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I used to live in TN before here, but now I am in Colorado. I’m pretty sure this is my forever home now 🙂
If I were a photographer, I would be a wildlife one too. I’ve been HOURS just hanging out in Thomas Mangelson galleries, just imagining his surroundings and getting lost in the beauty and wonder of nature. I just found out last week, that one of my clients used to be good friends with him! lol. I totally get how you feel though. Nature and animals can take us out of our reality so quickly and connect us to beauty, awe and God. It’s such an effortless connection isn’t it? What a gift they are.
I understand how difficult this time is for you, as the basic way you get your needs met to stay balanced is not available to you. It’s time to get creative. That energy of feeling like a caged wolf can turn toxic on you. You want to find other ways to help you manage this phase of your life. Your life has become handicapped, so what CAN you do to adjust and still meet your needs? What are some of your ideas? Let’s brainstorm here…
Heidi
Hi Kandas,
Welcome to the forum. This is a really good question. I know how scary it can be to have someone go missing and have no clue where they are. I’m sure he had ways to be able to contact you, even if he lost his phone. I imagine he could have found a way to email you or call you from a phone he could have borrowed. It’s a strange story. I don’t understand why he would have plans to go fishing when you were in town visiting. And why would he not tell you that’s where he was going? I might be misunderstanding the story.
Would you mind sharing more details? I am wondering why you automatically are assuming that he is lying. Has he done this in the past? Is it possible that he truly lost his phone? If you believe he is lying and didn’t lose his phone, are you suspecting that he is cheating? Is there anything he has communicated to you about that would make you think he might not be happy in the relationship?
Tell me more about your relationship. Do you like how your relationship functions? How long have you been together? How often do you get to see each other? Being that it’s a long distance kind of relationship, do you guys plan on moving to the same city at some point?
Looking forward to hearing back from you.
Heidi
OMG!!! A few weeks at a sandy beach sound sooooo spectacular! I miss the beach. I grew up near one and I miss the smell and the sound. I live in the mountains, but beach vacations are something I never thought I would dream about…lol. I would pick the mountains over the ocean though. How about you?
YES! Mother nature did need a break. It’s amazing the impact just by taking a one month break. Wow! Thank you for sharing those things. It made me smile!
My hope is, these new patterns of all of us having to slow down, stay at home, connect more with our families is something that will reset us permanently.
I’m glad you have joined the Facebook group. I know many people who agree about Facebook, but it might be worth it for right now to just join and meet new people to give you a little life force energy.
Pictures of wild horses sounds AMAZING!!! Have you ever done that??? Gone out and searched for wild horses?? I never have, but I imagine it would be a magical experience.
Heidi
I get it. Maybe if you talk with him and let him know you actually are interested in being friends and not just saying that. You can suggest maybe meeting up once a month and doing something fun. You could say something like, “I really like you as a person and truly would love to still be friends. There are all kinds of restaurants and museums around that I have never been to. Maybe once a month we can meet up somewhere new and just do something different. Just a thought.”
I’ve dated a med student before and it was hard. He barely had any time. I got to connect with him for short 20 minute intervals here and there and occasionally we were able to stay a full night together. So I would keep your expectations, even about friendship, very low right now. I’m not sure what year he is in, but it just gets worse as time goes on.
Tell us what you like about him that would make you want to continue the friendship?
Heidi
Hi Rhonda,
Some of how I am looking at this, is using people who have become handicapped in one way or another. They went from having a normal, active life, to all of a sudden losing their body in some sort of way. If they can figure out how to re-adjust their thinking and figure out how to meet their needs after losing their ability to be physically active in the world, then I can too! We have all been handicapped in one way or another right now.
So if you all of a sudden became paralyzed and were not able to go on hikes anymore, what can you do to get your needs met? I know this may be a weird approach, but reality is, you don’t have the environment you need to nourish your soul right now. So what can you do instead?? Keep fighting for your life Rhonda, on a deep level. Feeling numb and robotic IS NOT the way to live. You have so much inside of you that is worth feeling and experiencing!!! Your job is to find the ultimate joy, peace and happiness with whatever life has handed you. You are so much more than being numb!!
Heidi
Hi Sarah,
This is a great question!
Yes, age does matter sometimes. I think the older you get, the less it matters. He is still so very young. You have already gone through some very adult experiences in your life which creates a pretty big barrier in maturity levels. He is still 25, figuring out what he wants. You already were married and had 3 kids. BIG DIFFERENCE! He is young enough to even be naive in trying to plan his life out as to when he wants a serious relationship and children.
