Hi everyone,
Thank you for responding. I DO appreciate it very much. I spoke with him last night. He is a perceptive guy so he encouraged me to tell him what was the matter. He asked me if it were his ex girlfriend again on my mind. I started in (like frigging automatic pilot) all my reasons that i felt he loved her more than me and that given that they have a baby between them i felt he will want to go back.
He told me he was so confused by the way i think. We sort of agreed to disagree last night and both hung up in frustration.
This morning he emailed me to ask me "what is going on" with me. Said he wants his confident Jess back and that he is sure that if i continue to stress myself like this that
I am going to simply leave him just to get relief from my own pain/ my mind. He said that would hurt him very much if I broke up with him over nothing.
So when i didn't respond to his email (bc i was scared and taking time to think about what to say )- he called me. He said he loves me and wished things felt the way they did when we were friends for nearly a year and the first several weeks of our intimate relationship. He said those were such good times.... said i was so funny, carefree, and confident. He said he loved how i would playfully get tough with him and them become so gentle. He said that is all gone now and he doesn't know what he did wrong.
I just couldn't tell him i have low self esteem
. I am still ashamed. Therefore i said something like.... 'i know you have noticed a change. I know you miss me... in many ways i miss me too. I am really struggling with insecurities regarding our relationship and it seems i have focused on your ex and become stuck. Not sure what to do.'
I informed him that i was aware that it was coming from me and my perception of things... i told him that he hasn't recently done anything wrong... i just keep comparing how he treated the ex and how he treats me and it is completely different. She was lavished with gifts and i pretty much never get anything.
He spent 1/2 hour telling me why he did the things that he did for his ex girlfriend. He told me that he never again wants to get a woman who is dependent.... who (although she was very kind to him) kept milking him for money. Given that he is a multimillionaire he didn't care about forking over some cash for her to go shopping. However he told me that it grew completely out of control... 20 grand here and there.
He said that she was sweet to him- but there was no depth between them. It was all superficial. He said he wanted a woman to "stimulate" his mind.. who was smart. He said he then decided that he wanted an independent woman.... someone who also brought something to the table... someone educated.... "she has to be hot of course" (isn't he sweet for saying that
)... He said he felt he deserved the total package and he feels he found that in me. Told me not to destroy this over someone he has no feelings for.
He asked me if there were anything he could do help me feel secure with us again.... to get his old Jessie back. Said he wanted to do anything he could. OMG my heart just melted... He actually wants to help me.
Can you believe he said that......... see this is why i feel badly for putting him through all my garbage. I am going to continue with my therapist.... work on my readings.... complete the exercises in those workbooks and just have a positive hopeful attitude that he and i will be okay. That i am worthy of having him.... that he didn't consider his ex better than me. If he did he wouldn't have left her.
My therapist has been demonstrating how to deal with my negative thoughts that pop in my head taking me from 0 to 100 in a matter of milliseconds. It is just SO difficult to implement her strategies when the negative thoughts are so automatic and thus send my emotions into a tailspin. I am going to practice and practice. I really hope this works over time. Of course i am not expecting anything after only 3 sessions, however... my goodness i hope by next year this time i am more emotionally regulated
Thank you everyone SO SO SO much. I love reading your responses. If anyone else has anything they would want to say i sincerely welcome it. I supposed being honest (even though i didn't say the words LSE) was better than my old approach of either avoid or argue to protect my ego!
Jessie