28 Apr
So it has been more than a month since I broke up with Mr. Not Quite Right. After our big break up (in which I dumped him, mind you) we had the obligatory, “lets stay friends” talk. Silly me, I thought we really meant it.
About a week ago I reached out to try and establish contact. I had some gnarly shit going on in my life. Shit that he had known about when we were together, and I thought it might be helpful if I could talk to someone about it. So I gave him a call. No biggie. I did my best to sound “breezy” on my message (failed miserably) and figured welp, that was that. Later I received a text saying he was out of town for his “man weekend” and that we’d talk later. Ok, cool beans.
Soooo I wait and wait and then nothing. 6 days later – nothing. This leaves a normally mellow girl to start obsessing. Was he so drunk that he doesn’t remember texting me? Did someone tell him I hooked up with Mr. Tall the week after we broke up and now he’s mad? Is he just over talking to me and moving on?
Rather than run these thoughts constantly through my head, I decide to attempt a one more final text. Ya know, in case he forgot. Or so I tell myself. (Insert groan here)
We proceed to have a very short dumb conversation about a TV show and then… NOTHING. No, “so hey how’s it been?” Or “How did that job interview go?” Or maybe even, “Did you have a good weekend?” Just nothing. At this point I am left with only one option (clearly) and that is to get snippy. So I text him back “Welp, good talk. Take care. ”
Now, I don’t need much help in seeing what went wrong here, because, clearly, what went wrong was ME. But, lessons learned are as follows:
- “I really want us to stay friends” actually means, “I hope your big tall guy friends don’t beat me up when I see them at the bars.” It does not mean, “I care about what’s going on in your life” nor does it mean, “I want to talk to you.”
- Don’t date someone who leaves you wondering if he is ignoring your text OR just got too drunk to remember it.
- If someone doesn’t call, don’t make excuses for them. It’s likely that if you do reach out to them again, you’ll get a stimulating conversation about LOST. And that’s about it.
Feel free to share these 3 great new learnings with your friends. Could have saved me a bit of trouble (and from looking like the bitchy ex gf who writes snippy text messages…)
amen to #2
I think part of this is the difference in what men and women think “lets be friends” means. One side thinks it means, lets be friendly and cordial and not bad-mouth each other. The other side legitimately wants to be friends.
You legitimately wanted to be friends with him, have him be there for you like a friend would be, after going through a hard time. It had been about a month and you wanted to re-connect and lean on him for friendship. He, in my opinion this is unsurprising, didn’t want to be there for you. I’m not saying you deserved it, I just am rarely surprised by how people react when the person that dumps them, then connects with them later on.
He probably felt like he was being used because the way you write about the event, it feels like you hadn’t talked post-breakup until you needed him. Maybe you had talked to him since the break-up, I’m sorry for jumping to conclusions.
I guess when I get broken up with, I think when I hear let’s be friends it means, “don’t be mean about me, don’t bash me, and don’t run away when you see me in public, be cordial.”
I’m sorry you had to find out the hard way.
You are totally right on both points. I think in guy speak, “let’s be friends” means I don’t want you talking a bunch of shit about me. In retrospect, I also think he was really hurt and he dealt with the break up in a very different manner than I did. At the time, I didn’t really appreciate that while I was having a hard time with it, I wasn’t the one who got dumped. He was. And presumably he felt like it was out of nowhere since I had bottled up a lot of my frustrations. So I think he absolutely felt used when I tried to reach out. He also probably didn’t want to reopen that wound. Sigh. There is so, so much I would do differently in regards to this guy if I could.
Although I do thank him for inspiring this post… interestingly enough, I wrote this post a good 8 months before I ever created my blog. I was just so pissed and laying in bed and I kept thinking, if only I had that dating blog I’ve been wanting for forever. If I did, I would have a lot to say right now. And I just kind of instinctively grabbed my computer and this poured out of me… 8 months later I was talking to my best friends, yet again, about how I wanted to start a blog and I told them about this fake post I wrote. They had me read it to them, and when they laughed out loud I thought oh heck, I should just do this. And that very night, sex and the twenties was born :)