# I am at a loss and basically shocked



## tmbirdy

First off, sorry this is long, but I did not know any other way to explain it...

My second divorce of 10 years was final about a year and a half ago and he had been verbally abusive so I had to leave (we don't talk at all anymore), and right before it became final, I met, or should I say reconnected with a man whose son and my son (from my first marriage of 20 years) played hockey together and our kids went to the same schools. He and I were never close and I knew his soon-to-be ex-wife a bit, but I went into this place to meet with my first husband (still friends after all these years) and he was sitting there having a beer with my ex. Found out he was getting divorced too because he said he just wasn’t “happy” and they had a sexless marriage. 

We are the same age, at that time almost 60. So we started hanging out because we lived close to each other. He had an apartment and I had just bought a home. He was always on again off again, and it caused so much anxiety, but I for some reason was fixated on him. We had so much in common and the chemistry was good too. I thought that because I was almost 60 that I needed to find someone. I could not have been more wrong. 

After a period of about nine months of his on again off again behavior, he finally made a formal commitment and we started seeing each other almost every night and would take two nights apart. Then we decided he could move in to my house. So he moved in about two months ago and everything was great, until around Thanksgiving. He went up to ex-wife’s for Thanksgiving and I went and hung out with my first husband and a bunch of friends. He has two grown kids and they were both going to be there and that is why he was going. My grown daughter lives in MN with her husband and my grown son who has schizophrenia lives nearby with my first husband so I did not have any sort of dinner planned. No big deal that he was going up there for Thanksgiving btw. I am friends with my first ex-husband and we talk all the time. That is just an understanding that we have had and it was working just fine. However, it did kind of bother me at times that his ex would invite him up for his 60th birthday and it would be just the four of them having dinner, and also on Thanksgiving it was just the four of them because of other people not wanting to travel due to Covid. So that was weird...and I thought wow, it would have been nice if he would have put me first on Thanksgiving and then just go up there for a brief time to see his kids. But like on his birthday, he stayed the entire day.

But he told me he loved me almost every day and said he was very happy. I met his sister and met his mom outside the window of her nursing home due to Covid. Everything was great. We took two trips together, celebrated both our 60th birthdays together which was in between our actual days, and had a great time. We played lots of golf together up until the weather started to get cold, and we dined out a couple times a week. We went to Costco and the grocery store, and I was cooking these awesome meals, and then once again, due to Covid, everything got shut down. So no more golf, no more dining out because there is only outside dining and it’s now almost Christmas and too cold. He had been out of work due to Covid in March but found a job working from home that started right before Thanksgiving. He became depressed, he says, that the job was not more exciting, and that things are shut down, and it’s cold and we are stuck inside this house all day now because we both work from home. The house is a good size so his office is on the other side of the house. We still have been doing our 2.7 mile walk everyday, however.

Long story short, he is moving out now the day after Christmas just like that. I knew something was not right as I was getting bad vibes and could feel his depression. He had made flight reservations for us to go to Mexico in January and when I would bring it up, he started not saying much. So after the Thanksgiving holiday I talked to him about it. I asked him if he loved me and adored me. The answer I got was I can’t be who you need me to be right now and I think I should move out. He said he has been fighting depression on and off and it creeped into his last marriage. Needless to say I am shocked as I had just told my family that we were living together. Everyone, including my friends who had known about him were completely shocked. My 28-year-old daughter is completely shocked. He’s not a player type at all and even when he and I were just casually dating off and on, he and I never slept with anyone else. I dated other men and had a pretty full life until he came back around. Early last year I even went without talking to him for 2-1/2 months. And then of course Covid hit and we were all on stay-at-home orders so one day in early April I texted him to see how he was holding up, and he texted me right back and asked if I would mind having a phone conversation that night. So that started everything back up but he was still on again off again until July when he made a commitment to me, finally.

I’m at a loss here. He moves out in eight days and has a truck coming to get the bulk of his stuff tomorrow and move it to his sister’s house where he will live. I am very sad right now, but one thing I do know is that I will never let him do this to me again. This is the last straw. 

I have never experienced anything like this. He’s here and we still eat dinner together and watch TV together and then at night we sleep in the same bed and he hugs me but I won’t have sex with him. What am I supposed to do, play hard to get forever and walk on eggshells and never have any intimate conversations? I’m hurt and confused. So the moment I start bringing up relational stuff because I was feeling anxious about our relationship, he bails??? Before he was all in! I realize that it's just not meant to be, but before that we were talking about all the fun trips we wanted to take, etc. He kept saying, put them on the list dear...

