Dear Miss U,
I met my boyfriend online we’ve been constantly messaging and our first actual meeting was when he came to visit me. We been together for about 10 months. I met his parents on skype, and his friends. We had same common interest. He stayed for about a month, until then when it finally started our long distance, we message, and do Skype calls. Here is the thing I am from the Philippines & he is from South Korea. Our love is strong. And we talked about our future together. My only concern is earning money and he as well. But he won’t make that effort to visit me again. And when I asked he said sure he can come back, but I can’t go there to see him next year. Lately I have seen changes in communication, and now that he is working I don’t want to bother him. He makes fun of the small things, like how I’m flat chested, how he would just bluntly say I’m not beautiful, or I’m too straightforward. I don’t ask anything from him. But just his time. Distance is hard. But lately I get a lot of ‘you can’t come here, cause you are poor’ (I lost about 80 thousand dollars from my ex bf before and I had to get money back) he knows my situation but he doesn’t understand how hard it is. I am learning Korean for his sake. He tells me I make him tired but I haven’t done anything. He told me he cannot wait for me for 2 years. He sometimes tell me that he will buy a hooker or go clubbing, as a joke… and meet other women. Cos I’m not around. As a joke.
I don’t understand. Am I not good enough for him?
Jelly Fish
Oh sweetheart, no. It is he who is not good enough for you. You are so far out of this guy’s league his only hope of keeping you is to destroy your self-esteem and confidence; which is the heart of these horrible things he says to you. People who want to be in your life, will be in your life. They make the effort, not excuses. True love? True love doesn’t tell you that you are ugly, because when you deeply care for someone and you know them at a soul level they never can be ugly to you. For example, logically I know that Mr. E isn’t the Old Spice guy or Zac Efron (or whoever people are swooning over these days,) but to me he may as well be. Some part of me knows that his skin isn’t good, that his mono-brow needs help and that marriage has given him a spare tire that wasn’t there before. I know these things. But somehow, because I love him, I see how enviable his eyelashes are, how firm his ass is or how competent his hand are instead. I’m not blind, but I do see beyond his faults. Sometimes I even love him more because of them.
Likewise, he doesn’t see the grey creeping into my hair and even though the breast fairy never visited me either, not once has he put me down for this supposed “lack.”
True love doesn’t break you down, it builds you up. Your partner should celebrate your straight-forwardness, and any other strengths you have. Someone that loves you doesn’t intentionally hurt your feelings and feed your insecurities by “joking” about sleeping with other women because you are not around. No. Just no.
There are so many red flags here, Jelly Fish, and I hope you can see them. This relationship is not ok. His treatment of you is neither normal nor acceptable.
Sadly you have already given him ten months of your precious life, but please don’t waste another day on him. Don’t wonder what you can do to fix this, because he isn’t worth fixing it for (and the problem happens to be him.) Like you said distance is hard; so don’t do it for someone who isn’t worth it.
Dear Miss U,
I’ve previously asked a question, “Boys-Behaving-Badly.”
Now for the update. Ever since she left, I’ve been working on myself, working on being a better person for me and for her. August 6 2015, I told her “I miss you” she then told me “I miss you too 🙂 hope you’re having a good time with your friends and all.” A month later (we had been talking normally during that month,) after not showing up as usual, I went down to her place to bring some of her stuff back as an excuse to see and to talk her. She then tells me she wants to move on and there’s another guy and she has feelings for him (don’t believe her.) There’s something that doesn’t mix, in my opinion. She said she was still crying about all of this and for me that means that she’s doing something that hurts her, that she won’t necessarily want, but she would then act on her brain instead of her heart, on what she needs right now. I told her “I love you and I want nothing but the best for you, even if it’s without me, but I would like to give my best shot when I’m at my fullest. The efforts I’ve made are too much to be discarded, disregarded, whatever the word is. I don’t want you to be upset or anything else but happy. Do you understand?” She said she did, but didn’t want a deal as I was trying to make one with her before saying that. Then I told her what the deal was: she thinks about it, I don’t message her, give her peace. She read it but didn’t say anything. Knowing her, she would have said no right away if she didn’t agree. How can I get her back? She = everything to me.
David
Dear David,
Thank you for writing to me again. I do wonder how things turn out for people after our lives brush against each other’s.
Sadly what I have to say to you is not going to be what you want to hear.
It doesn’t matter if you believe her when she says she has feelings for someone else. It doesn’t even matter if she is lying. What matters is that she has asked to move on, and you need to respect that. If you love her as deeply as you claim and you want what is best for her, then you need to let her go. Stop contacting her, and stop visiting her.
For women interacting with their ex-partners, life can be very scary. The biggest killer of women is men (whilst the biggest killer of men is heart disease) and so if she doesn’t feel safe she might simply be trying to find the right words to get you to leave her alone, without the risk of upsetting you to the point where you hurt her or pursue more aggressive means of “getting her back.” That’s reality as a woman.
The thing is, she isn’t a prize to be won. She isn’t property. She is a self-determining individual with her own wants and needs and whilst she may miss the good times with you, she doesn’t want or need you in her life. This is a decision she has made for herself, and it lands you firmly in “creepy stalker territory” if you don’t respect that and back off immediately.
As I said to you last time, sometimes too much damage is done to a relationship and it cannot be repaired. There might still be feelings, but the past can’t be undone, and thus there is no future. “Too much water under the bridge” grandma would say.
I know it hurts. Heartbreak is crushing, especially when you’ve been trying so hard to get your life together. The good news is that effort isn’t wasted. You will have the opportunity to start fresh with someone new, someone who isn’t held back by your personal dark ages, and that is a really positive thing – having someone in your life who meets you as the person you want to be, not the person you were before you found yourself.
Lastly, isn’t it better to be in a relationship with someone who wants to be there 100% rather than with someone you had to coerce to be there?
