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Old GF shows up; hilarity ensues.
McMonkey Burger
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I'm in a bit of a bind, and I would like to know what other people's take on this issue will be.
About three years ago, I got involved with a girl who...had some issues. To start, she was cheating on her boyfriend with me. I know, I know. I do feel bad about that, but I had never been faced with that situation and didn't really know how to handle it. Eventually, we broke up. There were some feelings there, and it wasn't just physical. We were both very confused about what was going on, and she was very clearly emotionally confused.
For a short time after we broke up, I still talked to her on the phone. But she started to develop a bit of a stalker mentality. There was instance when I was out with some friends (and she knew this, because I told her) so I didn't pick up my phone since I didn't hear it, then when I looked at my phone, she had called me five times in the space of five minutes. I called her back, thinking that it must be some kind of an emergency, and she told me that she got a notice for an unpaid parking ticket in front of my home, which she never saw and neither did I. I could kind of tell by the sound of her voice that she was trying to get me to pay her ticket for her, which I wasn't going to do.
Anyway, it eventually reached a point where I stopped picking up the phone and never called her back. She slowed down her calling rate, leaving one voicemail where she sounded somewhat upset about me not calling her back, thinking I was mad at her. She sent me a text message a couple more months later asking if I hated her, to let her know, and she would leave me alone. I never called or messaged her back.
Part of the problem is that I had no idea what to say. No, I don't hate her. In fact, even a few years on, thinking about this message upsets me because I didn't hate her, I care about her, and I'm worried about her. I know that she dealt with depression problems, and was witness to one episode one time where she came over, climbed into my bed with her clothes on without saying anything, and just went to sleep. I tried a couple times to talk to her that night, but eventually gave up and just held her. She was fine the next morning. The other problem is that I felt like if I did talk to her, everything would start all over again, and I didn't know if she or I could do that again. Despite how things ended up back then, I hold no ill will towards her and genuinely only want the best for her.
Cut to several years later, I get a Facebook friend request from her from out of the blue, and she only has like six friends on there, which means that she specifically targeted me. I know that she broke up with the guy she was with a few years ago (he told me; to my knowledge, he doesn't know what happened). My feelings on the matter haven't diminished. I'm older and wiser, and a lot has changed for me, although I am single. I have no idea about her. Part of me does want to talk to her, to see how she's doing, and make sure she's okay. Part of me is concerned that if I do, it's all going to go down the same path again. I'm genuinely torn. Do I give her the benefit of the doubt and see if she's matured, regardless of whether her intent is to rekindle things? Or do I try to go on my own way, wondering and continuing to have some worry about her in the back of my mind?
tl;dr: Old girlfriend from several years ago who had some mental issues tried to contact me. I want to talk to her, but am worried about doing so. What do I do?
About three years ago, I got involved with a girl who...had some issues. To start, she was cheating on her boyfriend with me. I know, I know. I do feel bad about that, but I had never been faced with that situation and didn't really know how to handle it. Eventually, we broke up. There were some feelings there, and it wasn't just physical. We were both very confused about what was going on, and she was very clearly emotionally confused.
For a short time after we broke up, I still talked to her on the phone. But she started to develop a bit of a stalker mentality. There was instance when I was out with some friends (and she knew this, because I told her) so I didn't pick up my phone since I didn't hear it, then when I looked at my phone, she had called me five times in the space of five minutes. I called her back, thinking that it must be some kind of an emergency, and she told me that she got a notice for an unpaid parking ticket in front of my home, which she never saw and neither did I. I could kind of tell by the sound of her voice that she was trying to get me to pay her ticket for her, which I wasn't going to do.
Anyway, it eventually reached a point where I stopped picking up the phone and never called her back. She slowed down her calling rate, leaving one voicemail where she sounded somewhat upset about me not calling her back, thinking I was mad at her. She sent me a text message a couple more months later asking if I hated her, to let her know, and she would leave me alone. I never called or messaged her back.
Part of the problem is that I had no idea what to say. No, I don't hate her. In fact, even a few years on, thinking about this message upsets me because I didn't hate her, I care about her, and I'm worried about her. I know that she dealt with depression problems, and was witness to one episode one time where she came over, climbed into my bed with her clothes on without saying anything, and just went to sleep. I tried a couple times to talk to her that night, but eventually gave up and just held her. She was fine the next morning. The other problem is that I felt like if I did talk to her, everything would start all over again, and I didn't know if she or I could do that again. Despite how things ended up back then, I hold no ill will towards her and genuinely only want the best for her.