And the reason he is staying until after Christmas is because neither one of us wants to be alone at Christmas time and the days are short and it's just depressing.

I’m headed to FL to stay with a girlfriend on the 28th for a whole week, and he is headed to MT to stay with a good guy friend of his for a whole week after Christmas. That will be it for us. I plan to not contact him anymore and probably will be renting my house out and moving to FL. I need to re-establish who I am again. Funny thing is, I was basically over him and living a very full life with lots of golf and new friends, but then I let him back in to my life and now this…

This is tough…


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## Diana7

tmbirdy said:


> First off, sorry this is long, but I did not know any other way to explain it...
> 
> My second divorce of 10 years was final about a year and a half ago and he had been verbally abusive so I had to leave (we don't talk at all anymore), and right before it became final, I met, or should I say reconnected with a man whose son and my son (from my first marriage of 20 years) played hockey together and our kids went to the same schools. He and I were never close and I knew his soon-to-be ex-wife a bit, but I went into this place to meet with my first husband (still friends after all these years) and he was sitting there having a beer with my ex. Found out he was getting divorced too because he said he just wasn’t “happy” and they had a sexless marriage.
> 
> We are the same age, at that time almost 60. So we started hanging out because we lived close to each other. He had an apartment and I had just bought a home. He was always on again off again, and it caused so much anxiety, but I for some reason was fixated on him. We had so much in common and the chemistry was good too. I thought that because I was almost 60 that I needed to find someone. I could not have been more wrong.
> 
> After a period of about nine months of his on again off again behavior, he finally made a formal commitment and we started seeing each other almost every night and would take two nights apart. Then we decided he could move in to my house. So he moved in about two months ago and everything was great, until around Thanksgiving. He went up to ex-wife’s for Thanksgiving and I went and hung out with my first husband and a bunch of friends. He has two grown kids and they were both going to be there and that is why he was going. My grown daughter lives in MN with her husband and my grown son who has schizophrenia lives nearby with my first husband so I did not have any sort of dinner planned. No big deal that he was going up there for Thanksgiving btw. I am friends with my first ex-husband and we talk all the time. That is just an understanding that we have had and it was working just fine. However, it did kind of bother me at times that his ex would invite him up for his 60th birthday and it would be just the four of them having dinner, and also on Thanksgiving it was just the four of them because of other people not wanting to travel due to Covid. So that was weird...and I thought wow, it would have been nice if he would have put me first on Thanksgiving and then just go up there for a brief time to see his kids. But like on his birthday, he stayed the entire day.
> 
> But he told me he loved me almost every day and said he was very happy. I met his sister and met his mom outside the window of her nursing home due to Covid. Everything was great. We took two trips together, celebrated both our 60th birthdays together which was in between our actual days, and had a great time. We played lots of golf together up until the weather started to get cold, and we dined out a couple times a week. We went to Costco and the grocery store, and I was cooking these awesome meals, and then once again, due to Covid, everything got shut down. So no more golf, no more dining out because there is only outside dining and it’s now almost Christmas and too cold. He had been out of work due to Covid in March but found a job working from home that started right before Thanksgiving. He became depressed, he says, that the job was not more exciting, and that things are shut down, and it’s cold and we are stuck inside this house all day now because we both work from home. The house is a good size so his office is on the other side of the house. We still have been doing our 2.7 mile walk everyday, however.
> 
> Long story short, he is moving out now the day after Christmas just like that. I knew something was not right as I was getting bad vibes and could feel his depression. He had made flight reservations for us to go to Mexico in January and when I would bring it up, he started not saying much. So after the Thanksgiving holiday I talked to him about it. I asked him if he loved me and adored me. The answer I got was I can’t be who you need me to be right now and I think I should move out. He said he has been fighting depression on and off and it creeped into his last marriage. Needless to say I am shocked as I had just told my family that we were living together. Everyone, including my friends who had known about him were completely shocked. My 28-year-old daughter is completely shocked. He’s not a player type at all and even when he and I were just casually dating off and on, he and I never slept with anyone else. I dated other men and had a pretty full life until he came back around. Early last year I even went without talking to him for 2-1/2 months. And then of course Covid hit and we were all on stay-at-home orders so one day in early April I texted him to see how he was holding up, and he texted me right back and asked if I would mind having a phone conversation that night. So that started everything back up but he was still on again off again until July when he made a commitment to me, finally.
> 
> I’m at a loss here. He moves out in eight days and has a truck coming to get the bulk of his stuff tomorrow and move it to his sister’s house where he will live. I am very sad right now, but one thing I do know is that I will never let him do this to me again. This is the last straw.
> 
> I have never experienced anything like this. He’s here and we still eat dinner together and watch TV together and then at night we sleep in the same bed and he hugs me but I won’t have sex with him. What am I supposed to do, play hard to get forever and walk on eggshells and never have any intimate conversations? I’m hurt and confused. So the moment I start bringing up relational stuff because I was feeling anxious about our relationship, he bails??? Before he was all in! I realize that it's just not meant to be, but before that we were talking about all the fun trips we wanted to take, etc. He kept saying, put them on the list dear...
> 
> And the reason he is staying until after Christmas is because neither one of us wants to be alone at Christmas time and the days are short and it's just depressing.
> 
> I’m headed to FL to stay with a girlfriend on the 28th for a whole week, and he is headed to MT to stay with a good guy friend of his for a whole week after Christmas. That will be it for us. I plan to not contact him anymore and probably will be renting my house out and moving to FL. I need to re-establish who I am again. Funny thing is, I was basically over him and living a very full life with lots of golf and new friends, but then I let him back in to my life and now this…
> 
> This is tough…


