I’ve been quiet around these parts and that’s because there’s been a lot happening in my life that I wasn’t ready to share on my blog until things panned out one way or the other. Things have panned out and now I’m ready to write about it all.

I’m 43 and haven’t had a boyfriend for a long time mainly, I think, because of the little boy in my life. When I became pregnant nine years ago it freaked me out, I was in denial for quite some time but then I had to face up to the fact that I was going to have a baby. He was born and the last thing on my mind was a romantic relationship. It wasn’t until he was about two or three that I even felt anywhere near ready and I started going out on some dates.

None of these worked out and I gave up on the whole thing and have instead been working on making my life more fulfilling in ways I can control by taking up ukulele playing, getting into photography a bit more, and this whole blogging thing takes up a bit of time too.

Then a few months ago I was introduced to someone I’d seen around at various parties off and on but had never met or talked to. A while later we saw each other at a friend’s gig and by his later observation and by my admission I came across as a bit shy and standoffish. I know I do this sometimes when I meet a single fella but I can’t help myself. Something to work on for me.

He invited me to be his Facebook friend not long after that and that’s how we started interacting a bit more. All of this progressed into something a bit more and I began to think that he was a bit special and that there might be something more in it for us.

I had started a bit post with a lot more details but I really don’t think it’s fair to go into those details here in a public forum so, sorry, I won’t share them all.

He had met my son a few times (they got on well) and I’d met his children once. We did sleep together numerous times, both platonically and otherwise and it was great to hop back on the wagon after some time off it.

But just when I thought it was our beginning he was thinking it was our end. He went away for a few days last week and on the first night there was communication between us but then it went completely quiet for the next few days. I was starting to really worry. Worry that he’d been in an accident and was lying incapacitated, or worse – dead, in a hospital somewhere. Deep in my heart though, I knew he was avoiding me.

Finally on Friday, he called and started chatting to me as if things were normal. I let things go along in this vein for a little while and then asked what was going on with us. This is when he told me that he only wanted to be friends. I don’t remember a heap of the conversation after that. The upshot is that he’s got quite a bit of baggage he needs to sort out from past relationships and we probably met at the wrong time. The other thing of course is that he’s just not that into me.

I don’t know how the whole friends thing will go, that remains to be seen. No doubt I will bump into him around the place as we have mutual friends. I’m upset with him that he wasn’t honest with me (and there’s some things that I haven’t mentioned that he wasn’t really honest about).

So what does one do when one has their heart broken? They turn to their girlfriends and mine have been bloody fabulous. A few of them knew many of the details of our relationship so it was easy to tell them the next part of the story, break into tears and it not matter to them.

I didn’t break down when he was on the phone doing the friends thing but I’ve certainly cried since then. My lovely wise friends told me that it’s not me, it’s him and I recognise that. I think I’ve got it pretty together and I was straight and honest through this whole thing with him.

What is it with men who say they want a relationship and that they fancy you, but then turn around and say and do something completely different? That really hurt because he’d gotten my hopes up that there was some potential when in fact there probably never was. I think I hurt more because of the possibilities of being in love with someone, more than I hurt over losing him.

It’s also helped me enormously to write about it. I’d had an earlier post which I won’t publish that had more details. I also wrote him a letter which will stay with me and won’t be sent to him and that was really cathartic.

So to try and look on the positive side of all of this? As mentioned above, he helped me break my drought. That’s made me feel fantastic and it wasn’t as hard (pardon the awful pun) as I thought it would be. In fact it was rather nice and I look forward to doing it again some time soon.

I’ve also lost some weight. I can fit into clothes that I haven’t worn for a couple of years and that’s not a bad thing.

So now? I’ve just started six weeks holidays while JJ is on school holidays. Luckily I hadn’t been relying on this man to help me fill my holiday days and I won’t be sitting around home moping for him – that would be absolutely pointless. I’m picking up the few pieces that I dropped, putting myself back together and moving on.