Ugh.. I think I need professional help 😅

this sounds like a joke but it's not.

I feel I've been having a weird wrong attachment to a guy that was never truly mine. It started like 12 years ago, when I was still in high school. We had testing in a classroom shared with another class. He came in late. It felt like we had an instant connection. I don't know what it was, It wasn't the kind of connection like a tread, it felt more like.. IDK, a chain that was pulling me, strong and absolutely undeniable.. I couldn't stop staring at him, and he was also looking at me. The next day, he was on time. He was in front of the closed classroom door and I innocently wiggled my way through boys and girls, until I stood next to him. He's quite a bit taller than I am, and since I had wiggled through a crowd, we were pretty close together. So when I turned towards him and looked up into his eyes.. and his eyes meeting me back.. ugh.. I could have melted in the spot, I actually might have.. I felt like I was shooting through a million dimensions. Then ofcourse a teacher came and we had to take our seats. He walked me home that day, we had a good chat that I remember nothing about. When I was home, he kissed the top of my head. I felt like hyper kinetic rainbows were shooting through my entire body, starting from where he kissed me. This is something that stayed. We had a non-defined something. At some point that schoolyear I moved to my own apartment, due to domestic abuse. He already had his drivers license, a car and a job. So when he felt like it, he'd drop by, we'd chat, we'd have sex.. (I mean seriously, there's nothing better than having sex with someone who makes your body feel electrified with the tiniest touch) It wasn't ideal though. We never met outside my apartment, we never did stuff (obviously he was busy and had a job and went to school and he still lived at home and his parents never allowed him to sleep elsewhere)

Anyways at some point he decided to not contact me anymore and to ignore me when I tried to contact him. Mind you, our chats never involved how he felt about me, that was always up for my guessing and since we never did anything else but have sex.. I don't think he felt about me the way I felt about him. He did try to teach me self worth.. like I was often talked into situations I didn't want to be in and he told me to stand my ground and my words hold value and I am in my right to set my own boundaries. (I still have issues with that now) and looking back and thinking about those words make me think like.. wow that was actually pretty damn mature.

Anyways after he ignored me, I dated a guy I didn't actually care about, and then later I dated a guy that has a similar physique and when I was in his arms, I felt like flashbacks to this guy. We've been together for about 8 years and have a child together. We seperated officially this july (2023), but we were actually broken up the july before (2022). So a couple of years after he ignored me and we didn't have contact, (this must have been like 2016?), he sent me messages.. a "hey" then a couple of months later "hi" then a few weeks later "hey, are you still mad at me" So I asked him like why are you contacting me and he was responding without responding.. eventually he said he didn't want us to be fighting (it had been like.. 4 years since we last talked) I asked him why (I obviously wanted him to say he was deeply in love with me or something 🤣 or.. idk.. at least that he felt a similar connection) so he concluded that I was still mad. I told him that I had been hurt because it appeared we had had different things on our minds etc. but whatever and I couldn't talk anymore because I was on my way home from a nightshift and I wanted to remain trackable.

A couple of years pass and he was living like.. a mile away from my dad (and I'm pretty close to my dad) with his girlfriend who is so very similar to me it's almost creepy. Since he lived so close to my dad, and he started a business, my stepmom ended up sharing his business and I liked it (on Facebook), because well I like the business and I know him and I wanted to.. idk support or something.. So he started a conversation with me in messenger.. We talked what life was all about and it seemed pretty normal, like friends.

