I never wanted a relationship with him-he crossed my boundaries, and then he ruined everything
Hi, I have an ex boyfriend who recently tried contacting me again as I temporarily unblocked him from sending me messages. I posted about him some time ago, and even talking about it now makes me feel sick because I feel that I deserve better than this and I don't know how I fell for his games, but he played me, and I thought he was being honest at one point. I knew there was a possibility he was not serious, and I distanced myself from him, but then I went back again and this is when the last time, it did damage to me. I was trying so hard to avoid it. He crossed my boundaries from the very start and this is why it never worked. I just wanted to be his friend and he did not respect that. He tried to convince me to go out with him on a date after I told him I didn't want to. We are both adults. So I went out with him but I had told him from the start I would only go on one date with him. We had a little flirting and he had been pursuing me for some time, and eventually we did some things alone in private... I felt like for some reason I could not say no to him even after I told him I wasn't interested. I was very clear about it but he chose to ignore it. I really thought he would back off and respect my wishes but he didn't. So I went out with him and I still could not make myself feel anything for him and I felt horrible after the date, and trapped. I told him I did not want to go out with him or see him anymore. I thought that was that but since we live in the same town I saw him again and it did not really end there. The thing is because I was not looking for anything with him or anyone, he made it seem like he really wanted a relationship with me and what ended up happening is that he ended up using me for sex. Even though it didn't feel like that at the time as he would say he was in love with me. He made it sound like there was no one else and also that he did not want to see other people or ruin what we have. He also would repeatedly say he did not want to ghost me. I don't know why he would even mention that, but that's exactly what ended up happening because I was so unhappy also, and he did ghost me for days at a time and not get back to me when I tried contacting him and was unhappy about something he did or said
To make a long story short, the last time we tried again, I ended up getting more attached to him, and he really hurt me. He started flirting with another woman who is in his circle and which I always felt a little unsure about and sort of "threatened" by but in reality I have nothing to feel threatened about. It does not seem like she is interested in him that way, but I am sure if he had had the chance he would have. Now I feel that after being with me he feels more emboldened and like I gave him the courage and ego to go and pusue her since I ended up giving him everything he wanted, and I eventually told him I loved him.
Well, he knew how I feel about this and he still hurt my feelings, and then he turned into someone completely different that I did not recognize. I realized he really must have been lying to me or bluffing the entire time. In the beginning, he alluded to booty call or fwb when he knew this is not what I wanted with him. I feel like after this he just fed me lines to get me to do what he wanted and I fell for it.
I told him I could find a fwb if I wanted to and he took offense to that. But he really shoulnd't have because what this means is that I didn't want that with him or anyone potentially, and that if we were to continue with the sex, I wanted a relationship and not fwb because I was not interested in him that way and not sexually attracted to him at first.
Well, he said he wanted a relationship but he never had the time because of his schedule, and then he didn't call or text me when he said he would and he ended up keeping me hanging. Then he started flirting with this woman. Also I noticed he would call me late at night, and then he made no effort to plan anything interesting for us aside from taking me out to dinner a couple times and he almost canceled after he had already invited me for a holiday. He even kept me hanging and didn't answer my calls or texts on the day of. I had to beg him or convince him since we had already scheduled. After this his efforts were even less !
He also never took the time to get to know me. On our date he never asked questions about me or my life to find out what my goals were or to get to know my likes or dislikes or anything. He also never took interest in my background which is quite unique and which normally other people find very interesting about where I am from, another culture and language.
The relationship soon turned into something completely meaningless! So, I cut off contact with him after about 2.5 months. Then, I felt bad and reached out to him after about 3 months because I was concerned about his status in the military and thought he might have left due to the war but it turns out this was unlikely, and the whole thing started over again. Needless to say it never went anywhere, the problems we had were still there, and nothing changed!
Now again recently, he is now flirting with that woman publicly on her profile. He knows that this is something that bothered me when we were together. The other thing is that everyone in that circle knows him and her, they also knew he was kind of involved with me but the thing is, I never went to his events, and he never invited me to go there to where his friends are and this woman who is the bartender. He would show up drunk and he also has or had a drinking issue which it took me a while to realize this as I didn't know this at first. Why would he ruin what we have and embarass himself like this in front of everyone? By flirting online with this other woman who seems out of his league and as am I?
