Is there any way out of the pain of unrequited love?

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It seems to me that people who fall in love with someone who doesn't love them back are treated as losers or neurotic or somehow at fault? I'm in that position now and it's driving me crazy. I want my life back! He knocked on my door first, but says he just wanted to be friends. Now I'm in love with him and it hurts. I don't think this is my fault, because I don't know how it happened and I don't know how to get out of it. I'm stuck either seeing him regularly at my zen center or worried about how he's doing, missing him, and worried about my role at the zen center if he doesn't come back because of the tension between us. I don't know how to behave and I vascilate between the feelings I have for him and my frustration over the situation and how to take care of myself in the face of his Aspergers and mine. He's often so blunt and gruf that it just hurts more on top of his not loving me.

But isn't this the plan? It seems like this is how nature is set up. You win some. You lose some and it just takes time to come back to yourself again when you lose. Is there any more to this than patience? If so, I'd like to know. Hope springs eternal. There's always a part of me that thinks that somehow we could miraculously get through this and it would work out between us. I don't know which way to go. Both directions seem healthy in some way. And he says he's showed me all his cards, but somehow I feel like some are still really hidden.

I just want to say, "Yo, God. What's up with this? Could you cut it out already?"

Last edited by WonderWoman on 25 Jul 2008, 5:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I feel you sister (and I very seldom call people sister)...i have totally been there.....it really sucks....rawwr....I do not know the best plan of action for getting rid of that kind of plague. It happened to me and it lasted 5 stinking years.......complete cycle obsessing lameness...oh the wasted energy....oh the wasted time...and tears..and papaer...I guess I had it pretty bad...and yes I was treated like I was an insane loser.......I did get some pretty good songs out of it...and also some inspiration....there are things I did that I am glad I did that I would not have done if it had not been for that evil ***head...
Still...it was painful, and it did take a long time to get over......but I DID get over it....

Hopefully your situation will take less time and be less painful...if you DO truely remain friends...don't be friends with benefits....don't give him any gifts....even if your brain is screaming at you to do so....don't open yourself up to being used.

i dunnow....it is one of those tough things.....and that is why it sorta makes the world round....

Separation from the guy is the best cure....really.....

Wish I could be more optimistic.....

I did write a manual about what to do if this sort of thing happens to you....I also did a series of crudely drawn comix about it.....

Definitely no benefits. Luckily, he's a gentleman, and I don't feel in danger of being taken advantage of that way. (Which by the way, makes him more appealing! Because he's a good person! Ahhh!) He also seems afraid of intimacy--with just me or in general I can't tell from my vantage.

The creative outlets are another good thing.

Well, right now, there's not a "creative" thing I'm trying to do, but I am trying to pay back all my charge card debt (have to learn to "live creatively"?), and I tell myself that if I do find requited love then I'll be a better choice for him. It should take me one year of prudent living. Also, my zen practice for me is very creative. If you don't meditate, I hope you'll trust me on this, but I try to throw myself into it and when it's effective I'm a new person from moment to moment, still built on all the useful and good stuff of the old me, but newly created, fresh!

Thanks, poopylungstuffing

Everyone has a bad fault if you try to look for it. When I like a girl and they don't return the feelings, that's my first step. I find a fault I never really liked and just "ignored" or "overlooked" and I expand it to where I tell myself they are worthless and not worth my time and energy. A good friend perhaps, but "I'd never date them". A lot of it is a lie, and I know that, but you know the saying about repeating a lie enough and eventually you'll believe it?

The other part is knowing there is nothing you can do to make the other person love you back. First time this happened I spent 3 days, obsessed about what I did wrong, how I misjudged the situation, all that stuff. Analyzed it to a fault and never came up with anything (except lots of lost time as I got nothing else done those days except a little sleeping and a little eating). Turns out they were just using me and acting friendly to get what they wanted. I don't know if that is the whole truth, but that's what I've convinced myself of and there is some good evidence supporting it so I'm gonna stick with that because even assuming the worst case scenario it makes me feel better knowing she was just a user and there was nothing I could of done to detect it ahead of time and save myself from that situation again.

Either way, its going to hurt, so a lot of it is a time thing to matter what you do unfortunately.

Rynok, Thanks. I'm not ready to think of him as a worthless person, because he just isn't. But I think what I can do along your lines is be more realistic about him. I know plenty of his faults, so every time I think I miss him, I could remind myself of being free of those faults and be thankful for that: make a list of them in my head and just keep reminding myself of them. It's hard, because part of the ideal of love is to accept the person with their faults. But I gotta do what I gotta do to move on with my life, and he is definitely not perfect.

