Fumbling my way forward

[TJT]

Hey all - just wanted to write after this long spell to share… the day came. My ExH wrote me an email saying in short he regrets everything since the day he hurt me, is trying to work on himself, blah blah blah. He said he wished he had been a better person but now has to live with the consequences etc. and I was the best thing that ever happened to him. He made sure to say I shouldn’t feel obligated to respond (gee thanks for taking that weight off me haha).

Here’s the thing: I know his affair partner left him and in fact cheated on him. How do I know this? Pinterest. Dude only uses it to post deep quotes when he’s going through something apparently and I checked it after receiving his email to find a thousand clues.

The irony is beyond words. The quotes he’s posting are all like “if you love someone you don’t leave no matter how hard the situation”… “I hope they ask about me and I hope you tell them you messed up”… and other things about cheating, feeling useless due to being discarded on a whim, etc. Hah.

All this to say, first and foremost, I didn’t respond and don’t really care about this man one bit anymore. But also, I don’t believe for one minute he’s actually working on himself. His little fling left him and now he doesn’t know what else to do. While I feel validated in a way by his email - mainly just the concept that he feels the regret - it’s also maddening in a way that he still doesn’t seem to really fully get it and still continues to behave in a manipulative way veiled as something else. For example, he said he has hated every day since he hurt me. Really? I gave him more opportunities than he ever deserved… (and boy am I glad he didn’t take them). He also made a comment that he attempted to take his life because of being in such a dark bad place with things weighing heavy on his heart, so that’s why he’s writing me to express his regret. Everyone I talk to agrees - that seemed pretty irrelevant to say and more just an attempt to get pity. Same with the “don’t feel obligated to respond comment” - seems like a basic reverse psychology attempt. Oy. And lastly - if he really has all these realizations of his problems and is really working on himself I would fully expect him to have a therapist at a minimum. And while I don’t know this for sure, by the way his email was written and knowing how this man was in the past, he’s not doing a dang thing. He’s saying he’s doing it and telling himself he’s doing it when he’s really not doing jack. There was no specificity in his email about what issues he was going through at the time or what actual help he’s getting.

Anyway, not my problem anymore. I do find it interesting how I notice my mindset after receiving this email. I felt relieved that he wasn’t my problem anymore and also like I wanted to get away from him even more. While I always looked forward to one day getting this note to validate that I’m not crazy and didn’t deserve what happened, it’s also just totally not even close to fulfilling enough for all the pain he caused. That box is checked, but I am now repulsed by this person, and it embarrasses me that I ever tried so hard to make it work. I give myself grace because I guess it’s only until we let the whole thing transpire that we can accurately see the person for who they are. I can’t blame myself for thinking he should have been a good person worth fighting for, or might have been willing to put in work to grow.

So there’s that. Otherwise, I’m still seeing the same guy for 2.5 years now and I’m still working on my abandonment anxiety in general. Some things definitely still need to change with how I put way too much in before getting equal out. I learned this is a subconscious form of trying to prove my value in umpteen different ways when really I myself alone should be enough (I just thought I was a nice loyal person but this actually also makes a ton of sense for why I go above and beyond for nothing). I’m still trying to reconcile that because I don’t feel like I go through life feeling less than… I have just always felt like I need to work for what I get, I suppose, which isn’t a rule you necessarily should have to apply to a relationship at least in the way that I do.

Enough for now. Thanks to anyone still reading