That is until NewYear 2023. I wished him happy new year, he liked it, wished me happy new year, he asked to be reminded of my snapchat. Now.. I never had any snapchat. - and here's where I am absolutely wrong, ok, I am aware of that but I am at this point not in a committed relationship and I don't know the status of his' and I don't ask about it because I don't want to hear that he's happy with her and she's the love of his life or whatever he might answer, so I just don't ask. I do assume that if she's the love of his life, he wouldn't be texting me. But I am very aware none of that is an excuse. I shouldn't be texting an occupied man whatsoever. It feels conflicting because I knew him longer/my feelings are stronger (I just know... 😂 ridiculous)/he holds most responsibility because he's in the relationship/whatever.. but I know it's wrong and I still did do it. - So I downloaded snapchat and made me an account. He told me they're sleeping seperately, but that's about it. He told me she has a similar relationship with her (abusive) parent as I have with mine. He told me part of his life, he listened to my story and why I ended the relationship with the father of my child. Then by February I asked him if he was doing something for valentines day for his girlfriend, at this point we were still amicable and I was just curious; as he had went all out for Christmas, I thought he'd go all out for valentines day as well, but he doesn't, he was however quite judgmental at my EX for not doing anything for mé? That confused me. At some point I think I told him about how I felt when we had met.. but that I am not having hopes anymore because of how things played out. He told me to "Stay Positive 😘" Like what did that even mean?

Later I was watching a real chickflic, Romcom with heavy leaning towards the "rom" part when he asked me what I was doing. I told him "I'm watching an over the top unrealistically romantic movie" and he told me "oh, you never know xx"

Anyways for a couple of months he sent me a lot of messages with a lot of xxx and ❤️❤️❤️ and 😘😘😘.. and I admit, I sent some back. When I was sick he was worried about me. He was texting me good morning and good evening every day. I saw him on an event in my dad's village, we didn't end up talking because he was with his friends and I was with my dad and my feral 3yo. But we smiled at eachother. I was super shy. Later he told me that I looked adorable and also that at one point he knew we were near but he didn't want to come closer because he wouldn't have been able to restrain himself from embracing me and that he didn't want to bring me in an uncomfortable position with my dad there. Then like a month later he invites me to his home, I refused, I share a car with my ex and I didn't have the car that day and it was also my son's birthday, which he knew as their birthdays are days apart. since I refused and explained he'd been super flakey. he's not responding then apologizing for being busy to when I ask him when he's not going to be as busy he's telling me he's not busy at all.. So just flakey.

I waited a while.. Like a month I sent him "hey" and he sent me hey back but then I asked why things were so watered down he just didn't respond, left me on read. Last Sunday I sent him "I don't understand what happened, but anyway. No response is a response too"

I meant to say something like "goodbye" or "have a nice life" or something but that sounded way dramatic, especially because we never really had anything so I left it at that. He read it about 30 minutes later.

Today, he responded. and I'm debating with myself if I even want to open it.

This sucks because I feel the way I feel and like I said, it's strong. Like for the past year or so I've been actively holding myself back to not just go to him whenever. Like I don't care if I have a car, I'd cycle or walk, it doesn't matter how long I'd be on my way. I think that's less now since his flaking again, but I still have some feelings.. and part of me thinks.. F_ck you, you don't get to toy with people like that. Like.. the time for a perfectly reasonable explanation is over.

So I want to just not open it. But I'm also curious. But I also know I'll want to respond if I see it...

I might need therapy for this... I don't think this *connection * I have with him is healthy even if he is feeling the same.

##Sorry of things are unclear or badly written, or don't fully make sense. None of our conversations were held in english, we are in Europe, my first language isn't english, I translated to the best of my abilities. At 1am (his message was sent around 4pm)##

@Leenda

I agree.

@Ashley

Can you be co-dependant if you've never been together?

@Kat

I haven't been waiting for him at all, for a while, I thought that might have been the issue, but it appears that it's not. What I'm worried about is that it's been 12 years. How am I going to move on? How can a therapist help me, like that's a genuine question, how can they help me? I did move on, I do think that we would be bad together, he has actually hurt me,... There are so many reasons it should be easy to move on.

I am aware that I won't get closure (That was the only reason for opening up to him now that we are adults and I feel he just took advantage of it) so I don't understand why it's so hard. He hasn't been a part of my life for so many years and it's still so strong.