I suspect that he was in no way emotionally ready for another relationship. Few people are for sometime after their divorce. For me it was 4 years before I was in anyway emotionally ready to date again. You were both still married when you met after all. 
It sounds as if you have friends and family and an otherwise good life, so have a time of being single before thinking of another man is my advise. 
From the time you met he sounded unsure, so its best you found out now rather than later.


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## StarFires

But, hon, the guy was flakey from the start, and you have been a convenient option. Then you called him that day that began what seemed like a serious relationship, but he wasn't going to call you. He wasn't there thinking about you and how you were doing. He was on your mind, you weren't on his.

You can never believe a person's reason for the break up of their marriage or prior relationships. They always exempt themselves from blame, but he wasn't an innocent party.

I'm not blaming you or anything, just trying to help you examine the circumstances as they were.


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## tmbirdy

Diana7 said:


> I suspect that he was in no way emotionally ready for another relationship. Few people are for sometime after their divorce. For me it was 4 years before I was in anyway emotionally ready to date again. You were both still married when you met after all.
> It sounds as if you have friends and family and an otherwise good life, so have a time of being single before thinking of another man is my advise.
> From the time you met he sounded unsure, so its best you found out now rather than later.


True and I realize that now. I am going to take the time out to just be on my own. I had been living on my own for a year before we got serious and now that I know what I know, I won't be hoping for something that was never meant to be anyway. And you are right, I would rather know now then find out a year or two years from now. He was already a waste of my time and sanity.


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## tmbirdy

StarFires said:


> But, hon, the guy was flakey from the start, and you have been a convenient option. Then you called him that day that began what seemed like a serious relationship, but he wasn't going to call you. He wasn't there thinking about you and how you were doing. He was on your mind, you weren't on his.
> 
> You can never believe a person's reason for the break up of their marriage or prior relationships. They always exempt themselves from blame, but he wasn't an innocent party.
> 
> I'm not blaming you or anything, just trying to help you examine the circumstances as they were.


A bit harsh, and I get that, but after being married consecutively for over thirty years I guess I needed to find that out for myself. 

And no, he was not an innocent party in his marriage. He'll even attest to that. His second wife even cheated on him because of his emotional unavailability. And his first wife of a few years back in his twenties cheated on him too. 

It was not all me just thinking about him. Before we got exclusive, he was calling me and texting me all the time, and at times it was irritating. I was living my life and having fun even after Covid because golf courses were open and so was dining and happy hours with a mask. I had met new friends and got reacquainted with old friends. 

I had resigned to write him off even in early July when he said he was going to move to MT for work, but then he called and said he couldn't move and the main reason was because of me. And he kept texting and calling and said he missed me a great deal, so I took a leap of faith and just went with things and gave it a shot. He was the absolute greatest guy and spot on like I said until around Thanksgiving.

He is even still super nice to me and does a lot around the house and comes into my office quite a bit these days. I told him I can never take him back. Some things just don't work out. But we did have a lot of fun the last five months, and I'll just chalk it up to that and move on.


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