I’m having trouble how someone can love you and still choose to walk away.
I’m 28, and I’ve been involved with a man quite a bit older than me. He’s married, although his marriage had been unhappy for a long time before I came into the picture. Eventually, he told his wife he was leaving and told me that he loved me and wanted a future with me.
Things got complicated very quickly.
His family found out. His kids were hurt and angry. He ended up staying with his parents for a while and started realizing just how much his decisions had affected everyone around him. He’s also been dealing with his own mental health struggles and recently started therapy.
At one point, he told me he needed to step away and get his life together. He said he didn’t want me to have to deal with his problems and that he was afraid he was going to hurt me. He told me that if we were meant to be together, he would get himself together and if I was still single, we would find our way back to each other.
He has told me that he loves me. He has told me that I make him feel good. He’s told me that he cares about me and never wanted to hurt me.
But I am hurt.
What I’m struggling with most is the feeling of being shut out. I understand that he has things he needs to deal with. I understand that his kids and family need him right now. I understand that he needs to work on himself.
But I don’t understand why loving me means I have to be completely removed from his life.
I wanted to be there. I wanted to help. I wanted to be someone he could lean on instead of someone he had to protect from his problems.
And now I’m left sitting here wondering if I simply wasn’t enough for him to choose me.
That’s the part that hurts the most.
He didn’t necessarily leave because he stopped caring about me. In some ways, that almost makes it harder. He says he’s leaving because he believes it’s what he needs to do, and because he doesn’t think it’s fair for me to deal with everything he has going on.
I know logically that someone choosing to step away from a relationship because they aren’t capable of being in it right now doesn’t mean I’m unlovable.
But emotionally, it feels like rejection.
I love this man. I want him desperately. And at the same time, I’m exhausted from waiting for someone to decide whether there is room for me in their life.
He asked if he could check in on me every once in a while, but I’m starting to realize that might actually make it harder for me. Every little message gives me hope that we’ll eventually be together, and I don’t know how to heal while holding onto that hope.
So I think I may have to let him go, even though I don’t want to.
I don’t know if I’m looking for advice, perspective, or just somewhere to put all of this because I feel completely heartbroken.
How do you let go of someone you still love when the reason they’re leaving isn’t that they stopped loving you?