I started talking to this guy at my sister's wedding in Aug 2006. We were friends & just hung out until we started to date in May 2007. The summer went great. Things got harder when school started at the end of August. He works full-time & takes night classes at the local college. He ended it at the end of September. He's a great guy & we still talk on occasion. He does know I want him back, but he feels pressured.

One of the biggest reasons he ended it was because he decided it was too hard. Finding time to spend together was hard enough just getting around out work schedules & his school schedule. To add to it, he has a roommate that is way to controlling over his life & has to know where he is at all times. This roommate didn't know we were dating, because she (who he isn't & doesn't want to be involved with) would make things even harder then they already were.

Please give me some advice on how to get him back. I really miss him & want what we had back. I do know that we can get it back. The biggest problem right now is that I've been trying to get him to see that for a few month now & he doesn't. He keeps telling me to stop pushing cause I'm pushing him away (which I don't want to do).

Please don't tell me to just move on cause he's "not worth it." Trust me he is worth it.

welcome to the forum.what he telling you is true,you can chase a man so much until he becomes uninterested in you.it can be a true turn off.you have told him how you feel,now it is up to him to decide if he wants this relationship.believe this anything that a man is truely interested in he will find and make time for.I would hate to see you get your feeings more hurt then they already are.give him room to think about what he'll be missing out on.mean whilebusy yourself with other things.

Welcome Sep780

Hhmm...

The finding time it I understand.

The fitting in with the controlling rules of a female room-mate, I do not.

If you share with someone, then of course you have to respect their wishes and have shared house rules, but room-mates do not decide who you date and when.

Maybe he doesn't want to date her ~ or maybe there is something there ~ who knows.
Anyway, that doesn't mean she doesn't want to date him.

If I had a boyfriend who was living with another girl, I would be a bit wary. If she was involved in us breaking up, I'd be even more wary.

It's true that chasing a boy can turn him off, but, if he really cared as much as you would like him to, then you would be having a relationship, where you see each other only occasionally, as decided by you, yourselves; not breaking up with the help of another girl.

I'm sorry if I sound blunt ~ and maybe I really have got him wrong ~ but in spite of what you say, I do think that you might be better off finding someone who shares his thoughts with you, rather than someone in the control of another girl.


Okay ~ good luck!

Trust me she doesnt' want to date him. She's married to someone else right now who lives out of the country at the moment & is in the process of moving here. He does care about her, but only as a friend.

Fair enough ~ but why, then, is she trying to control his life?

I'll give that a try. I've been trying to not push him for a while now. Working a little better now that I have 1 friend I'm talking to about it again. Managed to go a whole week w/o calling or msging him. That was my goal. Giving it a try again this week. So far so good.

That's sorta complicated.

I am sure you must be wonderful but he is not for you. If he was, nothing could keep him away. Accept this now and save your heart for one who would value it as the treasure it is.

I'm sorry because I know that isn't what you want to hear and I don't blame you. When the right one comes along you will know. You won't need to ask them to fit you in. They will make it their business to fit you in all by themselves and because they want to all by themselves.

Have you ever heard the song, "You Can't Hurry Love" by the Supremes? I am dating myself here but it is a wonderful old song. Google for it and I am sure you can find it somewhere to listen to. Truer words were never sung. Take that advice too and don't worry. Just be the nice person you are and the rest will happen for you on its own.

Yeah I'm sure I've heard the song. Will look it up though.

Part of why he left is because I've been talking the blame for everything & honestly believing that everything is my fault & feeling inferior to everybody for about 20 years now, & I'm in my 20s. Put that on top of how hard it was already, & I can see how it got to be too hard on him. Any arguements we had while dating were about whether or not I made a mistake & whether or not it was my fault.

You need to look objectively at why you do this. Perhaps you could go for counselling or to assertiveness classes.

I'm one of those people who feels guilty at the slightest thing and worries about things I've said, etc, but no-one is perfect; everyone makes mistakes. You are probably no better or worse than any other average person, so try hard to lighten up ~ with help if necessary.

