and all the old feelings came back. Although it didn't work out, I always felt she and I were "the ones" for each other in some sense.

So I'm 48, and I really haven't gotten over it completely.

Every time I've been away from Salon for a while I think it couldn't have possibly been as self-indulgent and full of crap as I remember...and then I come back for a few clicks, and lo and behold...

First of all, Cary, what a major load of new age horseshit. Seriously. Second, LW, for whatever reason you are hanging on to this because you don't want to take responsibility for the quality of the life you have now. You're forty-five. How many more precious years do you plan to invest in this self-indulgent nonsense?

Get yourself a good, ruthless therapist who will tell you when you're bailing on your own life and when you're making progress. Then listen to him/her. You also might want to trot yourself over to a hospice volunteer program and see how much those people would give for just some of the time you're wasting right now.

And then...get over it.

you have zero respect for this person...why would she listen to your "advice"?

Why don't YOU do some volunteer work, and figure out where your garbage is coming from.

I'm surprised Cary didn't suggest seeing a therapist about grief and loss. Your reaction came from a very deep place and there's something unfinished about the process. Perhaps you could find good therapist and investigate it. It will eventually take you to the next thing.

You're in a lot of distress, so that's motivation to work on this problem. Have you tried going to therapists before? Perhaps you have and it hasn't helped.

This seems like a complex problem, very deep, unexpected for you. So this is where you find a psycho-dynamic therapist to help you, a depth therapist (Jungian, neo-Freudian, humanist). It's not a simple problem that can be dealt with in brief therapy. It's not a cognitive problem. Instead it's coming from the deepest parts of yourself.

You're dealing with what sounds like ocd or something . . . this isn't normal. You can't meditate this into submission. Get to a psychiatrist and try some medication or serious behavior modification. Go on a sabbatical that takes you away from everyone you know. LW, I am sorry to put it this way, but you are just pathetic. Get a life. The life you are leading sounds well worth tearing apart and moving away from. Get drastic. Do it. Cary's advice is absurd.

I heard some news about someone who was NOT the perfect match for me, far from it... and the old feelings still came back and sank me for a while. It would have been a bad relationship, dissatisfaction on both sides, but remembering that I had lost that person reawakened that sense that a part of me had died.

I'm sorry, LW. Please listen to other posters and see a grief therapist.

It is really rather nice that you feel so committed to his family, but at the same time, it doesn't seem to be doing you any favors in the emotional healing department. I think it would behoove you to distance yourself from all things "him." Whether that be an abode you shared together, favorite haunts, and most definitely, his family, it's time to stop wrapping yourself in the dirty laundry he left behind. Ten years of longing is probably 8 to 9 years too long. I can't help but think that surrounding yourself with his "ghosts" is only going to haunt you into an even greater emotional stagnation. Pining over someone who is never coming is never fun and certainly no way to live. Good luck in finding peace.

If the first therapist you see doesn't work out, go see someone else. And keep trying therapists until you click with one of them, and then keep going until you get results. You know your state of mind isn't normal. And I say that because the most helpful thing anyone ever said to me when I was in a tailspin were those very words: "this isn't normal." Your condition is obviously about much more than an old boyfriend. So please find someone who will help you feel better and get your life together. Good luck. (And to Downeast: way to kick a depressed person when they're down. Depressed people don't just "snap out of it," in case you didn't know.)

I could be off track here. It's hard to tell a lot from one letter. But all of the emphasis seems to be, not so much who this guy is as a person, or how the relationship was, but on his "amazing life," his charmed existence, his success in your mutual field.

If what's really at stake is your feelings about your own life as compared to his, it will keep on hurting until you really deal with that. Maybe there are things that you always wanted to do, but didn't. Or maybe you are using the wrong measuring stick for your own life.

I just think that maybe, after three years together and ten years apart, his absence may not be what's causing you grief. It may the absence of something else entirely.

So spare us your profundity.

Whoever you are... I understand. I understand. I truly understand.

Meditation is a good step... but it will only work, if you will do the work. A therapist is a good step... but it will only work, if you will do the work. Recovery is possible, indeed, happiness is possible... if you will do the work.

You just have to take my word for it that I understand what you feel. I have been there, I have done this. You have to choose: you can stay where you are or choose to heal and be happy.

I know this because I have done it. It hurts, and its hard. But, you can be happy. Its up to you.

Write me: silverfox008@gmail.com