Cut to several years later, I get a Facebook friend request from her from out of the blue, and she only has like six friends on there, which means that she specifically targeted me. I know that she broke up with the guy she was with a few years ago (he told me; to my knowledge, he doesn't know what happened). My feelings on the matter haven't diminished. I'm older and wiser, and a lot has changed for me, although I am single. I have no idea about her. Part of me does want to talk to her, to see how she's doing, and make sure she's okay. Part of me is concerned that if I do, it's all going to go down the same path again. I'm genuinely torn. Do I give her the benefit of the doubt and see if she's matured, regardless of whether her intent is to rekindle things? Or do I try to go on my own way, wondering and continuing to have some worry about her in the back of my mind?
tl;dr: Old girlfriend from several years ago who had some mental issues tried to contact me. I want to talk to her, but am worried about doing so. What do I do?
McMonkey Burger on
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Letting her back in will only make her think she can come back in it again when you inevitably part ways next.
1) For emphasis, it has been three years. I know that I've changed a lot since then. I've matured and my life has gone through drastic changes. I'm not the same person. I don't know if she is.
2) For clarification, the way I ended it originally was...unfinished. Basically, the way we ended the heavy romance was when she got mad at me at walked out of my place because I told her she needed to leave. She didn't like being "kicked out" (which I had reasons for, namely that it was late and I needed to be at work the next morning; not unreasonable to me). She called me from the road to yell at me and say she wasn't coming over any more, then called me the next day, somewhat apologetic, but saying that maybe we needed to take a break and she wouldn't call me unless I called her first to give us some time apart. And then she called me two days later without me calling her first.
When we stopped talking, I just stopped picking up the phone and not calling her back. I basically just disappeared on her. I feel guilty about that, and have thought not of starting things up again, but simply talking to her and explaining things. Maybe give things more closure, unless she has changed.
I don't know if I'm thinking right about this as it's a more emotional thing which does cloud my judgment, which is why I'm asking for more objective opinions.
You're right, people can change. Go ahead and drop her a line, and clear the air on the whole mess. Stay sharp, though, and don't let yourself get swept up in any drama (but this is just good advice in general).
how old are you guys mcmonkey?
If stuff gets crazy you can just always stop talking to her again. You really have nothing to lose.
but they're listening to every word I say
Unless you have something on your profile you don't want her to see, I don't see what harm there is in just adding her. I mean, you don't need to make yourself super-available to talk to just to add her on facebook, unless there's something on there you'd rather she didn't see. And that would be fine.
I'm not too worried about her sense of closure or whatever.. I think yours is the real issue. Maybe if she wants to have a conversation sometime, you can go for it. If worst comes to worst, you can always say 'yep, she be crazy' and remove/block/ignore away, but by letting things play out will either make a new old friend or be able to say for yourself "back then when I wasn't sure what to do... yeah, I did the right thing".
Certainly though, I don't think anyone will fault you for choosing to leave things buried and ignoring her. Unless you have an interest in getting to know her again, there's not really any reason you need to feel obligated to reintroduce ancient drama into your life.
This is what I was thinking. Unless you're leaving out a lot of details about her craziness, on the 1 to 10 crazy scale she sounds like maybe a 3. Calling you 5 times in a row doesn't make a stalker, it makes her a normal lonely person who liked you and really wanted to talk to you. If she kept spam calling you or showing up uninvited for days/weeks/months, that would make her a stalker. Sounds like she got the hint and gave up pretty quickly when you stopped calling her back.
Honestly, it sort of sounds like you were the wrong one in this break-up. She wanted to talk to you and be with you and instead of honestly telling her it wasn't working out, you just stopped answering the phone.
I'm not saying this to make you feel even more guilty. To be honest, whenever I've broken up with someone, I've done the same thing - stopped picking up the phone - and I still feel guilty about them and wish I'd handled it better. I guess all I'm trying to say is that this girl doesn't sound that crazy so you shouldn't let that stop you from seeing her. What should maybe stop you from seeing her is if you think you're going to blow her off again once she gets attached again.
As far as the stalking goes, if you really think she is a stalker then you can't give her any way back into your life. I had an ex girlfriend who did the stalking thing for a while. Called me a billion times a day, showed up to my house uninvited, etc. I did what you're doing and after a while she went away. Then I found out she joined the army and sent her a quick two word text message: "Good luck."
That started it all up again. The calls, trying to get my new address from my friends, showing up to my mothers house uninvited to try to get her to give up my new address/phone number,
Eventually I had to sit down with her and tell her if it didn't stop I'd be contacting police/lawyers. Don't give 'em an inch, man.