We all make mistakes regularly. Welcome to humanity. Now that we have that out of the way, the next thing is how do we handle this without beating up on ourselves and injuring our own self-esteem? Life is for learning and nobody needs to be hurt to learn. So be nice to you is my first bit of advice.

In keeping with that my second bit of advice is you should seek out a counselor and spend some time in talk therapy. You need to talk about your feelings related to self-esteem and perhaps other pertinent related things with a professional where you'll get the best help you need. This is not about any sort of weakness or deficiency in you. It's all about the very real need that so many of us have at times in our lives for objective guidance and support in finding our own answers and growing as we do so. I can tell you need some support in building up your own confidence, self-esteem and sense of self worth.

Happiness and fulfillment in life are things that spring from within, not from without. You won't find them in a relationship with someone else for example until you first find them within your own self. When you cross that bridge then you are ready to be in a healthy loving relationship and you won't need this old man to tell you so on a message board. You will know.

A good counselor or therapist can help you get to this good place and I would sincerely and highly recommend you get on the phone Monday and make it happen. The sooner you are working on this with someone the sooner you are heading for feeling good about you and you really do deserve that. I know you do and I believe that you can come to know it too.

Don't know where to begin? Ask your own doctor if you have one for a referal. If that is not an option, open up the yellow pages and make some calls. If like me you believe in God in some way, don't forget to ask him to help you find somebody good.

Lastly, you might like to read some books with nice daily affirmations that are wonderful for helping one to focus on positive things about themselves. I know you can find such books at any good bookstore and probably the library too.

You'll be glad to know that I have started seeing a therapist. I have had 2 sessions with her so far. I started to go because of a friend's urging in a way. Although right now the only people I've actually told is her & one of my mngrs at work (who is like a 2nd mom to me). I guess you can say I'm hoping that with professional help & friends & family I'll be able to get past some of the "constant guilt" (aka. always blaming myself) & my fellings of being inferior to everybody. Both of them stem back to my childhood though & aren't from the relationship. They are both parts of why he decided it was too hard though.

I'm working on the book of self affirmations in a way. I have some of the people I'm closest too making lists of 10 things they think are good about me. I only ask why they see them for the ones I don't understand.

Things are already on the up, then, because you have had the motivation to set things in motion. That's great!
Well done ~ and good luck!

Now the biggest thing to do with the affirmations is to find a way to believe them myself. I do see not just telling people they are wrong about some of the ones they came up with & instead asking why they see it as a small step though.

Yes ~ keep being positive!
I'm sure that there are lots of very good & positive about you ~ make some lists yourself.
For example, you have given some good advice to others on here.
And even little things, like your posts are polite ~ not everyone on forums is helpful and polite (though this one tends to be better than many).

As I said, I've had real problems, myself, with the guilt thing. Sometimes you just have to really face up to whatever you think you have said or done and look at it objectively.
Is it really that bad?
Are you getting into a state over something of little consequence?

It can be hard ~ frightening even ~ to confront your demons, but often those 'demons' are minor, once you actually confront them.

Good luck!

I just started doing a "self-confidence" course at www.more-self-esteem.com & signed up at www.selfesteem4women.com. I've also had a few sessions w/ a therapist now. Not sure how the therapist is working out, but I'll give it a try. Only had the first "lesson" for the confidence course so far & that one was pretty much figuring out for myself where I lack confidence & where I already have it along w/ where I want/need it. I know that there is no way it will make things any worse & really want it to make things better. My one manager (she's like a 2nd mom to me almost in a good way though), believes that it can & will help & has told be to be positive about it.

If you can do this yourself, then I feel that it will do you good! Take care!

