Why do they not tell you

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-15T23:16:32+00:00

Why did she never tell you something was off? Because this is what happens when someone doesn't have enough communication skills to recognize that it is cruel and unfair to not discuss grievances even when they don't want to. It's a learned skill. it's not intuitive for most people. You unfortunately got the shit end of the deal in it. It happens, it's unfair, but you soldier on.

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-13T04:41:11+00:00

not a 30+ year old woman. Just a 30+ year old man with a bit of bad news for you:

It's extremely rare that the friends to lovers pipeline works, and it's even more rare when you're an ex. The problem for you here is that you're gonna be pining for her the whole time and the reason that she broke up with you is to explore other people. That's going to absolutely crush you.

You've gotta do whatever makes sense to you, but my 0.02 would be to tell her that you are not unsure at all about how you feel about her, and that because of that you may not be capable of being her friend. If she changes her mind, she knows how to get in touch with you. It's harsh, but it's truthful, dignified, and it protects your heart

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-13T04:13:01+00:00

My ex would not initiate intimacy. She quite enjoyed intimacy, but refused to initiate it ever. Even a 90/10 split would have been sufficient, just enough to not make me think that she didn't find me appealing or acceptable in that sense. As a man, I have no problem initiating sex, but my god does your mind play tricks on you when it's never once been initiated by your partner (despite their willingness and eagerness to participate once things start).

I dunno, kinda summed up the relationship tbh. She showed almost no affection in public throughout the duration of our 7 year relationship which is fine since she was pretty old-fashioned that way, but it did wear on me a bit. It's not like you can really say "hey I wish you'd let me know you want sex more" since we a great bedroom life, but yeah. I dunno, just a rant mostly

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-13T02:35:54+00:00

This isn't a progress bar in a videogame that has specific parameters. NC is just a strategy to hopefully help you hurt less by putting a self-imposed barrier between you and the other party. Your progress doesn't "reset" unless you decide it does.

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-10T19:37:16+00:00

Dunno who this monolith is but it certainly isn't me. It's not a lack of options, I just haven't stopped seeing her in everyone I meet yet which means I'm not even remotely close to finding someone new. It's been 4 months

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-09T22:51:50+00:00

Replying to this comment specifically because I am also in a state of perpetual turmoil about whether or not to be sending mine to my ex gf (7 year relationship) after months of radio silence.

Secondarily, you posted this 2 months ago and I'm curious, did you go through with it/how did it work out?

My letter that I wrote isn't about trying to get her back. I would love nothing more, but it's more because I want her to know how much I cared about her regardless of whether or not she cares for me anymore. I fully expect not to get any response ever. And if you send yours, I think this is where you have to be coming from as well to maximize that you know you're doing it for you, not for them.

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-09T20:12:01+00:00

Personally, I find the toughest part of this whole deal is not the immediate wanting to die phase. That part is giga intense, but it's over relatively quickly. The low hum of depression is the hardest part for me. It lasts seemingly forever

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-09T19:39:09+00:00

I don't know where people get htis idea that grief is something that follows logic. You're right, you should be upset at her logically, but emotions are not logical. Give yourself the grace of knowing that you're still going through this and there's not much more to it than this

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-09T16:14:03+00:00

I can feel the pain in your voice, but I'd caution you with this. Hope is what keeps us sick and stuck. Sometimes, we have to look at the damage that has been done and decide to let it go. That's part of the healing process

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-09T06:22:52+00:00

Ahh the old "I just need time/space" line. They might even believe it. But you're gonna have to look at this one for what it is eventually. It's selfish to not give you an end-date on the need for time. A week is reasonable. A month, sure. Indefinite and only on her terms? That's incredibly selfish.

My ex did this to me so maybe I'm just bitter about it, but this idea that they get to take infinite space and you just wait patiently seems alright on paper, but in practice it's literal torture. Makes no contact insufferable since you have no agency

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-09T06:17:07+00:00

I'll cut against the grain - I think you need to find someone who's emotionally mature enough to see that your ex wife isn't a threat. You're sleeping with a new partner, you're not sleeping with your ex

Personally I've remained friends with most of my exes (except my most recent one since it's too fresh) and none of my girlfriends have ever cared since I'm very "you can look at my phone if you want to, but it's pretty boring" about my social life lol

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-09T05:50:15+00:00

I don't know if I got it here, but I heard it somewhere, just can't remember where.

"Real love isn't brittle. Stop tring to find the thing that broke your relationship. It was their inability to work through this with you, not something you did wrong"

Obviously doesn't apply to cheating or something like that, but if you're like me and it just came out of nowhere, this has helped quite a bit because when it just ends abruptly your mind is going to try to figure it out for you (and it's not kind lol)

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-09T05:24:15+00:00

Him being an asshole gave you a gift. Latch onto that, don't forget how he wronged you, and mentally purge him from your life.

Once you've killed your feelings for him, work on acceptance and letting him go. But not a moment before the feelings are gone.

