This is long so please bare with me
Hey there. Me and my LDR partner have been broken up now for exactly 54 days, so almost 2 months soon. We’ve been in “no contact” for 33 days. I say that with quotations because I have reached out once since then with an email, however I did specify in it that they were not obligated to respond to it and if anything I did not want them to feel any sense of urgency from it. I sent the email about a week ago and have not heard back since, which is fine with me.
Me and my partner were dating for about 4 and a half years. They’re across the Pacific Ocean and I’m in the US. We’d visit each other for about 3 weeks to a month once a year, and every time it was always so beautiful and lovely. Partway through the relationship though, I noticed they had a tendency to clam up and shutdown emotionally whenever their anxieties overwhelmed them. This caused a lot of friction when it came to communicating, which was especially important in an LDR, and it really messed with my head at times. However, it was worth it to me.
A lot of their anxiety about our relationship came from the fact they received a lot of shit about the relationship from their dad and his side of the family. He’s an extremely cold man, your usual patriarch, who literally told them that he didn’t find our relationship to be equal because we split the cost of our tickets sometimes. His side of the family even told them when they were visiting (they live in another close by country) that they need to settle down and find a good boy to date there, despite the fact that they had told them about our relationship already. Recently their parents are potentially going through a nasty divorce.
They’re also attending an extremely demanding school program that they’ve now had to take a second time for failing the first, all the while being away from home. They feel a lot of insecurity about it because they’re 25 (same age as me) and a lot of the people who passed were much younger.
They also deal with extremely intense OCD, and have literally openly told me they’re aligned with fearful avoidant tendencies.
When they broke up with me, it was actually I that brought up breaking up, not as an idea but they were acting odd that day and I was letting my anxiety get to me. It was stretched out for a week, not knowing where I stood, until they delivered the blow. They told me the distance was just too much and they felt worried about not giving me enough of their time. It’s not that I didn’t believe them, the distance does suck, but for it to suddenly now be the reason to breakup 4 years in was baffling to me. I’d spend time writing lengthy responses, and they’d either select what exactly to respond to while ignoring other parts, or just respond with “I’m sorry.” They said they didn’t know how to stop feeling this anxiety and that they hate hurting me. I as much as I could told them I didn’t mind, but was frustrated because of how blindsided I was by this, and it was almost like I wasn’t even given the chance to fight for us. Whenever the topic of closing the gap came up, they’d always clam up and shutdown, which made it impossible to actually have that conversation.
But still, I’d like to believe they still love me. One of the things they said during the breakup was “I knew what my dad said would upset you and I hate seeing you cry it breaks my fucking heart.” So I think they still care but let their fears and stress get to them.
Am I crazy for thinking that? Has it been too long now without talking that they’re now over it? I’m just so lost and I want my friend back and to show them that I’m willing to do whatever it takes for us.
EDIT: this is actually an important aspect I left out. But they said they were planning to get the tickets for their trip to visit literally just three days before the breakup happened. They had just been procrastinating telling their dad.