Gurl if u were me I would but him behind and find some other guy to please you, cuz u hooked on this guy and you have to let him go.

ok Im late to this post, but from what you first wrote I would have to tell you the truth, you seem really nice but,,, ok the reason he gave you is xxxx, he only told you that to be nice.. if he cared for you he would make time, and Im not just saying that, you make time for him right, and you deal with all the xxxx too so, which means he ended up not having feelings for you in that way anymore, its sad but true, he wants to be friends to be nice also, truth is he dont, he wants you to move on and stop asking him how he feels about you. the best thing I can say is...you better then that, find some one else, or not find persay but keep a eye open... dont pass up any one becasue you are waiting on him... he well not turn around. its been to long of a time and he has moved on... now yu can...hope this helps

You feel you have personal issues that you recognize you need to work on like self confidence and it is always good to try to improve the way we approach life and personal relationships. This should be something you do for yourself. It shouldn't be something you do as a way to better yourself so that you will be acceptable to him. I don't know if he made you feel that you were lacking self confidence or you came to that conclusion yourself. We all go through issues like this. You wouldn't be the first person who cared so much about someone that you were constantly self assessing and afraid of loosing them. A lot of very loving people with big hearts get hurt and it is hard to rebound and have confidence in yourself after that. I have to tell you that there is someone out there who can look past that insecurity and see into your soul and let you know how beautiful you are. That person will instill such confidence in you that you will see yourself through their eyes. They will love you for yourself. It won't be difficult to arrange his schedule to see you. Your self confidence issues won't be "just too hard to deal with". I think you shared genuine feeling with your friend, but if it has all become to hard, as you put it, he does not have the same feelings about the relationship as you do. It is possible in his effort to return the relationship to a not so demanding one that he has told you reasons that have made you feel responsible for it failing. It wasn't you.....It just was not the right chemistry for a truly fullfilling relationship on both sides. It is hard to see that he would never be able to make you totally happy because you love him. But love is not the be all and end all of a relationship. When you truly find that someone that will accept you for who you are and love you flaws and all and still want to make you happy and will go to the ends of the earth to see that you are, you will know what I mean. I am sure that your friend cares for you as a friend or he would not be talking with you. Don't fall into the trap of thinking if you were only better or more confident or less fault finding of yourself that somehow things would return to the way they were. The truth is, you are just fine. If he was the one and only true love of your life, things would already be the way they were. Concentrate on accepting yourself and your confidence will take care of itself. Concentrate on finding someone who will also accept you as you are and your heart will be taken care of also. The subject line of your post was "I want him back". If you really think about it what you probably want most is the adoration you felt when love was new. That feeling was total acceptance. Have faith, you will know it again.

Right now I know there is no way he'll be back. The biggest problem is that I feel like it's totally my fault we split (even though he ended it). I also feel like caring about him at all was a mistake that I have to forgive myself for (even though he says it's not a mistake), like letting him in was a mistake, etc.

In all honestly, I don't think I can ever care that much about someone else I don't think someone else can care that much about me. I also have no clue how the unlucky guy who would be willing to settle for me will ever find me. I pretty much go to work & then go home & get online. I used to also watch TV, but I temporarily have roomates who have total rights to the TV while they are here, but that's a whole separate issue that will be moot in about 2 weeks, so nothing I can't live with until then.

I feel like I have more to say, but not sure how to word it I guess so I'll end this here for now. Feel free to comment, offer advice, etc.

It is perfectly normal to feel rejected and unworthy especially when someone walks out on you. If he had made you angry enough to be the one to walk away, you would not be as sad as you are right now. Just remember it will pass. When you loose a loved one, it is a lot like a death. You have to allow yourself to go through the phases of loss. It might help to sit down and make a list of all of your good qualities and traits. Add to it where you want to be in six months emotionally, financially, and career wise. The power of positive thinking can sometimes work wonders. Try to treat yourself as if you are your own best friend because you are. Sit down every morning and read the list and read it again at lunch. Sit down again and read it every evening. I once had a friend that changed his life totally because he kept his goals continually before his mind this way. When unhappiness seems overwhelming, we have a tendency to let it color our whole outlook. It always helps to put things in perspective. I can suggest something that might help you look at your life with much more positive emotions. I once did this when I thought my life was falling apart and my outlook changed totally in the span of 20 minutes. Find a hospital near you that specializes in treating cancer patients of all ages and go there for a visit. Walk in the front door and take any elevator to the top floor without getting off. Press the down button and ride it back down and leave.Take care.

