Second Chances.

I’m a firm believer that everybody deserves a second chance. Some people may disagree with that. In fact, I know a lot of people disagree. But the way I see it, is everybody makes mistakes. If they can correct those mistakes and prove themselves worthy, why not give them another chance? If they’ve learnt their lesson, surely you can forgive them?

I personally don’t see what the big issue is. Why people make it out to be so much different to give a guy (or girl) a second chance, in comparison to a friend. For example, if I had an argument with a friend, or they did something that upset me, everyone would tell me to forgive them and to give them another chance to prove that they’re a good friend. But when it’s, oh, I don’t know, an ex boyfriend… the matter changes completely.

Sure, there are exceptions. For example, if a guy cheated on me, I’d like to say I’d have the courage and willpower to not take him back. But then again, I can’t really comment on that issue, as it’s never actually happened to me. Although saying that, a friend of mine was put in a milder form of this situation, forgave him, and they’re one of the happiest couples I know. Everybody’s different.

For me, second chances are a way for people to prove that they still deserve a place in your life. I completely believe that they can work, and can make couples and friendships even stronger than before. With second chances, it allows both parties to correct anything that was wrong with the relationship in the first place, giving the opportunity for a better one to work out. 

Second chances aren’t always a bad thing. It’s third, fourth and fifth chances that I have no interest in. If you can’t correct your mistakes after the second chance, you sure as hell don’t deserve anymore.

Have any of you been in a situation where you’ve given someone a second chance? Did it work? Or if you haven’t, do you agree with them?

Confusion.

It’s not a secret to us females that men are confusing. But why is that? They’re not a complicated gender. In fact, as a woman, I can say with confidence, that we are a hell of a lot more complicated than men, yet I don’t think we’re confusing in the slightest.

When it comes to finding out what a man wants, it’s near enough impossible. They send out mixed signals, they can bombard you with messages & attention one minute, then completely ignore you the next. They can never be open and just tell us what they want, be it a relationship or not.

I’ve had times when I’ve been talking to a guy, and he’ll seem genuinely interested in how I am, ask loads of questions, and make me feel like he really does want to talk to me, like he actually really cares.

Then the next minute, he’ll send me one word replies, such as “haha” which, of course, completely kills the conversation. To me, that gives the impression that you’re not interested, that you don’t want to continue talking to me.

But then he’ll pop up in conversation while he’s WITH HIS FRIENDS, and ask new questions or start a new conversation when it’s run dry. It might just be my brain over-thinking, but to me, when a guy talks to you while he’s with his friends, there’s more there than just friendship. I’ve been with guys in the past who have openly told me that they won’t speak to me when they’re with their friends. Friend time is guy time, and they don’t want to be texting their girlfriend when they’d rather be spending time with their friends. And I’ve always accepted that. But talking to me for hours while he’s with his friends? That says that he cares.

If there are any guys reading this, seriously: stop messing with our emotions. If you like us, tell us, if you don’t, tell us that too. Don’t leave us to over-think every little detail of our conversations. It’s tiring. Stop being so confusing.

"Just Friends"?

Since my breakup in the middle of June, I’ve been through a whole sea of emotions, all of which have left me in a slight state of confusion. My relationship was a little different to others I know of, being that we started out as very good friends. In fact, I’d go as far as saying he was one of my best friends at uni before we started seeing each other. So when we broke up, I was left wondering the age-old question; can we ever go back to being “just friends”?

A few friends gave me examples of their past relationships, and how their “just friends” turned out to be friends with benefits, which of course, can only end in disaster. However, they were never friends first. I imagine it’d be hard for anyone to go from a relationship to friendship when it wasn’t built on friendship. They didn’t know what it was like to be friends in the first place.

I did a quick poll on Twitter last night, asking this very question, and I got mixed responses. Some said yes, some said no. One response in particular caught my eye though, which said it is possible to be friends, as long as the relationship isn’t spoken about.

I’m generally quite an emotional person, so when we broke up and agreed to be friends, I swarmed him with drunk “I miss you” messages, which of course, helped nothing at all! It got to the point where he stopped speaking to me completely because he was fed up of talking about feelings which, at the time, I hated him for, but now, I can understand. After all, if you’re trying to get over someone, the last thing you want is to be inundated with messages of how much they miss you.

After a series of other events - I shan’t bore you with the details – we started talking again (no mention of feelings or emotions, though), and we’re basically back to how we were before the relationship. I can talk to him about anything, we can still joke around and have the banter we had before, and I’m genuinely happy that things can go back to that stage.

However, I am a bit dubious. What if keeping him in my life in such a big way is stopping me from moving on? People have told me to cut him out of my life completely, but the thought of that makes me a little bit sick. Yes, it probably is the best thing to do, but I honestly can’t stand the thought of not having him there, as a friend.

Another thing worries me. As we’re in the same friendship group at uni, when we go out, we always go out as a big group. Even though it’d be completely out of character for him, what if I saw him kissing another girl in a club or something? Even though it wouldn’t be my place to tell him not to do those things, I don’t think my heart could take it if I saw him with another girl.

I still haven’t seen him in person since June, and I’m fully prepared for the inevitable awkwardness. But I actually believe that it is possible for us to go back to how we were. Yes, it’s going to be difficult, and I know that there’ll be times where I’ll wish it could be more, but I’m perfectly happy in the knowledge that for now, I have my friend back.

Get Over It

Get over it. That’s what they say, isn’t it. When a relationship, or even a friendship ends, whenever you express a moment of sadness, anger, or any emotion at all, the advice everybody gives you is to just “move on and get over it”. But it’s really not that simple.

My relationship ended almost 2 months ago. That’s a long time. And it still hurts to this day. Obviously I’ve gotten used to it now, so it’s not as bad as it was at first, but the pain is still there. And I have a feeling that’s not going to change anytime soon. It’s the same with a friendship ending. Most normal people don’t go from speaking or seeing this one person all the time, to being absolutely fine with no contact at all. It’s hard, and to me, that just shows how much you loved and cared for that person. It shows that they were an important part of your life.

But when friends or family tell you to just “move on”… I’m not gonna lie, that really just pisses me off. Do they really think I’m heartless enough to just not care about that person anymore? I’m quite an emotional person anyway, so if someone comes into my life and makes a big impact on it, I attach myself to them in a big way. I open up to them more than I would anyone else, and it makes me more vulnerable from it.

I recently started talking to my ex again, and even though I’m really glad we can still talk like we did before we were together, there’s still that part of me that wishes we could go back to a couple of months ago. Friends have told me that it’ll be harder to get over him if I keep talking to him like this, but really, I don’t think it’s gonna make much difference. It’s going to be hard regardless, at least now I don’t have that voice in the back of my head screaming that I wish he’d just talk to me.

My inspiration for this post was from Debi. She writes a “Thought of the Day” each Tuesday, and this week’s included a quote from Dr. Seuss.

 It got me thinking that yes, I am still gutted that our relationship didn’t work, but the reality is, it wouldn’t be good for either of us to go back to how we were. But at least I’ll always have the memories of the good times we had, and how when we were happy, we really were happy. And I’m content with the fact that we can at least still go back to being the good friends that we were before.

So if any of your friends or family is upset over losing someone close to them, don’t tell them to “get over it”. Support them, and show them that you’re there for them. Because with something like this, they just need to know that they have people who they can turn to.