Vigilant Gambit
Member
3 year relationship. I've been unemployed for 6 months, and she's been covering most/all of the bills for the last few. She had actually broken up with me previously, back in March, but we got back together the following day after she agreed to a plan I had about seeing a paid relationship counselor. We had seen a free student counselor at her college previously, and it worked out well until she got switched out for another, way less effective one. Also, our relationship at that point seemed to be in a good place, so we stopped going to counseling.
Anyway, we couldn't afford paid counseling, so we tried to simply work towards addressing the problems we had with each other, but that only worked for so long. I had been dealing with what seems to be a pretty deep depression due to the extended period of unemployment, so that made it really difficult to be the man I wanted to be for myself, much less for her. Add to that anger management issues, and me being visibly upset during an outing with her family put her over the edge, causing her to start sleeping on the couch (with some BS excuse) from that day forward (about a week prior to the breakup, which happened last week Friday).
A similar thing had happened that ultimately caused our March breakup; she had had enough, started to stonewall me (not talking, clearly not wanting to be around me at all), and after a week I just couldn't take the shut-off-edness, and brought up my concerns, to which she responded by breaking up.
Again, I brought up the stonewalling over the past week, and again, she responded by breaking up. Due to this being my first relationship, I don't really have the experience some of you guys have as far as dealing with it, so my reaction (once I was able to calm down from the pain a bit) was to come up with what I thought was a solid plan for us to be able to thrive together in a way that wouldn't wane over time because we'd keep each other honest about it and talk about our issues regularly, before they became truly problematic. We'd also start going to the free counseling again, to shift to paid counseling once I got a job.
The thing is, that was contingent on both of us being on board for it, and she simply wasn't. When I pressed for a reason why, she cited long term doubts she had, including wanting a second cat (we've lived together for about 2 years now with her cat, and I am not a pet person at all, so it's been a real struggle for me, though I've been feeding and cleaning up after it), marriage, and kids. I mentioned that we hadn't discussed any of those issues in several months, and I would've been open to discussing it further now, since I've had time since our last discussion on it to consider it, but she was unwilling.
The truly shitty part of all this is that despite my conscious, smart brain understanding the fact that I shouldn't want to be with her because she is clearly unwilling to put forth the effort it would take for us to work through our issues, while I am, I still am having a lot of trouble not continuing to rack my brain, pulling out all the stops to come up with a way to convince her to get back together with me, even though we just signed the papers today to break our lease and move out in 2 weeks.
The crux of the issue is, whenever we discussed a relationship issue, we would talk in circles. I'm inclined to keep talking about something until we figure out some way to resolve or get over it, which can often mean repeating something I'd said earlier. Sometimes it meant a discussion would be rehashed. She's inclined to discuss something until she's had enough of the discussion, even if it means leaving serious issues and problems completely unresolved, indefinitely. She would then stonewall me while she simply gets over whatever it is with time. Meanwhile, I'd feel like shit about something, as it just bounces around in my head, making me miserable.
The other issue, one that I had, anyway, was that we'd have some problem, and through discussion or whatever, we'd move past it, but then she would bring it up weeks/months later as an indicator of relationship problems. "Remember that time when..." Well, shit, I thought we'd already dealt with that!
Anyway. Fully aware of the rambling I'm doing at this point, I have to mention the fact that I've been unemployed for 6 months now since the end of my last contract in December, and in just over a week, I'll be starting month 7 of zero income. I sent out 150+ job applications last month, and not a single one got to the point of an on-site interview. There are dozens of new software engineering positions posted each day, but, after 6 years of working professionally, apparently only a handful that I'm actually possibly qualified for.
It's also important to mention that I've been looking for a position both locally, as well as out of state; specifically, in Seattle, which is an amazing city that I'd like to move to (nevermind the initial plan I had with my ex, which was to move there with her; that city is fucking great).
For that reason, it's also hard to shake the feeling that had I gotten a job, we'd still be together. For career reasons, I would've ended up moving to the west coast on my own until she converted to a full-time employee at her job in January, and could then just transfer to the Seattle office.
Anyway! Aside from hanging out with friends, and doing fun stuff, is there any advice you guys have for me? Any war stories of how you got through similar situations? Part of why this is hitting me so hard is that my ex is the only one in my life that I allowed to get as close as she was, so without her, I felt as though I didn't really have anyone. I have one very close friend, but I would often let weeks or months pass between contacting him outside of the odd Facebook comment.
This post from another thread has been really good in terms of providing perspective for me though:
I've been trying to find a source for all this, but I can't seem to find one.
