Goodbye Berlin

Ow ow owwww.... VERY sore heart. I completely misread it with Berlin and now we're done. And I'm feeling so sad. And not a little bit humiliated also.

Berlin and I have been talking on WhatsApp. Every day. Keeping in touch with each other. After his whole 'online love scam' story we've gotten pretty close, and have walked next to each other through all our daily events. Just a nice virtual comfortable companionship. Remember that during the whole love scam unraveling, we had a pretty straight talk about what had happened all those months ago and that he wasn't really feeling it with me. And we settled on 'friends'.

So what made me think we could be more than friends? They way I felt, I guess. I thought he'd get past his infatuation with the scam girl, and that he and I would find our happy place together again. And that we would get closer and closer until we got together, like we'd wanted to all those months ago.  And another part of me thought that was probably never going to happen so tried to keep me 'in play' with my other boys - the CEO, the Banker, the Fund manager, and the Bush Man fling from last week.

But the romantic in me won over the cynic about a week ago when Berlin gave me a 'kiss' over WhatsApp:

21 Jan 9:10 PM - Trudy: How's your bath?

21 Jan 9:20 PM - Berlin: Not entered yet... but now now... Eyelids dropping...

21 Jan 9:20 PM - Trudy: Mine too

21 Jan 9:20 PM - Trudy: Meds kicking in

21 Jan 9:20 PM - Berlin:: Can I give you a good night kiss?

21 Jan 9:21 PM - Trudy: That would be just lovely.  Yes☺

21 Jan 9:22 PM - Berlin: Gentle one with a hug!

21 Jan 9:22 PM - Berlin: 😘(kiss pic)

21 Jan 9:22 PM - Trudy: 😘Nice

21 Jan 9:22 PM - Trudy: Night Berlin

21 Jan 9:23 PM - Berlin: Night Trudy😉

Wow. My  heart just melted. "He's coming back," I thought.

But after this moment, he started pulling away again. Not responding to my messages for hours, if at all. Clearly active on Facebook messenger, but not with me. Who then? I tried not to think about it. And forced myself to stop torturing myself with seeing his phone activity with other people - probably work or something, I told myself.

And we were set to meet up this weekend. It's been a month since we saw each other before I went overseas. And as I got back, so he was away, working and family time things. So this was The Weekend. We were going out for wine together. I have been counting the sleeps. And feeling such a sense of excited anticipation - just knowing at some level that this is the moment that our relationship will move to Another Level. Maybe he'll kiss me in real life. Maybe we'll just talk and touch and connect with each other at a deeper level. But I was just so sure this would be it.

Then Friday he was too busy. And suddenly on Saturday he was attending a braai. And finally, today, I wasn't getting much out of him about committing to a time. My head kept telling me to let it go. To leave it to him to make a time. To not chase him about it. But my heart was so very eager to see him. And, heart wins against head most times. So I messaged him.

25 Jan 12:03 PM - Trudy: {Photo of my online bank error message]

25 Jan 12:03 PM - Trudy: And suddenly my tax work grinds to an unexpected halt due to unforeseen circumstances

25 Jan 12:03 PM - Trudy: When is wine???? 

25 Jan 12:18 PM - Berlin: Ah, so you're also with those gangsters... Right now I'm lying by the pool and feeling veeeery lazy... 

25 Jan 12:19 PM - Trudy: You're not allowed to be too lazy to see me! 

25 Jan 12:41 PM - Berlin: Aaah.... let's see... 

25 Jan 1:15 PM - Berlin: Don't be grumpy with me... Just a lazy bone on a sunny Sunday... Maybe I'll wake up a little later... 

Ouch! Ouch ouch! WTF??  I'm in this huge excited anticipation space, and he might think about seeing me if he wakes up later? I suddenly felt so very discarded and disrespected. What happened to our plan? Wasn't he as excited as me to be together? Ugh. "He's just not that into you" suddenly started ringing in my ears. Ugh. No. Really???

