Many of the stories that readers share about their relationship experiences, in a nutshell boil down to things not being mutual. Lack of mutual interest, lack of mutual words and actions, lack of mutual values, lack of mutual love, care, trust, and respect and lack of mutual feelings and relationship. Unfortunately, if it’s not mutual, whatever you have in mind for the relationship isn’t going to happen.
The harder you work at what is already on an imbalanced and unhealthy footing is the less mutual it becomes, especially as what you feel and do becomes distorted.
You’ll end up feeling rejected, being confused, in pursuit and feeling like you have to ‘win’ them over and in turn, not good enough, and you’ll get overwhelmed by your feelings if you don’t opt out at the lack of mutuality. It’ll become difficult to distinguish between who feels what and who is doing what.
And maybe that’s what’s so incredibly difficult to get your head around in these situations; how can you be feeling these feelings ‘alone’?
It can boggle the mind to fathom how you can feel something so deep, so all encompassing, so consuming…that the other person doesn’t feel. How can this be? Surely we can’t feel so intensely for someone without having some contribution from them?
It’s like raising your hand and saying “Gimme five…” and then being left hanging, only it’s your heart hanging over a precipice.
When I was with the guy with the girlfriend, believing that he felt the same kept me floating for several months. After that, I could only cocoon myself with these feelings for short periods because I realised that after the Future Faking came groundhog affair masquerading as One Day I Might Get My Unprincely Faux Prince if play my Other Woman cards right.
But then fighting against the realisation that in truth, no matter what he was feeling, it wasn’t mutual and it wasn’t something that actually looked and felt good, kept me holding on for about a year. It felt like I’d been a victim of a relationship-jacking. I’d been robbed! Where was the love? Where was the happiness? Where the frick was my self-esteem? Why was I alone most of the time or living off crumbs and stolen moments and yet in possession of such monumental feelings? And Lord help me, if he’d told me how we were ‘best friends’ one more time, I might have stuck his empty words where the sun don’t shine. These intense feelings and protestations for this ‘amazing’ ‘soul mate’ relationship that never actually was because it never took off and was never mutual were so disproportionate.
Relationships that aren’t mutual are like ‘restricted’ love. You’re never free to just to love and enjoy it. You’re free to let your imagination and even your libido run wild, it’s just that it’s incredibly painful when you realise that you’ve far outpaced reality.
You can be in love on your own but you actually can’t have a mutual relationship, one with love, care, trust, respect and shared values, on your own. Real, mutual love doesn’t have ‘buts’. You don’t need someone saying “I love you but…you know my situation” or “I love you but I can’t give you what you want” or even “I love you and we’ll always be friends but…”
You want someone to say “I love you” – simplicity. After they say it, you continue about your life together, a life I might add that reflects that of two people who love each other mutually. You hug, you kiss, you make plans, those plans come to fruition but before you even make plans, you can even get on and enjoy the simple, normal things that make up the day to day.
There’s no being left hanging. Loving someone that doesn’t step up and ‘meet’ you in a mutual relationship is like throwing your energy into the abyss. It’s demoralising.
It’s impossible to quantify what another person feels and work out if what you feel is what they feel. Any one of us can profess anything we like, hence why love is an action feeling. We see how mutual something is by the results. If you look around and you see the results are, that you’re still waiting around for someone to give you back what you’ve already been putting out, or that you’re in pain, miserable with fleeting highs, or you’re actually regarded casually or as a ‘friend’, that’s a poor result. It’s not one that you need to correct – it’s one you need to opt out of.
“I had hoped you’d see my face and that you’d be reminded
That for me it isn’t over.” Adele, Someone Like You, 21.
The first time I heard this line from the now infamous and heavily played song, I remember thinking that Adele could replace Mary J Blige as being the best Fallback Girl songwriter. And then I thought “How can it not be over for you, if it’s over for them?”
It’s like the relationship ends, or for some of you doesn’t get off the ground, but your feelings continue. You then have expectations that they should say or do certain things, or as Adele hoped, react a certain way and maybe even abandon a current relationship and hotfoot it back to you. You’d rather continue to have these expectations and continue to attempt to make good on them, than walk away.
One of the things I learned about myself that helped to impose an important boundary is that while loving myself is something that I myself can do, I can’t do all or the majority of the loving for a relationship.
This means that there must be proportionate relationship to back up my feelings or the deal is off. This put a stop to all Betting On Potential, being immersed in denying, rationalising, and minimising, and basically compensating for the type of effort that no-one should ever make up the shortfall for. If they’ve walked and moved on or are failing to to give me a mutually fulfilling relationship, I’m not going to fight for something that’s broken by its lack of mutuality.
If they’re not loving you back and reflecting it into a mutually fulfilling loving relationship, it’s time to step.
If you’re saying ‘love’ and they’re saying ‘friendship’, it’s time to step.
If you’re saying ‘let’s be together’ and they’re saying ‘Er…I’m still married/attached/my cat’s stuck up a tree/I’m not ready for a relationship/I don’t have clean drawers/or whatever’, it’s time to step.
Loving someone alone or in an imbalanced, unsatisfying, often somewhat ambiguous setting is beneath you. Mutual relationships take two and you can’t make someone love you. You’ve tried and it doesn’t work, so don’t continue to force it.
Separate out what you think, feel, see, and do. How much of this is evidentially similar to what they claim to think, feel, see, and do? Remember that love, even when it’s healthy doesn’t make you Siamese twins or Mystic Meg. You can only legislate for you. Love doesn’t create an IOU hence you don’t have to feel like you’re owed if you only get into and stay in this when it’s mutual.
You’re better than this. Pain is not love, it’s pain. Love does not sell you short.
Your thoughts?
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Ugghh I think one of the disadvantages of being a woman who comes across as a bit of a challenge to get through to, is that you tend to attract men who live for a challenge. They do EVERYTHING to make you let your guard down. But once the challenge is over, it’s done for them, but you’re hooked and wondering how the hell you got to this point, you’re supposed to be smarter than this, etc. So even if it seems mutual at the beginning, that doesn’t necessarily last.
Meanwhile, why doesn’t anyone ever write songs about healthy reciprocal love??
Shiv, you got it so well! You hit the nail on the head. I’m the same way. They see me as a challenge, and I think that tends not to attract the good guy, but the guy who wants to chase and think to himself “Hey, I did it again, I’m so hot that the women fall for me!” Then once they think they’ve got you, or actually do have you – they start acting like an ass to force you to leave, or they find some excuse to leave – leaving you totally blindsided, in shock, and in horrible emotional pain. I went through this pattern for 3 years, from 2005 to 2008, and after the last one in 2008, I pulled myself out of the “market.” It’s just too painful. I’m thinking of getting back in again, but my heart is not in it, and while I want to feel the “in love” feeling I felt with the last guy in 2008, which was amazing and which I had never experienced before, I’m too scared to try. Add to that that the males in the age group I’m interested in (47-59) don’t have much to offer in terms of morals (including monogamy), ethics, or a lasting relationship, I don’t see the point of giving my time to any of them. Other than for perhaps just getting out of the house, having male company for events and dancing, and feeling desired (but feeling desired is not what I want – I want to be loved), I’m not very motivated and feel safer (although completely bored) attending events with women’s groups.
Shiv
Someone chasing you down with compliments and attention is not the same as a mutual relationship.
I think/hope that when we are more sure of ourselves (which has nothing to do with being smart or “hard to get”) then we will see what IS genuinely mutual. I do know it has nothing to do with attention, sex, compliments, seduction and blowing hot.
Shiv,
The question is – why is your guard up? You don’t want to be too easy, but to be too much of a challenge seem to attract the EU batch. A good grasp of who you really are and what you want, brave dealing with emotional matters and with clear boundaries is a good enough EU repellent.
EU are emotionally dead inside, so chasing (the high) is like CPR for them.
Some ( male and female alike) like the thrill of the Chase. Unconsciously they do not want a relationship ( fear of intimacy and other emotional quirks).
The guys have their own guard up too that they never take off while they are chasing you. Nobody gets to know the ” real other”, it’s EGO friction.
Everybody is safe behind their protective walls. Nobody grows anything. You moving a lot but you stay on the same place, like on a treadmill.
Shiv,
My take on this is that there is a big difference between having secure boundaries / realistic expectations and being an out and out challenge..?
The kind of guys who will respect our boundaries and have ones of their own (because they are perfectly entitled to) are also the ones prepared to co-pilot a mutual, authentic…going somewhere relationship.
The guys who seek out challenging women, the uphill struggle are often, in my experience, very competitive in other areas of their lives and enjoy the hunt.
There is nothing wrong with enjoying the build up We just have to want to sign up for more,for consistent behaviour, for actual actions that back up words..if we hope to have any chance of a relationship developing.
I say this as some one who used to enjoy being pursued hard, I would need to feel elusive in order to enjoy the start of the romance, in addition, if the guy was ‘hard to get’, this would add to the thrill and drama.
These are EU behaviours, exciting in the short term, but actually setting yourself up for a hard fall. You may as well say’ Hi Pavement.. my nose is going to meet with you soon!
Damn it Natalie, you’ve done it again! It’s almost like you “know” what is going on in a precise moment of my life and then write an article about it!
Because I am currently in a “relationship” with a guy who only wants to be “friends.” Deep down I think he is a closeted gay, because he made it clear that his past relationships with women were disastrous (where they cheated on HIM, not the other way around!), and that he isn’t looking to be with a woman now (he told me an “Elle cover model” could walk by and he wouldn’t go after her– and to top it off, we were both models!). I “overlook” the things he says because physically we are a perfect couple, we have a lot in common, and he is a wonderful person (he has truly been a good friend to me, and I’ve been to him). I can’t HELP but be in love with him, even though I’ve tried to resist those feelings.
I know it’s easy to say “move on,” but it really isn’t for me. I just don’t find myself attracted to a lot of guys. I tend to only get “hooked” on one. Which is not good, I know, but it is what it is. I am SO in love with this man on literally every level. Part of what makes me so attracted to this man is because of how good and DECENT he is (something my lying, drug addict/dealing ex was not!). So this is like a daily torture to me and I feel like I’m losing my mind. I WISH I could fall madly in love with a man who actually WANTS that love in return, yet I haven’t found that yet! But you’re right Natalie, it’s time to “step.”
Marina,
I’m with ya girl. I’ve stepped & I “get” all this stuff intellectually, but emotionally I am having a hard time letting go. I could probably be in his bed right now, but my MIND knows there is only more upset & disappointment-that’s why I called it off.
So, although I am proud of myself for walking away, my mind insists that I am waiting to hear from him to make it all better. And then I tell my mind, “Hey! We’ve been through this many times with him & it ALWAYS ends up not good! Let him go!”
The door is shut. I’m just stuck on locking it! I’m not even counting NC days anymore-it’s like 2 months. I need help locking the door 🙁
Reading your words touched my heart as I have been right where you are. The only difference is that this friend supposedly had feelings for me too. All I needed to hear were those words and I was hooked for a couple years on the hope that we would eventually get out of no mans land and have an actual relationship. But it never happened, and every time I would bring up the subject he would find some kind of way to dodge answering any questions. All that time having those feelings for him, and during most of I didn’t really feel all that great. Eventually something in me just snapped and I figured out everything that Natalie has written here, and remained angry with myself for taking so long to get to that point.
I know it hurts like hell, boy do I know, but be patient with yourself. It’s like they say, we seldom end up where we want to be but we always end up where we need to be, and for whatever reason, there is a lesson in this that you needed to learn right where you are, and may not have gotten it otherwise. It sucks to have to go through something like this, but you’re in this situation to learn more about yourself and what you can tolerate, and what you won’t as well. Everybody has a level that they are not willing to sink to, where the price is too high and not worth it, my guess is that you just haven’t reached yours yet, or if you have it has yet to be realized. I have faith that you’ll come out on the other side of this with a few scars, but with much more self awareness and wisdom. If you think about it that way, you’ll actually come out of this much better off than he will…
Marina…. I read your posts about this before …and can see now that you are stuck repeating the same mantra to yourself about this guy. This sound hard, I know, but your post concerns me.
You do have relationship with him, in my opinion, he offers you friendship, nothing more. It’s seemed that this is what’s been on offer for a while…?
Even your reasons for wanting to be with him sound flawed?
If he is a good friend, why ‘overlook’ anything he is saying to you about not wanting a relationship with a woman? This disrespects his wishes and motivations and actually will risk your friendship.
In addition,and I have been there,believe me, wanting to be with someone because’you are both models’ and seem physically a perfect match is no reason to pursue a relationship. Again, this disrespects him because it objectifies him…?
I hope you get this, I really do, because fancying a gay guy, is barking up ‘wrong Tree…wrong Forest’and you may as well say
‘ I’m on this site to remain an EU person’.
Nat’s article is not about’ being in love on your own'(which you can still fly solo,unfulfilled), but about endeavouring to have a mutual relationship(other person,consistency,action,authenticity)
Your comment;
‘ I know its easy to say move on…but it really isn’t for me’
made me concerned for you, now and in future.
Marina, I remember once being asked by a friend “At what point will you realise that this tool has a girlfriend? When he’s married her?”
So I ask you Marina, at what point will you accept that he’s gay? When you find him riding another man?
The fact that you believe he’s in the closet is a deal breaker. Instead of trying to break him back into women (that’s if he ever really was in the first place), break away from this man. It doesn’t matter if he’s the most beautiful man on earth, superficial ‘love’ that will leave you devalued and rejected is not an option. You both deserve better than this situation.
Thank you for all the comments. And as usual you’re so right Natalie. My (shameful) answer to your question is “yes.” That I guess I really am waiting for that level of confirmation that he’s gay. Because I am not joking when I say he is pretty much the most beautiful man on earth. And I’m sorry if that’s superficial, but in combination with what a good man he is, it could truly test any woman’s strength to not be crazy for him! But the fact that he’s probably a closeted gay IS a dealbreaker, I know. I met this man at work too. It’s not as though I went “looking” for a fucked up guy! He sort of fell into my lap! He’s just the first man I’ve fallen in love with in a long time, so that makes it so much harder. 🙁
@Marina, why don’t you ask him if he’s gay? If you have a good friendship, there should be sufficient basis for honesty and confiding, no? Loving a gay man/a man who is decisively and firmly gay-identified for the rest of his life, won’t lead to any good outcome– I know someone who has been stuck on a gay man for 8 years. I don’t mean to demean your friend, am sure he’s got good qualities, but if you had a cheating shady drug-dealer ex, then when decency actually comes along, its significance is amplified. Yes beauty is enticing and mesmerizing, but that is just lust, and in combination with a “good man”, really doesn’t make him a good relationship partner for you.
I just want you to know that I understand the pull of beauty. I thought my ex EUM was the hottest guy in the entire world. The hottest. In the world.
But once I got distance and perspective, I was able to find other people attractive. Like you, I hardly find people that I’m physically attracted to (unless I get to know them on a deeper level). So just know that you’re not the only person to face this problem, but it stems from idealizing something that doesn’t deserve to be idealized. If you let this guy go, you’ll eventually find other people who you might believe are just as “beautiful.”
@jupiter23-
haha “The hottest. In the world.” hahaha!!!!
Thanks for the laugh & for letting us know it gets better the more distance you get! thx!!!!!!!!!!
To me, it’s not so much about getting to the truth of his sexuality. He’s obviously not there yet himself. You might think that if he came out to you or you saw him kissing a guy at a club or something that would break the spell. I’m not so sure.
I think you have a decent friend who is being as truthful with you as he is with himself. That is of great value. And he is offering friendship — not as some post-breakup crumb, but as what is the truth between you. I say accept it, think of him as a beautiful artwork, and take this as a great opportunity to morph the drama of unrequited love into taking amazing care of yourself and becoming available.
Ixnay, you’re exactly right. He’s not come to terms with it yet either, which is why I don’t ask him outright. I honestly think he’d be horrified if I asked him or if a guy came on to him! There is absolutely nothing “gay” about him, which only adds to the confusion! If he weren’t so masculine, I wouldn’t be attracted to him either!
“Loving someone alone or in an imbalanced, unsatisfying, often somewhat ambiguous setting is beneath you.”
So true! The first few times my ex tried to make a comeback, I was so angry that I almost spontaneously combusted. It’s like, “Ummm, for all your yammering about what a ‘great girl’ (Why is that phrase used so often by assclowns?) I am, don’t you think I deserve better?” He may not – but I do. Nat, I love how you pointed out that in these situations, you’re not even free to enjoy whatever you feel for them. If that isn’t a No Fun Zone, I don’t know what is.
p.s. I burst out laughing at Mary J., Original Fallback Girl Chanteuse! If this isn’t a Fallback Girl Anthem, I don’t know what is. Such a great song, but everytime I listen to it, I want to be like, “GIRL. He can’t be that great.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbbmf9Gc1-c
“I love you but I can’t give you what you want.”
This struck a chord for me because my ex always said this. Just add in the words “right now” at the end. He definitely made me believe he just wasn’t there right now, but he would be soon. Now I realize, why did I love someone who couldn’t give me what I wanted, which was commitment, love, respect, quality time, honesty and joy? Would you say you loved a store that was always out of your favorite food or something like that, something that could not give you what you need and want?
Love coupled with a however is not love.
