Holding it together on September 21, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

My ex and I broke up about a year ago. We were mismatched in every way but one, and a lot of bad things happened. We still have a lot of mutual friends online, even though he’s told all his friends that I’m insane/delusional/dangerous. For my part, I did most of my most vehement bitching to people who didn’t know him.

A couple of days ago, he posted a long and uncalled for summary of some of the worst things that happened between us to a usenet group, because he thought I was snarking at his wife. (They’ve been married for a couple of months, I guess.) He’s under the mistaken impression that I’m conducting a smear campaign against him, when even my closest friends say that the worst thing they’ve ever heard me say about him is that I ought to have known better, and that he still owes me money. (He did, at the time. We’ve since settled.)

I just hate it that he’s implying that he has a life, simply because he and some fat blue-haired chick got married in the park; because I’m single by choice, and spending my spare time going out with friends, doing volunteer work and generally living the life I want to live, mine doesn’t count.

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Dear Breakup Girl,

Help. I have acquired an extraordinarily complicated personal life.

Two months ago, it was like a Frank Lloyd Wright structure, all clean lines and good sense. Then my bf of six months broke up with me for another girl he had known for preCISEly forty-eight hours (no standing in the way of true love, I guess). We were determined to stay friends. It was a difficult break-up for both of us; we cried a lot, I was upset and mad and he was just … in love.

The friend thing quickly fell apart because his new gf goes rabid at the thought of me, and because now that I was no longer the primary female in his life, this previously conscientious, thoughtful and sweet man started being none of the above. I won’t get into specifics, but he started demonstrating aspects to his personality I would have been much happier never to have seen.

This really scared me. Before: Cool guy. After: Hyde. Who knew?

Now it seems that the planets have realigned and every man I ever knew before him has reasserted himself in my life in their single states. The ex love of my life who lives far away is going to be in town for a month. The guy I lived with in university and who lives even farther away is in the country for two months. The guy I had a huge crush on at my first job and who had a girlfriend is now single and making it clear that he’s interested. A guy who I would have dated had I not met Hyde who then started dating one of my friends called me the minute he found out about the breakup and said (I quote) –“It’s not serious between us. She knows that. So do you want to go out for dinner some time?” Then there’s this sweet boy who lives far away who keeps asking me to come and visit …

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A sad ending on September 7, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

I am, I think, as of today, finally extricating myself from a relationship that was horrible and sad, from a man I love(d) with all my heart. I feel so awful, looking around the house we just moved into, and seeing our whole life that we had built together (hanging pictures, watering the plants, meals together, etc.), and I feel like I’ve wasted so much time and tried so hard, for a man who, ultimately, was so wrong for me. I feel guilty for letting my elation and infatuation get in the way of all the alarms in my head at the beginning, and postponing the end for years(!) until we do nothing but hurt each other, and still know we love each other. Although the insurmountable reason I’m giving up is that he’s attached to another woman and can’t/won’t let go, I realize our problems were so big that she is really just the catalyst.

I’m an intelligent woman– I pride myself on being positive and optimistic– do I have to become cynical and build the walls I hate in others to someday achieve a healthy relationship? Or, will I just punish the next guys for what I’ve been through with my past relationships? AND! How does anyone ever really know someone is right for them? It seems like everyone puts their “best foot forward” and then after I’m already sucked in I find out things that would have eliminated them at the start, but by the time the “bad stuff” is evident, I’m already in love and want to try to make it work!

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Motherly advice on August 17, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

I have a son that has been dumped after a 3 1/2 year relationship. He is a total basket case, almost suicidal and drinking HEAVILY. If he continues trying to drown his sorrow, he’ll turn into an alcoholic. How, as a mother, can I help him????

— Polly

Dear Polly,

Go, Mom! Excellent question. Over to you, Belleruth: “What you should do depends on whether he lives at home or not and how long this is going on and how bad the drinking really is. If he’s at home and it’s been going on for a long time, then it’s definitely your business, cause if he’s with you, his moods, habits and behavior affect you directly. It might even be useful to him for you to tell him to shape up and get a grip, cause he’s driving you nuts and you’re tired of tripping over beer cans and trying to keep your mood up in the face of such perpetual, unmitigated anguish. If the drinking is out of control and he lives at home you can tell him to stop, get help or get out. If it’s only been a few weeks, you can listen, make encouraging little noises, occasionally suggest something helpful, like “Why not go out and make believe you’re not miserable for a coupla hours… maybe you’ll even wind up having a halfway decent time…” etc etc., and when his friends call, you could even occasionally intervene, as in: ‘Yo, Bob, take him out, will ya? He’s turning into eggplant parmesan on that sofa.’ And if it’s been a really long time and nothing is changing, you might want to suggest AA, therapy, a support group, etc. for him, or try Al-Anon for yourself — or at least see a drug/alcohol counselor and get a professional evaluation on how bad it is and what you can do. Otherwise the best — and most difficult — thing a mom can do is take deep breaths and try not to die a thousand deaths while watching the kid suffer, wish him well, and know that this too will pass.”

Love,
BG/BR

The opposite, from June 15, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

Love you, love your column! THE love of my life destroyed me last summer and I still haven’t gotten over him. I have dated a whole bunch of men, tried to keep busy etc….but can’t stop feeling that I have lost the best thing I ever had. I just keep thinking I don’t want him to be happy because I am not. I thought I was doing well for a long time but lately it has all come back to me. Help me! I want my ex out of my head.

— Hopeful to Heal

Dear Hopeful,

You did lose the best thing you ever had. Until that point. And at this point, it’s all coming back to you because, well, you still know what you did last summer. I mean, really, the teeniest things — the whiff of a scent, the note of a song — remind us of loves and losses; how ’bout when that reminder is … the sun ?! And so, even at this time of increased slothitude, you’ve got to do more than “keep busy.” You’ve gone past the statute of limitations for “distractions.” You are still just treading water, gulping brine into your empty heart and lungs. You said it yourself: you do not want him to be happy because you are not happy. This is the problem: not getting over him, but changing what’s around you. What will make you happy (no fair saying “him”)? Grad school, a road trip, new curtains? Figure it out. For real. And at the risk of sounding glib, DO THAT.

Love,
Breakup Girl

Predicament of the Week from June 29, 1998…

Dear Breakup Girl,

After three years together and two years of friendship my girlfriend broke up with me…over the phone. She informed me that she did not want a relationship and then refused to talk to me about it because she was late for a movie! I tried calling her later that evening and once more she refused to talk about the breakup, only saying she enjoyed being single, and hung up on me. A few days later she sent me an e-mail saying that she never said goodbye and that she needed time; our time together, she went on, was important to her, and she would never give up all the gifts and stuffed toys I had given her over the years. She told me she would call me on Thursday — well, Thursday came and went and she did not call. I worried, so I called her and her first words were, “I’m going out with someone else now and there is no chance of us getting back together.”

It only gets worse after the jump…

This story made headlines last week:

Richard Batista can live with his broken heart. He just can’t bear his cheating wife living with his healthy kidney.

The Long Island doctor wants the one-time love of his life to pay $1.5 million for the organ he bestowed on her eight years ago in a gift meant to save her life and their foundering marriage.

Dude, you have two and she gets half of everything, right? Oops, not so fast:

But divorce lawyers say a donated organ is not a marital asset to be divided.

Well, now there are counter claims from the wife!

Dawnell Batista says Richard Batista was so obsessed with the idea that she was cheating on him that he went so far as to go through her underwear seeking signs she’d been with another man.

That’s it? I thought she might sue for her old uterus back.