Really struggling to let go of my ex.

It has been 3 months since I last saw him. We had been together for 7 years, with the last 2 being long distance as he tried to find a job so that I could eventually join him back in his home country. We were planning to get married, we had talked about it for years and I was desperate to, but he had been a student for the first 5 years of our relationship so he wanted to have a job first so that he could support us both. There were times during these years were I did consider ending things, I felt that my life was perpetually on hold, I wasn't happy at times but felt I had invested so much that I just needed to stick it out.

We got together when we were both in our mid 20s and it sounded like we both wanted the same things: marriage, kids by 35 etc. Last January he finally got a job but it also coincided with my grandmother getting terminal cancer and passing away (it seemed to have come out of the blue so the shock was overwhelming). As I didn't have a job at the time, I took charge of all the formalities and clearing out her flat. In the meantime he found a flat for us, got a car, bought furniture and prepared for me to join him. And then in September the time came to join him and I hesitated, I had felt so unsupported that I felt like we weren't 'us' anymore. I made excuses and dragged my feet. Now when I look back I don't know why I didn't just go. He was finally giving me everything I wanted and I couldn't bring myself to make the leap. I don't know if I was still grieving, if I was unsure about us because of the time we had spent apart, if I was unsure if he was 'the one', or if I was just too scared at the time to venture out of my comfort zone and move to a totally new place. He wasn't always very attentive to me, eg once when I flew over there to visit him he stayed out at a networking event with his friends until 2am and didn't think to even message me whilst I sat alone in his room.

I often felt insecure with him and as if I was going to lose him, as if I wasn't his first choice, he is very good looking and he knows it. I always put it down to my own issues and insecurities, but if you're with the right person then maybe you're not meant to feel this way? You're surely not meant to feel drained and like you have to try and get them to love you? When we met all those years ago he had broken up with his previous gf, he said that that was why he had moved to a different country, just to get away from her, but she kept contacting him and even took a flight over. I had a gut feeling at the time that things would end badly for me if I got involved with him and I told him to take his time and we would date when things had been settled with his ex. But his response was to go on dates with other people and I was so infatuated at the time that I ignored my principles and ended up getting involved with him, he has always said he is a serial monogamist so I worried that I would lose him if I didn't go for it. I think she always remained a problem for us, even after all these years she still contacted him and he didn't always tell me about it. He now blames our relationship breaking down on how he handled things back then.

The way things ended with us was also messy, I didn't realise we were broken up and by he time I did he had already moved onto someone else (the girlfriend of his friend). We had spoken on Skype just before Thanksgiving, i was still feeling sad and stressed about the prospect of leaving my family, I was still indecisive and I said I didn't think I could do it. He said he was going to think about possible business ideas and get back to me, we wanted to have the freedom to live part of the year abroad, and after that we kept messaging like normal. Then about a week later we had a fight and that was when he said his feelings had changed, that he had had enough of my indecisiveness and had taken our last conversation as us breaking up. I was pleading with him and telling him things weren't over for me, although I can understand his point of view. A week after that I flew out to see him and that's when he told me about his new girl, she had left her bf and moved out when he told her I wasn't coming. He said she had made it obvious a few weeks earlier that she was interested in him and he had messaged her at Thanksgiving to tell her I wasn't coming. When I had first told my family and friends about him saying it was over they all asked if he hadn't met someone else, and I insisted he wasn't that kind of person. I guess that's partly why I can't let him go, the fact that I could have been so wrong about him even if I drove him to it? I take responsibility for my part in this, but I wonder if it was inevitable, if maybe the loyalty which I valued in him wasn't really there? I'm angry at myself for my actions and obviously feel betrayed by him, it's hard to accept that 7 years together could have resulted in this, and sometimes it's hard to know if I am looking at things though rose tinted glasses.

He had said he wanted to stay in touch but has mostly ignored me, although I sent some pleading messages afterwards, and when he did respond he kept sounding like he was on the fence. He had said he needed time to think and that he wasn't discounting the thought of us getting back together in the future, he even told my friend that he thought maybe we were meant to be together. The last contact we had was about 3 weeks ago when I reached out to see how things had gone with his work contract. He responded about an hour later and said he wanted to tell me that he did miss me a lot, that it didn't mean he thought we should get back together, but that he wanted me to know he hadn't forgotten me and never would. I don't know what the need was for that as I hadn't said anything like that in my message to him.

I guess I feel like I'm in limbo, i feel like it's him that I miss but then at other times I don't know if it's the stability that I am craving. I feel overwhelmed at my life right now, in my early 30s, single, unemployed and living at home again. And I can't help but wonder how much better my life could currently have been if I had just gone over there sooner. I can't figure out if I made a big mistake and didn't appreciate what I had, or if my gut was telling me it wasn't right for me, I don't know. Right now it obviously feels like I will never meet anyone else, I haven't even been attracted to anyone else, although I am trying to focus on myself and getting a job and letting life happen as it needs to, but sometimes it's hard to see the positive. I'm a hopeless romantic so part of me does think that we were meant to be and that we will end up together again, but am I just being a dreamer?