So, yeah, title is self explanatory. Me and my girlfriend of two years have split up. What I can guess is permanently. It was a mutual agreement more or less.

To give a little bit of a backstory. She is 5 years my senior and was my shift manager at my first job which was in a restaurant. Ended up becoming friends, I chased her around and stuff, but never really made a sexual move seeing as I still had my V plates at the time, so being an anxious little virgin, as you would. I proposed a date which she politely declined, I think I was nowhere her usual type and suspected just as much but continued to persist. One day at a staff do she ended up getting drunk and went home with some other guy right in front of me, so as you can imagine I was heartbroken, somehow though I decided to look past that and continue my pursuit. Which I severely regret because the doubt which planted in my mind from that point, to this day, remains in my mind.

Anyway not sure how it happened but we finally ended up sleeping together. First time we tried it, she felt it was wrong taking my virginity, me not knowing how to do shit etc was painfully obvious. So I went off and made a lie that I slept with some girl from school, but in reality just ended up reading a fuck tonne of information on how to actually do "it" from some female sites etc. You'd be surprised how good advice women can give. Anyway we did it and proceeded to be friends with benefits for 3 month's or so but it has eventually developed into a relationship. Which has carried on since November 2012 up until 2 days ago. As in every relationship we had our good and bad days. But the last few months were just horrid in terms of what a relationship should be. I have graduated few months back and got a "real" job shortly afterwards, so that left just weekends for us. But she continued to work at our old restaurant as a manager. As I still live with my parents I don't have to pay rent yet, so I have decided to save up money as much as possible over the next year or two to be able to put down a deposit for a mortgage for us, but she wanted to go out on weekends etc. And me being a guy who was raised that way, I wanted to cover the restaurant bills etc. So I was running into the red rather than saving anything. So sometimes I would skimp out on not going to zoo or something because the night before I had to pay for cinema and dinner, which already totalled £90, huge for a trainee quantity surveyor btw.

Thing is I didn't want to go out unless I paid for it, because she had rent etc so I felt really shitty if I forced her to pay for it. Skip forward till two weeks ago, we have a "break" that she proposed so I go cold Turkey and don't contact her for 4 days till she starts messaging me. I've got a feeling she was feeling that relationship has died down a few months now because I felt that way too and her boss who's her friend and her roommate was giving her weekends off, which is huge for a restaurant in an attempt to rekindle our relationship I can now guess. But the way those weekends panned out is whenever I showed her affection she would get annoyed about it and just watch tv, so I get bored and whip laptop out and just sit on it, So effectively like an old couple just sitting there in silence.

At that point sex life has died down to once a week from the usual randomized quota which was definitely more than one. So I get pissed off, working in an office you get a lot of time to ponder on life and make rash decisions, so I tell her we need to talk. I show up she tells me that it's just not the same, to which I agree and that we should break up and be friends, you know the usual shit. Then we hug and I tear up like a little bitch. Grab my stuff and gtfo. As I drive just break down in my car from her intoxicating smell on my jumper and have to stop to collect myself. Problem is mum knows her too and likes her, so she keeps Fucking bugging me about what went wrong and shit, and apparently how it's my responsibility to win her back, which brings me to think that we genuinely had very little in common, our political views do not align in the slightest, she doesn't game, I don't really like to go out that often.

I think the biggest blow is that she made A class carbonara, and she knew I absolutely Fucking loved it. But she stopped making it and every time I requested would just say no, I guess that's the point I should have cut it short, because it gets to the point where you don't give two fucks about pleasing each other, like I stopped caring and would play games till the very last minute before heading off to hers, most the time turning up late with some bullshit excuse, I think that's the stage where I should have realized this relationship wouldn't work. My main interest does not align with her main interest.

TLDR: met a girl. First girlfriend. Two years. Broke up cos love is gone.

The real bollock is that now am feeling really Fucking shitty and mum keeps insisting I should patch things up and it's just the older women insecurities shining through, she is 5 years older than my step dad too. However I think that love is gone, and without the things in common we will just run into the exact same barrier in 1, 3, 5 years time, what could be worse is if we have a kid or something together.

