I was dating this very nice girl, and she was very special, and then
she decided that she didn't want to keep seeing me, but asked me if we
could ever get married...but after I was asked her the same question,
she stopped speaking to me...now everyone I know says I should stop
trying to contact her..but if I don't at least try, we will never get
back to together...is there really nothing I can do?????????

Hi astern-ga,

I'm sorry to hear about you and your ex-girlfriend, so I thought it
would be best to suggest a five-step process for dealing with your
grief.

ACCEPTANCE

If your girlfriend does not want to speak with you any more, trying to
get back together with her is definitely a poor idea. A relationship
requires the participation of two people, so no matter how hard you
try, nothing will ever develop unless she reciprocates in some way.

CLOSURE

I'm sure that her asking if you two could ever get married must have
put a lot of confusion through the your mind considering she was
breaking up with you. It seems that this has lingered in your mind
that it was slightly possibility that she could still be interested.
For this reason you need to contact her, not to say "come back I love
you" but instead "I need to know if our relationship is over or not".
She may be backing off your earlier attempts to speak with her because
she was concerned about her potential future with you, but giving her
the chance to end the relationship will show her that you respect her
wishes. You never know, she could say that she is still very much in
love with you and explain why she stopped talking to you.

SELF-LOVE

Assuming that she ends the relationship, you need to go through a
rebuilding phase. The most important part in this is to regain your
self-confidence - here are some links that address the best way to do
this:

http://wywy.essortment.com/howtogainco_rfbl.htm

Here are some other things you can do:

Ask yourself each day what you have to be grateful for. 
Make a list of all the things that are great about you and tell
yourself.
Go on a personal development workshop that will boost your positive
self image.
Surround yourself with people who give you hope.

http://enotalone.com/article/2003.html

MOVING ON

Once you feel great about yourself again, remember that there are
plenty of fish in the sea and go fishing! If you don't want to jump
into another serious relationship, just go out and have fun and make
new friends. You could try many of the common avenues, but here are
some nice online alternatives:

Lava Life: www.lavalife.com

Match: www.match.com

Mingles: www.mingles.com

I hope the above information will be helpful in dealing with your
breakup, but if there is anything you don't understand just post a
clarification and I will answer it promptly :)

Regards,

answerguru-ga

---

Request for Answer Clarification by astern-ga on 26 Dec 2002 12:39 PST

Thanks so much for your response...Your answer touched on many themes,
acceptence, closure, MOVING ON, and self love that I have learned
about over the last several months...I think that I now generally
realize that our relationship is completely over, as she has not
returned my happy holidays phone call (the first attempt by me to
contact her in months)....

A couple of followup questions:

Isn't there something to be said for persistence???...that until she
says don't call her, I should keep trying...when she broke with me in
the spring, she said we could still be friends, but then made it
impossible to see her and hard to reach her...I just feel that I
should try....that isn't stalking...

Why would she, by her own admission, send me mixed messages????

I know I need to move on (and there are tons of girls who want to go
out with me) but Is there anything I get do to get her back???

---

Clarification of Answer by answerguru-ga on 27 Dec 2002 00:19 PST

Regarding your follow-up questions:

Persistence, in my opinion, should only be undertaken when she
responds in some way. Unfortunately, the whole "friends" thing can be
misleading - both men and women often say this sort of thing to let
the other party down easily when they are breaking up.

Mixed messages are the result of scrambled thoughts...she may have
initially felt bad about breaking up and these messages were likely
the result of the ideas floating through her head (there really is not
better way to consider this).

If by "get her back" you mean revengeful act, then ABSOLUTELY NOT. If
you meant to try and get back together with her, it's quite clear that
things are over so it is definitely time to cut your losses. You have
to forget about this and start seeing other people.


Good luck!

answerguru-ga

"...but after I was asked her the same question..."

What did you answer her? I am confused about that part. Did she break
up with you because she thought you would never ask her to marry her?
Or did she break up because of another reason?

I'm a guy, but I browsed a book on dating from the women's
perspective. This doesn't make me an expert on this topic and the book
might have been rubbish for all I know, but I thought I would chime in
with what it said. The book recommended a break up as a way to get the
guy to propose to the girl. It said it didn't matter how much the guy
was in love with the girl -- the girl had to break up in order to spur
the guy to make a firm and swift proposal. This is kind of ruthless I
know and I doubt many women would have the guts to implement such a
scheme, but I just thought you might want to consider it as a
possibility.

Astern,

I'm very sorry that your relationship is no more.

Your friends are right, though.  She's not speaking to you anymore,
isn't making attempts to contact you.  Continuing to try to get back
together with her will only make matters worse, and make you seem like
a stalker.

Answerguru has given you terrific advice.  I hope you follow it, and
find someone who won't play games with your heart.

Good luck.

--Missy

I am not sure even today why she broke up with me....I told her that I
was willing to talk about getting married, but it was a separate
conversation than talking about breaking up....it was all part of the
mixed messages thing

I don't think that that was her strategy, as I gave her a fairly firm
response (that I love her and was willing to discuss getting married)
BUT She left me anyway....

Thanks for your comments

Dear Missy,

Thanks for your warm words of support....I need someone exactly like
you said...someone that won't play games with my heart..in fact, that
is what I gave her for valentines day...a big heart...and I guess she
didn't really want it...

As answer guru said, it is time to move on...