In an earlier post you said: 'Part of why he left is because I've been talking the blame for everything & honestly believing that everything is my fault & feeling inferior to everybody'.
Now you are saying:'I feel like it's totally my fault we split (even though he ended it). I also feel like caring about him at all was a mistake.'
So, in spite of the active work, little seems to have changed in this area.
And this needs to be addressed. Otherwise you will keep thinking that only an 'unlucky guy .. would be willing to settle for me'.

You said: 'I've been taking the blame for everything & honestly believing that everything is my fault & feeling inferior to everybody for about 20 years now, & I'm in my 20s'

And this has to be dealt with ~ and it's likely to be painful. It's probably something where you will need the support of someone you really trust ~ either a therapist or a reliable friend / family member or both.

If this goes back 20 years and you are still in your twentys, then it strikes me that something happened when you were a child to make you feel that you had to take the blame; that things were your fault.

Children feel like this for a whole host of reason:

They may take the blame to protect someone else.
They may find it hard to make friends, so think that there is something wrong with them.
They are bullied by other kids, so think that they must have done something to deserve it.
They are slapped or scolded by adults, so think that they must have done something to deserve it.
They are sexually abused, so feel shame & guilt.
Their parents split up, so they think they must have caused the problems.
They are told by someone that they are naughty / bad / wicked / wrong ~ and believe it.
Someone else ~ eg friend or sibling ~ is praised more than them, so they feel inferior.
Doing right & wrong is made to be such a big thing that their conscience becomes overworked and they develop a guilt complex ~ this can be caused by religion or by a strict family upbringing.

Children think differently from adults. The world is a bit of a scary mystery to them. And they are usually under the control of other people ~ older kids & adults, usually. Adults should have a better understanding of the world and can be ~ sadly not always ~ freer to be themselves.

In your case, your inner child is grasping you and pulling you back to the fears and other negative feelings of a child. You need to take her by the hand and guide her out of whatever nightmare she is sucking you into. As an adult you can help the childhood you to deal with this ~ but you may need professional help.

One thing though, you need to start believing, straight away, that whatever these negative feelings are, they belong to your childhood, and nothing that you did before the age of 10 can possibly have been so bad that you were ever truly blameworthy. Anything that may have been your fault back then should not be affecting you now. You were a child then; you are now an adult, and you come over as a pleasant person.

You miss this chap; you feel rejected and guilty, so you will feel down, but if you could deal with these negative emotions of guilt, things would improve.

As I said, I've had problems with 'the guilt complex'. I haven't been a bad person, but of course I am not perfect. I have said & done & thought things that I shouldn't have. Now I think over everything I have said and done, just in case I've said or done something I should be feeling guilty about. I have got over the worst of my 'thing', but it won't go away completely. Meeting my husband, at 18, helped me to get things into proportion; and a one-time RC student at university helped me realise that Roman Catholicism heaps loads of guilt onto the shoulders of its children.

Seeing things objectively, as an adult, can help ~ but it can be difficult. The results are worth it, though!

Good luck!

PS
I should add, to show how things can affect kids, what it was that affected me.

I am two & a half years older than my brother.
When we were little children, I was very protective of him ~ to the extent that I felt that if anything bad ever happened to him, it would be my fault.

Of course, as kids we fought & argued. This upset my Mum, because it reminded her of her one and only minor childhood argument with her sister, and how guilty she had felt about it when her sister died, not too long afterwards.

So, I blamed myself for something that might one day happen, and I carried my mother's guilt over an argument that she had had with her sister, and which was transplanted onto arguments I later had with my brother.

My Mum was a child at the time; I was a child at the time ~ but we both carried our worries into adulthood. And I still think that the 'perfection' often expected by the RC church didn't help (not that they expect perfection from their priests and nuns, etc.)

Sometimes a word that seems of little consequence to an adult will take on a huge amount of significance to a child.

Ask him if he wants you back and if he says that he does then tell him to meet you at a very special and nice restaurant

I'm not sure how that would help with such a complex matter ~ but welcome to the forum.

