I don't feel secure in my current relationship. I feel like the guy I have been seeing is going to ghost when it takes him a while to respond, even if things seem fine on the surface. We have this odd dynamic where I am always excited about anything he suggests for a date, but whenever I try to initiate the plans, he has a weird or flimsy excuse for why he can't go.
I proposed to Dawn, and she accepted. Over the next few months, she became agitated and threw her engagement ring back at me. I kept it until we figured things out. Two years later, Dawn ghosted me. I was hurt, so I gave her space. We reconciled five months later. Three years later, I finally trusted her enough to ask her about getting married.
One of the most disorienting and heart-wrenching experiences many have gone through in the aftermath of a narcissistic relationship is seeing how quickly they replace you and move on to a new relationship. More often than not, the replacement is already waiting in the sidelines where the new relationship overlaps with the current one they are trying to leave. This is known as "grooming" the new supply for external validation, ego stabilization, and control.
We spent hours together and helped each other sort out our problems. He knew more about me than my wife. With no explanation, he stopped responding to texts and messages and is ignoring my calls. I have come to terms with this and deleted him from my social media and social circles. It's been two years now. The problem is my wife. Everyone else in my family has removed him from their social circles.
I've been getting close to a man for the past year and a half, and the other day we had a big blow-up. I didn't like the lax way that he was responding to me, and I wrote him a note saying as much. He got angry and accused me of speaking to him like he was my child. When I attempted to address the issue at hand namely, his unresponsiveness he got madder.
Any new technology created for the purpose of human connection also creates an opportunity for novel forms of missed connection: the envelope returned to sender, the unanswered phone call, the forlorn voice mail. We replace face-to-face interaction with layers of mediation, each with its own chance of breakdown. The fear of losing touch is rooted in human nature; in eleventh-century Japan, women of the imperial court fretted in the hours following a tryst, as they waited for the customary morning-after poem from their lover.