Good analogy!! How long, really, would that store be your favorite if it didn’t have what you wanted??? Natasha … LOVE IT!! I remember one of the many EUMs coming up to me with his feeble apologies (fortunately my best friend was with me with her hand on her hip and her UH HUUH attitude) and my telling him to “Get out of here!” That didn’t keep us from playing the ” game” for a few more years!! LOL!! I moved on to another EUM or two after him. Natalie, I’m so proud of you for coming to your senses at a younger age. *sigh*
“You’ll end up feeling rejected, being confused, in pursuit and feeling like you have to ‘win’ them over and in turn, not good enough, and you’ll get overwhelmed by your feelings if you don’t opt out at the lack of mutuality.”
BINGO! What a fantastic post. Tough, but fantastic. That was me: rejected, confused and feeling not good enough. My thoughts were endless loops of “I must not be pretty enough, not young enough, not sexy enough, not fun enough, not talented enough, not enough-enough” when really, it was him that wasn’t enough. He didn’t have enough for me. Who gives a f**k why anyway? So, I’m out. Finally.
I think I’ve gotten to the point (reading nearly everything here on BR and going NC- thank you sooo much NML) that I know I can’t make up for his lack of feeling with my love and affection. He is an ego blackhole, sucking it all up and emitting zero. It doesn’t matter what I throw at him, it’ll all be eclipsed by the simple fact that it is just not mutual, no matter what he might have said (years ago, at that) because in actual ACTION it only ever went one way. That’s the hard truth. Better to live in reality, right?
Yay!!!! What a stormer Natalie! Yes, yes, yes to every word. Genious post!
I can say that all of this really started to penetrate my consciousness over the past few weeks – perhaps from reading other comments here – that has certainly helped me more than I think it does at the time. But I have become consciously aware of a full understanding of what you say in this post. I finally understand – not just theoretically – what you say here in this post has slowly but surely become my attitude about the ex EUM particularly (and about relationships generally) And that’s the difference you have made to me.
I could quote every word you wrote as really speaking to me and for me, for what I recognise as a tangible shift in my attitude and thinking over the past few weeks, but my first big “Yay!” came here:
“Unfortunately, if it’s not mutual, whatever you have in mind for the relationship isn’t going to happen.”
It’s just NOT. End of.
Thank you so much for everything you do!
I heard that one hit wonder type Irish singer Sonia on the telly a few weeks ago singing her old “You’ll never stop me from loving you / it doesn’t really matter what you put me through/ you’ll never stop/me from loving yoooouuuu!!
Had heard it loads of times before when it was hit years ago and never batted an eyelid at it – and there I was standing in my living room agawp at these lyrics being belted out on a tea-time show thinking ‘OMG, young girls would sing along to that crap’ Then I boked.
fearless
I hear you. My family is very musical (though I’m not) and my 9yo niece likes Adele. She got the CD for her birthday and I thought “is this appropriate?!”. I’d rather she watched Rihanna grinding! But I guess what’s more important is that her parents love her very much. I trust that she never equates love with pain.
“Pain is not love, it’s pain”.
This is a marvelous post. So true. I’m slowly internalizing all of it and believing the significance and importance of mutuality. Not so very long ago, I felt helpless and in so much pain, that I assumed it was a sign of love (the extent in which you feel for someone can be mistaken as romantic depth, a true indication of love and depth of longing but it really had nothing to do with it at all, and was rather a case of protracted emotional abuse). My feelings and actions of “love/care” were disproportionate to the actual reality of the situation, it didn’t warrant it, I thought that all this could actually compensate for everything, that it would be sufficient but then I felt so very alone, alienated and emotionally starved.
Was talking to a friend last night who’s teetering with a man who has a wife, and I was trying to delineate attraction, being in love and taking the steps in establishing a mutual relationship, the later takes a lot more will, actual doing, practice, conscious, conscientious effort. It’d be unequivocally clear and transparent, one doesn’t need to playing guessing games or strategize over how to win the target.
The song that got to me, even as a teenager and still grates is;
‘ Jolene’…’Your Brimmin’ eyes and Auburn hair,
And I cannot compete with you Jo-lene!!!
….. I’m begging on you, please don’t take my man?’
I used to think,get the hell outta the arena and let Jolene have the cheating bugger!
Even today,though I have made tons and tons of mistakes on the road to Emotional AvailabilityI can say hand on heart that I have never stayed in a relationship when another woman appeared on horizon.
So, for that, thankyou Ms Parton… Great voice,wrong sentiment.
Jaysus I’d forgotten about her and that woeful song Fearless. I’m sure she was being batty on some reality show a few years ago. These songs are drummed into us. There are so many songs along the lines of ‘I’ll always love you (even if you’re a twat)’ and ‘I can love you better than she can’.
It is very scary reading this right now and uncanny. All I can say is I could not even finish before I scrolled down to start writing this. I was thinking today about how I usually end up in situations where I’m head over heels with someone that just is not there; he’s not interested or he is unavailable in some frickin way. And it all makes me tear up. It is so gosh darn painful to be in love with someone and it’s not reciprocated the way I wish it was. It makes me swing back to that feeling of “why can I just be in love with someone that is in love with me?” I’ve never had that happen…..or the one time it sorta happened, the guy turned out to be too effed up for me. It didn’t last long. Ohhh, jeez and I laughed out loud at this: ” If you’re saying ‘let’s be together’ and they’re saying ‘Er…I’m still married/attached/my cats stuck up a tree/I’m not ready for a relationship/I don’t have clean drawers/or whatever’, it’s time to step.” What a riot!!
But I mean if I were a different woman, if I did SOMETHING different, wouldn’t that make them want me? If I were somebody else and did/said/acted a different more appealing way, would they want me then? This flippin’ sucks. Why doesn’t a man want me? I’m going to take a long walk now. Ugh.
colororange, I think a better question is “Why would a good man love me?” Seems you don’t have the answer, for yourself, to that question either. Or actually, you’ve been more positive on yourself recently; so maybe you just dip in and out of your self-confidence, and your question is coming from a wobble. If you’re going to ruminate (and I am a master ruminator), why not ruminate on all the good things this not-yet-met good guy will see? There are so many! You’ve been involved with EUMs. Doesn’t matter why THEY don’t want you. And the good dudes can only see what is also visible to you. So start inventorying!
Colororange, periodically you take a detour back to There’s Definitely Something Wrong With Me Town. What’s ‘wrong’ with you is that you fundamentally believe something is wrong with you and you’re still wondering if a ‘better’ woman would have converted an Unavailable man. The aim of adapting how you feel about you and your relationship habits isn’t to win an Unavailable man over.
You are not available for a healthy, available relationship. You’re not. You’re still trying to turn pee into wine so when the married ex reaches out, you respond.
Do you think you’re acting like someone who is available and ready for a healthy, mutual relationship?
You have made progress over the past few months but you have some way to go. Much as you’d like to avoid getting uncomfortable and instead get distracted in your comfort zone telling yourself the same story, you’ve got to keep pushing past the status quo. Telling yourself it’s all you or that the world is a crock is easy. Breaking old habits and beliefs is where the real work is.
Ouch! That hit home so hard it hurt! That was me for 8 years! I just hope it doesn’t take 8 years to get over it…
No it won’t slow learner. Acceptance, creating new habits, feeling all of your feelings, will take a fraction of the time. Don’t force it but don’t milk it. Somewhere in between this, you wake up one day and realise that you’re so busy being you, you’ve stopped being consumed by them.
Nat…I agree 100% on the Adele song…God almighty!Before I found thhis site,I may have thought “what a romantic song”..but not today.It is clearly the wrong message…And the radio stations here would say the love song of the summer????WTF???How does this song equate to that!!
Anywho…..I am in total awe of this post.I was that girl saying I love you to no response,Running in circles to go out of my way to be accomdating to someone who clearly did not give 2 shits about me!!My fav line of yours Nat….”He went from angry asshole….To boyfreind material”….God I love that,I giggle everytime….
Love from Canada
Brenda
Glad to make you laugh Brenda. Adele is very relatable but they’re not ‘love songs’ – more ‘pain songs’
Unfortunately, I think movies/songs/entertainment have made it their job to pound it into our heads that relationships are supposed to hurt and be hard. All the stupid romantic comedies have some whore man who is emotionally unavailable finally falling for the leading actress. Puh-lease, that is SOOO not how it is in real life…
Here, here Michelle. I think I’ll be forever shocked by the number of emails from women telling me that SATC movie 1 proves that Mr Unavailable will settle eventually. Ugh.
I find it strange that anyone would point to that as proof since it is a movie. Not real life. The author who inspired the series, in fact, did not end up with her Mr. Big.
Great post Nat although it left me a bit *urgh*
I’m on the other side of this right now, one of my good friends told me about 4-5 months ago that he was in love with me and wanted a relationship. We aren’t compatible for many reasons, so I told him this and while we continued our friendship, I backed way off him to give us both a bit of a breather.
To cut a long story short, I’ve had to go no contact with him now because of some recent arguments about me spending time with other friends and not him. Which sucks. I think I’m doing the right thing here? I feel he needs to get over those feelings before we can be friends again and I also need to get on with my life.
He unfriended me on facebook after that argument (fine with me) and get up this morning to a friend request from him, more *urghs* – have ignored so far.
Any opinions would be appreciated (my brain has burnt out)
There is a clear difference of your act and general AC act – you said it honest and out loud at the very beginning, that there´s no way, etc, instead of doing the AC act, which is stringing along, using and manipulating getting his needs met, knowing exactly that relationship is not on the plate. So chill – all is in perf. order
Kirsten, your post pulled me up short for several reasons. This has happened to me three times. Once as a very young woman, (I ‘m in forties now)with a guy who I had been friends with for years and who had been a real force for good in my life. He blurted it all out one day, I sat and listened, was flattered and appalled. The friendship couldn’t be sustained. We couldn’t get it on an even keel and he left to go down south… I have hardly heard from him since. Sometimes I miss the friendship acutely still.
The second and third guys were work colleagues, again both lovely guys. I was totally blindsided by their interest and confession. Totally and completely shocked, as I had never considered them relationship material, remotely attracted to me…
This is what I think.. I was so emotionally unavailable to decent,honourable,consistent men back in the day, that I didn’t even see them as figuring on my radar. Nice guys didn’t count.
I wanted to say, that certainly in the case of one of the guys I worked with, I regret not pursuing it further. At that time as an emotionally unavailable woman who was attracted to aloofness and challenge, someone nice telling me that they wanted me was scary,repulsive even…not my love equation at all.
So my advice to you is, take time to examine why you feel as you do? Are you rejecting him because you don’t fancy him. Fine. Move on, but you may have to live with the demise of the good friendship… but be absolutely sure there is nothing you might want to pursue, even very slowly, in terms of a relationship. Share with him how you feel confused by this and tell him you need reflective time.
Hey, Kirsen, Lynda,
I’ve had the opposite experience — got involved with a good friend who declared love. I didn’t want to lose the very nurturing friendship. I remember making a pro-con list, and probably number one on the “pro” was “amazing homemade soup in hand-thrown pottery.” I also remember, shortly after getting involved, trying to put the brakes on, and being somewhat emotionally blackmailed with the end of the friendship.
Anyhow it lasted 4 years, and of all my relationships it’s the one I really regret. I wanted to be taken care of and, frankly, worshiped. I couldn’t offer the same. It wasn’t fair and ended in acrimony.
I say trust your gut. Making a pro and con list is in retrospect a red flag!
Linda from L
Just trying to make you feel better, but since you were “ so emotionally unavailable”, do these men did not have the same affliction as you – being attracted to you?
My mother, who is so good at pointing out other people’s fault and ignoring her own, told me about a nice guy who was crazy about ME ( in my 20) and married this lovely woman yet he is unhappy with her now but stay with because of the children. Now I was blind to it, it’s hard to notice people liking you when you are so self involved with self-loathing like I was then. But then, had we got it together – I am not sure we had lasted very long. Frankly I was a nightmare to be with. It has taken a long time to like myself, I woke up and I love myself , I try not to have regrets because torturing myself about not buying Google and Amazon shares when I had the chance is not beneficial. I am a different person now and I attract different people, I can’t handle EU now.
this is very interesting reading about “Love” and addiction.
http://www.peele.net/lib/laa4.html
Hi Artemesia, will check out your link. Thankyou.
I don’t remember these guys as being emotionally unavailable, they both went on to have long term relationships. I think that the persona I projected at work(and this was more than a decade ago)was a persona. I was able to’ look’ much more together,be lighter in attitude, relaxed when I was at work. I was also able to appear confident.
This follows on from the relief I felt as a child to go to school, it was a structure and environment I did well in, home was much more stressful. In the last fifteen years or so I did a bit of group stuff on being the adult child of an alcoholic and found others who felt the same, albeit it might have been another outlet and structure.
But I am with you on the struggle its been for me to see myself as being worthy and entitled to have a mutual supportive relationship. That’s ongoing, but the sea change in the last two years has been remarkable…partly due to finding BR and the brilliance of Nat and others like yourself.
The harder you work at what is already on an imbalanced and unhealthy footing is the less mutual it becomes, especially as what you feel and do becomes distorted.
You’ll end up feeling rejected, being confused, in pursuit and feeling like you have to ‘win’ them over and in turn, not good enough, and you’ll get overwhelmed by your feelings if you don’t opt out at the lack of mutuality. It’ll become difficult to distinguish between who feels what and who is doing what.
My last relationship was definately imbalanced, even within the relationship when we together I often felt rejected not that I would admit this to myself, just add another fur coat of denial.
I never ever felt good enough which at the end of the day was to his advantage he could act the ass clown and because I had no self esteem and was always trying to ‘win’ I would again ignore what was under my nose, please can I upgrade my rose coloured glasses to the thickest lens you have?
I could not find my way out because I was on a steady diet of bullshit.
Yesterday I landed with a massive BUMP into reality and though I was getting there the bump I got yesterday has sent me the rest of the way.
The line in the Adele song always stood out to me I felt each time we met he would see in my face that for me it wasn’t over and somehow we would hook back up.
Thank goodness though its hugely painful right now that I committed an act of such humiliation that I’m here in reality where I’ve struggled to be for so long now.
“How can it not be over for you, if it’s over for them?” This is where
I still have some confusion though, why when nothing is mutual he wants to keep me as a friend and has made it clear on the other hand its over?”
Tulipa, Tulipa, Tulipa
The”friends” topic has been covered multiple times. Nat has posted specifically on it.
There is mutuality in genuine friendship too. You know you won’t get it from him. He likes having lovely young women around to chat to and admire him. Someone to call up when he’s a bit bored/lonely/at a loose end. Think about it, wouldn’t you like that?
What do you get in return? Self-doubt, jealousy (and jealousy is a normal emotion in these situations, I ain’t criticising), unmet expectations and disappointment. Drop him, he’s got nothing for you but more of the same.
Thank you Grace
How right you are even as I typed the question I thought surely you know the answer to that!
I can finally admit to myself that I am still a fully signed up bona fida member of the fallback girl club, I thought I had made progress and at times yes I have, but I go back when the crumbs are offered.
I will go back and read the posts about friends.
Tulipa & Grace,
All these comments are so helpful to me. This: “He likes having lovely young women around to chat to and admire him. Someone to call up when he’s a bit bored/lonely/at a loose end” and “What do you get in return? Self-doubt, jealousy (and jealousy is a normal emotion in these situations, I ain’t criticising), unmet expectations and disappointment” is some SERIOUS truth-telling. I need it engraved into my brain!
Like you Tulipa, I have a “best friend” (who wants sexy-flirty inappropriateness too, of course) who tells me I’m special and important (when I push) and I remember all the times he’s said he loves me (though not recently) and those (less and less frequent) moments when it feels like we have something real.
But then he tells me all the details of the many women in his harem (and I get photos of them! because my EUM photographs nude models as his hobby/art! It’s like a bonus hit to my self-esteem!). And I have to fight off the reality: I am not special. His ambiguousness, his disinterest, his betrayals, his endless self-involvement- that is what I need to focus on. The truth is that terrible bouts of jealousy and self-doubt are the most significant things he’s given me in 11 years of ‘friendship’.
Like you Tulipa, I don’t want to look too closely at his behavior because when I do I am mortified that I’ve accepted it. It is beyond humiliating. I can’t even say what I’ve put up with and what I’ve done because it’s… too much. And then I get angry. At myself (for continuing to put it out there) and at him (for not giving a shit). But I have to remember that my pain is not going to change him. It hasn’t yet!
If I stay in this ‘relationship’ more pain is all I’m going to continue to get. It’s really hard to keep that at the forefront of my thoughts, especially when I know he can be charming and sweet and funny and loving, but it’s the truth. It’s probably the truth for you too.
If you’re getting mixed messages it means you’re getting contradiction which means their actions and words don’t match which means back away. Fast.
I did not get to my humiliating experience all by myself, I was getting mixed messages.
I hate his ambiguity in fact many a time to myself I have called him Mr Teflon because nothing sticks everything can be interpreted a different way and usually the oppisite to what I took it to mean.
You are so correct our pain our hurt doesn’t have an effect on them and won’t change them.
I am very angry right now at him and at me. Mostly at me for never listening to the advice on here. And that damn thing within me that strives to win but what a price to pay and the prize someone who doesn’t know his arse from his elbow.
I am trying to get to the point where I can write everything down so the truth is sitting in front of me, but my anger is preventing me from doing it so I go to the gym instead maybe I should have joined boxing. This also saves me from telling him all about himself.