I totally agree with PDM. I would only offer one more thing. What PDM is suggesting will reverse the circle. that you have been caught up in. Yes he broke up with you. Maybe it was because of always taking the blame and feeling wrong. If you now feel guilty and wrong then you will go on to have more feelings of low self esteem and be feeling as if you will do something wrong again. You will keep repeating the same actions because of how badly the actions make you feel. If you take PDM's advice, it will help you to stop the chain of actions that cause the feelings that cause the actions. You will be able to see that things do not always have to be your fault. I also think that a professional might find that your suffering from anxiety. Anxiety can cause a person to obscess on their actions and analize them and scrutinize them and constantly be anxious about what they are doing or not doing right. Do you do any repetitive actions? Do you also check things that you know are ok, just to make sure? Do you have to have things arranged just a certain way in your home? Do you worry that you have forgotten to turn off stoves or other things and have to return to your house to make sure that it is ok? Do you go over conversations in your head, again and again, unsure that you said something that was embarrassing. I am only asking because these are some signs of anxiety and obsessive compulsive behavior that sometimes makes a person feel wrong and guilty. I speak from personal experience as I went through this myself.

Yes ~ that certainly rings bells with me, too!

Look Sep if I were you I would try to move on even if you dont want to, by what I hear it sounds like you broke up and he dosnt like you because if he did he would be with you. And the girl that is living in his house or room. Since she got in the picture I would be worried that he may like her or something.

Sandiesloved.

Sep780 may indeed need to move on, but I don't think that you can simply assume that you know whether or not her ex likes her. This is a very complex and serious situation.

Sep780 has explained the housemate ~ who may just be showing concern for her friend, because she recognises that sep780 needs to get herself emotionally sorted out before she is ready for a serious relationship.

(Yes sep780 ~ that's something I thought might be possible.)


Destiny & SandiesLoved.

When something this complicated and important is going on in someone's life, the comments that you post need to be very well thought out, after having read all the information and fully understanding the situation.

I have already received a private message from someone else, who needed serious advice in a complicated situation, and who became very upset at a rather shallow response from someone probably too young to be experienced enough to be really helpful.

Please, everyone, when it comes to important emotional issues, do give your posts a lot of thought before adding them.

Thank you.

Hi, instead of trying to give sep some advice i want to tell my story but i start from the end i'm 31 now happily married + 2 wonderful children’s. This story happened 12 years ago i was with my girlfriend 6 years from the age of 15 until late 21 she was my first love she was my only friend and she was my whole world at that time. i've no connection with my parents. and after 6 years i've decided to leave her, from many reasons but it hit me 3 months later when i woke up one day and i've understood what i've done. It was hard. it took me almost 3 years to get over her. it took me almost 1.5 years to be able to touch another woman. i was finished. i am not going to go inside all the details but you can imagine yourself what i was going through. i can say that after 3 years i left the country because i couldn’t any more. that action changed my life, i was crazy and despaired I was looking for love without knowing that i was looking for a perfect family without knowing that. i've started to travel and learned first of all to get along with myself i've learned to like and love myself i've learned to be alone, alone, alone and to enjoy every min. i've learned new people i meet my wife, the moment that i saw her i've knew that she is the one. now you understand my i've started from the end. we have to be strong and stay strong all the way. One day everything look black and you want to k***** but day after is the best day of your life. I'm happy and i'm going to stay happy it's not easy but i'm working on it every day when i wake up and before that i'm falling asleep. I just promise myself that tomorrow will be the next best day of my life. My daughter said today her first word PAPA.

Hi nam-nam & welcome.

I'm sure that many people will find hop in your uplifting story.

Thank you. I hope things continue to go well for you ~ and your family.

Hi PDM, Thanks a lot. I must say that today after I wrote my story and thought about it last night. I have a great day today. Only if I could know this 10 years ago. SO, to all of us out there START FIGHTING NOW it’s worth it. I hear someone in Australia or Canada, but nam-nam what should we do. I tell you, start with one small thing! Are you ready? START smiling, think about something that makes you feel good. Think about it or do it. For example I love comedies so pick up a nice funny movie and start laughing Wish you all a great funny sunny day.

I think im in the same situation. I really want my girl back how about from your point of view what should i do if i was a little too pushy when we first broke up trying to get her back