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Dear Breakup Girl,

I recently ended a year-long relationship with the man of my dreams (I thought). We met on a match-up site on the Internet because we had so many similar interests. We e-mailed each other for three months before arranging to meet. He was 49, divorced for five years, with two grown children. I was 46, divorced for seven years, also with two grown children, and it turned out that we lived 15 minutes away from each other! After our first face-to-face meeting, we both felt that this relationship would be "something special."

This man was a CEO with an international real estate company, so not only did he have the prestige of the position, but seemed to be a loving, caring, "too good to be true" guy. He touted his love for me after three dates and gave me the key to his house. He started our "firsts" book: first date, first kiss, first trip, etc. (complete with theater stubs and pictures). He drew me candlelit baths and gave me relaxing massages; we went on marvelous trips together. I was given roses every month on the anniversary of the day we met. Yes, this was the man of my dreams. I moved in fourth months after we met.

Then the CEO took over. Everything I said was scrutinized, analyzed, and given a name from one of his many relationship books. I was a very complete, empowered woman when I met him. But, according to him, I became a sniveling, helpless snail unable to fend for myself. After I moved in and took off my rose-colored glasses, I realized that there was no fun, spontaneity, or conversation in the relationship unless it was through e-mails.

After nine months, he decided I should move out. No discussion. I was told there was no more spiritual or intellectual energy in the relationship, but he thanked me for sharing the sexual energy. As I was packing and in search of a manila envelope, I came across many files with women's names on them in a file cabinet. Since he was away on a business trip, I checked them out and couldn't believe what I was reading....

In the five years since his divorce, he had become a predator on the Internet. I was just one of over 200 women that he had contacted! He had group files and individual files, each filled with the e-mail correspondence he had with each woman. He met and slept with the majority of them; he had asked three or four to marry him. He had compiled lists of where they met, his first impressions, their hair and eye colors, favorite colors, birthdates, children and ex-husband' names, hobbies, sexual needs, etc. I realized that all of the special e-mails he sent to me had been copied from e-mails he had sent to them, except with the names changed. "Our" songs had also been "their" songs. Everything he had said and done to me had been carbon-copied. Even the trips had been repeats. I found a picture from one of the hotel rooms where we had stayed together, except this was taken by someone else from the same room! Even the breakup, about how the "energy" was passe -- yes, that was his standard line to all of the women.

Needless to say, I feel totally victimized. It was kismet for me to find the files; he had convinced me it was something I had done to destroy the relationship. I know now it had nothing to do with me, but I had to suffer nonetheless, and have to submit to a very humiliating HIV test.

How can I ever recover from the evil and dishonesty I have suffered from this relationship and trust a man again?

-- Suzz

Dear Suzz,

See, everyone, what I mean? Suzz, as crazy crazy mad bad as this must stun and hurt, Breakup Girl CAN assure you with 100% conviction that, well:

"NOT ALL GUYS ARE LIKE THIS."

Huge, heinous humdingers such as this one may be the most shocking, but they are, as such, the least indicative of...ANYTHING. Except perhaps that sometimes people are (technical term) total nutcases. Now, I'm sure part of you is like, "Yo BG! That 'nutcase' was my boyfriend!" I know. I totally don't mean to question your feelings or judgment, either then or now. You trusted this guy; he betrayed you. He wasn't the person that, er, any of you thought he was. That's about as bad as it gets.

How to heal? Well, I could give you some exercise like,"Suzz, look into your life and see in what way you perhaps 'seek out' compulsive Lotharios who still use carbon paper..." OR I could throw up my hands and say that people who dupe people like this succeed precisely because they're really good at it. That's their racket. But the percentage of people who dupe people on this level, among the people you'd meet in an average Single Life...is teeny. Hell Date stories abound, sure, but surely THIS is an off-the-charts aberration. Again: arguably/logically, you CAN pretty much trust that the next guy will not do something like this.

Still, I know that trust doesn't necessarily turn on percentages or statistics, or elaborate files of evidence. And who wouldn't, after all that, be terribly, reflexively, wary? You'd have to be, and that's not a bad thing -- after all, a little lack of trust goes a long way toward self-protection and survival.

So for now, nurse your wounds. Hurt all you want. Rage is fine, too. Remind yourself that, as you yourself said, "it had nothing to do with you." Be grateful -- glacial comfort though this may be -- that things didn't go even farther, that you weren't just dumped on your ass by someone you STILL believe is the cat's pajamas. Rely on your friends. Take baby steps back into your own life. AND take baby steps into the next thing -- NOT because "everyone's a predator," but just because, yeah, your sense of trust might be tiptoeing behind you. Give it a chance to catch up. And -- here it comes -- "you've got to trust yourself, too." Not only to tune in to warning signs, but ALSO to maintain, with only a soupcon of healthy suspicion, your standards for overt affection and devotion. So try, try, not to let this guy give all the good stuff you had a bad name. There is such a thing as "good" AND "true" -- and when you find it, you won't have to share.

Love,
Breakup Girl

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