The Breakup

So I did it. I broke up with The GF. Over the last few days I've been feeling 'out of sorts' and I guess this was just a culmination of it.

We traded emails at work. In a nutshell, what started out as a seemingly good idea by me turned in to this ball of screeching and finger pointing. I said in an email after getting a terse response, 'I was trying to do something good. My intent was not to make you mad or upset. I was only trying to be a more active part in this relationship.'

After all the emails back and forth I called her to try to straighten things out and it only went downhill from there like an Olympic skier. She pretty much went off on me. I'm not sure about other people but I don't respond to well to finger pointing, blaming, and jabs. I like contructive conversations with solutions at the end. It's the pragmatist in me.

The conversation went on like this:

Me: ...then we should breakup. It's obvious I don't meet your basic needs.

The GF: But you do. You only do it in spurts, but I've seen you do it. I know you can.

Me: But if meeting your basic needs means I lose myself in the process, is that really worth it?

The GF: You're saying you don't want to? That's how I see it. You just want to give up. You don't even want to try.

Me: I've tried. I admit that I have been able to make you happy at times, but if we weigh it out, in the grand scheme of things you are unhappy more than you are happy.

The GF: I'd have to say it's 50-50.

Me: 50-50 is only good in baseball. (Other sports too but you get my drift!)

The GF: I don't agree. It's not what I want.

Me: It's what I want. I can't go on like this. It's crazy but I look in the mirror and don't even recognize myself. You want only the good parts of me. You want to mold the rest in to the man you think I should be. I am who I am. Scars and all. You need a man that's going conform to your definitions of what a man should be. Unfortunately I'm not that man. We are so far apart on the fundamental parts of what makes a relationship work.

The GF: How so?

Me: Here's a big one for me. It's the destination not the journey. For you it's all about the journey.

The GF: Example?

Me: This weekend. The bbq we went to.

The GF: So you're saying that you don't want me to have my way?

Me: It's not that at all, but each time you get your way and it compromises my own beliefs, I lose a little bit of myself. Today is nothing but a microcosm of how we don't work. I am not that man you need. I will never be. I believe that now.

The GF: Part of a relationship is working at it everyday.

Me: That illustrates my point. Fundamentally we disagree. I think good relationships just are.

The GF: No, you have to work at it.

Me: But you shouldn't have to work this hard....

It went on from there but that's the gist of it. I can't do this anymore. She has so many built in insecurities that I end up paying the price for what others have done. To her, if you make a mistake, it's within the rules to have that person pay over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again. I don't live in the past. Fix it. Get over it and move on. Let's start living for the good days. Stop worrying about what happened in the past.

I say this knowing that some things take more time to heal but other things are minutae (that's a great word).

My issue has to do with her control freakishness...her inability to be spontaneous. I love life. I live it like there's no tomorrow. I operate outside the lines because that's where it's most fun. She bandies back and forth between the lines.

In the beginning it was a good contrast to my aloofness. In the end it's one of our many downfalls.

She's not a bad woman by means. She's a great woman. She's just not that great for me.

SIDENOTE: ..amanda, I can't comment on your blog. Your word verification doesn't work.