At the same time I can’t blame shift anymore though I was humiliated and yes he led me there I still chose my actions.
I think, RB, to move on we do need to look at the situation we have been in as hard as it is.
You deserve better than chasing someone in the hope that they’ll finally ‘let’ you ‘win’ them. How long can you keep running for? It’s like signing up to a long distance marathon with no end to it – it’s exhausting and even debilitating. Nobody is that special that they warrant you chasing them for their attention, validation, and eventually your dignity for months or even years on end.
I remember one day sitting on his couch and the phone rang and it was an ex girlfriend of his. He kept saying he had to get of the phone and she kept him talking. I thought come on girl you are better than phoning him and keeping him on the phone. And I thought I will never be that poor girl.
I not only became that girl I was worse than that girl.
I can see now I have a part in his harem too, I have sold myself so short as I was told all along I was. The truth has been sitting there in its simplicity for so long now I don;t know what has been wrong with me to always want to deny it.
I am grateful that nobodys message changed from this man isnt worth it cut your losses get him out of your life to oh yes just do a b…
b or c and yipeee he is yours.
You deserve better than being with someone who thinks they’re so special while treating you in a less than manner. Stop blowing smoke up their bum and inflating their value – it’s like worshipping a false idol! That’s not a relationship – it’s being a groupie
I was a groupie (I have the two signed posters to prove it)
No wonder I get crumbs from time to time. Of course he doesn’t want to give up his number one groupie, someone who lets him commit verbal masturbation since all conversations are mostly about him.
Who would want to give that up?
Wow have I sold myself short over and over again and been too thick and stupid to see it.
I am off to the gym to work out more anger and to save myself from telling him all about himself.
Yep, Natalie you are so right. The stepping part is easy; the problem is what comes (or does not come) next. The loss is the hard part, especially when the odds are against you; feeling that this may indeed be it. Not to say that one should put up with any sort of disrespect in order to not be alone. I know that I did the right thing in going NC with my AC and also ditching a four year so called friendship w/a guy that hated that I am intellectual and hated all of my other core values. However, it really sucks to be totally alone except for a few colleagues. Knowing I did the right thing does not make the pain go away. Both of these guys got to “skate” without having to think about or feel the hurt they caused. At this point I just wish there was a way to get through the next nine years here without feeling anything, leave, and start over. Sorry to whine so, must be the approaching holodays
You’re so right when you say…how can I feel so much and they don’t. You can be crazy for someone, and they don’t have the same feelings. Then you go through agonies getting over it… and years later, when you’ve got the benefit of time and distance lending perspective… you see it. Wasn’t the right fit. Wasn’t mutual. Just like you said.
Being older now and having done that a few times, I think it’s crazy how much pain I felt. That was ridiculous. All that suffering was useless…. the other person never came back, and now I can’t remember much about them…except how badly I wanted them to want me. Wasted time and suffering.
If I could go back, I’d tell myself…hey…this isn’t mutual. Best put your hopes away and move on. There is mutuality waiting for you… you just have to find them, and you can’t find them if you’re pining over someone who isn’t thinking about you, at all.
Hi, I’m new here.
I’ve never had a mutual, committed, loving relationship because I’ve been very hurt and don’t know how to let someone close. Don’t know if or when I’m going to be ready… I’m “only” 29.
Nathalie, I have a similar problem, I’m rarely interested in the guys I meet but when I meet one that for some reason I decide to be hooked on, I get hooked BAD. And he’s the most unavailable guy ever…
I guess I’m really petrified of letting someone close to me, terrified of being hurt again. I just want to forget about the ex, it was a nightmare of giving myself up mind, body and soul to be loved by someone who was content to give me crumbs (and who didn’t deserve me, in the end). I felt like I was whoring myself out for the love that I didn’t get, that I felt I would be given if I only pleased him enough and made myself into what he wanted. It’s pathetic, I know.
I desired to be loved so badly that it consumed me and I found myself becoming what I thought he wanted, and hating him for it. I didn’t listen to my feelings of discomfort, disgust, anger at the beginning and I forced myself to go numb and engage in sexual acts that I felt uncomfortable with, and to have sex when I didn’t feel like it.
I’m glad I found this site. I realize I have big problems, and I’m not ready to date yet. The last date I went on with a guy I burst into tears before him two times during the date. I just felt so damaged and ashamed of myself. He was kind with me but I felt so embarassed. And I felt like I needed to have sex with him afterwards so he would like me, even though I know it’s stupid, this little vulnerable part of me was like “If I do, he’ll love me and he won’t leave me”. I didn’t sleep with him, thank god, but there will be no more dates for me for a while.
I just need to talk to other women with similar problems I guess. I need to find some support, even if it is only online.
Please don’t publish this unless my e-mail adress will be kept absolutely confidential. Thanks. 🙂
marrri
Your honesty touched me. It’s been a long time since I was in a bad relationship and I’ve pretty much forgotten what it was like (yay!). But this comment brings it back to me.
Many, many of the wonderful women here have felt the same way as you, or are still feeling the same way. You’ll see that we are at various stages of the journey to a better life but we are getting there.
No, you’re not ready to date yet and that’s okay. Good for you for recognising that. Take some time out for yourself, your friends, your family, your hobbies, your interests. Enjoy.
Marri,
I went trough a breakup last year around this time, and I was feeling pretty much like you. Just stay away from a pain source and treat yourself as the most valuable precious thing in your life and you’ll recover from this. It doesn’t happen from one day to the other, but gets better every day that goes by. I am in a much better place one year after and you will too. I almost appreciate going through something like that, now I know how it feels, and I surely won’t get myself in such a situation again. You are on the other side now, don’t loose hope in yourself, keep going.
Well Natalie, this article described me for the last solo lack of mutuality whatever in the hell it was…sad…but *and huge BUT…I’m done with that…tis a new season of understanding…new rules for stepping…thanks…and yes, I love well on my own but it’s not a relationship…it was relationshit and I am better than that. No more broken men who fail to fix themselves. If they want casual and a string of women then more power to them…I want none of it. I went through that string stuff years ago…bad news then and scarier now for many reasons…but hey I’m wiser and more in tune and no longer need to run from intimacy…just have to know when to step…no more wasting my good stuff. I’ve worked hard to get here…may all who wish better receive it and may all who want casual be honest about it. Well, since so many aren’t I’ll just have to suss it out…thanks for all the wisdom you pass on!
Natalie, thank you so much for your continued postings. I have referred your web site to countless people, so many, in fact, that I’ve lost track of how many.
Of the dozens of your articles that I have read through religiously, THIS ONE takes the award for most relevant to me – followed closely by “The Fallback Girl”!
This very issue of mutuality is the thing that I think through over and over again in my mind. The voice in my head says “How could I feel this deep fulfillment, complete satisfaction, and feeling of floating on cloud 9, and this guy not be feeling the same thing?” “How could I have felt such a buttery, velvety, warm and fuzzy feeling of ‘in love’ and this guy felt nothing for me?” It’s very disappointing, which is a huge understatement. It makes me feel unlovable. It’s a terrifying feeling to feel unlovable! It removes all hope of every finding a NORMAL MAN, meaning that he has a working heart that feels in-love, love, kindness, a desire to be with his lady and to protect her, to be hers as she is his.
In fact, just an hour or so ago as I was driving in my car, I was crying and thinking, as I have thought so many times in the last few years, that no woman should feel anything for a man unless he is feeling it for her – it should be mutual. There should be some kind of “love hormone” that kicks in mutually, each person senses it, and presto – they are mutually in love, behave with mutual consideration, goals, etc. But alas, ’tis not the way of life – at least not yet. Perhaps in another millennia or so it will be. 🙂
@Terry.
I hear you. It’s devastating to think of one’s self as unlovable. I didn’t want to really face the reality of the ex-EUM not loving me in the way I wanted (he wasn’t capable of doing so, anyway), so I chose to carry on with the illusion that my love was good enough for everything.
“no woman should feel anything for a man unless he is feeling it for her”..
Part of what kept me floundering in my unhealthy situation was that I didn’t want to be upholding conditional love, it sounded petty, restrictive, tit for tat, calculative. I was very very taken with the film “Letter from an Unknown Woman” (it didn’t help that there were so many uncanny parallels and themes between the film and my actual life, the cultural and geographical space I inhabit) and basically fantasized about being her/taking on her subjectivity. That kind of love was something glorified, to be emulated. The ending also shows the man in deep regret and agony, after reading what is literally, a letter from the grave. But really, I was being a practitioner of the worst kind of masochistic unconditional love and self-abuse.
I learned from a relationship expert, Dr. Pat Allen, that the reason I always longed for unavailable men is that I was afraid of intimacy and I was addicted to the chemical hormone produced by LONGING called “norepinephrine”. The longing for an unavailable man stems from a longing for daddy. Can I have a hallelujah? It was such a light bulb moment for me. My dad was emotionally unavailable and I was desperately trying to get his attention and approval throughout my childhood and into adulthood. Fast forward and I’m seeking (and not getting) that attention from men. I’m now working on self-love which is the only thing that matters and that can attract the love of another. Easy to say and harder to do. It’s taken me over a year of practice and I’m just scratching the surface of what it means to truly love yourself and not rely on a man to “save” you or Complete you.
@Feast to Famine, here’s your hallelujah!!
I have that too…fortunately you got yours before I got mine. My light bulb moment only came when I was at his funeral a year ago. The yearning for real love but the fear of intimacy because its been ‘conditioned’ to not expect it, so we seek it from people who simply can not give it…so crazy, but so true…
Pleased to say I’m a work in progress and refuse to date again until I’m 100% sure of myself and the other’s mutuality.
In some ways the feeling between myself and the ex wasn’t mutual, in that I thought constantly about him, and always wanted him to call me, and felt a sense of relief being together with him, though none of the time spent with him was in fact that enjoyable. I wanted him the way an addict wants her drug, and he was as indifferent really as that drug, or as the dealer who had it to give to me. He wanted me for reasons that were his own drug, and to which I was just as indifferent. Our dysfunction was certainly mutual, but it was imbalanced in the sense that I wanted the relationship to work to get love out of it; he wanted the relationship to ‘work’ to get other things out of it.
I am so thrilled to feel these slow but sure gains in self-esteem and self-love. It was impossible, to me, to just decide to like myself any more than I would have been able to decide to believe in God when I was told it would be good for me to do so. But I am coming to learn what I do like about myself – funnily enough they are the parts of me that have been so rough and angry – what’s underneath all of that is pretty astute, and interesting, and interested in the world, and passionate, etc. There’s a lot here to love.
Does it make sense to say that I’m just starting to like myself enough, that it is kind of *like* falling in love, in the sense that I’m discovering a bunch of coolness right here, and that I am feeling that for the moment, I don’t want to share any of me with anyone but me? Like – hey – I discovered this cool person and I want to get to know her and be her best friend before I let anyone else in?
I include these last two paragraphs in a meditation on this post because I am coming to a new sense of what “feeling mutual” might look like. I’d like it to be a mutual sense of someone being like – hey, Magnolia is pretty great, and me being like yeah, I feel that too; and then when I like them, I am joining in on their love of themselves. Does that make sense? Rather than mutual “I want you; I need you,” it would be more of a coming together of like minds. Two people each liking our selves: first we like our selves individually, and then we come together in a mutual liking of ourselves – as individuals and as an ‘us.’
Makes perfect sense.
Yeah, I really like that, your joining in with their love of themselves…and they let you in. A joint acceptance. No see-saws in sight.
Totally agree with you, Magnolia. I like this mantra of “there’s a lot too love”, it’s healthy, affirmative thinking for one’s self. The fact that your ex didn’t want you, doesn’t say anything about your undesirability, it says something about his limited imagination, his inability to access, engage with and to be amazed by the individual you are, to even begin to know and understand the core of your being. (EUMs mainly instrumentalize women for the attention they give them, and can never be fascinated or enchanted by another being).
Like you, I am amazed to look back and realize that time spent with him really was not that enjoyable, scintillating (not out of bitterness, but really taking stock). There was no empathy or ability to fully listen, be attuned to another, or to thoroughly unpack a conversation. Like a pond skater, skidding on the surface of life. His relationship to the world is governed by objects, acquisitions and thus people are easily exchangeable. Apart from the fact that I liked his eyes, smile and smell.. What was it that I was pining after? Love in its abstract form, not the actual reality of the man.
I like what you wrote at the end. Wholeness attracts wholeness, brokenness attracts brokenness. I think it was Victor Frankl who came up with these two polar opposite conceptions of love, “I love you because I need you” vs. “I need you because I love you”.
“Does it make sense to say that I’m just starting to like myself enough, that it is kind of *like* falling in love, in the sense that I’m discovering a bunch of coolness right here, and that I am feeling that for the moment, I don’t want to share any of me with anyone but me? Like – hey – I discovered this cool person and I want to get to know her and be her best friend before I let anyone else in?”
D’you know, Magnolia, I LOVE this. In fact I may copy it out and post-it to my wall.
I’ve been really struggling with self-esteem for eons now, and I’d got to the point where I can’t even see the point of having any (‘what difference would it make and who cares anyway?’ sort of a way) but that quote just brought a rush of “YESSSSSSSSSS!” THAT’S what it should feel like.
The other thing that I’m trying to do at the moment – in an attempt to reclaim my arty side – is make a collage/shrine to my aspirations and hopes for the future – who I want to be/what I want to do etc. So far I’d only got as far as cutting a few pictures of lions out of magazines and stocking up on the glitter before I ran out of steam on the idea, but you’ve just inspired me to crack on with it again.
Umm, this one is going to take a ton of thought. Every single sentence applies to me in so many ways. I’m just in awe Natalie. Then, I have to sit down and figure out how I could have played such a demoralizing role. Thank you for giving me some more to think about. Where do I start, again?
Dear god, I will not respond to text messages from any guy, other than to ask what my favorite champange is and if I prefer OJ with pulp. No more crumb “Good morning sunshine” texts while he wakes up with his wife. No more crumb “Night night”texts while he goes to bed with his wife. WTF, was I thinking? I settled for a TEXT??? Thank you.
I’ll probably be a blog hog on this one as I process it. This one hit home, again! Only thing I can think now is what could I have been thinking??? . WTF was I doing? Who was that woman?
Hi runner, go easy on you, eh? I think when these guys give us a big dose of their attention, we get hooked on that feeling, and it carries us through the periods of no or crumb attention, until we get another big dose.
If you’re a plant in the desert of love, and someone comes along and dumps buckets of water on you, you’re going to be like: water jackpot!!! And then when the drips come, you won’t say to yourself, I’m settling for drips, you’ll be saying – there’s a water jackpot here! What can I do to tip the bucketfuls again? You wouldn’t have settled for crumbs if it was all you EVER got, if it was what seemed to be on offer. DoucheMM knew enough to give you some weekends with hiking and champagne brunches and his full attention.
Remember common-law-married poethost, from Kansas? He was in town here in Canada this weekend. I never heard from him after I told him that I wouldn’t put him up when he came, and had wondered about not seeing his name advertised around, but then went to a reading Saturday night and guess who was the surprise guest?
Very different to meet him on my turf. I felt compelled to do drinks with him and some of my friends; it was totally fine, above board on my part. I asked who put him up, he said he was in a hotel, in a mildly martyred tone. Later he told my friends that I “practically lived at his house” when I was in KS, which felt again like a little dig. Anyway, over drinks, as I was no longer the new young woman in his world, he turned his attention to another young woman in our group. Really something to watch. Paid her all kinds of attention. I didn’t listen in; she seems a sweet girl; she gave him a big hug and kiss as we left, offering to exchange emails.
These guys are kind of genuine, I think, when they do what they do, because they are big attention-sluts who want fresh admiration all the time. So with each new woman who isn’t their main, they get swept up, they feel big, and they’re into playing the part of the big man who gets swept up into romance. What was never on his mind was the genuine desire to find someone to be exclusive with and permanently focused on. (Then again, neither was yours …)
But the big attention hit … I think that intensity can be misread, it’s real, but real what? and it can also act as a real hook … that dies for him the moment it becomes alive, as expectation, in you.
Mags – You are writing so beautifully and poignantly today. The last couple of paragraphs of both your comments are inspired.
Mag
Agree with Elle, you are on top form today.
As for this guy, I never liked him. I feel vindicated. You’re absolutely right, they feel it AT THE TIME. It can all change tomorrow/next week/ next time a pretty girl comes in the room/ when you get sick/ when they are sick/ there is pressure at work or, God forbid, they have to sleep in a HOTEL!
My close friend told me, after listening to my then-latest episode, “they totally mean it at the time.”
She then told me that when she was in her 20’s, the man that she was in love with proposed to both her and another woman *the same night.* Totally sincerely. Okay, the guy was a heroin addict, apparently a charming, arty one. Can you effing believe that?
Thanks ladies! I am in a profound streak of writing in the dissertation – I actually went to bed last night asking myself what the best part of my day was, and it was these kick-ass sentences I wrote on minds growing like plants, lol! Yay sentences! It’s almost embarrassing when I like working this much. Guess some of it is spilling out here!