I was tempted to just swallow the sore stuff and wait for him to wake up. And ask me out. But I knew that would be a bad move. I had a similar thing early on with John-the-Narc where I just swallowed my pain when he dropped me for a date at the last minute, and look where it got me!

So I decided to go for the brutally honest (albeit humiliating) approach. I told him how I was feeling:

25 Jan 1:32 PM - Trudy: Shew Berlin. I don't like how this makes me feel.  We're obviously in different places. I've really been looking forward to being with you a lot. And I think you're half hearted about it.

 And I'm confused. You 'kissed' me goodnight a few days ago. And then started pulling away from me again ever since.

 And it's ok that you're in a different place to me. I'm not blaming you.  I'm just saying that I don't think I'm capable of being in a yoyo place with you.

 I guess I do want more from this relationship than you do. And if that's the case then I need to take 10 steps back. Because it makes me too vulnerable with you. I keep feeling like we're on the edge of something delicious,  only to feel pushed away again. Ugh. It's like being 16 again. I just can't. It's too sore.

Wow. Hard to brave like this. Much easier to be breezy and pretend it really doesn't matter to me one way or the other. But it does. And if he can't handle that, then I guess it's better that I know about it sooner rather than later.

I got the sooner.

25 Jan 2:09 PM - Berlin: Trudy I'm baffled now... I thought we've been there already and we spoke about everything and cleared things... Now it seems we're back to square one... I'm honestly puzzled! Thought we were friends! Last week you tell me about how you got laid the way good friends that share secrets talk to each other and now this? 😳 All I said was that I'm relaxing a bit by the pool and after a seriously hectic week I don't see anything wrong with that on a Sunday afternoon... I'm sorry if you had any great expectations! Didn't realize what was happening in your mind after we spoke openly about everything quite a few weeks ago. Maybe it's better if I withdraw. It's probably better not to do business with each other under these circumstances too.

OK. That's it then. I was smoking my socks about him.  SO SO SORE! I guess I just have to spend a while getting over that now then. Ouch.

I sent my final response to him:

25 Jan 2:13 PM - Trudy: I'm a confused girl.

25 Jan 2:14 PM - Trudy: And it's not your fault.

25 Jan 2:14 PM - Trudy: I'm really saying it is just too hard for me. I know you were clear with me

25 Jan 2:15 PM - Trudy: I just also felt like i was getting mixed signals from you. But easily misinterpreted by me

25 Jan 2:15 PM - Trudy: Please don't be angry

25 Jan 2:16 PM - Trudy: And no need to withdraw from business space

25 Jan 2:19 PM - Trudy: I'm sore.  And sad.  And lonely. And far too susceptible to anyone who gets too close. I guess you really got under my skin all those months ago and I didn't ever really manage to shake that little hope that we would somehow find a place to be together.

25 Jan 2:19 PM - Trudy: Not your fault

25 Jan 2:19 PM - Trudy: Not your problem

25 Jan 2:19 PM - Trudy: My bad.

25 Jan 2:31 PM - Trudy: And of course there's nothing wrong with needing to collapse in a Sunday afternoon after such a hectic week.

It just made me realise how much we are in different places. I've been counting sleeps until I see you again and I would have moved heaven and earth to make sure that happened this weekend. And you were in much more of a 'ja whatever. .. I'm tired. Maybe we see each other,  maybe we don't'.

It was a shock to me. But made me wake up about the lalaland I'm living in.

So now I'm just nursing my poor heart again. I must be honest with myself - a part of me has loved him since we first found each other all those months ago. And I never lost my hope that we would be together at some stage. Like I was saying the other day - I think I believed I could 'Earn' my way into receiving love from him in return. Even now, in the face of very clear evidence to the contrary, I still think a part of me doesn't want to believe his response. But I must. I really must. I need to work through this very sore place now, and feel it all. And move on, putting my energy into people who do see a chance for me. Who want to be with me. As much as I want to be with them. And to stop chasing after rainbows.

I'm a good person. I deserve to be loved. And wanted. And cared for.

Don't I?