We were in our late 20s when things went down before. We've both crossed the 30-year mark since then. So we're a little older. I know that being passed 25 doesn't mean that someone is past the point of changing. I just have to point myself out and how I've evolved over the last three years to say that people still change, even later.
I shouldn't have quite said that she was a stalker before, but it definitely felt borderline at the time. When I look back, it still feels that way, but I question why. I know that she told me that I made her feel safe, and she liked the way I talked to her. It's possible that she was very lonely was trying to latch on to me. But then again, the part that was somewhat buried in the first post was that she did have a boyfriend at the time. I was the other man. Like I said, I feel bad about that, and it probably led up to the break-up, mostly because I just couldn't let things continue that way.
As for Facebook, I don't have any really private info or contact info on there other than my email address. I set up my page assuming that everything could potentially become public, through hacking or whatever, so I keep my private info private. I don't know if she still has my phone number.
The problem in my mind is that there were feelings there. I'm pretty sure they were mutual feelings. Like I said, I don't know if I would want to date her again. Seriously, I don't know. Despite how things went, I will admit that I do care about her and only want the best for her, crazy or not. My thoughts get all muddled when emotion gets involved.
EDIT: I should also add that I'm aware that I'm engaging in an enormous amount of speculation. I have no idea what her intentions are, what her current situation is (for all I know, she's seeing someone, although that didn't stop her before), or anything of the kind. I'm just kind of...trying to read the signs, I suppose, not to mention how things left off before being on my mind, and anticipating that it could still be on hers.
IMO, add her, you can always delete her and chances are she just wants to add everyone she's ever known like everyone seems to do when they first start on facebook.
Alternatively, you could wait a few days and see how many friends she has then. If it's stayed at 6, she's targetting you. If she's got 26 then, she probably just thought to add you along with a bunch of other people as she just got on it.
Not true at all. It seems like a general rule because a lot of people don't try hard enough, but people can change. It just takes a lot of work.
Also I think it was kind of crappy to not respond to the texts that asked if you hated her. I have had kind of the same thing where someone cut me off and it ate at me big time until I got the chance to just talk to them and resolve things and put them to rest.
Letting her think you hate her kind of sucks.
I didn't understand the timeframe that much though so I'm not sure if you should talk to her or not.
I guess you could try being adult about it and just be civil to her but I don't know too much about the situation.
People change, but only for themselves. The saying is you can't change someone.
ceres, as usual, has hit it on the nose. This thing is decidedly more about you than it is about her. If you really wanted to cut her out of your life, you would've just ignored her Friends request and moved on without a second thought. You certainly wouldn't have created this thread, described the ending of your relationship, and asked for help on what to do. I think you're suffering from two things: 1) recognition of the fact that perhaps you were the one who was a douchebag, and that you may have ended things poorly and prematurely, and 2) the natural curiosity we all have to see what has happened with the people who have since left our lives (e.g., the high-school reunion effect). The truth is, you made the decision to end things by stopping communication with her. She obviously made the effort to reconnect, even to the point of gaining closure. You didn't take her up on the offer; hell, you didn't even respond. The guilt and reminiscing of your past together may even go so far as to be pushing you to consider reigniting the old flame.
If you are honestly afraid she will stalk you then don't Friend her. I think that would be blatantly obvious under any circumstance for anyone, regardless of your past together. Otherwise, stop lying to yourself, dude.
But yeah, you made it sound like her problems were the result of some enviromental condtions, and people can totally reinvent them selves in less time than 3 years. And more to the point, everybody deserves a 2nd chance, especially those you care about. For sure give her a call and catch up. It doesnt sound like she ever posed a threat in anycase.
Hahaha, Metal Gear!
That aside, I say no harm in a little contact. Use discretion. If things feel right, maybe it could be something better! If not, you're pretty strong-willed (stronger than I, may I say) about the cold shoulder method, so just rinse and repeat. You're in a safe position from what I gather.
Wut? Metal gear? No son, Fallout. The god of games. Narrated by Ron Pearlman. Who has fucked your mother and you sister. And they said "THANK YOU SIR".
The thing is that at the time she was so needy. Like I said, she pretty much wouldn't leave me alone, which while flattering at first got old kind of fast. She never paid for anything. Whenever we went out, she wouldn't even begin to offer to pay for anything and basically expected me to pay. And, like I mentioned before, she tried to manipulate me into paying her parking ticket for her. Also, the night we had the fight when she left and she called me, she said she wasn't coming over anymore. I could kind of tell what she was really getting at and said that if that's the way she wanted it then okay. That was not what she was expecting, so she started trying to mock me. In other words, what she expected was for me to chase after her and beg, which I won't do. I don't take anyone trying to manipulate me well at all.
