostly because I was lonely and being in a relationship was all that I had known for such a long time.
Last year, as you know, I started up with DK, again unsure of what I wanted, thinking maybe a short term thing was okay. It wasn’t.
In the six months since DK and I broke up, I’ve really learned to love being on my own, to live alone and like it, as one of my favorite books say (thanks again, Anonymous Writer!). To realize that I didn’t want to be in a relationship just to be in one, which I think makes me ready for a real full-blown relationship.
For H. this last year was pure misery, and only in the past few months has he begun to recover. A few months vs two years of recovery – quite a difference.
So I’ll give it a little more time and try to stay calm about the whole thing. Of course we will talk about all this, but in a little while.
If we broke it off, I could see us being friends, which actually gives me a happy feeling. But we’ll see.
Recovery is a very personal thing. I’ve seen people turn around after only a few months (maybe they were deluding themselves). Personally, I need A LOT of time between relationships. It sucks.
It sounds like you’ve got a good sense of what you need which is great.
personally speaking, a year was about right for me, but that was coming out of a tumultuous relationship, not a dreamy-everything-perfect relationship. i too needed to get used to being alone, and not feeling lonely for it.
I think slowly is a good approach. I wouldn’t worry so much about whether or not this is the end all relationship. If you have doubts, then you should probably start dating other people too.
Remember, advice is worth what you pay for it :-)