Time, and just easing the burden with friends online helps. Thanks.

Been there done that, still doing it. I think it's been the story of my life. I tend to get fixated on one person and focus all my energies into him. It's that way now. The difference is that he wants to be friends, he just doesn't seem to want a romantic involvement. He knows how I feel yet he hasn't pushed me away, he still seems to want to be here with me.

The pain is very great and I've often thought I should walk away but I never do. The joy outweighs the bad right now and it's an online relationship not a real life one at the moment. I've made the decision to ride it out and be prepared for the heart ache to come. That day will come when he finds another woman that he does want to be with and I'm left alone.

I wish I knew how to make it change and like you I hope every day that something will click in his head and he'll "realize" how much he really does love me. I think some of that is my own fault, I'm always online waiting for him, he never has to go without me here so maybe he doesn't know what it's like.

My best advice is to follow your heart. Does the friendship matter more than the other? Just know that it's not your fault and you are not worthless.

The friendship matters to me a lot, but if he does one of his gruf, blunt aspie responses or behaviors, it hurts even more because it makes me think that not only does he not love me, but he doesn't even like me! so I think that I should not stick around for the abuse and I react to him (i.e., tell him off). I don't know which way to go. I am continuing to try to stay mentally healthy in my own way, but it is hard work and I don't know where he should fit in.

Sorry to hear that you are going through a similar thing. Mine wanted to be friends too, but I can't handle the pain and I get mad at him. Sounds like you're able to handle it and behave properly. For me, my obsessions and meltdowns get in the way. When I feel safe and loved that doesn't happen. I can't behave well if I don't trust how someone feels about me.

*posts some hugs here*

hugs back at ya.

It's difficult, I know. I'm in a similar situation... there's a bloke who really likes me, but is being strichtly platonic because his depression has rendered him temporarily asexual and I don't know whether he'll turn back to me or not. It can be maddening and it sucks.

All I can suggest is time. It's trite to say that it heals all wounds, I know, but it's true. And if you can, it might help to fall for someone else. Someone who loves you back, in the way that you hope to be loved. But I wouldn't recommend leaping into another relationship straight away... give yourself some time to get to know other people and be as patient as you can about seeing whether something more develops. And try to do things that make you happy, things that take your mind off your feelings for him. The more you can fill your life with other things, the less overarching these feelings will seem.

I wish you the best of luck.

Thank you. Good advice. All very sound and soothing. Doing chores at home today, but tomorrow I have the whole day to do as I want. Even today i exercised slowly and that was for myself.

I've been in that position before... I had rushed into things too quickly; the result was a 3-year depression that nearly cost me my life (i.e. suicidal). As of now, I'm still somewhat friends with her, although because my feelings of attraction never truly die once they come into existence, I still feel something for her...

I was 14 at the time. I had no experience around women whatsoever (including just on a friends level), and of the many stupid failures that I've done in my life, that was probably my biggest, and because of that I will never rush into something like that again...

Better to have loved and failed, then not to have tried at all. You can't control things....you can help but not control them. I hope you recover enough someday to feel safe enough to love again.

The pain at times is very great, I have literally broken down in sobs over things like him not showing up or things that he's said. None of this he is really aware of because he's not here to see it. I can tell him I'm upset but he doesn't grasp the full extent of it. The blunt aspie responses are very hard to take even though I've grown to understand what he means but it's not easy to hear. What keeps me coming back is the fact that when he is here, he pays attention to me, he talks to me, we voice chat with a head set sometimes and I love his kind jovial voice. We used to use the web cam but after a year he decided that he wasn't comfortable with it. That was a hard one to take. He is here almost every day and spends alot of time on the computer with me.

I've gotten mad and given him a hard time, later I feel bad about it yet he still comes back the next day like nothing happened. How many guys would do that? I try to believe that if he didn't care, he wouldn't be here. Yeah, at this point, I don't think I could stand not having him here at all.

I do know that the obsessions eventually fade and in the past I've ended some on my own and others have ended because of the other person. It does take time but it will get easier if it ends. If you can't handle the pain well, it might be best to cut loose and start the healing process. You've got support here if that helps.

By definition, if a person doesn't love you back, then he or she is most certainly NOT the person for you, because "THE ONE" will love you, I assure you.