I know that I didn't handle things terribly well, although I feel it was mutual. It was a learning experience, and if she's learned and grown as well, I would accept even trying to rekindle the old flame. Like I said, though, I recognize this is a lot of speculation on my part, and I have no idea what her intentions are. In any case, I have accepted her friend request, and I'll play it by ear. Open-minded yet cautious.
Which is not to say that they won't want to change for you.
It is just that you can't make them change, they need to want to change.
If she just added you i think you are looking way too deeply into this, especially if it's been a really long time like you say. The chances of her not having moved on are pretty damn slim. It's entirely possible she's just curious and wanted to see how you are doing now after all that time. Which i see nothing wrong with. I've had a couple ex's do that before, but then again i handled my relationships a little better than you appear to have.
Just like war, people change constantly and without cessation. Try not to get too much of your life knowledge from videogame taglines.
Also, to clear something up, I don't know that I want to be just friends with her. There are still some lingering feelings, even this far on. Whether those stem from guilt or feeling of things being unfinished, or I really do have feelings, I don't know. I would be comfortable being just friends, but I'm debating about whether I want to try giving things another go. Things were handled badly before, although I also feel it was handled badly on both sides. Of course, I can only be responsible for what I did, and try to make amends for that.
That's something I want to talk to her about. I really do want to talk to her, even if it's only to clear the air. But I don't want to do it online. This is the kind of conversation that I feel should be done either on the phone or in person. I might send her a message asking her to call me, and then we talk. And I'm still not sure what her intentions are, or if there are intentions. Too much speculation and what-ifs going through my head right now.
but they're listening to every word I say
Crazy, maybe, but I never felt it was a dangerous type of crazy. She already knows where I live anyway, so that doesn't matter. It's just that what I feel needs to be said shouldn't be done through a venue as impersonal as the internet. If we clear the air, and if we're even going to talk at all I think the air needs to be cleared, then I want to talk to her more directly.
My assumptions about her may be based more on my thoughts than hers, but knowing her, she might want to rekindle things. That's just how she is, but again: assumptions. I do need to talk to her, even if it's for my own peace of mind, both to apologize and to explain what happened, and what's happened since then. Then I'll play it by ear. Before it was handled badly on both sides, but I'm getting ahead of myself. First steps first and all that. Cautious open-mindedness.
What's really weird is that another friend came out of the woodwork this last week, too. One of the main people who encouraged me to take the route that I did.
This was my thoughts too.
She hasn't even contacted you...wtf are you talking all this stuff about? Seriously man. You are looking into things that more than likely aren't even there. You are extremely self absorbed if you believe that after 3 years this girl still has those strong feelings for you. I am almost willing to bet she was randomly thinking one day "Hey i wonder what so and so is up to after all this time?" and then decided to add you to face book to find out.
You are looking waaay to far into something that is more than likely just a facebook friend add out of curiosity. 3 years is a long time, i dont know anyone who would not have moved on by then. It seems to me you are the one who is all hung up on what happened 3 years ago, and you are just assuming she is like that too. I'll bet she isn't. I also doubt she would want to be romantically involved with someone who she probably felt treated her like crap 3 years ago. I know i wouldn't in her shoes. I mean by the sound of it it was not even a long or deep relationship, why would she even care about that 3 years down the road? I barely even remember short relationships i had back years ago. I really, really doubt she gives as much of a damn as you seem to think she does. (With absolutely no foundation for these thoughts as well.)
Not trying to be insulting here, but really you are making this big deal and basically have this idea in your head this girl is all interested in you after 3 damn years and after you previously treated her badly. You are probably not nearly as awesome to the girl as you think you are.
Hell, i have 455 facebook friends. That isn't even that high compared to some. People randomly add me and dont talk to me much all the time. It's facebook.
Take a step back and think about all this for a minute, because you are being really irrational about the situation.
That being said, nothing ventured, nothing gained. I'd say start by talking, and be completely candid and honest about why you stopped talking to her and how you feel now.
cold shoulder
blunt and polite answer
both can lead to more calls, but really, I'd go with an honest answer, some people have trouble moving on, they need help, a good ol' kick in the butt. but make it certain that while you want her happy, you want no part of anything with her.
He's not getting any calls, and hasn't in 3 years. That's the thing.