Being with you in a relationship means he would instantly have to deal with children. He is not ready for that. It sounds like he is just in the very normal phase of life where he is still learning about himself. The 20s are such a developmental period of time. He hasn’t even moved out of his parent’s house yet, which is a HUGE step in becoming more mature and more of an adult. As much as you both get along really well and as much as you both have a great connection, the difference in maturity levels and life experience can definitely be a challenge. When I was in my 30s, I dated a guy 15 years younger and to this day, it was the very best relationship I had ever had. It was the most amazing connection, we had so much fun together and our love ran deep while it lasted. The ENTIRE TIME I knew our age difference would get in the way. I knew there was an ending at some point, because we were just too different. When he would come hang out with my friends, he didn’t quite fit and when I would hang out with his friends, I didn’t fit either. We both dealt with it, but differences in life experience and mindset that existed because of our age difference, eventually is what caused us to separate.
So first, I want to encourage you to slow down. You have only known him for a few months, so putting him that category of “man of my dreams” is really a fast track to disappointment. He doesn’t even know who he is yet out in the real world, as an adult who 100% takes care of himself. That’s a HUGE step in development for a person. You barely know him. You don’t know what he is like when he is angry. You don’t know what he is like around your children, you don’t know what he is like when he is sick and not feeling well, you don’t know what he is like when you have really hurt his feeling or what his negative patterns are. There is so much you don’t know about him and soooo much he doesn’t even know about himself yet. So I like the idea of just hanging out and being friends. I would recommend for you to continue going on other dates and finding someone who is better able to meet you where you are at in life. This guy has a lot of growing up to do still.
I know this is not what you want to hear and I KNOW how deeply painful it is at the idea of letting him go. I have already gone through letting go of the best connection I ever had. My ex set a new standard for me though. I now know it’s possible, I now know I will accept nothing less than how I felt with him and I know I can find it again.
thoughts?
Heidi
Maybe it’s time to talk about what happened sooner than later. I’m not sure why you want to wait when it could be the reason why you feel this strain on the relationship. Set up a time to hang out together and make sure you talk about it and then see if it helps shift the energy between you guys.
Or…you can keep waiting. Maybe you can try saying something like, “I miss seeing you…how about I make us a delicious dinner followed by a seriously good foot rub.”
Is this possible to do? I’m not sure where you are and whether or not you are ordered to stay in doors now or not.
Heidi
HI Micaela,
I’m glad you are willing to take a few more weeks. What’s your plan? How can you use this time to continue to deepen your relationship with yourself? How can you use this time to help you learn more about your trust issues?
Yes, he was angry because you hurt him, but HOW he responded comes from many years past. We ALL get angry and hurt and how we respond to that comes from deep within us, what we were roled modeled as a child, our personality, our wounds etc. This is why it’s important for you to truly pay attention to this. He said those things in the moment because he felt hurt. What will happen next time you hurt him? His reaction and how he responded is NOT a 1 time thing. It is who he is and how he responds to stress and his angry feelings. I understand you want to just let it slide and talk about it when everything cools down and you, of course, get to do that. You deeply care for him and want to keep trying, so the best thing you can do is really work on yourself. Really work deeper on your trust issues. It will be one less topic to argue about in the future if you can truly heal that insecurity of yours.
Heidi
Hello Li!
Welcome. We are glad you are here and sharing your questions with us.
You are asking a good question. Being that he was in a 7 year relationship and is still freshly out of that, he is going to need A LOT of time to truly recover and heal – if I were working with him, I would recommend at least a year of being single and not getting involved with someone in a serious way. I don’t know how long your last toxic relationship was either, but it sounds like you might benefit from some time to heal from that as well. You both were rebound experiences for each other.
If you would like to stay connected to him, how do you feel about taking the friendship route? It helps build a solid foundation, you both can continue to just have fun occasionally with each other and then maybe down the road, something further can develop. He is in med school which is so intense and time consuming, so being friends instead of dating will be much more manageable for him. I”m glad he ended up being honest with you, which is so important. If he admitted to not have feelings for you, there is nothing you can do to change that. But becoming friends for awhile could possibly be a really good step in that direction.
Is this something you are willing to do?
Heidi
Hi Jane,
Welcome!!!
I definitely understand your need to understand what you mean to him. I want to encourage you to slow down a bit. It’s been 10 weeks and there are some yellow, caution flags that need to be paid attention to. He still lives with his parents, which REALLY inhibits a relationship. What is keeping him there? How come he is not out on his own yet? How old is he?