Oh yeah Magnolia, I’m with you on the dose of attention phenomenon. I was able to subsist in a desert with a good watering of champagne now and again, clearly daddy/childhood issues. In fact, the suck it and see weekend was the perfect “DoucheMM knew enough to give you some weekends with hiking and champagne brunches and his full attention”, replete with what type of OJ did I like in my mimosas. When I got that text, I laughed. For the prior 2 years, it never mattered. He also wanted to help with the dishes! He pulled out every water jackpot. Too little water and too late. That’s the thing though, no consistency, not that a MM could ever be consistent. Just a bucket full of shite every now and again which I magically turned into champagne.
I remember the Poethost from Kansas and I’m so glad you didn’t succumb to the dose of attention. His cat is permanently stuck up a tree. I’ve watched the same thing when “HE” turns his attention to another poor soul, watched her swoon, knowing she’ll be hitting the pavement tomorrow. Thank god and Natalie you avoided the pavement. Let him sleep in a hotel, for gods sake. Isn’t he important? Important folks sleep in hotels. The Pres of the US sleeps in hotels. It’s part of being important, right? Is Poethost more important than the Pres of the US?
I’m sensing there is such a huge difference between an attention hit and a healthy relationship. A year ago, I thought the former was the latter. You all are amazing. Attention crack is crack. I’m starting to see that a healthy, mutual relationship based on love, honesty, and respect is different than than that crack high. So grateful. So grateful. Thank you. You dodged a total crack hit Mag. Good for you! His drawers weren’t clean and his cat was up a tree…total LOL.
This post made me well up a little. Such a swirling of thoughts around this very subject lately for me. And although it was a mutual parting and is what’s best, I’m exhausted with the “whys?” I keep asking of dead air. Its so hard to let go sometimes. Even when you KNOW you deserve better treatment and must insist on it. And then NML writes a poignant blog reminding you of WHY you just did yourself a solid in stepping away in order to not defraud yourself and you feel really grateful and then you thank God for her.
I was lied to and manipulated into thinking that he cared about me, and I was in Love and it was a one-sided relationship. Wish I would have had this wise information from this article many months ago….
When I found out he was cheating on me secretly for five months I took all the love I had for him away. 5 weeks of No contact and I am doing great. I don’t even need him as much as I did when we started out 14 months ago because I have more friends, a great place to live, my job is really rewarding and interesting, and because I started going to gym about 10 months ago to ‘deal’ with him, his abuse, and the relationship I toned up, lost weight, and am healthier – so I am more appealing to myself and to new men that I’m meeting and wanting to date!
So really, this sick sexual predator, narcissist, this damaged and difficult man taught me some lessons, and got me back into the gym and into myself! I was also doing self-improvment on my own… I joined a Gregorian Chant choir about same time I met him, and this choir helped me bring my spirituality back into focus!
My brain is so clear, and I’m becomming my happier real self. The EUM and all the events are really disappearing from my forethoughts. (anyone who has trouble with obsessing and ruminating, etc will appreciate the Peace I am having). I am actually surprised at how well I Have Broken Up and Off this One-Sided Relationship; one where I was in Love and he wasn’t.
I’ve been reading Natalie’s brilliant works for months and I am so grateful! Thank you Natalie!!!! and to all the wonderful women who are also here right now, because I get so much from your comments too! Peace Y’All no matter what stage you are in… Happy Thanksgiving.
Shiv- I completely agree with you. Being in my twenties all guys are like this. They like the chase, but once they have you, they don’t want you any more.
FedUp
I have to butt in. This is completely untrue. I know/have known a LOT of young men in their 20s . I work in law and, as you may know, each year we get an influx of trainees straight from University or young attorneys moving firm. As their secretary I would pick up pics of their girlfriends/wives from their desk and interrogate them “Who’s this?” “How long have you been together?” Most of them were in long term relationships or married. They spoke very fondly and with no embarrassment about their partners. That’s when I first got an inkling that my experience is not everyone’s experience. I know plenty of men in their late 20s/early 30s who are looking forward to their first child. And, yes, they are with the mothers and haven’t done a runner.
My brother has had all of three girlfriends. The first one dumped him. The second one he maried and she cheated on him. You’d think he would have given up but the third one’s the charm.
You are free to hold these negative beliefs but, unfortunately, they WILL negatively affect your relationships with men. Or, indeed, anyone come to that.
Yes, there are players out there. If you keep running into them you have to look to yourself. As Judge Judy is fond of yelling”You get no compensation for emotional distres.. YOU PICKED HIM”.
I do understand that their are some deceitful people out there, but we can learn to avoid them. What we really must learn is to stop finding them attractive. And that starts with us.
Grace, true story! I just turned 30, live in a big city and I’d go around lamenting that all the men in my age bracket were players that would drop me as soon as something better came along because I wasn’t special enough. Oy, just oy. Mind you, all of my friends are in great relationships, so obviously my city isn’t full of men that only consider themselves worthy of supermodels who moonlight in finding cures for obscure diseases.
p.s. I used to be a legal secretary and I’d do the same Photo Interrogation haha! I’m nosy like that.
@Natasha: My reasoning used to be the opposite: Everybody except me seemed to be in a healthy relationship, thus it must have been because of me that I couldn’t have any, right?
Like as a child: I was the one how constantly lived in fear and pain because of my family’s ongoing abuse and my schoolmates’ bullying. I was deprived of anything fun and yet was constantly being told I was the most spoiled brat in the world! I wondered why. Why did all those other kids had nice lives and were happy, why wasn’t I? What was wrong with me? Why did I “force” people to do all those bad things to me???
To me it seemed as if in my relationships, I was just repeating my childhood and it was all my fault.
EllyB, I’m so sorry you had to go through that. No wonder you got it in your head that you were doing something wrong – I’m so glad you’ve realized that this is not the case! I totally get the “it must be my fault” feeling and isn’t it hugely libearting to move beyond that? I really believed that if I was prettier/smarter/more successful the guys I dated wouldn’t have been so nasty to me. HELLO. I really respect you for being able to move beyond the things that happened in your childhood – you are one amazing lady EllyB! 🙂 *Big Hugs*
Fed Up, you’ve got to look at the part you played in the chase. What made these guys continue to think they could treat you badly…sorry it’s not an age thing at all.
There are ‘players’ of fifty or more that are still going through the repeat love’em and leave’em fiasco’s because they have no need to change.Women have not pulled them up short on their behaviour ever.
My son who is 21, sometimes leaves me awe-struck, in his respect and consistent behaviour towards women. I absolutely love that this bodes well for his future… I am so proud of this in him.
This is so dead on! I started seeing a guy a couple of months ago:handsome, hardworking,& a good divorced dad. I hopped on a possibility cloud & let him take the lead. He dangled just enough in front of me to get & keep my interest: bad divorce,worst relationship after, just wanted a good woman. The ugly truth came out soon enough as in the past couple of days: he’s still sleeping with a sex buddy(off & on for 10 years), still sleeping with his ex(they’re in negotiations to get back together); he’s not ready for a relationship bu he’s more than willing to take whatever I want to give. Tonight he anounced that he would like to see me, but he’s all about family for the next couple weeks. I might, might get to see him around Christmas. My response: thanks, but no thanks. I’m a big girl; I need more then the teaspoonfuls of affection he’s trying to give…
GettingBetter
We all need to be careful of equating good dad with good partner. Bad dad probably equals bad partner but it doesn’t work the other way.
Is he sleeping with his ex wife and sex buddy? One day when the kids have grown up and realise that their father has jerked their mother around, and probably them too, they might have a different take on whether he’s such a good dad.
And it’s easy to enjoy kids when they’re young and think you’re the centre of the world. Who’s going to provide the moral compass when they get older? I’m not sure that a man juggling multiple women is up to the job.
I’m getting quite hardhearted in my old age!
Wow. Powerful words. I haven’t read for a while but felt I needed to and this was exactly what I needed to hear. I have been struggling with that last bit of letting go. I don’t want to see him or need anything from him to validate me but I kept worrying why I still thought of the AC from time to time (not fondly). This post helped. He didn’t love me (or even like me, when it all ended) but that doesn’t mean what I felt didn’t have depth and significance to me. I was just in it alone. That’s why getting over future fakers and assclowns is so hard. For a few minutes, it felt very real. Then, we project and prolong those feelings to keep “it” going, even though “it” isn’t worth shit. It’s not that the feelings aren’t real. It’s that they aren’t mutual. I kept trying to convince myself the whole thing wasn’t real. What I should have been focusing on was that it wasn’t shared. This helps more than you can know. Many thanks, Natalie.
Your comment helps me, Debra.
Me, too.
“He didn’t love me (or even like me, when it all ended) but that doesn’t mean what I felt didn’t have depth and significance to me.”
Yes. That has been hard to accept. What happened in my last relationship had incredible depth and significance: to me.
Your words make me realize that it is in part that very depth and significance that I want to hang on to. Thank goodness there are so many ways in life to create my own depth and significance. (Looks like I was creating it on my own anyway, lol!)
You could entitle almost every one of your posts “BAIL.” Just, “BAIL.”
No other word describes so clearly the entirety of points made on this blog. I especially can’t think of a better word describing what to do when we throw ourselves into another person so shamelessly and literally expect nothing back. What else should we be doing but bailing!
I honestly don’t believe if unrequited love is really love, though. I suspect it’s more of an attachment disordered type of neediness with a lot of resentment thrown in.
But then I think unconditional love between adults is a crock. Love is earned. Unconditional love is for children and pets. Adults need to earn love. Shouldn’t love have conditions attached to it? You don’t (or, you shouldn’t) keep “your partner if he beats you up, continually lies to you, cheats on you repeatedly, etc. Telling you “I love you but not the way you need it,” or “You know where I stand, I’m seeing other women,” or he just doesn’t even stay in contact with you, how is any of that EARNING your valuable loving feelings and emotions?!
So I honestly don’t know if it’s love. There’s a lot of evidence to me that we are neurocognitively hardwired to accept an emotionally barren landscape as a “relationship” and then call it love.
molly
Funny but true – just BAIL!
I can see why people object to that. Why not do a, b, c or x, y, z? I don’t think they understand the futility of these relationships, or the fact that we HAVE tried abc AND d,e,f and all the letters of the alphabet! We are not men-hating prima donnas who boot men out at the first minor offence. I WISH!
What applies to a mutual relationship does not apply to these one-sided situations (it’s barely a relationship). I too think unconditional love between two adult people in a sexual relationship is a crock. I’m not sure about having to earn it, but it should certainly be MUTUAL.
I don’t believe we are programmed to except crapola as love. I think as human beings we NEED love to thrive, and if we don’t have it we are in danger of inventing it. And love comes from all kind of people and even animals.
It’s hard to take that first step for yourself, especially when you’ve stayed so long and given him all of the power, it seems like its damn near impossible to feel powerful enough to take some action on your own. I love the Toni Braxton song “Just Be a Man About It”, mainly because of the way she emotes, but it’s also the truth of what happens in some “relationships”. Sometimes all the signs are there that the relationship is not what it should be, and it feels like all we need is for that other person to just tell us point blank that they don’t want us (even though that’s the last thing we really want). But how many of us are ever really that honest? Some people try to spare others’ feelings, others are cowards, and some just plain old don’t know what the hell they want. It’s ridiculously lazy to want them to do the work of breaking things off with you when you’re the one whose unhappy, and just plain ridiculous to expect them to do anything if they haven’t by now. I ran myself in circles for a long time before I realized that he didn’t have anything to lose either way because he wasn’t actually doing any of the work, but I did. My friend asked me if I had the choice between my happiness and sanity, or him, which would I choose. Sad thing is that those two things did not go together, but the choice was obvious, I choose me.
“It’s ridiculously lazy to want them to do the work of breaking things off with you when you’re the one whose unhappy.”
Clunk execellent point.
Wow ~ you truly are my guardian Angel today, can relate 100% to this post but realised last night following a phone call with my ex (together 5 1/2 years) that it’s over, it has to be, as painful as it is I’ve got to let it go ~ I loved the whole post but particularly liked ‘It felt like I’d been a victim of a relationship-jacking. I’d been robbed!’ How long does it take for the pain to heal & can I really find myself in a loving relationship after all these years and at my age ~ 44??? And how do you learn to love yourself & build self esteem?
Hey Karen, Read Nat’s older posts, do your homework, do new, interesting and lovely things for yourself, be gentle in your thinking. I don’t think anyone could tell you how long it will take before you feel a certain way, and I suspect these things will always, to some extent, ebb and flow. But, if it helps, my father just told me about a female family friend whose husband left her for another woman, at 46, some time ago. She was devastated and asked him how long she would feel bad for. He said (in his usual, decisive way!) in two years she would feel great, and that it would take the same time for her husband to feel miserable again (as the problems within himself he thought he’d solve through leaving her resurfaced). He saw her today after 22 months, feeling happy and looking great. Turned out his prophecy was perfectly true. In any event, around these parts, it’s always you first, THEN a relationship.
Elle
You know what, I think two years is right too. A friend of mine lost a twin sister and she said two years as well. The first year is hard – it’s the first birthday without them, the first Christmas. By the time the second one comes round, it’s getting better. I read an article about the actress in Solaris, first name Natasha, after her husband died. She said it took two years to heal.
Now that’s if someone dies. From my own experience it takes a year to get over a serious breakup where no-one has died (yes, ladies, no-one’s died!). It’s not a year of complete misery – if you stick to NC there is a marked upturn after six months. Which you won’t get if you keep contact. Or keep dating losers for that matter.
Of course, it varies by individual, but if it’s months and months of unabated misery, it may be time to take yourself in hand. It took me three years to get over someone I was “with” (ie I loved him, he was milking it). Sure, there’s no set timetable but I’m gonna say that three years is entirely too long. I used to think it was because I loved him so much. I did love him, but the recovery was dragged out by the fact that my self-esteem had been crushed over years of bad experiences.
If it seems to take forever, it’s probably not all about him.
Agreed that six months really is a turning point. I had mine at about 4-5 months and was feeling much much better after that time, wasn’t even on my radar.
Also we need to keep in mind that healing is not linear. It’s some back and forth and regrets and feelings of loss can always return in some form. I had a trigger of sadness because I heard a song that the both of us loved and it triggered some sadness about him for a while.
So what did I do? I came to this site and read, read, read. When I felt shitty, I read some more. It really helps. Not listening to the song and putting it away for a while also helped!
Karen,
You ask how long will it take to get over it? You can read up on that and there are ratios, but 5+ years could take some time. If abuse was involved it can take longer… But no matter how long it takes you will be free to find a better love. After one break-up I had I cried every day for a year, but I didn’t have excellent support that you will find right here on Baggage Reclaim. Be patient and good to yourself. It gets better and I’m wishing you the best.
Feel for you Karen, what works is allowing yourself to feel absolutely everything you can about the relationship. If you feel anger get it out, if you need to cry, don’t hamper yourself. (sometimes at work etc, it can be difficult if you are feeling weepy etc, give yourself quiet time to grieve later). Try not to let things slide, easier said than done…but if you have personal routines, keep them up, try and meet deadlines etc. This helps maintain self esteem.
I found in the past if I owned my entitlement to all feelings…then the healing came quicker. Avoidance doesn’t work.
I used focused writing at times, feelings diaries to sort out my needs/feelings and this helped with anger and stopped obsessive thoughts.
Finally,take every day at a time, don’t future project about him, fall prey to worrying what he thinks or will think. In time you will focus on your own future, that is as it should be.
Hello Everyone!
@Feast to Famine
“I learned from a relationship expert, Dr. Pat Allen, that the reason I always longed for unavailable men is that I was afraid of intimacy and I was addicted to the chemical hormone produced by LONGING called “norepinephrine”. The longing for an unavailable man stems from a longing for daddy. Can I have a hallelujah?”
Oh. My. Goodness. Yes you flipping well can! HALLELUJAH!
I totally ‘get’ the combination of the addiction to the ‘high’ and the fear (terror in my case) of being dependent and truly intimate with another human being. Talk about trust issues!
With me it was a longing for some warmth and validation from an emotionally unavailable, uber-critical mother that triggered a thirty year long parallel process of having long-standing stable relationships with warm and affectionate men, that I would cheat on, with EU men, for whom I would turn cartwheels, lusting and desiring them, in mainly one-sided, fantasy scenarios, at the expense of my ‘real’ life.
No wonder I’m so bloody tired…
Ha ha!!
I am there.
I am in the verge of forgetting a man who constantly blew hot and cold, picked up my heart, smashed it, tore it apart, threw it on the trash and then, once in a while, gave me some breadcrumbs hoping to maintain his status quo. Since we worked together for him it was easy to behave in this so creepy manner, I gather.
Once I stood up for myself and started to not accept this behavior anymore he got crazy and haven’t been able to handle this situation. Long story short: yesterday I have been fired, due to some “professional handicaps” (aka “I cannot bear to be by your side anymore, even if I am being a total and complete jerk”). If there is a bright side on everything, I assume there is one here as well: I will finally be able of pursuing a complete NC with this man – I will live overseas, while he remains here in Austria.
Wow Sabrina,
Being fired is a big one! You sound so very positive, Good for You! Being fired can be very positive and now you have so many new opportunities. I’m hoping the best for you! Be Strong and Healthy…
Hi AngelFace,
thank you for your so kind words.
Yeah, I am being positive *now*; this is not the first time I comment here, it’s a while already that I am dancing such a twisted tune with Mr. Chaser. Point is, I was still projecting my inner world, made of unicorns, fairies, fluffy pink clouds and cats over the outer world, not to mention all BS I had in my mind because of him.
