question

Post Reply New Topic

i'm a 41 year old woman, and i agree with jspark.

i have had to not only stop associating with two former flames(one was my fiance actually and dumped me for his best friend who was a married woman), but i have had to stop talking to them and stop going where they go and stay away from the former mutual friends. not everyone has mutually agreeable breakups, so there is absolutely NOTHING immature or cowardly by putting YOUR best interests first in managing your sanity.

my own emotional stability is more important than any "friendship" with any old flame.

i'm going to try to post this again.

i am a 41 year old woman. and i agree with jspark.

i had two failed relationships last year, the first one was my fiance who dumped me for his best friend, a woman who is married. i found it was just best for me to not only cut off all contact, but to not go where they went and not communicate with the mutual friends even.

you have to do whatever you think will help you maintain emotional stability.

and it is going to take a long time, sometimes. i hate that NTs seems to get over stuff like that so quickly. but don't let anyone tell you that something is wrong just because it takes you longer.

i'm going to try to post this again.

i am a 41 year old woman. and i agree with jspark.

i had two failed relationships last year, the first one was my fiance who dumped me for his best friend, a woman who is married. i found it was just best for me to not only cut off all contact, but to not go where they went and not communicate with the mutual friends even.

you have to do whatever you think will help you maintain emotional stability.

and it is going to take a long time, sometimes. i hate that NTs seems to get over stuff like that so quickly. but don't let anyone tell you that something is wrong just because it takes you longer.

stop judging me like this in all your posts ....calling me chicken not-man and stupid stuff like this , come live in the southern of Beirut and let 's see who's the man

Anyways , i went out with them last Saturday (and with others) to a kinda goodbye meeting for a friend (a friend who s going to travel) .

so i think i go for the second part of the question: how forget this feeling toward her ...not the person?

but i ll be honest with you : I am not a close friend to her like before and I don't want let her to use me as a "close friend " because she knows that I like her and I know how she thinks : she loves to keep fans around as "close friends" . I guess we are just normal friends for now .

Last edited by LePetitPrince on 21 Feb 2007, 2:36 am, edited 1 time in total.

time.



The idea that you have to stay friends with an ex or the like is no more rational than the idea that you can't. If you can't / don't want to be close friends, that's your choice. As long as you don't view it as a permanent thing for the rest of your life, there's no harm in it. What works today might not tomorrow.

Okay. I'm not going to talk about being a man (I'm not one), playing sports (I don't get the idea of grown ups chasing a ball around) or shooting things (I'm a really bad shot and I don't need to go to jail this week for killing stupid people. It's a waste of my time.)


So! Having said all of those disclaimers, on to the question at hand. How to forget this feeling toward her and not the person.


Here's what you have to do. We like to puzzle things out. Relationships are no different, they are just extremely hard because we're emotionally involved (not a really good position for a researcher to be in). The way you get around this is to look at the relationship dynamic instead the people. The people are kind of irrelevant in the end anyway. You need to get to the root cause or you can end up repeating this and you don't want that. So, take it apart in your head like a car or a computer and look at the parts and how they work. Put your emotions away for now. Picture a box and put your feelings in there. You will never be able to see what really happened until you do that. It's okay. You can take them back out in a little while and feel them again. Just put them away for now.


When you've put them away, visualize your relationship in terms of the behavior dynamic between the two of you. If you can't do it that way, then picture two other people or stick figures going through the same scenarios. Don't leave anything out. Assume that you missed some criteria in this experiment because you did. We all do that. So let them play out and watch them as a Scientist now and not a participant. Keep the emotions in the box. If you have to, put other people in your places.

As you observe, watch for what happens between the two of you. Dissect it. What was wrong with that dynamic between us in that particular interaction. Don't let yourself move out from that. Get down to the detail where you are looking at things in parts.

For example, She likes to keep fans around as "close friends." You already discovered something in the dynamic between the two of you that breaks down. She likes fans and she treats them as "close friends." Air quotes signifying they are not really friends here. It signals that you do not believe these people are her friends or that she really, deep down, believes that they are. But, she treats them as such because she likes fans. Okay. That's what she wants. That's cool. Just accept it. Don't judge it. Just accept it.

Now there is you. Just by the way you type that, you don't like that. It is a dishonest and insincere relationship. You choose not to be in it. There is nothing wrong with that at all. You don't have to think she is bad for doing that, you only have to accept that you do not want it. You do not want to be there.


Do you see that? Once you see that, go through the other things. Sometimes you will see a really good dynamic and sometimes it will end up being a bad dynamic. That's alright. We don't have to like everything someone else does. We don't have to be friends or in a relationship with everyone. So, it's alright to say that dynamic does not work for me and I don't want to get involved in it. That isn't personal, it just recognizes what is and moves on.


If you do that with all the dynamics between the two of you, it will become apparent to you where things broke down, as well as where they went right. Now you know more about yourself and what you like and dislike. Use that for the next time to avoid this situation.


Sometimes we just convince ourselves that we should love someone because it seems so right. When that happens, we want to believe it so badly that we turn a blind eye (or so we think) to any evidence to the contrary (i.e. fans not friends). But, just because we ignore the evidence, doesn't mean that it goes away, it actually means the opposite. It means that underneath it all that behavior still bothers us because it is not what we want or like. When you deny that, your mind remembers and it begins to eat away at both sides. You end up not liking it anyway and wondering just how sincere she is about other things. She ends up wondering why you are with her if you don't like her the way she is. You start putting a little distance between you perhaps in an attempt to protect yourself. She meanwhile senses the distance (which you may not even conciously be aware of) and it makes her feel even more rejected. It can go on like this until it breaks down. Since neither of you ever acknowledged it, it can remain the eternal mystery. That is the power that it has. You must take it apart and see it as it is to unlock that power and free yourself.


The key to relationships is figuring out what fits. It isn't <insert name here>. It's about knowing what you like, dislike and what you can't abide. It's getting to know the same about the other person. It's accepting those things for what they are and not personalizing them. Sometimes things fall apart before you reach the point where you really know what you want. That's okay. Yes, it hurts, but the best way to honor what you had is to look at what happened, see where it broke down and avoid that in the future. It is necessary for you to think she is all bad or good. It isn't necessary for you to be the fall guy or the "man." It's only necessary to understand you and what fits with you. No one else has to even understand it or appreciate it. That's only necessary for you and one other person.

Dear Marie,

first of all , thanks a lot for your long and useful reply !

In fact , I already started to make a distance between me and her and she already sense it ...many things happened shows that she felt that I am making a distance and it seems that she 's trying to pull me back .....not as just as friend but just i was like before for her . Lately she asked me why I am becoming little dry with her than ever before .
And as about fans , she told stories before about her fans and it seems that she's not the kind who rejects directly the guy , but she keeps giving them silly excuses to avoid them , and later she was used to tell me what she's doing to avoid them . She was used to enjoy tell me about her fan's tries and letters :S . I asked her once why she doesn't be honest them and tell them that she doesn't like ...she said that they should understand and she prefers to keep them as good friends . So obviously she enjoys somehow having fans as friend around .

Don't understand me wrong , this girl is not bad person at all ....she is close to perfect in fact ....but I don't to be another fan friend of her .

I did your observation thingy . and I must admit ......yea there were few things I think that made us bit incompatible to each others physically and mentally ...maybe she was too good in some things for me or too NT for me or I am too skinny or short for her .....I am starting to accept some facts .

anyways thanks again