How did your first serious break up pan down and why?

Ps. Fucking hamster died today too, choked on a woodshaving. Really close to worst week of my life to date.

Fucking phone. Going to format on a laptop

How old are you?

Going to turn 22 this October.

On a grand scheme of things I got a really cushy easy life and this is just one of those "first world problems". I know that. But still doesn't make me feel any better no matter how much I put it in retrospect about what other people my age are growing through, or the shit that is to come.

But my parents are moving house this weekend, so I won't have internet for the next two weeks or so, so I got that going for me, which is just great, because I really do need it to keep me occupied and really not use my spare time pondering.

Anyway.. Listen.. You're young.. Probably your first real gf? Yeah its sucks breaking up.. Bwoewoe.. Cry for a few days, never forget the things that made you smile but remember.. You two broke up for a reason.. A lesson you now have learned.. Never listen to your mom about love.. Its your hart not hers..

The thing is, and i'm gonna be blunt as a drunk dutchman, YOU know NOTHING about love. experience it with other women, 2 , 5 , 10 i don't care... LEARN from every relationship that you will have. Till the one that is 95% working for you AND her.. Work TOGETHER on the other 5%.

I'm 10 years older and my god i have shitty friends in shitty relationships.. Married, 2 kids etc and they tell: "yeah i sometimes pretend to be dumber so my husband feels better" that fucking ridiculous.. Or "my wife doesn't cook what i want" which i answered with "why don't you cook" and the gaze this friend gave me like wtf are you talking about.. Don't be a fool thinking she is it.. You know nothing but do have the time to learn..

My first breakup? Devasted like all.. I was like 15? Most beautiful girl in class moved away.. There was no internet back then.. So yes i made the mistake comparing every other girl after her with her.. So i didn't see the other beauty, other qualities these girls had.. Not fair to them extremly stupid from me.. Also didn't go for blonds for a while.. But then i met this girl who made me forget about my first love.. But then she screwed up by saying i had this boyish charm on lot of the girls.. With that knowledge i went into the fase of getting to know a lot of girls in private..

I hear you. And being young does play to my advantage here. And every time I think of things to come and where I am now I do feel a lot better and optimistic, and I know it's better for both of us that way.




But then I get sad and nostalgic anyway, which I would assume is the standard case of "my mind is telling me no, but my body is telling me yes". I don't feel like talking to people irl about it, so I put on a charade when we went for drink yesterday, it's just weird not having the self control to stop feeling so Fucking sorry for it ending. Which is I guess what love is. I do think am a partly sociopath because I do hate talking to people and would much prefer to do my own thing, and when I do have something I don't have love for it or anything, but when it's gone I miss it like fuck.

Exactly what am talking about would happen if I did win her back. As I was a student I didn't want to move in with her and when I got a job it was the case of saving the money for apartment later, but that's what was the downfall of the relationship I think. It was a time bomb waiting to explode is what I come to conclude when I think about it rationally, but then I get all depressed.

She also wants to be friends with me and it was the case of "It's not you, it's me". But I know it was me AND her. And I know full well a friendship wouldn't cut it either, because whilst we're still friends we won't be able to move onto serious relationships with our somewhat brief - yet long history together, and it would just create a vicious cycle.

Yeah that pretty normal.. The "its over and its never ever getting better" feeling.. Thats the one thing i can't advice on.. Cause it personal.. Sometimes it took me 3 months to shave my beard on go out.. Other times like 3 days... Which more felt like having a weight lifted of my shoulders.. Its not easy to acknowledge the moment that your heart is open again.. When you are older its easier, normally by then you know a lot more people and have connected with them.. Some you have stronger feelings for but never admitted to them cause you were in a reationship with someone else..

But like i said.. You're young.. Go out with your friends.. Meet new people.. There is always that girl at the office who you have a connection with. Ask her for a drink. And listen closely; just a drink, its not that you will have to marry her. Thats the only advice i can give you.. Some people are waaay too occupied with the results and future consecenses of a date that they miss the point. Two persons enjoying spending time with each other..

I applaud this post. Much wisdom in it. =)