First time, long time.

I'm not sure where to begin. My LTR of 2 years and I broke up last night and I'm reeling. I took the time to run and meditate, and my head is starting to clear. I've tried to revise this post and pare it down, but I can't find the point of failure. I tried to include as much information as might be relevant about what I'm like, what she's like, the circumstance and the breakup itself. I'm trying to work the problem and do an AAR but I need impartial feedback to coldly cut through my emotions.

My LTR is a 25 year old junior Navy officer and Army brat. She's a stand-out sailor, won a marksmanship trophy and is already on the Navy sailing team after only serving 8 months. A real hard charger. Prior to that she was a D1 athlete and well-paid civil servant. I understand a high-value woman like that eats betas for breakfast, and I know an attractive female in the Navy has guys buzzing around her at all times.

I am a 31 year old Army combat veteran and national para athlete and coach. I have had national press coverage every year for the past 4 years for my athletic achievements and work advocating for veterans. I'm going to school on the GI Bill, where until last year I was double-varsity at a D2 school. I like to think I've achieved a lot, and I work my ass off to keep it that way. I train full-time, and was featured in a Jockey campaign. The entire time we've been together, women have been sliding into my dms, I even had a household name male celeb give me his cell number lol . I have goals, and I work really hard for them. I don't mean any of this as a brag, I just always though of myself as a high-value guy and I'm feeling fucked up over this breakup.

The media stuff fucks with me because so many people put me on a pedestal, and I never asked to be the poster boy. In fact, it drives me crazy that anyone can google me and read about the worst day of my life in detail, my injuries and my PTSD. I'm not ashamed of it, I'm proud of what I did, but it makes it hard to be myself. It's a distorting lens and it means I am constantly trying to live up to what people expect me to be, and shut them out when I'm not able to. I'll go to fancy events, shake hands with Joe Biden and then not interact with anyone outside of class, practice and the gym because I'm feeling fucked up and have the shakes again.

The other problem with even relatively minor amounts of "fame" and the high level of fitness, I guess, is that it is ridiculously easy for me to pull women. Whenever I'm single, I can pick women up on the street and tinder is shooting fish in a barrel. I had slept with 2 women when I joined the Army, and it is in the triple digits now. I'll just say the Athlete's Village at the Warrior Games isn't so different from the Olympics.

I got involved with my ex because she was the most sought-after woman at the training facility for my sport. I brought her home the day I met her, and was amused to discover how many orbiters she had flying around the gym. She would show me guys I had just practiced with texting her, asking to hang out when I was spinning her and I liked having that over my athletic rivals. I was less amused to discover she was cheating on her long-distance LTR of 3 years when we first starting hooking up. She trickle-truth'd that one so the timeline is fuzzy, but I know - she traded up when I paid attention to her. It was probably a red flag.

Lots of redpill writing mentions that women love taking down guys who are held in esteem, and her old man was a bona fide war hero, and legend in the military. I don't want to drag her, but she has a lot of unresolved issues from that. Good soldiers make bad dads.

Over the past 2 years, I think things had been pretty good. I'd been getting my life together before we met, but recovery is a process and the "para" in para athlete means I still have to deal with some of the psychological and physical injuries. I was actually going to join the French Foreign Legion before we met, but decided to stick around. I know, don't change your plans for a woman. My previous LTR ending was devastating because I was dating another high flying type-A woman (her ex is also a national athlete) and the breakup was explicitly because she and her mom thought I wasn't doing enough with my life. She fell for the myth, and no amount of frame can maintain that. I have a chip on my shoulder, and I feel like I've done more and worked harder than most people to get where I am, so to hear what was essentially "you're not good enough" fucking sucked.

I really thought that wouldn't happen this time. We got a place in the suburbs, a dog, I traded in my hooah army douchbagmobile for a family car, we were straight up playing house. I thought it could work. I tried to maintain frame, but when you live with somebody you can't hide the days when you're hurting, and for all of the medals in the shadowbox there were visits to the VA and Army hospital. She was pretty good about it. One thing was that I'm living off my VA benefits and she was making tens of thousands of dollars more than me as a civil servant.