The question is, why would he do this now that the relationship is over. He is such a mean and cruel person that he said to me that he was trying to play mind games with me at some point. I am starting to wonder is this what he is doing? Or he really does not care about me? Why on earth would he do this? So, he is just trying to use me again? If he was really interested in her why not contact her directly or in private instead of doing this publicly like this in front of everyone?
I am so sad, this is so painful but I am also dealing with other personal matters.
I am trying so hard not to let this get to me, it still makes me sick to think I was involved
People that care about you never play mind games, much less communicating and bragging about it. If he says to you “he is trying to play mind games with you”, then that is literally what he is doing. It’s really that simple. There’s nothing to think about, nothing to figure out, there’s no positive side to his behavior that you need to look for, no redeeming quality that can justify how he is treating you. Worse, if he is brazenly ADMITTING to you that he is doing that, then it tells you that he has absolute contempt for you, and doesn’t think you have enough self respect to DO anything about it. He’s bragging about it. It’s his way of saying “I will treat you however I like, even if I treat you like trash; and you’re just going to have to deal with it.”
Him flirting with her in front of everyone is like clickbait. The fact that he KNOWS it annoys you is exactly why he’s doing it very publicly. He’s obviously hoping you’ll notice and get a response from you. He still doesn’t want any kind of sincere fulfilling relationship with you (2 meaningless attempts in the past should pretty much confirm that beyond a doubt). He just likes to know that he can get you involved AGAIN. You’re just a game to him after all and he told you as much. When you check their socials, and monitor his behavior, and ask “What is he doing? Why is he doing that?” It is exactly what he is hoping you will do. It shows you still care, that you’re still curious about him. That’s you clicking the clickbait. You’re responding to his provocation which is all he wants.
When you blocked him, that was actually the best thing you did for yourself. Sometimes the only way to “win” is by NOT participating. You’re better than this. I know you’re perceptive enough to see all of this. You’ve outlined his every flaw very clearly up there. You know everything wrong with this situation. You just need to stand by your resolve to disengage from all of it. You need to believe that you deserve better than to be treated like garbage time and again. You need to realize he doesn’t improve as a partner, not with any amount of chances; that the constant drama and antics and mind games don’t go away, they just get worse. Stop being his puppet every time he decides he needs someone to string along!
CatsInTheCradle
@CatzInTheCradle thank you for responding.
@CatzInTheCradle it's just that I have to live in a world where I have to keep to myself. Here I was allowing someone a chance in my life, giving them a chance to be in my life despite my suspicions, and they complete took advantage of my kindness or the fact that I even gave them a chance at all; ad they have the audacity to flirt with another woman just because I gave them enough leeway into my life and as a "beautiful woman" made them feel imporant and special by giving them my time and of myself.
@CatzInTheCradle Sorry I meant "it's sad that I have to live in a world where..."
@CatzInTheCradle
Well, guess what. I am done. I am not letting him "win" anymore. He can think what he wants. If he thinks I am hurt, and he wants to hurt me, I don't really care. He doesn't have a chance in *** with that other woman and he still chooses to go online and make a fool of himself "flirting" or trying to get her attention in front of everyone like that, when had me for an entire year almost, and I didn't want to be with him in the first place. I did not want to go out with him or date him, and I did. I gave him the opportunity. He used me, and he took advantage of me. He said he would never jeopardize what we had, he said he would never ghost me, he said he loved me.
He contacted me again recently, I really do not have the time for it.
I had purposely blocked him online and he decided to reach out to me. I blocked him and unblocked him. We live in the same town and really not that difficult to get in touch with me before when I wanted him to, especially since he delivers the mail where I live. He could have left a note in my box, called and left a voicemail. Instead he chose not to. He told me he ignored me because I turned him off. So he chose to walk away from the relationship but now is coming back to find out how I am doing.
I am the only one who finds this just a little bit unnerving, rude and inconsiderate? And then it seems to me he gets a ride from reiterating why he chose to ignore me. He almost implied I am stupid during our conversation because according to me I didn't understand why he was ignoring me. Yes, I did understand why, he was being cruel and mean, and only thought about himself for the most part during the "relationship" which wasn't exactly consensual. I tried setting my boundaries and he ignored them so I turned nasty to him and didn't really care for his attitude.
He was just using me for sex, even if that was not the intention which I highly doubt, I had mentioned I was not ok with that. He kept doing what he wanted and telling me things.
Guess what he has now apologized, but I have so much going on that I don't have the time for it.