Now I learned my lesson. It is true, it is being positive, all right: I will come back home, to Brazil, where my closest friends and family live. It couldn’t be better and, truth to be told, he’s one I have to thank for such an amazing change in my life. 🙂
xoxo
Sabrina.
I read almost all your blogs, and rarely comment. But the last sentence of today is my new mantra. I recently (like yesterday) let go of an unrequited. How do I know I let go? Because I looked at my actions and laughed. I NC’d him and went back to work. And other, decent, interested men started coming out of the woodwork. I have myself back. Thank you for your words!
The hard part is remembering when it was mutual. Especially when you can get dumped out of the blue like i did. Sometimes I wish I could have my memory erased like in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Its the good memories that hurt. I don’t fall in love easily, but when I do, I do fall hard. How do you overcome the fear of getting hurt again?
Fed-Up: I wanted to add that I had also wished I ‘d never met the man I fell in love with but I also realised that I’d learned SO much and that I did love him and I probably always will and that is okay…but since the relationship didn’t work as I need one to, then it was best to free myself for one that could. I’ve read someplace that courage isn’t being without fear, it is going forth and doing despite your fear. Ultimately it is your call. I may never find another that I felt so much for, but I hope to.I’m not hunting for one either, but I want to be ready if and when that love appears, meanwhile I’ll live and enjoy the loves I do have in my life: friends and family and the beauty of the world as well as all of the other things that make life enjoyable.Wishing all of us love and peace.
Hi Fedup,
I guess that only with time you will loose this fear… I didn’t loose it yet, but I am confident that one day I will.
xoxo
Sabrina.
fedup
Idon’t have that fear anymore, and for quite a long time I was terrified of men and relationships.
I also don’t love the ex anymore and I thought I would always love him. I was quite committed to that.
It’s been over five years mind, and even the most most romantically inclined would raise an eyebrow at someone carrying a torch for that long.
It takes time. You do have to lose the illusion as well. Sometimes, it’s just not as great as you thought it was.
Feelings are just feelings. You can’t die from them. You won’t. And if you are afraid of the bad, you miss out on the good. And there can be SO MUCH GOOD. We were designed to be with another human being to love and connect. And when we are really in touch with our OWN emotions, we learn to recognize who is safe for us. There really are safe people out there. THERE ARE. I believe that. I really do.
Fed-Up: I think there will always be fear of hurt because that is natural after experiencing it. However, I don’t think that fear should run your life. Natalie teaches how to suss things out so we have tools, and as life is full of learning there is no doubt there will be disappointments, but when you love yourself loving another will not cause you to destroy yourself. Loss does happen as we are born to die. That which happens in between we have only our own self control over…I choose love despite the fear of hurt…I hope you will too. I also choose to believe that once we die then we will have all the answers that we need and it probably won’t matter anymore anyway provided that did the best that you were able…so live while you are here with a brave and loving spirit !
“Damn it Natalie, you’ve done it again! It’s almost like you “know” what is going on in a precise moment of my life and then write an article about it!”
Haha, so true! I’m doing exactly as you describe, The relationship is over for 6 weeks now. It was mutual but it didnt work, our communication and our insecurities clashed constantly. Now he seemed to have made it his goal to get over me as soon as he can and move on… we met once after we broke up and there was still a lot of feeling and to be honest, I realy hate being alone again and kinda got desperate feelings that I wanted him back. He doesn’t seem to want me back.. But since he never actually SAID that (yes, I know..)…. I’m still here rekindling the relationship all on my own…
Thank you for your post Natalie…
I became the woman he cheated on his girlfriend with. Then I was the woman he cheated on his ex-girlfriend with (because she hadn’t moved out, and he didn’t want to hurt her by telling her about me). When he became “single”, he introduced me to his kids, took me on holidays, and I thought we were on the same page. It was months since I had fallen in love with him. But after a long bussiness trip, he came back saying that we shouldn’t see each other anymore. I was devastated, but I kept telling myself that we had never defined our relationship, and that we had never really discussed our future. I hadn’t talked about my feelings. And I felt as if I had no right to be angry or dissappointed.
Three days later he said he couldn’t bare the idea of not seeing me ever again. He offered a relationship. He said that he had met someone during his trip. He talked again about his divorce, his ex-girlfriend, his problems. But he wanted to be with me now. I remember listening to him and thinking that everything would be ok if he said “I love you”. I could forgive, we could work it out. All he had to do was looking into my eyes and saying the words I LOVE… and I would interrupt him to shout “I love you too!”. He never said it. But that didn’t stop me to convince myself that he did love me, but he couldn’t express it; that we were going to be happy ever after. Three weeks later, just after new year’s day, he said the relationship was not working (as if he had even tried), and that he had never realy seen me as his future wife (guess I should thank the small moment of honesty there).
How absurd to give away a year of my life for someone who could never be there for me. How demeaning to base so many dreams on someone who never showed any respect for me as a woman.
I’ve been in love on my own for too long now, even after months of no contact. His words still resonate in my head, at least the ones that help to construct a possibility of being with him in the future. How tired I am. But life goes on, one step at a time.
Wow, AMAZING post Natalie. Very ‘urrrrgh’ but very very true. There’s no more to it. Thank you for your wonderful insights….all that bloody pain and grief that these lads put you though have been a blessing that’s for sure!
“I’m not going to fight for something that’s broken by its lack of mutuality.”
Funny how you know this, but you have to be in the right place to finally see it for what it is and surrender, game over.
I’ve been a bouncing yo yo for five years and even a stint a the OW, yes it’s insanity and fricken demoralising even though you may fool yourself that you are cool with it, he’s worth it or are so fricken confused you don’t know who he is anymore anyway – i was hanging on to the ideal and the zazazu. i recently read his online profile and realised he couldn’t even give that a smidgen of character and depth. Who the hell did i think I was ‘in love with’. sigh.
Grace you are so right about highlighting the friend option….I am wrestling /waivering with this right now but you are right. What the hell would I get from the friendship? Nothing but excess baggage, a few how are you emails? It’s highly unlikely he’ll be in my life anyway …just a sticky beak and a number for a rainy day! A security benefit to him not me. If I’m not good enough (in his eyes) to be a partner, I’m not good enough to be his friend, nor he mine.
Love your work Natalie, come to Australia for a little workshop, there’s plenty of clown carnage down here to keep you busy! 🙂
AMEN!!! Maree, I’m in Queensland 🙂
Marie ~ I know….I wrestled with the friend thing too, but finally got over it (on my good days). I realized I was putting in exactly the same of myself into it (maybe even more) and getting even less than the crumbs I got before from him. What you want matters. What you need matters. Just not to him. Or just not enough. (If that reads harsh, I’m sorry, speaking more to myself I promise)
Thanks Natalie!!
this is so timely for what is going on in my life now. I met a guy on a online dating site 2 moths ago. We had plan to meet a month ago but he canceled because of something came up with his son. Another month passes and many texts and emails and he asked me to visit him at his house, so I told him that i wanted to meet him but not in his house, so he said he will treat me to a mexican restaurant, that was a monday and we were supposed to meet saturday, friday night he texted me asking to move the date for sunday, and I just have another commitments so I declined, he asked me to meet then friday after thanksgiving, I said yes but then I texted him that it was better to not meet. He is living to Afghanistan next month for a year.
I felt he was treating me like an option and that i was the last card he was playing. So I feel a little sad, but at the same time I know it was the right thing to do. I just could not be the one available all the time and that he could just cancel or change dates at will. For me it meant low interest in his part, i know sometimes we can get commited to events with family and its hard to say no, but if he was interested, he could have squish a lunch or cup of coffee just to be true to his word.
You did the right thing Allie…absolutely 100%
Marina
Eternal Summer
You will get through it. I thought the same as you ladies did for almost 13 years on and off. I am not one to get hooked easily but this man was likek to me. It has taken me almost a year to see him for what he really is and get over my addiction to him. I finally learnt to love and respect myself first. That is the key
Wow so well put. I really needed to hear this!!! Thank you…
I just got home from filing my divorce papers when I saw this post. It couldn’t have come at a better time. Thank you! My marriage was very one sided. Me doing all the loving, all the relationship work, and me wanting sex way more than he ever did. After 20 years, I finally noticed that very little I brought to the relationship was ever reflected back at me. I decided to risk it and get out rather than settling for a one-sided marriage for the rest of my life. Thanks for giving me some thoughts to remind me that leaving my marriage was the best thing for me.
That’s amazing Anne, congratulations. 2o years of your life weren’t in vain, now to embrace the rest of your life and your freedom. xxx
It’s like you read my mind when you wrote this post Natalie! Today I found myself wracked with pain, nerves, feeling my body sending out bad signals like an alarm… when I thought about him with someone else (which will inevitably happen) and how much I wanted it to be me. At this mere shadow of an idea (not even grounded in reality), I could feel myself folding like a pack of cards, feeling sad/rejected/shitty, totally belying my resolution to take these next few months for me and doing all the things I’ve been waiting to do.
Then I read your post, and deleted a chatty, status quo restoring message I’d written up for him in my drafts folder—one that was kind, happy, funny and totally glossed over the time we’ve spent together. All with the thought of keeping him onside, to make sure he still “felt” about me.
This is a sorry state of affairs because I’m feeling so much pain and this is not a mututal relationship. Not anymore, and I’m still clinging, hanging, just hoping something will tip the scales.
It’s such an unhealthy way to live. I don’t want to sweat out the minutes of my life, waiting with my breath held. Like I’ve done. I’ve pandered to every single whim and instinct, and it’s gotten me here… out of breath and with no self worth to speak of! I guess I gotta take it a day at a time.
Natalie,
That’s me. You described me.
This very issue is what has taken the last three years of my life.
At 57, I don’t really have three years to give.
I search early now for balance.
Are there are like sensitivities and passion?
One of the first things I gauge, when encountering the potential of a relationship, is genuine interest versus passive curiosity.
If I don’t see that interest exists, and effort is made, then I back off quickly.
Time to move on, because I know that she is out there somewhere.
She will show up when it is time for her to show up.
Rick
Runnergirl, Fearless, and Magnolia:
You have been my biggest supporters during my NC journey. Last week was my first full week to make it through. I made it. Lots of crying, blogging, worrying and more crying, but I made it through. Wouldn’t you know, he started texting me again Saturday night??!! Do you think there was any mention of my heart felt poured out email saying why I could no longer continue my connection and communication with him?? NOPE. He said “Hey, You don’t have to respond. I don’t understand why you wont…but whatever. Your team is slipping in the rankings.” This is what he had to say to me. Going back to our sports bantering. I didn’t respond. This definitely proves the feelings were not mutual. I really hoped they were and he just couldn’t say it. For years, I thought this kind of “crumb attention” meant he was thinking of me and this was his way of connecting with me since he always told me he “wasn’t good expressing his thoughts and feelings for me, but of course he cared”. Now, i see him for what he is…thank you ladies…and Natalie!!! He is dishing out the crumbs, trying to get me to take them as always. I can’t do all the loving and caring in this “whatever it is we have relationship”. I care more about me than this man who obviously has no feelings (to completely disregard my message and feelings) and has made it very clear he is Emotionally Unavailable. And obviously void of any feelings. He’s also just plain screwed up to be messaging me about sports after all that and 4 years of visits and promises. A mutual relationship does take 2 people, one person cannot do it alone as Natalie said. Trust me, I’ve tried.
Complicated, I’m going to say something here that you’re unlikely to like, but it’s something you and no doubt many other readers need to hear:
It was just an email.
I get it. What you feel is intense and real for you plus there’s this whole one sided friendship or faux friendship or you thought it was much more, but it was just an email.
Now ladies (and gents) – we cannot slate others for lazy communication that we engage in ourselves. When it’s a crumb for them, it’s a crumb for you.
You want to pour out your feelings – you pick up the phone, you meet face to face, you jump on a plane. In a relationship littered with texts and emails, another email is Just Another Email.
The email feels like a big deal to you but that’s just *you*. The truth is that he’s matched you in effort – he replied. It wasn’t the reply you wanted but let’s be real, no serious communication about your relationship, no serious *discussion* takes place via email or text.
And therein lies the problem – we do these things because we know, if we did what a couple in a mutual or even remotely respectful relationship do, we’d be met with tumbleweeds or a brick wall. An affair erodes this further as it limits how you can act in a situation – you then end up inflating the value of texts and emails when they’re actually lazy communication there to keep you ‘managed’ and at arms length.
I do not doubt for one minute that you’re hurting Complicated. I’ve had my own pain, as have Runner, Mags, and many more readers.
These men are like Barbie dolls – there’s millions of them.
But it was just an email and if this is what you have to dine off for attention, it only amplifies the fact that your relationship with this man is insubstantial.
He doesn’t ‘owe’ you anything. He’s Future Faked and whatever else but you have also made your choices. The only people he owes anything to is his wife, himself and any kids.
You’re not entitled to pain and suffering severance pay. The longer you make a big deal about this mans crumb offering is the longer it will take to recover, is the more invested you will seem, is the worse you will feel about yourself for treating you like this, is the more you will look for attention from this clown.
You are better than this.
NML
This reminds me of a hilarious incident with the MM. I told him, ” I don’t want to conduct this by text”. Which I said in a text. Brilliant.
Complicated,
You are getting there. Yes, a a mutual relationship takes two – but neither can be involved with another person! You can’t have a mutual relationship when there is a third party. As poor Princess Diana said, “there were three of us in the marriage. It was a bit crowded.”
Anyway, he has texted you. Don’t reply. You get the satisfaction of the last word. I know we should be too mature to care about that but, hey, whatever keeps you from responding!
Ignore, ignore, ignore.
Hi Grace,
I do like having the last word hehe. Thank you so much for your support during this time. You do not know how much this has meant to me. I have to say it’s been one of the most difficult and painful times in my life and my lesson learned is to never lower myself to be an OW again. I know this isn’t the last I’ll hear from him. Someone said on an earlier post that these men are like roaches after a nuclear bomb has gone off…now I know what that means. Also, knowing he has no intention of acknowledging all those things I said when I poured out my feelings, as if they weren’t important enough to acknowledge, I realize this isn’t someone who needs to be in my life. His wife can have him. Good riddance. I sound strong writing this, but it still hurts as I’m sure it will for a long time. I still feel stupid for falling for him and believing somehow we’d end up together.
NML,
Thank you so much for responding!! This is such an inspirational site you have here. You’re right, I didn’t like hearing that…although it was the truth. However, I think that’s why most of us visit your site. We can tell our stories, and receive both the good and bad feedbacks….that’s what makes it so real and insightful. I believe for a long time, I’ve been “Hooked on Hope” as I’ll call it. I never intended (nor have I ever) fell for a MM. I brushed aside his advances, promises, and blissful words: “I miss you, want to be with you, chatting with you is the best part of my day, etc.” for months when this all started 4 years ago. But, part of me thought, we have a history, we dated and talked marriage years ago, so maybe this is fate (albeit, the timing sucked with him already being married) and ours was the Unrequited love I’d read about and seen in movies. Ugh. I even told myself I could just be friends. But once I was hooked, I was hooked emotional line and sinker. Once he realized how ‘hooked I was’, he began blowing hot and cold from then on…the next 3 years. I saved my money and traveled to see him and have our ‘visits’ and hear his sweet words and how much he cared although the timing sucked, when he could fit me into his busy schedule to see me, several times a year for the past 4 years. Funny, he told me all this time how much the timing sucked, but what could he do he was there and married and I was here. Although he cared for me he said “what do you expect me to do?” I’ve told him I loved him MANY times over the years, but never asked him to leave his wife. So, he was upfront all along and I was “hooked on hope”. I hung onto every text as though the world would end if I didn’t receive one. Yes, I invested everything…my time, sanity, and money for this man. In return I received crumbs. Now, that I see this, I can make the much needed changes in my life without him and invest all this energy into focusing on me. Thanks again NML for everything! Here’s to a successful upcoming 2nd week of NC.
Thank you for this very candid response, dear Natalie. I’d just like to clarify. When you wrote that “he doesn’t owe you anything”, do you mean it in the specific context of Complicated’s situation, or more broadly, that men don’t really have any ethical responsibility to acknowledge/apologize/explain themselves. Would your advice be that, it would be great and ideal if he could, but if he can’t/won’t, the onus is then on the woman to move on as we cannot keep badgering him to give us an answer. Maybe it isn’t really an answer we want, but the words/confirmation of “I love you and I want you”, which isn’t there to begin with (that we don’t really want to face). So these EUMs are actually being truthful, by not saying anything at all.
The sense of feeling owed and wanting redress, is something that I really relate to. I wonder if it’s fair/right to feel this way. Is feeling sadness over an Assclown, even preposterous? I’ve revenge fantasies of dunking coffee over him, or kicking him. Or does he really not owe me anything, because he is entitled to behave the way he is/and probably is acting out his original nature in the first place. I wanted an apology for being a victim of his future-faking, for making him realize how cruel he’d been, for wrecking my life and poisoning my beliefs about love and the little disregard for human life/emotions he had. I got progressively downgraded and silenced. From face to face, to phone calls, to epic handwritten letters (all ignored). Once when I brought it up, he just looked at me and said “what do you want me to say”. Then, faux-assurances, placations through SMS.