Around this time last year, she had an identity crisis. She was offered a promotion, and she realized that if she took it, she'd be a lifelong government bureaucrat. She kept saying how much she admired me and our dads (my old man is also a senior Army officer) for what we had done for our country and blah blah blah. So I sat her down and told her that if she was going to do something about it, she'd better do it now. Her old man told her she could never hack it in the Army and so I held her hand through every step of joining the Navy.

I put work into training her in PT, studying for the tests, I took her out on Spartan Beasts and the 24hr Spartan. When she finally shipped out in August, I took crying phone calls from her every night of basic. Basic that was way softer than my day and her old man's. I mean, she had her phone for fucks sakes. I did all of the shit you're supposed to do, because I know the military.

And because I know the military, I made sure the house, the dog and the car were all in my name. I made sure I kept my own bank account, and didn't tell her how much was in it, the same thing her old man still does with her mom. I didn't give her power of attorney.

Anyone here who has time-in knows exactly what happens to sweethearts back home once they're away at Basic or in the fleet. I had seen that shit play out with my friends a million times, and my boys all told me to make sure I had my shit locked down before she shipped out. I made sure to fuck her brains out whenever she got leave, not matter how tired she claimed to be because I know basic is a fucking joke these days. I also made sure to be on point at her graduation and personally introduce myself to all of her male fellow candidates that would go to the next training establishment with her.

She also wanted me to get married at city hall between Basic and her phase training. I said no way. Marriage means that I'm on the hook when she fucks Jody or LTD gets too hard, and I'm a churchgoing man. Then she wanted to get engaged. I said no way. I'm not spending 3 months salary for a ring she could take off while she blows her classmates. I gave her a very nice, reasonably priced promise ring. I said if we made it through all of her training and she arrived at the fleet, we'd get married.

She wanted me to move out to where she's training, which would mean leave my school and up-end my career plans. Male military spouses make 50% less than other men of the same level of education. Training is not that long, and I knew she'd be posted across the country when she finished, so why up-end my life, my friends and my family twice before she's even in the fleet? I'm not a fucking dependant, I have my own goals and giving up education and a career is not an option. She's a fucking junior officer, I made more than her as an E-5, my benefits are still more than her take-home, and that's while she has no expenses.

While she was out there, there were two things going on. One, was all of her friends who got married. A lot of the females in her unit were also women who joined the mil because they had boyfriends who were vets or serving. She kept saying "so-and-so got married and she gets leave to see her husband and is allowed to move out of barracks". She kept talking about co-posting, and when would I move out there or marry her so she can come home to see the dog whenever she wants. The way I see it, what's the difference between getting married now or when she finishes training, other than I don't get fucked financially and legally if she can't hack it?

On the other hand, she started going out all the time and having lots of female friends. This woman never drank a drop of alcohol when she lived out here and got up at 4 in the morning for practice. Suddenly she's hanging out with the guys, drinking during weekdays, closing out the O Club, going out on the town. I keep having to pay for more than we agreed because she's partying away her pay.

Then Covid happened. All leave is cancelled, all troops are confined to base. Only, now they're having barracks parties every night. If you ever meet a woman and she even hints at knowing what the inside of a barracks is like, move on. We used to fuck girls in our open squad bays. It's bad, bad news. So now even if I wanted to I can't see her. She's getting crankier and seems more resentful every time I talk to her. She keeps saying I should give her money to cover her because she took a $40k paycheque to join the Navy. She gets pissed off when I told her that's what she signed up for, and yes she still has to pay the rent (another thing, I didn't want to buy a house because she might get part of it if we split. I know rent is more than a mortgage but there's no cost to peace of mind). She keeps talking about how if I really loved her and cared about her I'd have married her, or proposed. She tells me we can still declare common law. I said, when the lockdown is over, we'll talk. I had just seen her when I took her on a trip for Valentines day. I told her - a deployment is 8 months and there's no fucking phone. You're going to have to hang tough, it's been 3 months.

