So, I got out of a long-term relationship a little while ago and it was fine. A healthy breakup. We weren’t right for each other and there was no intimacy for over a year. No sex, no nothing. She fell out of love and had a lot of trauma and social fears she said she wanted to get over before she felt okay being a partner to anyone. That’s totally fair, so we went our separate ways.
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I have a history of being in a couple of abusive relationships, and it has taken me many years to get past the trauma from one in particular. I’m in a healthy place now. I was in a healthy place going into the start of this last relationship, and now that it’s over I still feel like I know exactly who I am, what I want, and how to communicate and look after my own feelings. An old ex of mine and I got back in touch a half year ago, just as friends, nothing more. She was seeing someone, I was still with my last partner. Well, now we’re both single and we’ve been reconnecting even more. I very quickly remembered why I liked this girl so much. She’s kind, funny, and absolutely beautiful. Just being around her is like being outside on the most gorgeous day you can think of. She also has a history of being with abusive partners, so we are able to understand what the other has been through extremely well, and we talk about it.
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When this ex and I were together, it wasn’t long. This was back in 2018. Only a few months. She ended things because she said she didn’t want to be together with me anymore, which is fair, but I always suspected there was something more. I was right. While we have been reconnecting, I asked her about it and she was totally honest about it. She said that when we were together back in 2018, an on-again-off-again partner she had been seeing before me came back into her life and promised he would do things right, and treat her better. He is a narcissist, through and through. But, she was still in that abusive cycle with him, and she believed him and ended things with me to give him a chance. She apologized for not telling me the reasons back in 2018. She said that she tried to make the best choice she could back then while being in the abuse cycle, but she had felt a lot of guilt and regret since about potentially hurting my feelings, because she still had feelings for me when she broke up with me, but she never told me that until now. I forgave her (because, honestly, I had come to terms a long time ago that breaking up is allowed, and while it did hurt, she told me straight up that she didn’t want to be together).
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Since that time, we have been getting closer and closer. We’ve been going on dates, and playing minecraft together, and she has been nothing but open and honest about every hard question I’ve had. I really really like this girl, but I also feel terrified. When she ended things in 2018, I felt like it was because I had come off as too forward with my feelings. Even though I know the full story now about why she ended things, I still have that fear in the back of my head. Part of me wants to tell her how wonderful talking to her again has been, and how amazing she is, and how much I just want to make her laugh and smile because she makes me laugh and smile, but then I think about last time, and I feel somewhat scared. How can I get over this? I want to talk to her about it but don’t entirely know how to approach it – I feel like I’ll come off as too clingy or something if I tell her 🤷♂️
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**tl;dr**: Ex and I reconnected, it has been amazing so far, but I feel a lingering worry from the last time we were together and am having a hard time figuring out how to bring it up with her respectfully and not pathetically 🤷♂️