It's a huge waste of my time and I wish he would have just left me alone when I had asked him to.
Yes good for you! If he still wants to treat you with contempt (making out like your stupid etc) even while apologizing, it shows he has not reformed his ways at all! He still thinks you’re less than him. Don’t give him the chance to disappoint you again. We’re proud of your resolve!
CatsInTheCradle
@CatzInTheCradle
thank you
I would have more to say but I am out of energy/not worth my time at this point
thank you for the encouragement and support
Sorry for the delayed reply. I don't know if you are therapist, someone who is training to become or maybe just someone who wants to help others. But, I have to say that your posts have been very revealing and to the point. I have seen other response and feel the same. Specifically your post helped me realize the reality of the situation more. I am not saying I am stupid or that I didn't before but I think I dived into something unhealthy without knowing or thinking it was. I am familiar and aware about abuse and toxicity yet this happened to me again. I am honestly so saddened by this realization. As the days go by I realize more and more things that there were, that I refused to acknowledge. I don't want to talk about what this person did to me because I honestly now think it was all done so that they could feel in control and like they wanted to dominate despite my refusals. It is so obvious and obvious as day to me now, but it didn't initially come across like that, it all seemed very innocent. The reason I still have anger is that he crossed my boundaries in every way. As I said I have dealt with this before. I know and unfortunately this is not something that can be dealt with here. I believe my past has led me to believe and accept that I don't deserve better. I realize this and this is also what makes me feel even more anger. After a while you can tell from someone's character, this is just who they are, but I did not go looking for it. I did not set out to look for this person. Rather, they targeted me. What makes it even worse is that I thought if I naively communicated my thoughts about it to them that they would make an effort to do something about it. This was the last thing they wanted. It couldn't have been father from the truth. Well, it's not my responsibility to change someone and tell them what to do or be. Still, I don't see what does that leave me with aside from someone who just used me and manipulated me. If this is not evil, I am not sure what is.
They did the wrong thing here, OK? They are the predators. They are the ones that lack humanity and goodness and decency.
It’s not you. You did nothing wrong here. You didn’t deserve this. You are a person filled with love, who deserves love and kindness, and respect! You’re not asking too much. You’re not asking for anything less than you deserve as a human being.
Yes, you ignored the warning signs. Maybe in hindsight when you think about his behaviour there were many signs that he was manipulating and using you. Maybe you didn’t want to see it and convinced yourself that wasn’t the case. But it’s not because you were stupid, or because you deserved to be manipulated and used! NO. It’s precisely because you are filled with love and want to be loved, that there is goodness in your heart; that you seek the same in others. And maybe that makes you vulnerable to seeking it sometimes in people who have malicious/selfish intentions. Maybe that sometimes inclines you to seeing good in a person that isn’t really there because you want to believe in a pure kind of love, that you want to believe that you are deserving, and so you attributed wholesomeness to a person who took advantage of that.
But it’s not wrong to believe in love! It’s not wrong to want someone to see your worth, to want to share something special with someone, to want to devote yourself to someone, to have someone appreciate all that you are. You didn’t do anything wrong in wanting and pursuing those things - You just gave it to the wrong person, and made a mistake in putting your faith in someone who only wanted to take advantage of people. That doesn’t make YOU a terrible person! His abusive behaviour here reflects poorly on him only.
So take a deep breath.
You’re a good and kind person. You want to be loved and that’s OK ! You made a mistake in trusting someone who betrayed your trust! That’s OK too! Forgive yourself for it. You will learn and grow from this experience and have better judgement in future. In the meantime, the realisations will hurt, and you might feel some humility and disappointment - but this is good because it means you expect BETTER for yourself! It is your pride and dignity telling you, that you can do better next time! So don’t berate yourself over and over when you acted from a place of love. LOVE YOURSELF. Nurture your self esteem. Let all of that hurt go. Be kind to yourself.
As for me, I am not a professional of any kind. I have a little bit of formal training from part of a social work degree, so I have studied some concepts about healthy relationships, building healthy self esteem, some social psychology and so on. But honestly, just talking to people and hearing their experiences has been more instructive and informative of my views than anything else.
Keep working on yourself and these issues! You’re making great progress and I can see it in your posts! Remember to come from a place of love and kindness and acceptance, especially when it comes to self reflection!
CatsInTheCradle
@CatzInTheCradle I'm blown away by your reply. You are a very kind and generous person.
Thank you.