Last Thursday, my mom contracted covid and had a stroke. My uncle died of covid in March, firefighter, good guy. I called her, knowing she was just in the department bullpen doing dick all and she didn't give me the time of day. I'm good, I have my friends, my veterans group and the padre. My mom is okay too, recovering fairly well. I thought my mom was fucking dying. I drove 500km to be with my family, and she didn't call once during the drive to see how things were. This girl called me sobbing hysterically because she failed a white-glove inspection in basic (everybody fails, that's the point. It's just a game).

I just got little workout selfies and shit between Thursday and yesterday. Little nothing texts.

I called her last night, and I had that sinking feeling in my gut. She was pissy, and I could tell she was with her friends. She wouldn't engage at all. Usually she calls me, and if she doesn't I just wait her out. I guess with my mom, I dunno I wanted to hear from her, but it was like I was an imposition on beer pong.

She said something about her dad coming by to get some things to ship out to her. Those things included her bike and all her clothes. Hmm yeah I've seen that one before. She fucking danced around it before I said, okay so we're done. It was a trickle all the way. She pretty much admitted to wanting to blindside me only once all of the stuff was gone and the dog was with her parents. What a moral coward. She's a goddamn commissioned officer and she can't muster an ounce of integrity?

She was so cold, it gave me the chills. She hemmed and hawed and didn't articulate a thought or feeling without being pressed. I'm still angry thinking about it. I'll admit it, I was shocked, and confused and broke frame a few times. She was just completely shut off. I didn't get to the begging and pleading stage, but I did try to work the problem and point out ways to make it work. No effect. She periodically cried, but just kept saying the same shit "Her friends say this and her friends say that, and she's felt this for a while but didn't tell me blah blah blah".

Those posts on trp about the run up to a breakup give me chills. I know she's already secured the approval of her friends, there are a million bored, fit orbiters literally across the hall willing to fuck her, she might've fucked them already. Even if somehow I was able to work this out, or wanted to, nobody is flying or booking hotels right now. I feel absolutely sick about this.

She mentioned money a few times. Said that I had promised to put most of my pay in the account where she could access it. I said that I pay the bills anyways so what does she need it for, and she said because she had sacrificed her financial situation and standard of living in the navy. That I should financially support her, she's tired of asking me to pay for things.

She said that it was because I hadn't shown enough commitment. That if I had married her, she'd be at home right now. She kept saying variations of that. "You should have married me" "I asked you to be common law so many times" "Why didn't you propose". That she hates being in quarantine and the separation. She said she's so incredibly hurt, that she's been sitting on these feelings for so long, that she tried to tell me. That if only I had shown her I loved her we'd be alright, she'd be home and we'd be married right now. I pointed out that this is entirely outside of my control, you can't retroactively marry someone, I couldn't fly there even if I had wanted to. I can't lift a lockdown, I could live right outside the gates and she'd still be confined to base, if not barracks.

tl;dr I have no idea what the fuck happened.

I thought I was a high status guy, and I had managed to keep D1 and national athletes away from her, even when she practiced with them every day. I'm fit, have goals, have a public profile, have the kind of past people find impressive. I didn't think I was a loser, but today that was my first thought on waking up and it just keeps circling around in my head.

More importantly, all of the shit that supposedly caused the breakup, just saved my ass. That absolutely kills me! My dumb grunt instincts and Army buddies were right. I didn't drop out of school, move across the country, give up my whole life, risk my house, dog or car because this might happen and it did. I was fucking right to do it. That keeps looping in my head, like a guy in a Greek play that can't change his fate and every clever thing he does to avoid it draws him closer without him knowing.

I held off on commitment to see if she could manage, she couldn't and now she says it's because I didn't commit enough! I'd be staring down a divorce if I had, right? Or is she right and I fucked myself over by maintaining that defensive posture?

I'm going to be honest, I'm really torn up on this one.

Can anyone please explain what happened, what if anything I can do?

If anyone wants to Monday Morning QB, I might feel a little better. If she's just popping smoke to cover for giving out barracks BJ's, I won't be haunted by thinking I could have and should have married her.