Am reminded again, of a good friend’s story. She is feeling a growing sense of resentment (because of an ambiguous MM situation) and kept saying “I want an explanation”. It’s this insatiable desire for an explanation, that can keep one ensnared in a psychological knot, not positive attraction. For me, it was quite soul-destroying.
Very interesting reply to complicated, Natalie. So true. It’s ironic we complain about the lazy communication while doing it ourselves – and for the very reason you say:
“we do these things because we know, if we did what a couple in a mutual or even remotely respectful relationship do, we’d be met with tumbleweeds or a brick wall.”
Yep. I knew that so well. So I’d email – or I’d text him. Trying to actually talk to him about what I wanted to say would have been stonewalled – not allowed – and the thought of trying it made me anxious and fearful of the consequences, i.e. disappearing followed by silent treatment.
All so true – v. interesting!
@ Natalie, I love your topic sentence: ” Complicated, I’m going to say something here that you’re unlikely to like, but it’s something you and no doubt many other readers need to hear…” I usually end up liking what you have to say and needing to hear it because there is no way to deny the truth. You made me howl with the comment that these guys are like Barbie dolls…but aren’t they more like Ken dolls…lacking balls and other things?
@Complicated, whatever you do, stay NC, no matter what lame 3 second text/email he sends. You are worth more than 3 seconds, right? (I know, if you add up the 3 second texts, it may equal an hour. That’s still shite.) Everyday of NC brings clarity regrading the pain of being an OW, settling for crumbs, and the fact that frequently being an OW means being in an “imbalanced, unsatisfying, often somewhat ambiguous setting”. That’s the perfect description, in my opinion, because there is no such thing as a mutual relationship with a MM based on honesty, love, and respect because he is married. Natalie aptly described the exMM as a cockroach after a nuclear bomb to me after I blocked him via cyberspace. He resorted to sending a B-Day card via snail mail. Guess what, it was just a $2.50 card with a 45 cent stamp, not a mutually fulfilling relationship. A card, pun intended. There’s just no way around it, texts/emails/cards, stolen secretive moments are not the foundation of a healthy relationship. No butts, pun intended. I tried to magic the crumbs into a loaf and I had to break down and realize they were crumbs. “I’d been robbed” and I aided and abetted the robbery of me. Sorry Complicated. Stay strong and clear. MM’s are unavailable AC’s. I’m with Grace, if you don’t respond, you have the last word/action. While that shouldn’t be important, if it keeps you from responding…DELETE, DELETE, DELETE. Clean house. He only owes his wife for his deception, not you.
@Complicated,
Glad you made it through one week and please believe that you will pull through over the next few weeks, months. Your EUM is really passive-aggressive and is obviously trying to provoke you into responding, the “but whatever” is really lame and thoughtless. He knows you well enough to believe you will respond and I hope you’ll prove him wrong. His behaviour shows he is not interested in addressing the issues you raised in your email.
You seem to be seeing him for what he is now, myself, and many others (I believe) only arrive at that belated realization. I think this clarity is really crucial in freeing us from an emotional entanglement. If you still have past emails, SMSes, Complicated, something that might be helpful to do is to review them. Just a suggestion. I did that before deleting the whole archive, to come to terms with the emptiness of it all.
Take care. You know you want more than sports banter and someone who sees you only when he’s bored. Focus on that and don’t compromise your standards.
Hi JadeSesame,
I also had the same thoughts about my EU/MM being passive aggressive. He can’t acknowlege any of the things said in my email so he did in fact turn it around on me trying to get me to respond. Then, the fact he started lightheartedly talking about sports as if everything I said had just gone away makes me sad. I may be wrong here, but I truly believe any human that deceives, hurts (accidentally or on purpose), leads on, or wrongs another (knowing that other person truly cares and loves them) should apologize. It may not be owed to us per se, but it is the decent thing to do. If we step on someone’s feet getting out of the morning train or knock a paper out of their hand, most of us at least throw out an “I’m sorry” to a complete stranger. So I don’t know what would be so wrong with telling someone you’ve known for over a decade, slept with, made promises with…”I’m Sorry”…especially when they know how badly you’re hurting. I also went through the downgrading from our face to face visits, then daily texting, to once a week texting to nothing..until this past weekend. I’ve been going back to the exchanged texts and they make me feel very empty and sad. Tonight, I just cried at the fact I had told this man numerous times that all I wanted from him were “daily texts” (which he couldn’t even make time to send) and how much I cared for him and he has never even acknowledged my feelings after everything that’s happened. Yes, I know deep down I wanted more than daily texts, but I never said this out loud to him or asked him to make any changes. These things were all flashing red lights and flags and I just chose to ignore them. Coming to terms with these past few years and how it’s all ended is very painful..knowing it’s a pain I chose to bring on myself makes it even worse. Thank you for the kind words, they were much needed today.
Hi Complicated,
reading your post made me angry, it brings back fond memories- not! He is just pressing a reset button on you. Playing to see if you will respond, if you still up for being treated like s**t. Despicable, vile behaviour on his part. Honestly, who do these people think they are? When I left my ex and he was doing much the same as your ex trying supposedly to get me back ( where he thought I should belong on his terms) and after sucking it up to see several times that nothing changed I told him no, I need to have the last shreds of my dignity. Several months of being to hell and back trying to get over him later I think it`s so important, that dignity. Stay strong, don`t respond x
Sushi
Yes, dignity. When it finally comes down to it, we all need to hang on to whatever last shred of dignity we have and not allow ourselves to be further humiliated by these people. That’s what stopped me from texting – I was embarrasing myself.
I learned I DO have some self-respect!
I did this, went through old emails a while ago (stumbled upon them when clearing out my inbox). It was about one and half years after the break up (5 years on/off/on/you get the picture) and I was shocked at how self absorbed he was and how little he was giving me. I mean I knew before going through them as I was mostly over him, but seeing it in black and white, reading them again, it *really* hit home at how little the realtionship gave me. It was me always asking him about him, checking in, worrying trying to help and him just blathering on about him, his issues, what he was doing. Over the course of months I dont think there was one email where he asked how I was or how I was doing. Our phone calls were probably the same I’m guessing.
Re-reading the correspondence with a more neutral head on (rather than looking for crumbs “oh look how nice he was to send an email with some words, aren’t I the lucky one”) can be really useful in hammering that message home – you were getting crumbs from the relationship and you deserve more. much more. And this realisation could help you continue through NC.
Complicated, you will get through this, I promise. But you have to *want* to get through this. So keep going. Every day NC is a day closer to not giving a sh1te about this assclown.
Oh, and I’m starting to see that what he had to offer, truly offer (not what id made up in my own head)…wasn’t that great afterall. I want more than sports bantering and joking. I want someone who can acknowledge my feelings and give me more time than just fitting me in when he’s free and communicating with me when he feels like it. Every woman deserves more. I deserve more.
Complicated – you’ve been doing well with NC. In addition to all the wise feedback you got, my two cents is that he does you a favor by showing you what he’s made of. It helps you get over him that much quicker. I was actually glad that after I went NC, my exAC sent a few vacant, unwanted emails that said nothing about why I had been upset with him. He thought he was being light and friendly; I saw with some distance who he really was. Mind you, things got much easier and felt final when I blocked his email and number, and just decided not to know if he tried to get in touch. Recommend you do the same: block.
Complicated, I agree with Mags…..block. It is like the final decision, for YOU, that you are ready to move on. Anxiously waiting for a text or email from him, even if you don’t answer it, just keeps you in a holding pattern. NC is for you…. not him. Don’t expect any apologies or get hung up waiting for one. It is the right thing to do, to say you are sorry when you have hurt someone, but doing the right thing is not important to him as he has more than demonstrated. You going NC isn’t going to make him suddenly become a better person or make him realize his crimes. He knows his crimes already and has continued to hurt you. That is who he is. Block and NC. It’s not easy but it works. Why stay in the burning building? Save yourself.
Complicated,
You’re sounding stronger! Even if you don’t feel it or have setbacks, there’s a shift in your posts from all the focus on why and what you’re not hearing from him to the realization that it WAS just crumbs. I dined on them for way too long, so I know. You know you deserve better, y0u said it! You sound like I did, because as soon as I started to think about what a healthy, MUTUAL, loving relationship looked like, I realized what we had didn’t come close. I agree with Magnolia, you should block him. It definitely helps and it’s also empowering/protecting yourself. Stay strong.
Hi everyone,
I was in a relationship for 8 years, and we recently broke it off. My problem is not letting go of the ex, but letting go of the damage he has done to me; me being insecure, having anxiety issues, and not being able to trust others. Also I have a guy who I really like, who is actually emotionally and physically available but I’m not. How do I fix this? I want to leave my baggage at the door and be able to have a mutual relationship, one where I am not insecure, where I dont have anxiety issues and where I can trust.
Hi M,
Sorry for how you’re feeling and I hope the anxious feelings pass in time. You say there is another guy on the horizon… but it maybe that it’s best to concentrate on yourself and your recovery for a while. 8 years is a long long time.
It’s tempting, I know, to go straight into another relationship because we miss the closeness, being part of a couple etc but if you are still dealing with unresolved trust issues/insecurity there is a huge risk that you’ll take this with you into new relationships. Just practise looking after yourself for a while,take time to recover?
It’s also fairer to any future partners. I speak as someone who used to think that a new relationship would cure the ills of the previous one. I needed to have the prime loving relationship in my life with myself. Hoping that you are feeling better soon M.
I have done some very serious thinking lately about why I have picked the wrong men my whole life and stayed in relationships that were not mutual. Also, it extended into my friendships, why I remained friends with people who were not in a mutual friendship with me…the majority were one sided about what I could do for them. I’m starting to realize that I was attracted to people who were emotionally unhealthy or had shifty values because I didn’t think people who had it together would like me. It felt safer with misfits because they themselves were flawed. I stayed in relationships and friendships that weren’t mutual because I was insecure and didn’t think “normal’ people would like me and this was a good as I was going to get. I got rewarded with bad relationships and crappy friendships. I’ve started weeding these friends out. It’s been a learning process but I’m learning to say , “I no longer want to be used or disrespected in this friendship.” This last year I have been doing some housecleaning in my life, from toxic people to toxic emotions I’ve been living with. It feels great! I still have more work to do, but I don’t think I’ll ever tolerate the disrespect of a relationship that isn’t mutual again. It’s humiliating to stay where someone only halfway wants you around.
Hi Jennynic,
You’re so right that mutual respect should extend to our friendships as well..! This reminded me of an excruciating weekend trip I went on a couple of years ago with people who I referred to as’friends’but who were really friends of friends or acquaintances. I agreed to go because I didn’t want to be left out or be perceived as dropping out at the last minute. I spent three days being lectured to about ‘my failed marriage’ by a lady I hardly knew, was mortified by the way her husband spoke to waiters and ended up stressed out of my box by their rudeness.
On the drive back I sat thinking why did I put myself through that. I don’t like these people and they don’t like me.
I agree that we should only have people around us as friends who have our best interests at heart and who add support and love to our lives. This Christmas I am so different! I am forgoing the formal work do and going out with a few close colleagues instead, over the holidays I plan to catch up with people I seriously like and enjoy rather than endure.
Hi Magnolia,
“These guys are kind of genuine, I think, when they do what they do, because they are big attention-sluts who want fresh admiration all the time. So with each new woman who isn’t their main, they get swept up, they feel big, and they’re into playing the part of the big man who gets swept up into romance. What was never on his mind was the genuine desire to find someone to be exclusive with and permanently focused on. (Then again, neither was yours …)
But the big attention hit … I think that intensity can be misread, it’s real, but real what? and it can also act as a real hook … that dies for him the moment it becomes alive, as expectation, in you”…
WOW. This is quite possibly the best way I have to understand what happened with my separated EU MM and the horrid break up w/him this summer. The expectation you wrote about, yes, another girlfriend of mine mentioned that to me as well, the point where it all stopped being fantasy and was suddenly very much and all too REAL.
The funny thing, is all felt SO real at the time it was happening, it was like being swept away by an immense tidal wave of emotion and the inherent giddiness that comes from those feelings. I was “hooked, line and sinker” by his words to me and mine to him.
In the end though, that is all they were…just words. Its very sad to me because I have always loved words and have always put such great stock in them, perhaps in retrospect, too much stock now.
As Natalie says, “Words have to match the actions”…
Thank you so much for posting this Magnolia, you’ve helped me a lot to have better understanding and clarity about this 🙂
Hey Lessie, it was just words. I used to tell him the gain was worse than the pain. Why did I think pain was love? I so hear you, when it was happening, it felt so real for me. Here’s the thing, I think he used my vulnerability and low self-esteem to meet his needs. I’m coming to grips with understanding what I may think I feel is not the same as what he feels. Apparently, he just may need to get laid? That’s not what I was thinking or feeling. I just returned home from a visit to my dentist. The only thing I could think of was how painful it was to be with him and how less painful it was to go to the dentist. If the guy reminds me of going to the dentist and I prefer the dentist?
Oh so there it is in a classic Freudian slip…pain and love. Love isn’t pain. Duh! Head plant, face smack, and arse kick. A mutual relationship based on love, trust, and respect isn’t filled with pain, ambiguity, hurt, and anger and a text message? Okey dokey, almost a year later, I’m getting there, maybe. Few more head plants needed. Sheesh, I’m a tough nut to crack. Thank you for sticking with me. I’m still smacking myself for thinking that I was in love with a MM. Roll eyes. And smack. What the fuck? Totally flush.
Hi Natalie,
“But it was just an email and if this is what you have to dine off for attention, it only amplifies the fact that your relationship with this man is insubstantial”…
And WOW again. Natalie, you speak the truth…and its often a very uncomfortable, embarrassing, squirming in my seat kind of truth and…the truth hurts, BUT it hurts even more, in the long term, if I keep denying the truth to myself. I don’t want to delude myself.
It’s so easy to put such tremendous import to the words in emails and text messages, because its such an emotional “high” to see that name in your in box, to receive that text. I’ve been having lunch with a girl friend and seen that smile that happens, when a text comes in from her latest guy, I know that smile, I used to have that smile myself and truth be told, I MISS having that smile myself.
I miss those crumbs. I am cringing writing that, but I think I miss them because it is only in retrospect now that I realize that those crumbs constituted the basis of our relationship. The emails, the texts, the phone calls, the online chats…all that attention.
But, it was ephemeral…words, voices…it was NOT an actual relationship, even with the Future Faking on his part. So, I keep asking myself: “How can I miss something that never really was”…
Am I missing the illusion of what I believed to be real? How messed up is that?! “It was just an email”…why, oh why, do we put so much value into this and think it all must mean “something”…
I think this form of electronic communication makes people feel that there is something more substantial when in fact, perhaps it is the very opposite. Thank you for being honest and brave enough to say the things that we need to hear, but not always want to 🙂
Hi Feast to Famine and Mx,
Feast, yes, you are absolutely spot on with this! It very much feels like a chemical reaction that happens, much like with the Pavlovian response pattern, over and over again. It is a “high” in the way that perhaps a sugar high happens…it feels initially great, but very soon after wards, there is always that inevitable “crash” that happens.
Mx, I can so much relate to your words here (as always) 🙂
For me, it was my father AND my mother, both with holding in their own ways and always this unspoken message being given of “You are not good enough, you are not worthy enough”… I have exhausted myself in my search, through other men, mentally/emotionally/physically, trying to make them love me, trying to gain their approval and acceptance, thinking that if I did so, I would somehow be “worthy” of these things myself. Sigh.
A sign of attention meant that I was valuable, even if it was a crumb. How very sad that I never realized, until very recently, that it was “me” I should have been investing my time and energy in, and not the others who were so not worthy of my time and attention in this way. How I wish it didn’t always take so long to have these epiphanies, but I guess it is better then never having them at all. But wow, so much time was wasted by doing this.
My very best to you both 🙂
So I wasn’t the only one who thought “Wow Adele needs a big heap of Baggage Reclaim!”? It’s amazing how much I’ve become aware of this behavior in other people since finding this fantastic blog.
One song that’s a total anthem for this site is Christina Perri’s Jar of Hearts.
I hear you’re asking all around
If I am anywhere to be found
But I have grown too strong
To ever fall back in your arms
Oh yeah, I love that song . It’s full of spitfire and anger and strength. Great choice.
Natalie, I have been very guilty lately of carrying on in my head the unfolding of my brief relationship with my alcoholic Southerner. In my imagination, he has gone into rehab, quit drinking and, when he returns to my area in the spring, he will be sober, dial my cell phone and want me. That he won’t disappear, that he will reciprocate my feelings, that he will see my value. The reality is that I am NC and he has made no effort to communicate with me. My problem is: why did he tell me he was ready to “settle down” with someone? Why did he tell me he would come back? (I feel like Karen Carpenter singing “Superstar…”) How do you shut the video camera off in your head playing back these unhealthy, unlikely scenes? How do I accept that it’s over?