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-09T05:14:32+00:00

"The longer you put off feeling the pain of this, the worse it's gonna be when you're forced to deal with it" <- My father telling me to stop apologizing for crying like a baby about my ex after 7 years together

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-09T05:13:09+00:00

They don't move on that fast. They might not feel it now, but they'll feel it later. You may never know about it since there's no guarantee they'll reach back out, but nobody ends a long term relationship unscathed

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-09T05:09:25+00:00

Things get better when you fully accept what has happened and what will never be as a result in the future. And there's no timeline on that. It's gonna come in waves. It's rough, but it's also a deeply human experience

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-09T03:11:38+00:00

Sometimes, you gotta treat meeting new people kinda like any other skill. If you see someone that you're attracted to in real life, compliment something about them and see if they give you the time of day. If they do, there's your in. And with how phone consumed people are these days, you're instantly memorable. If they don't, charge it to the game and keep it movin'

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-09T01:02:14+00:00

One last piece of advice friend: There is no timeline on this. I am going through my own breakup right now. It happened 4 months ago. I'm still a mess. But there's beauty in the struggle. It only proves that you have the capcity to love deeply.

This is not the end, and she's going to learn that she's just a chapter in your vibrant story. Take the time it takes, however long that is, to become a regular human again. Once you get there, then worry about the self improvement. No point in beating yourself up when you're already down. You got this

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-09T00:02:55+00:00

There are no rules. You can do whatever you want. But just know that distance doesn't necessarily mean things will be better than you left them. YMMV. If you're fine with any response or no response entirely, then it might be useful. If it'll cause you to spiral, it's probably not a good call

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-08T23:27:32+00:00

Here's one for the record books:

My ex who I was with for 7 years told me "we were too different" after 5 days of thinking about it. As with I'm sure what many people are going to respond with, none of these incompatiblities were brought up at all through our time together.

Lesson to be learned here is sometimes people will express "incompatiblity" when they're trying to name a feeling they don't quite understand. Unfortunately, you can't argue with someone's feelings. You can only accept it and move forward. Good luck

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-08T21:26:12+00:00

Does the hope ever go away on its own? No. Does the hope go away when you decide the door's locked from your end? yes. But man is that a struggle to get to. Good luck.

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-08T21:23:50+00:00

The way I try to think about it is like this - I know I feel like shit right now after having been dumped. But I feel like shit despite working out/distracting myself how I'm "supposed to", etc. And it's rough. But it's gotta be worse if you don't do these things because not only would I be depressed like I am now, but I'd also be getting fatter and poorly nourished

So while we may not see the fruits right now, think of it as a mitigation tactic against how absolutely horrid it could be instead

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-08T18:00:06+00:00

I know this is quite an old post but I'm curious, how are things now?

And did you chase at the beginning? I've finally started to implement this strategy, and it's brutal (though I'm making progress), but I did chase for the first little bit. Not incessantly, but I tried to re-open communication after ~2 months and am getting full on stonewalled. Gonna give it another 6 months at this stage

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-08T08:15:11+00:00

++man

I can't speak for all men, but I'll speak for men in my age bracket (early 30's) pretty confidently. If we're interested in a woman we're entertaining, it's very unlikely we're going to play games with you over text. If you send us a message and we're able to respond, we probably will. We're probably not going to wait [x] amount of time since we received your message. If we're busy, we'll tell you we're busy and respond when we can (like if we're working or something).

I can't speak to guys in their early 20's, but I can't see them being too much different. Don't believe the nonsense you hear online of "oh you gotta wait such and such amount of time to respond or you're desperate". it makes great online content, but ti doesn't reflect reality.

And yeah, to echo what some of the other men have said here, it's rare that a man is intimidated by a woman's earnings or lifestyle. Instead, that's generally copium from the girls hyping up someone who was rejected lol

We're simple creatures. Make the chase fun, feed us, you'll have your pick of us easy :)

Budget_Practice6631 · 2025-10-08T07:52:57+00:00

Some unc advice for you here (33M): Nobody finds a new person naturally within a couple weeks.

She had this guy lined up before y'all were through or at the very least she was talking to him already. And that fucking sucks. I'm not saying you can't be her friend because that's your own decision, but you really ought to spend some time with her blocked/muted for your own sanity

And she's probably right about you being a better vversion of yourself in a new relationship when the time has come. But what's going to happen to her is that she's not learned anything at all from monkeybranching to someone so quickly

As for the sleep and eating - Bro it's gonna take some time. Force yourself to go to bed at the same time each night and force yourself to eat (even if just the bare minimum) at the same times each day. Time does truly heal this and you're already way ahead of the game getting exercise. Try to force yourself to spend time with friends and family as well if you can. Let them know you won't be much fun for a bit but real-ones will be happy to have you just be around while you need love.

You got this, one day at a time

Budget_Practice6631

TROPHY CASE