You also say he has a lot of low self-esteem. That means it’s A LOT of work for you. That low self-esteem will show up in a million different ways where you will constantly need to reassure him and be his cheerleader, where he will be intimidated by you and not feel like your equal, where he may have a lack of drive in his life and fighting for his dreams, because he is too scared. I’m just throwing out possible scenarios here. Someone with a lot of low self-esteem means high maintenance. We all have low self-esteem of course, but the amount of low self esteem is what needs to be paid attention to along with how does that person deal with their lack of self love and self confidence. These are things you need to look out for. Have you guys faced any challenges or disagreements yet?
Let’s talk about how you are feeling. If things are going so well just as they are, what is happening in you that you feel the need to find out where you fit in his life? If you judge by how he treats you and connects with you, I would venture to say that he really cares about you and you matter in his life. What SPECIFICALLY are you needing more than that?
Heidi
I’m glad you are connecting to yourself more. This is great!!! And you are spot on!
As far as “letting it go” I want to encourage you not to do that. NO ONE likes talking about uncomfortable subjects. This is the perfect time to practice exactly what you just talked about. There are ways to have the conversation though, that make it easier. Think about this recent situation as your teacher. If you both just sit down and talk about what you learned about yourselves and the situation, it can really help clear the air. So you might say something like “You know, I’ve been really thinking about how I handled this and I don’t like it. I got mad at you for disappearing, but truth is, I disappeared first. I get so scared that I just want to pull away and retreat. I want you to know that I know that is not okay. It’s unkind to you, it makes the situation worse and it’s not the kind of girlfriend I want to be. I’m not promising I won’t do this again, because I do have a lot of fear, but I do promise I want to do better. I’m going to really work on this part of myself so I can keep improving. I’m sorry I put you through that.” Saying something like this to start the conversation is pretty wonderful, right? It can open both your hearts to re-connect.
Thoughts?
Heidi
Hi Micaela,
Would you be willing to take a few more weeks to be alone? Your trust issues run deep. It takes time to really connect to everything you did in the first few weeks. Let it sink in even more and keep searching for anything that would be left in there.
As far as your guy, there are some HUGE red flags here. First, he is verbally abusive. He said some pretty mean things to you. He seems to be at a level of a 4 or 5 year old with anger and that is not okay. He is carrying some really deep wounds as well from his past. The thing is, we all have wounds from our past that can cause damage in the present relationship, but what we do about it, is what will make or break the relationship. He is showing you that he is more interested in being “right” than connecting with you through this challenge. He is showing you that he is not willing to forgive. He is showing you that he would prefer to stay the “victim” than to take responsibility for his choices in the situation as well. This is how he will behave every single time you hurt him. Just like you brought your baggage into the relationship about being cheated on, this is HIS baggage, not yours. So if you want this relationship to work, he needs to be someone who is able to forgive, take responsiblity for his choices and be able to speak to you with respect. Otherwise, each time you guys get into an argument, more and more harm will be caused and eventually everything will break completely.
So before you try to get him back, consider these things. Just something to think about.
Thoughts?
Heidi
Hi Lau,
I’m wondering…is it an unusual thing for you to be treated nicely by a guy? Guys who treat women nicely are everywhere, but maybe that hasn’t been your experience, so him treating you nicely feels extra wonderful for you. Just curious…
So help us understand exactly what you want from him. I’m getting a little lost in that you have him back now and you like how things are going. So what more do you want from him?
Heidi
Hi Rhonda,
A few posts back, you were talking about bible study and then said this: “I’m really kind of hoping something will develop with one of the men I just started talking with.” and then you asked for ways to connect online. So I thought it was a guy from your bible study group. It sounds like it isn’t, so how do you know this guy?
So this “robotic” numb kind of feeling is confusing to me. I know exactly what you are talking about, but what I also know that you have shared how the mountains are your haven and taking photographs excite you. You have gone on so many dates and felt things. Those kinds of things have passion and feeling in them and are not numb or robotic. Maybe those things bring you alive again? My guess is, this robotic feeling dulls things more than what they are. So even though you LOVE going to the mountains, it may feel like your excitement has more potential to it. If your numbness weren’t there, you would be feeling even your favorite activities, that much more. Thoughts?
Listen, don’t you dare go down that road of regret. I know that other job would have kept you in Canada, but there are so many other things that could have happened on that path. You are exactly where you need to be right now. There is no mistake in that. I know you are miserable with the lack of mountains and beauty. Remember to keep your focus on what you DO have. Maybe this time is a good time to really dive deep and explore those numb feelings. Whatever is there, needs to be connected with. Feeling like that is not a fun way to live your life. This is a good time for healing all of our crap, as we have to sit at home. This whole situation brings up many triggers, which gives us opportunities to clean out the gunk. Maybe set a specific goal of how you are going to use this very rare time, to improve your life.
Heidi
