The story so far (and why pizza is painful right now)

In October last year I started emailing a guy on a well-known dating site. Actually, let’s be clear, he started emailing me. (These details really matter to me right now.) We felt a connection straight away. As fate would have it, we couldn’t meet up for a month, but we stayed in touch and really got to know each other over email. So, by the time we finally met, we both already had pretty strong feelings. Five dates later he invited himself over to my flat since it’s in the catchment area for what is probably the best pizza takeaway in London. We ate pizza, we watched DVDs, we snogged like teenagers, and he asked me to be his girlfriend.

We were disgustingly happy. And I never even questioned that we were going to end up together. After all, a couple of months in he was the one talking about marriage and babies and moving in together. He told me he loved me. He pushed for us to meet each other’s families. He told me how much happier he was when he was with me. Now, you don’t know me yet, but trust me, I am not the kind of girl who starts planning her wedding after her first date. I’m too old and wise for that. 31 to be precise. But, for him, I let my guard down.

The months went on and we got into a lovely routine. We met the parents. We planned to take a month off next year to travel around Japan. And the whole time he warned me about how stressful his summer was going to be due to his job. But after the summer we would move in together. In fact, we did live together for a month. He moved into my flat while his house was being renovated. And we got on great.

I couldn’t believe my luck. But in a way I felt like I deserved this. I mean, I’ve had more than my fair share of disastrous relationships and humiliating dates. When I was 23 I went on a date with an investment banker who left me after one drink because he had, “a piece of chicken in the fridge that needs used tonight.” Harsh, right? So – thank goodness – everything was finally working out for me.

He went on holiday for two weeks. He was in touch every day. He told me he loved me even more when he was away.

Then his crazy summer of work kicked off. And he went to New York.

He was to be there for two weeks, then back in London for a week, then back in New York for six weeks. Did I think that this sucked? Of course I did. Did I complain? No. I was the supportive, cheerful girlfriend who he needed during this stressful time.

He came home after the first two weeks and something wasn’t right. I told him I felt insecure. I told him things felt odd. He said I was paranoid and had bad PMS.

When he went back to New York I felt awful. I was anxious, I was insecure, but he kept telling me he was just stressed with work. And I kept telling myself it was only six weeks. In fact, we saw each other at a wedding in Ireland two weeks later and everything seemed fine. Then I went out to visit in New York for a week and I thought everything seemed pretty much back to normal.

I should have trusted my guts.

The day he got back from New York I was super excited. I cleaned my flat, I got in booze to make his favourite cocktails, I texted him and said I would order “our pizza” for dinner.

He came over, hugged me, spent a good hour and a half on my sofa stroking me and cuddling me and eating pizza. Then he said he felt sick because he had, “something to tell me.” Turns out it was a little more than “something”. He had spent the past two months thinking about whether he wanted to be with me and had decided that he did not. He acknowledged that he had always been the one to talk about moving in together, but said he had actually never felt that way about me. He told me he was so much happier when he was with me, but “something’s missing”.

Honestly, I was in shock. There’s so many things I wish I had asked or thought to say. I ended up just asking him to leave so that I could call my friend. And before I even really knew what had happened he was gone, I was on my own again, and that f***ing pizza of doom was sat on my kitchen table – mocking me for my stupidity.

I’ve spent the past two and a half weeks going between my parents’ home in Scotland and my flat in London. I’ve spent a fortune on flights, massages and vodka. I’ve never felt like this in my life. And I thank god every day for my lovely friends who are on-hand to offer advice, encouragement, alcohol, halloumi, and powerful words of wisdom like these, “You will eat pizza again, Apes.”

Tags: break up, heartbroken, it's not you it's me