Hi bluberry girl,
Just been through my first and last experience with an alcoholic, I`m saying last because I know the signs now and it is a road to nowhere or absolute misery. They live in a different reality which is called denial and as heartbreaking as it is, and as Natalie says they do already have a love that is much greater than any woman can be. Not just you, any woman. Have a read of http://www.soberrecovery.com they have a friends and family forum section where you`ll find experiences of partners of alcoholics. Reading about what these people went through might help you accept your reality, it helped me. It really brought it home that addicts are the ultimate unavailable people, often even if they go into the recovery, and certainly for some time when they start. It actually made me stop smoking 🙂 . Natalie is so right, addictions are a no go zone. Keep strong x
@ Sushi
“I know the signs now and it is a road to nowhere or absolute misery.” It’s great to hear from someone with a similar experience who knows the deal, which you clearly do. Luckily, I have had little experience with alcoholism so I read with interest the forum on “What will change when he leaves?” from the website you recommended. The entries are just breathtakingly sad. I got out of the “relationship” fairly early when his drinking and denial of it became obvious (and with Natalie and the BR gals’ help) but I still cared for him and am grieving the loss. Thanks for the support.
Blueberry Girl,
I’m the adult child of an alcoholic and in my thirties lived with an alcoholic/addictive personality AC for four and a half long, long years. The only way you should ever get involved with an alcoholic is if he/she has been at least 2/3 years in recovery…and even then tread warily.
An alcoholic in denial is a human downward spiral. Like any addict there is little they will not do to feed their habit. You are secondary to it. He told you these things because it kept you with him,to get support, because he wanted to feel normal for a while…he may not even remember he said them, if he was’topping up’at time.
Your relationship was over before it began. .sorry.
It is a hard, hard lesson to learn that no matter how much love you show an alky, when they are in the throes of their addiction, you may as well be a fencepost, stuck in the middle of their living room…
Above all, do not make ‘helping’ their addiction, your addiction. I say this with many years of awful experience in trying to do so. An alcoholic only gets help when he/she has reached their personal bottom, sadly you may be dragged along for the ride. Do not step on that roller coaster Blueberry, concentrate on someone who is emotionally available to you.
Lynda from L
I can hardly express the impact reading your post had on me. Not only am I sad that I get to be the recipient of your wisdom from such an awful life experience, but also that I actually thought I could make such an impossible situation work. I was struggling to accept until now that NC is my best and only decision, no matter what I felt for him. Your profound words have only strengthened my need to move forward and respect this “hard, hard lesson to learn.” Thank you.
Love It!!!!!
The only line I don’t like in Jar of Hearts is
“I learned to live half alive”
I always think come on girl learn to be fully alive without him..
I know pot calling the kettle black.
Blueberry, Thanks for your thanks. I have many flaws but do talk from real experience here. I know what you are going through, you may feel that practical help, being there, listening, making him meals will help. You feel that if you leave him he will sink further. The truth is he will sink further, regardless of what you do…until he wants help for himself. The films where the hero finally puts down the bottle because of the love of a good woman are sadly not true life for most of us. Believe this, you actually may be preventing his ultimate recovery by continuing a relationship with him. He drinks because he is wired to’dispel the pain’,he chooses cotton wool hugging over real life. You add a layer of cotton wool. Remove yourself utterly. It’s his best chance..when he has had enough, he may get help. If he doesn’t then there was nothing you could have done anyway.
Beware of promises and charm, alky’s often have great charm, they are living without inhibitions most of the time..its a chemical romance. Truly, I am thinking of you. Stay focused on your needs and stay strong.
Smile and hugs to you, Lynda
You are dead on…that killer charm with the deep Southern accent…and tons of sex appeal…but I digress, back to topic…I knew there had to be consequences for his bad behavior and drinking, to keep my own sanity, so I went NC. He’s gone now several states away so we are removed from each other “uttterly.” (I love that word!) I pray that he gets the help he needs but I have no intention of aiding the process. Flo Night is not working this shift. He has to do this one on his own and I do understand that.
This is an incredible post. It is so insightful and thank you Natalie for managing to call a spade a spade in a way that doesn’t make me feel like the world’s biggest loser or some sort of uber-idiot.
“And then I thought “How can it not be over for you, if it’s over for them?”
This got to me. I had a ‘lightbulb’ moment recently when I thought “WHY won’t this end? Why doesn’t it ever end?”
And then I realised that it couldn’t end because it never started, despite the never-ending, overly-complicated and extremely painful relationship that we managed to have for two years and that resulted in a child, we were never ‘together’ so there wasn’t anything TO end.
And despite it always feeling like it was over, it never really was because actually, he LIKES having me hanging about ever-ready in the background, just in case things go tits-up with his girlfriend or he needs a bit of a boost.
I realised, as well, that even without the love/sex/relationship aspect, it was equally pointless trying to build a halfway-functional co-parenting relationship with someone who couldn’t give a toss about whether or not I was happy with the situation. And why should he, when I consistently behaved as though it didn’t matter whether I was happy or not?
At any rate, I’ve asked him to sort out third-party pick-ups for our son for a while (during which I intend to get some counselling, break out of the poxy dynamic and develop a sufficient sense of self not to hang a week’s worth of wellbeing on whether or not he feels like having a cup of tea at mine). Part of me is horrified that I won’t be seeing him at all for a while. But most of me feels a lot less anxious.
I spent the first few weeks of my break up listening to Bonnie Raitt; ‘I can’t make you love me’ and crying hysterically. it used to make me so incredibly sad. Any song about broken relationships, loss etc would break me down. My ipod was full of them. As my perspective changed and I saw through my EUM’s bull, I realised that some songs help but if you are in the mindset that without your EUM you will die, you will gravitate towards Adele and Mary J….anything that will reinforce what you believe and stop you from changing.
Don’t get me wrong, I still have ‘pain songs’ on my ipod but now instead of breaking down and identifying with them, I listen, enjoy and then I have a small conversation with myself about the realities of my break up and how that song is not going to change that.
Here are a few songs that eased my pain. These are my go to songs when I am sitting on a crowded train and everywhere I look are couples….happy smug couples that for that moment make me want to pretend my relationship was better than it was so that I can be part of a couple. Enjoy!
1.Bonnie Raitt – I cant make you love me – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nW9Cu6GYqxo
2. Sara Evans – a little bit stronger
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22zB6Soc2Gk&ob=av2e
3.vivian green- beautiful
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AqRur_lxJmM
4.Jewel – Stronger woman
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QaXr2vGDQwk&ob=av2e
Over here unfortunately all but the song from Vivian Green can’t be played because the music rights are not granted 🙁 I like Vivian’s song and will google the other song texts. Thanks for sharing.
I love Alicia Keys’ Superwoman:
“’cause I am a Superwoman
Yes, I am
Yes, she is
Even when I’m a mess I still put on a vest with an ‘S’ on my chest
Oh yes, I’m a Superwoman…”
I am not a native Spanish speaker, but if you understand or appreciate Spanish I recommend Shakira (especially before her current work) because in general even if there are some fall back emotions in some songs she still tends to be clear that it WILL NOT work and that she WILL not contact. (Even songs that sound fallback girl-ish confirm this like Estoy Aqui (In which the song begins I know you are not coming back, everything that happened between us will never happen again) and Inevitable(I know you are not coming back, I know you well)
Her songs have helped big time, especially the empowering ones!
Her best break up songs for moving on imo:
1. Te dejo Madrid.. (I’m leaving you Madrid)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jgCh19FJ1hg&ob=av3e
Look up the lyrics but she pretty much says “I know I’ll be well, cats like me fall on their feet..(later she says) I don’t want cowards who make me suffer.”
2. Te aviso, Te anuncio:(I warn you, I announce)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bA6fY8Y3HK4
Where she completely renounces the guy realizing that he has made her ridiculous and suffer while playing her against another woman. “Let heaven and your mother take care of you, I’m leaving, it’s better this way.”
3. Si te vas: (If you leave)
To sum it up: You’re leaving me for her.. She actually sings “If you decide yet another time to come back, I wont be here in this place..”
4. La Tortura (The torturer)
As the cheater tries to come back she says to him “Man doesn’t live on bread alone, and neither do I on excuses.’
I find that Shakira sings of love, and it going wrong but also of her resolve to ackonowledge the situation and also to move on… I really enjoy her..
This artical could not have come at a perfect time. Its difficult when you realize that you are in a relationship alone. I am so unhappy with my entire situation. After 4 years and a heart full of love for him, he decides he wants kids. I was 45 when I met him and under the impression he was 35. I later found out he was 25 and Married, but I stayed with him. he is deivorced, I am now 48 and he is 29. I have so much anger in my heart that sometimes I can feel the pain in my heart. I mean real pain. I dont know where to began. This artical is wonderful.
This artical could not have come at a better time. It is truly difficult when you realize you are in a relationship alone. I met this man 4 years ago. I was 45 at the time and under the impression he was 35. 1 year into the relationsip I found out he was 25 and Married. From that point he was never really in this with me. Now 4 years later he is 29, divorced and I am 48. He decides he wants kids something I cant give him. He has move on but still wants to keep me. I am in so much pain to the point I can feel the pain in my heart. I mean real pain. I have no idea what to do. This is a wonderful artical.
Angela
“I have no idea what to do.”
Yes, you do.
You deserve a mutual relationship. He’s not offering you one. He would like you to be in a relationship with him all by yourself while he finds a mutual one with someone else. Just say no. That’s all there is.
Jade Sesame your words are spot on. Any decent human being shouldve been able to apologize or at least give an explaination. This is what I struggle with. Why is it too much to ask for? Why is it too much to ask to get dumped face to face WITH answers? It makes me so angry. Why can’t they ever regret leaving us high and dry?
I mean getting dumped by text, you would think I was a teenager. But no! I’m almost in my mid twenties for christsakes. One day I hope I get married and look back on what an asshole my ex was. Like that Beyonce video.
Fedup – they don’t have the answers. It’s not nice to be dumped (sp. by text – it’s cowardly) but there’s never an easy and painless way to let someone down. You need to get your ownclosure and not expect them to deliver it. Yes, you are very young; and you def. will look back on him and wonder why you were so bothered about and upset by such an arse. Start now.
Hey Elle and Linda thank you thank you and thank you for you’re support, it hurts like hell but when I get home (I’m visiting family just now) today or tomorrow I’m going to make that final phone call, which will be my final decision to put an en to this all encompassing, painful, unfulfilling fantasy of a relationship, I can’t believe I got into it and am still making excuses for his behaviour ~ he is seeing someone else now and because were living miles apart from each other, I’m thinking, well I can understand he would want some company/attention ~ I am going insane and have to stop this now before it kills me ~ I’m already on sleeping tablets and beta blockers!!! I am an intelligent, strong woman, I have actually learned a hell of a lot about myself from this so called ‘relationship’ I just have to let it go now, take what I’ve learned for myself and build my self esteem etc and truly become the person I want to be, thank you for you’re words of support and considering I’ve wasted nearly 6 years of my life ‘waiting’ for him to decide if he wants to be with me/marry me then 2 years working on me being truly happy doesn’t sound like too bad a deal to me, thank you once again and I’ll be back here again, in my bid to gain strength I am not going to keep all this stuff hid inside of me as I always have I’m going to let it out, feel it, get support and truly move on ~ very scary but the alternative is really not an option ~ deep breath, here I go ~ choose life!
Karen,
There’s no reason for you to make any phone call; it’s not likely to lead to anything that will make you feel better.
Just, as you said, choose your life.
Good Luck!
PS: Thank you, NML.
LOL with the Adele/Mary J Blige thing… but Mary J decided to put up a fight for her fallback girl singer title recently:
Baggage reclaim also saved my life, as many state here. Last year I had a problem with an EUM, in that he was playing me for a fool. I had started reading this website right before I met him, so I never gave in. He chased me down all year… It drove me nearly insane but I stood my ground, as I am in no condition to date and I haven’t been for years and will probably not be for a long while, sadly, as I learned this summer with another EUM/total AC…
But what happened was strange… after he realized that I would never fold he genuinely became my friend. Now, he might still up and disappear one day, although at this point I doubt it but I also don’t care… I never gave in, never responded to his half-hearted attempts at seduction. It was unlike any other woman in his life that he gave that attention to, so I guess he decided to treat me with respect. Or something. But since May I have had absolutely no problems with him, in fact, he was there for me when things actually went down in my life with other men, or school, or what have you. I also lost all attraction for him… and I want to thank this website and Natalie, for opening my eyes.
The other guy that played me, well, he had to lie his butt off and future-fake like no other. It definitely didn’t last long, and though it hurt, I am happy to say that it wasn’t because I ignored the truth– I wasn’t even shown the truth! Oh sure, there were signs of his emotional unavailability, but I noticed them and brought it up. And then he ran…
But I am unable to get past the issues that make me unable to date again. I don’t know how to work through this, but I also don’t have the time. Now I just know how to say no to bad situations, but I am still at a complete loss to open up to the good ones… I’m sure it takes time, and I’m sure this is not the right time of my life to be pursuing relationships anyway.
Never again will I be in love with someone who doesn’t love me back in a healthy way, with love trust care and respect. Thank you!
Hello All,
First I want to thank NATALIE for the amazing work and dedication that she has most obviously put into this project. Had I not stumbled into this site as I was looking for ways to rescue my relationship (again), I would most certainly be at the stage of loosing self respect in trying to get my ex back. “I am better than that”. What I realized while searching the web for answers was that everything was cookie cutter; what I mean is that they all lacked substance in explaining both sides of the story. They all suggest the same thing about coping and moving on… Just forget, join a gym, meditate, and talk to your friends… Yadda, Yadda, Yadda. Yes those things are helpful, but they don’t answer the question as to why I feel the way I do and why the ASS CLOWN (AC) treated me the way they did. And once I understood that it was not me, but the AC fault, she had no more power over me. I TOOK THE FOCUS OF HER (yes I am a man) because I knew her next moves, I understood the why and how from both sides. This is NATALIE’s niche. This is what no one else has been able to capture and explain. I understand that this is a woman’s support site, but I can assure you that unavailable relationships are not bias just to woman. I too was involved with an AC and future faker. I dedicate years waiting for her to finalize a divorce, helped her and supported her in every way, to awaken one morning and realize that her unavailability had nothing to do with her ex marriage, but her past relationships that she had fostered while with me. When I confronted her I got no explanations, no sorry and was immediately shut out. I knew that she expected me to run back apologize and make excuses for her (not this time) I started no contact 2 weeks ago, but fell off the wagon demanding explanations. I felt owed at least that. During our brief discussion I realized she was starting to dangle just enough in front of me to get me to forget and forgive. She blamed me for not trusting and not getting over past indiscretions. I said my piece and went back to NC. It has been a week now and she texted me last night that she was going to be in my office today to deliver a package to someone in my office. “Just a heads up” I mean REALLY? Uggh. Well, Natalie you are correct in that as much as we may want to hear from our AC, hearing from them does us no good. It just starts the…
Keep up the NC, free. Longstanding patterns are hard to break, and with any contact you will fall into one. She’s used to you being there for her. Stay strong and best of luck.
freetobe
we do need the reminder that it’s not just men who do these things. I’ve done some dodgy things myself.
Forget about her explanation. Now, many, many years after some of my bad behaviour, I’m able to understand why I did it and how hurtful it must have been. She’s not going to come up with that understanding in two weeks. By the time she’s realised what she’s done (if she ever does), you’ll be making babies with someone who loves you properly and you really won’t care to know anymore. I’m going to say what I always say:
Ignore, ignore, ignore. (And eat your vegetables).
freetobc
Good to hear from a man on the site. Yes, exactly what you say about Nat – I agree! She captures the problem from both sides so that we stop focusing entirely on the other person and start taking charge of “our” (own) situation and why we are still flogging the three legged donkey! Good luck to you. Listen to (Amazing) Grace – she knows what she’s talking about – especially about vegetables!
FreetobeC: I TOOK THE FOCUS OF HER (yes I am a man) because I knew her next moves,”
Does this not tell you all you need to know? Sign up with Natalie’s “No contact emails” and you will be feeling better soon.
Hi Runner Girl,
Oh wow, I just recently had a dental appointment myself and I can SO relate to this analogy too! It was less painful to be at the dentist, having my teeth scraped (sorry to be a bit gross) than it was to be in in the midst of the constant ambiguity of “Will he choose me” and then, “WHY won’t he choose me”…as you said, “Ugh, what was I thinking” and I often ask myself this very question too! And I realize, I wasn’t thinking, at all, not really.
Having someone future fake and give you crumbs, just enough, to keep you hanging on, is just the absolute worst…it messes with you in ways that can take a long time to recover from, not the least of which is because of all the doubts it creates in your own ability to feel like you can trust yourself and your emotions.
I recently watched (again) SATC movie and it dawned on me that, when Carrie reads Big’s emails to her (in which he copies from a book other great love letters from famous men) that she starts to forgive him…because he sent her EMAILS! Most of which were copies with a few sparse words of his own thrown in…ARGHHH!
The funny thing is, the first time I saw this the movie, I thought, like so many others, “Oh, how sweet and romantic, tender and thoughtful”…and now, I think, “No, Carrie, don’t do it, don’t go back” but of course, she did, leaving all us OW to think, “Yes, if it can happen to Carrie, it can happen to me too, if I am patient”…
Wow, just having that particular realization has been pretty intense for me…and, as the other ladies have posted on here too, all the love songs too, I am now re-interpreting both movies and songs in a way that I previously hadn’t before…meaning, I am trying not to have on the rose colored glasses when doing so!
I’m sending you many hugs sweetie, you’ll get thru this, we both will, I know 🙂
@Lessie,
I cried when I watched SATC because I was so touched by Mr. Big’s persistence in trying to win Carrie back and I wanted them to get back together. (My ex looks also just exactly like him, with a more baby-face). Maybe it’s time for a second viewing of the film!
