Update: umm THANK YOU for the stars and the gold award! And... sorry for the misleading title. It's obvious to me, too, that I'm not even close to being out of the woods. I was just trying to find something punchy to describe the situation.

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Sorry you guys, this is a final update to "On a break with my man and in pain," which has taken several twists and turns. Original post: https://www.reddit.com/r/RedPillWomen/comments/wdhvvq/on_a_break_with_my_man_and_in_pain/

Tl;dr - My (27) boyfriend (26) of a year and a half had a commitment crisis at the beginning of the month, so I asked for a break so that we could figure out what we each wanted. He didn't do any of the processing I hoped he would during the break. When we came back together to talk, we decided we'd try again. This lasted for 24 hours and felt all wrong, like none of the needed changes had occurred, and that we were just trying to soothe the hurt of the break. He witnessed my catharsis on his couch the next day, crying my eyes out about how wrong it felt and how we wanted different things. We agreed that we had to finally pull the plug. We officially ended it two days ago, and were wrapping up giving each other closure in my living room, until he has an epiphany (his words) right before my eyes and starts spilling insight, self-awareness, and confidence in his desire to commit to me and build a lasting partnership. I took him back, because I always sort of suspected this might happen, I just didn't think he'd need the full mental release of singledom to opt back in.

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They tell you never to hold out for these 180s! And that's the correct advice I think, partially because most of the time it doesn't happen. But the times that it does happen are dependent on your ability to fully let go. That's what I learned: if you love a "commitment-phobe," you have to let him go, whether he comes back or not.

My boyfriend was never quite clear on his own reasons for wanting to end the relationship and it always screamed "self-sabotage" from my perspective. When forced to provide a reason, it had nothing to do with our compatibility, and had more to do with his ability to picture himself committing to any woman long-term. He thought that he wanted sexual variety and also had never thought of himself as an LTR guy until he met me. I sent him this video and I think it really helped him, even if it didn't describe him perfectly.

Alexander Grace actually personally coached me through this breakup too, so shoutout to him (I think he's a great RP creator and will die on that hill, and have a special loyalty to him after all this). Here are the insights my boyfriend had while going through this epiphany. I think it's no coincidence that this is all coming out now that he's begun meditating again.

  1. Sleeping with a revolving door of FWB (we'll call this: sexual strategy A) was just what he's always done. He's not proud of it, he's just always does it because he can, and because it's easy. This has caused him to never develop a framework for the alternative, the LTR (we'll call it sexual strategy B), until me. Furthermore, it means that he's conditioned himself to think of relationships as replaceable.
  2. He thinks of most friendships as replaceable too. He was thinking about how there are some "kindred spirit" exceptions in the friendship sphere, and realized that I'm that kind of anomaly too in the romantic sphere. Some people are not replaceable.
  3. This scared the shit out of him because his entire relationship script would need to change. Up until now, it's been fun and easy to just go "thank you, next." The idea that he would need to throw out something he's been doing for his whole sexually active life was unfathomable, so he preferred just to run away.
  4. He thought that he could rationalize the running away as an acceptable reaction because he still fundamentally thinks of 26 as young enough to make a mistake like this, but not only was he realizing that running away was deeply unacceptable to him and his sense of self-esteem, but he's also come to realize a couple of other things related to his station in life and the people he meets as an adult:
  5. He realized that the mindset he was working from was not that of a 26 year old, it was his college mindset, and...
  6. a lot of the people he meets in life now ARE the replaceable kind, and he's getting to an age where he can't assume that the really special ones will come along in the same form again. He felt like it finally clicked that it can take years for another special person to come along, if that even ever happens again.
  7. He had been feeling a lot of cognitive dissonance surrounding the concept of "commitment." He knows deep down that a true, unwavering commitment isn't something anyone can give another person, so he had thought of it as something unfair to ask of another person. Now, he realizes that without a firm commitment, there is inevitably a power dynamic in the relationship. And power dynamics aren't only unhealthy in the short-term, but they can really fuck people up long-term too. So he promised that we could create a relationship where neither of us has to be afraid of having the rug pulled out from under us. He was able to reconcile the importance of commitment contracts with the belief that they're still social constructs, not natural constructs.
  8. I suspect my reaction to the breakup helped him feel free enough to make this decision too. I stayed pretty securely attached the whole time, and he saw me experience catharsis in the form of ugly crying on his couch when I realized it was finally over. Showing each other that we couldn't intentionally hurt one another even in the middle of a real breakup, and showing each other that we bounce back quickly and are emotionally healthy enough to exist without one another, I suspect, gave him the mental space to feel like he could make a purely personal decision to opt back in.
  9. In other domains of his life, he has to fail hard before he learns. And it took the most extreme form of relationship failure for him to learn this lesson.
  10. He admitted that he didn't have much experience with loss, so he couldn't anticipate he would react this strongly to loss of somebody important until it actually happened. That's why he didn't kick himself into gear during the break.
  11. He said: "I think my head is too damn big. I have a big ego. I have this belief that anything can happen and that I'll always be okay because I'm me." but that not only that he was operating that assumption based on a world that was still a soft landing spot (childhood mentality), but he also felt like he didn't have the humility to understand that operating alongside other people was healthy and good. Again, this "people are just accessories to my life" mindset coming down as he matures. I told him, "Yeah, it always surprised me how willing you are to be a free agent forever. the world kind of scares me." And I've taken on a lot more responsibility than him and learned the hard way (moved a lot, own a house, am a landlady to my housemate, have a cat).
  12. Switching from sexual strategy A to strategy B doesn't just suddenly happen when you get older. The draw of strategy A will always be there. The video describes what the appropriate emotion is for making this switch: grief. You have to grieve the transition but realize why it's necessary.
  13. Also, hey! A nice little cherry on top and a neatly packaged lesson was that, after the epiphany conversation, we were lying on the couch together and both got super horny. He emphasized that we shouldn't act on it, but it felt nice to feel that way, and it was a lesson for both of us that sick relationships are (and should be) a libido killer, and when something feels right, the inhibition goes way down. I think it tied a nice little bow around the idea that he hasn't actually lost attraction to me over time.
  14. I think another way of summarizing the epiphany was that it was a shift from an abundance mindset to a scarcity mindset. But not a scarcity mindset in the fear-based way, but in the way that makes you really value something.

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Hope that helps someone. Happy to entertain any skepticism over whether some men are just one epiphany away from solid commitment. Laura Doyle said it first though: you can bring relationships back from the ashes if you demonstrate secure attachment and pay attention to what you think he needs. That is, if the relationship is worth saving (this one is).