Edit: I mentioned this in a later response, but I'll add it here so I can get some input: Should I continue to go to the weekly board game meetup we've both been attending for almost a year? It's a decently large part of my life, but I don't know if it's worth it to continue going because I would invariably see my ex every time, even if we didn't play anything together (we usually don't).
Anyway, we couldn't afford paid counseling, so we tried to simply work towards addressing the problems we had with each other, but that only worked for so long. I had been dealing with what seems to be a pretty deep depression due to the extended period of unemployment, so that made it really difficult to be the man I wanted to be for myself, much less for her. Add to that anger management issues, and me being visibly upset during an outing with her family put her over the edge, causing her to start sleeping on the couch (with some BS excuse) from that day forward (about a week prior to the breakup, which happened last week Friday).
A similar thing had happened that ultimately caused our March breakup; she had had enough, started to stonewall me (not talking, clearly not wanting to be around me at all), and after a week I just couldn't take the shut-off-edness, and brought up my concerns, to which she responded by breaking up.
Again, I brought up the stonewalling over the past week, and again, she responded by breaking up. Due to this being my first relationship, I don't really have the experience some of you guys have as far as dealing with it, so my reaction (once I was able to calm down from the pain a bit) was to come up with what I thought was a solid plan for us to be able to thrive together in a way that wouldn't wane over time because we'd keep each other honest about it and talk about our issues regularly, before they became truly problematic. We'd also start going to the free counseling again, to shift to paid counseling once I got a job.
The thing is, that was contingent on both of us being on board for it, and she simply wasn't. When I pressed for a reason why, she cited long term doubts she had, including wanting a second cat (we've lived together for about 2 years now with her cat, and I am not a pet person at all, so it's been a real struggle for me, though I've been feeding and cleaning up after it), marriage, and kids. I mentioned that we hadn't discussed any of those issues in several months, and I would've been open to discussing it further now, since I've had time since our last discussion on it to consider it, but she was unwilling.
The truly shitty part of all this is that despite my conscious, smart brain understanding the fact that I shouldn't want to be with her because she is clearly unwilling to put forth the effort it would take for us to work through our issues, while I am, I still am having a lot of trouble not continuing to rack my brain, pulling out all the stops to come up with a way to convince her to get back together with me, even though we just signed the papers today to break our lease and move out in 2 weeks.
The crux of the issue is, whenever we discussed a relationship issue, we would talk in circles. I'm inclined to keep talking about something until we figure out some way to resolve or get over it, which can often mean repeating something I'd said earlier. Sometimes it meant a discussion would be rehashed. She's inclined to discuss something until she's had enough of the discussion, even if it means leaving serious issues and problems completely unresolved, indefinitely. She would then stonewall me while she simply gets over whatever it is with time. Meanwhile, I'd feel like shit about something, as it just bounces around in my head, making me miserable.
The other issue, one that I had, anyway, was that we'd have some problem, and through discussion or whatever, we'd move past it, but then she would bring it up weeks/months later as an indicator of relationship problems. "Remember that time when..." Well, shit, I thought we'd already dealt with that!
Anyway. Fully aware of the rambling I'm doing at this point, I have to mention the fact that I've been unemployed for 6 months now since the end of my last contract in December, and in just over a week, I'll be starting month 7 of zero income. I sent out 150+ job applications last month, and not a single one got to the point of an on-site interview. There are dozens of new software engineering positions posted each day, but, after 6 years of working professionally, apparently only a handful that I'm actually possibly qualified for.
It's also important to mention that I've been looking for a position both locally, as well as out of state; specifically, in Seattle, which is an amazing city that I'd like to move to (nevermind the initial plan I had with my ex, which was to move there with her; that city is fucking great).
For that reason, it's also hard to shake the feeling that had I gotten a job, we'd still be together. For career reasons, I would've ended up moving to the west coast on my own until she converted to a full-time employee at her job in January, and could then just transfer to the Seattle office.
Anyway! Aside from hanging out with friends, and doing fun stuff, is there any advice you guys have for me? Any war stories of how you got through similar situations? Part of why this is hitting me so hard is that my ex is the only one in my life that I allowed to get as close as she was, so without her, I felt as though I didn't really have anyone. I have one very close friend, but I would often let weeks or months pass between contacting him outside of the odd Facebook comment.
This post from another thread has been really good in terms of providing perspective for me though:
I've been trying to find a source for all this, but I can't seem to find one.
Edit: I mentioned this in a later response, but I'll add it here so I can get some input: Should I continue to go to the weekly board game meetup we've both been attending for almost a year? It's a decently large part of my life, but I don't know if it's worth it to continue going because I would invariably see my ex every time, even if we didn't play anything together (we usually don't).