“Having someone future fake and give you crumbs, just enough, to keep you hanging on, is just the absolute worst…it messes with you in ways that can take a long time to recover from, not the least of which is because of all the doubts it creates in your own ability to feel like you can trust yourself and your emotions”
I hear what you say. Maybe what we can do is to start fine-tuning our internal radar, to sieve out future fakers. You wrote about how perplexing it is, to experience someone’s grand gestures, someone who seems to be so genuinely in love. I find myself always trying to identify what was real, what was fake, like some tedious archeological dig. I believe that some people do enjoy feigning emotions, the grand gestures might have been real for them in the moment, but only in the moment, a flash in the pan, and never did quite run very deep.
i think the thing about mutuality is that it really has to be there from the beginning. i am very wary now of relationships that start off with the ruthless pursuit, the compliments, the flattery, the promises, the constant contact…etc.
with the last guy i dated it began like this. i was a bit ‘meh’ about him at first. instead of registering and assessing my ‘meh’ (part of it was because he was moving away) i allowed myself to be swayed. my ego will be the death of me.
badgered me for sex, relentlessly. i set the boundary that i wanted the wait for sex but he tried to cross and recross this boundary at every opportunity. promised me the sun, moon and stars. eventually i gave in.
the dynamic began to shift then. so began LDR, he promised me he’d contact very often. at first he did…but then he began i guess what some might call here ‘the slow fade’….suddenly i felt i was disturbing him with even a text…would take hours to respond when i did send one. always me initiating the contact. he claimed he was ‘busy’ when i asked him about it and would get annoyed at me for asking…yet i’d see him active posting comments to others on FB not even as much as replying to my texts or calling me which only takes a second.
i became the chaser. sadly i continued chasing for quite some time after…partially because i felt left behind, mostly because i didn’t want to admit i’d been used. that’s what it felt like. practically all the effort to sustain the relationship came from my end.
it really is the most exhausting, confusing and heartbreaking thing. i still cry over it. im wary of men now.
As usual, amazing. Where were you years ago? Oh wait, you were “here”….I was far, far down in it. Distance (not geographical), therapy and a whole lot of BR has brought so much clarity…I’m just so embarrassed that I kept at it for soooooo long. Embarrassed – not shamed. Overall, I still hurt some, but am definitely getting to a better place. Funny, when you step away from the rejection, you step away from the pain. Working on building the self confidence while dropping some crazy bootleg coping tactic I pickec up, the reverse ego (thank you Natalie – it’s amazing how much I catch myself doing this, but at least now that I recognize it I can correct it.) I still catch myself not missing him, but wondering if he misses me. Yep, still seeking validation from an empty source. I’m really excited about coming out of this a better person; both for myself, and for the next lucky bastard that gets all THIS. Just playing, but anyway, I am so thankful for all of ya’ll here. Thank you for helping me want better for myself…and know that I deserve it. It’s not all sunny skys yet, but the fog is definitely starting to clear.
aagirliknow,
“Funny, when you step away from the rejection, you step away from the pain.”
Well said! So true. Don’t let anyone make you feel bad about *you*. You are allowed to feel good about you whether they want you or not. Step away from the rejection and you step away from the pain – that’s a great way to put this and it is my experience exactly. When I dumped the idea/feeling of having been “rejected” the pain subsided pretty quickly afterwards – and I felt more able to do some “rejecting” of my own! It feels good when you take charge of what you are going to accept and what you are going to reject instead of sitting around waiting not to be rejected.
Baggage Reclaim Friends,
For some reason, I’m not feeling very strong today. I’m so tempted to break NC when he texts me this week. And I know for a fact he will due to certain upcoming sports games (just like last weekend). Since he’s obviously decided to ignore my email saying I had to cut contact with him because I care too much and he doesn’t feel the same according to his actions. I just want to text him back and say:
“Seriously, what’s wrong with you? You haven’t even acknowledged my email, but you’re fine with sending me messages on sports?! You may not be good at expressing your thoughts and feelings as you’ve said, but I’d hoped you had enough of a heart and a bit of courage to simply try. Do you not understand I don’t want to be friends with someone who could care less about me other than sports bantering when they’ve got nothing better to do. ”
Someone wrote earlier that healing is not linear. Wow, is that ever true!!! Yesterday I felt strong and today I am really hoping to just not hear from him because I’m afraid I’d break NC. I hate this whole situation and can’t understand how someone can be so cold and empty to ignore another’s feelings. It’s like he sees me laying on the ground moaning in pain, then asks “how’s your day going?” Feedback Please….
PS. Thank you all so much for helping me to get through what I’d consider the worst time of my life.
He does see you laying on the ground, moaning in pain. But he is too concerned about himself. It makes no difference to him. And you give him too much power. Its like you are looking up at him with, “What are you going to do with me laying here on the ground, moaning in pain??” Get up, girl. GET UP. GET YOUR STRENGTH BACK. YOU ARE MORE THAN HIM!!! Get up and dust the shit off. Walk away. Don’t look back. This is about YOU. LEAVE HIM BEHIND.
You are worth so much more. What gives him the right to have what he wants?? To determine where the relationship stands?? WHERE is YOUR voice??? You have a say. You have a right. YOU need LOVE. RESPECT. ATTENTION. GIVE IT TO YOU FIRST. GET UP off the ground. Quit letting him hurt you. Be GOOD to yourself. Surround yourself with people who LOVE you. Who WANT to be with you. Who respect your boundaries, your wishes. I know it SUCKS. I have been there. But he is just a fallible, man, and his poor wife. He is married, yes?? Must really suck being her. Yuck. I’d hate to be married to that! BLECH! You are worth so much more. You have to really start to believe that. First step is to GET UP and GET AWAY AND DON’T look back. He’s not worth it.
Lo J,
Thank you for your comments on my posting. I guess that has been my problem all along…focusing everything I’ve had on HIM, his texts, his feelings, what if I never hear from HIM again, etc. etc. I know now the world won’t end if I shift focus on ME, but it sure is a difficult, lonely and scary place to be…a place I haven’t been in a while. I didn’t want to hurt HIS feelings by not responding, which is why NC has felt so wrong and opposite of what I should be doing. I grew up with that whole “Treat others the way you want to be treated.” Well, that hasn’t worked out so well in this case.
But, looking back he never seemed to worry about hurting my feelings when he didn’t respond to me or only gave me 2 hrs of face time when I spent $500 (on several occasions to fly and visit him). Yes, 2 hours out of the 4 days I was in town!!!! Oh my, I feel as if I’ve just been slapped across the face thinking about that memory. Yes, he is married and I feel horrible for her. They’d only been married 2 years when we reconnected. He said there was no chemistry in their marriage, but they were the best of friends. How horrible, to spend a lifetime with someone who knows it’s not what they want after only 2 years. I guess I should be thankful it’s not me. Thank you Lo J, I’m getting up now…it’s the “Not looking back” that will be hardest for me.
Complicated:
‘Do as you would be done by’ is a good way to think and it does work, but you’ve got to go beyond the surface with it. It’s about doing what’s right, not what’s nice.
If you were horrendously screwed up, to the point that this bloke seems to be, would you honestly WANT that person to let you perpetuate that situation? Would you want them to enable you to jeopardize your marriage? Would you want to be allowed to carry on living your life in such a careless unfulfilling way without any consequences? Honestly?
I struggled with the whole ‘love-thy-neighbour’, ‘do-and-you-would-be-done-by’ issue for ages, and it’s difficult because I think that it constitutes a pretty core value/belief for me, that I didn’t want to just abandon!
But, ultimately, if you genuinely want the best for the other person you’ll stop facilitating their unhealthy behaviour. They might (will probably) carry on without you but that’s their business… I realised that letting him carry on with me so that I could get the emotional high and feel like a maligned saint was actually really selfish.
Hi Complicated,
Accepting of the reality is the hardest thing to do when you have your feelings invested, I`ve been there and still battle my “what if I was wrong ” voice and still look back, and explain to myself again, and come and read here and get the support and it makes me stronger bit by bit. Not happier yet, but stronger to be able to accept first what is real. Don`t make a mistake feeling bad for him. He is dishonest because he is having an affair. He lies to his wife. It`s very possible that he lies to you when he tells you that there is no chemistry between them. He is not imprisoned in that marriage, if he is unhappy he can always get divorced. You need that energy you are putting into him to look after yourself. Don`t believe him, remember, he is a liar, believe yourself when you feel so scared and distraught. That is what he gives you, this unhappiness. That is what is real. Take care.
yoghurt
I have to correct you. It’s Love your neighbour as you love yourself. Until we love ourselves any AC/EUM can come along and compromise our morals.
complicated (and all the OWs)
yes, treat others how you wish to be treated. and that includes not seeking attention from someone else’ husband. When you are married, you wouldn’t want another woman to do it to you. He can’t even complain that she’s abusive. From his own mouth she is his best friend. God help you if that’s how he treats his best friend – gossiping about her to another woman behind her back. Despicable. Stay away from him.
I dont’ know if he wants her or not, apart from the fact that he married her and hasn’t left her for the alternative right under his nose. But he sure doesn’t want you in any useful way. Yes, be thankful for that!
Complicated:
After I broke things off with the guy who dropped the P-bomb (polyamory — his, not mine) on me, I got one of those crumbs-messages a few weeks later. No acknowledgment of ANYTHING that had gone down, just a cursory “Hi how are you here’s a tidbit about myself”.
Eff that noise.
Read Nat’s posts about the Reset Button, and do not let this guy use that technique with you, or in any other way push any of your buttons.
Remaining silent in the face of his pokes and prods says everything you need to say — there’s no need to write a word to him. Really, silence is the biggest Eff You message you can send.
Be strong.
Tea Cozy,
I love your comments! Actually made me feel a little stronger like the woman in the 50s marketing ad, flexing her bicep :). My EU/MM has pushed the reset button on me and accepted his crumbs soooo many times, I’m 100% positive he believes this time will be no different. I’ve let him before and I’m fighting with everything I have to not allow him to do it again. That’s why everytime I feel like contacting or responding to him and breaking NC…I’ll be writing on here. Wow, I’ll be on here alot haha. I want so badly to remain silent in the face of his attempts to reach me. You’re right, that’s the best Eff You message I want to send. Trust me, that’s a message I really want to send.
Complicated…….sit on your hands, don`t text. Tomorrow is another day and you`ll feel better. He will not change because you will send him a text. Write down all that is bad about your relationship and tell yourself that this is how things will always be like, and if you want to accept things that way you can always text him tomorrow. You won`t. Don`t let him suck you in.
Hey Complicated,
I’ve been there and done that, felt like shite the next day, and it didn’t change a thing. Although I did maintain NC for the first 90 days which was just enough time to start to get some clarity with the help of BR, of course. No matter what I said or did when I broke NC made a drop of difference. Tea Cozy (nice name btw) and the others are spot on. Silence is the big EFF you. No amount of explaining is going to convince this jerk that he’s a jerk cos he’s a jerk. Natalie describes this phenomenon perfectly: “One Day I Might Get My Unprincely Faux Prince if play my Other Woman cards right.” I’m very sorry you are going through this. I know it hurts but it does get better. Have you done something nice for yourself today?
Hi Runnergirl,
Good to hear from you! You are all right, nothing I could say in that one text…after sending daily messages for a year…could change anything. I like that I feel comfortable coming here and typing out what I would’ve written instead of actually doing it and then sending it to him. The time of day that is worst for me is the mornings. So, instead of feeling pain and emptiness, I come onto this site and read all the inspirational comments written to me and it honestly helps me make it one more day NC. Today was another day of NC. One day at a time. I realize now this is a situation I shouldn’t have ever been involved in in the first place because he’s married, but that doesn’t stop me from feeling the pain now. Thanks for your continued support on this journey. It is much appreciated!
Complicated – me again!
If he knew his own mind and was horrid enough to speak it – as you want him to do – here would be the answer to the text you want to send him:
Dear Compie,
What’s wrong with me is that I am married, seriously, married and am only up for a bit of extra-curricular banter with you mainly by text and mainly stuff that interests me like sports and also a bit of sexting thrown in when I’m feeling randy; really I don’t want anything else from you other than that and only when I feel like it. I don’t like that you have other expectations and needs and want a mutual thing going on with me because I have no intention of being in a mutual thing with you or of fulfilling your needs or even dealing with them, which is why I haven’t acknowledged your email. You said in it you needed to cut contact with me and now you are whining that I am not contacting you about an email in which you told me to stop contacting you. So, seriously, what is wrong with you?
I sent you the message about sports to see if you meant what you said in your email. I see that you didn’t mean what you said, as here you are contacting me again. I have no intention of dealing with the stuff you said in an email; I can’t and don’t want to offer you anything more -I am married and I want to stay that way; what part of that don’t you get yet? You can love and want to be with me as much as you want – but that is not what I want. Why don’t you get that yet?
I am actually pretty good at communicating my feelings to you – you are just not listening. You are simply intent on hearing a different message than the one I am giving you. What you don’t get is that I am communicating a very clear message; you are just frustrated and angry with me cos you want to hear a different message, but that’s not my problem, it’s your problem.
I don’t think women should want to be friends with a man who couldn’t care less about them other than sports bantering and sexting when he’s got nothing better to do. But you have shown me you are not one of those women, so what do you want me to do about that? That is your problem to solve. I only want to do sports bantering and sexting when I’ve nothing better to do and if that’s not now what you want as well, why you still here, whining on at me in a text message demanding I give you something I don’t want to give you? I am offering what I’m offering. If you don’t want it then you should stop contacting me, stop answering my texts and jog on, don’t you think?
Your team is shite by the way!
that end bit’s a joke!
Fearless
Get out of my head!
This is hilarious. And TRUE.
@ Fearless, Exactly!
As one who had an affair with a EU/MM who WAS horrid enough to speak similar thoughts, this post realistically describes their selfish, cruel and controlling mentality.
@ Complicated,
They want what they want, when they want it, and nothing else. As the OW, your needs and wants never enter the equation. Who died and made this asshole king? Knock him off his throne! He doesn’t deserve your adulation.
A bloody Blueprint of these relationships! Inspired Fearless…
Hi Fearless,
Your comment and ‘letter’ was so sad and probably true of what he’d write me. Even what you wrote at the end…seriously, he’s actually written that last part! It’s sinking in that he is married, I’m not his and he’s not mine, and I’m not a part of his life and never will be. This sucks and makes me feel like a hollowed out halloween pumpkin..empty and void of life right now. The past 4 years meant nothing to him probably and I’ve built a relationship in my head between the two of us out of just crumbs. Oh my. But, I made it through another day of NC. He didn’t contact me, but I didn’t contact him either. Like an alcoholic, I’m taking it one day at a time. I guess in a way, he was my addiction. I got the highs from the texts and the lows with the withdrawls when I didn’t receive a text from him. Thank you for being here and commenting. This journey doesn’t seem so lonely anymore :).
Complicated,
The painful part for you is going to be facing up to the fact that the reality of the relationship you have been having with this man bears almost no resemblance to the one you are having (all by yourself) with him in your own head.
I shuddered at one of your comments in which you said you had not seen him since the spring – we are almost in a new year – but he was texting you once a day. When is the last time you actually spoke to this man? Spring? I also shuddered when you said you spent a lot of money to travel to see him and he had 2 hours for you – out of four days! If this is all the case, it is awful. If I’m reading you correcty, this is barely an affair never mind a relationship. What is this man actually offering you – even in pretend land? It seems I have more of a relationship with my postman than you do with this man.
No wonder you feel so bad about NC – you have pinned your survival and personal happiness on nothing more that text messages from a married man who never comes anywhere near you. You seem to have attached great importance on to text messages like it’s the only form of communication known to man. It’s not. There are also trains planes and automobiles – but he’s not shifting his ass onto any of them. Is he even picking up a phone? But all of this is irrelevant cos – he.is.married. So be thankful he’s not trying to reel you in any more than a text a day – that’s had a bad enough effect on your imagination. You have managed to turn a text a day from a married man into the love affair of the century. You have reeled yourself in and have landed on fantasy island. All by yourself. You are marooned. You better start building a boat!
I don’t mean to be flippant – I know you are hurting badly and I feel for you – try writing down exactly what you *actually* get out of this thing with this guy. Make the list. What does it say?
I’m so embarrassed. I, too, feel like I’ve been marooned on Fantasy Text/Email island. My MM and I have had a LDR for 16 months, and he’s been pretending to be separated and proceeding with a divorce. We texted/emailed every day and it was all love and roses, but only saw each other a few days a month when he’d come down to collect his rent checks and sleep with me.
I began to put pressure on him because I thought, based on his FF, that we were going to live happily ever after. He’d talk about the divorce, spoke of moving in together (“I don’t want to just date you. I move fast;” “I dream of what it would be like to sleep next to you every night. I want that, and hope you do, too.” Baloney.) Thus began a string of monthly breakups at the end of his visits, because I couldn’t understand why he’d never follow through. A few days later we’d go back to the lovey-dovey texts and emails. I literally lived for those. I sat here night after night, not dating anyone because we were “exclusive.” Little did I know, he was with his wife some of that time, even though he’d tell me that there was no chance for reconciliation and that his love for her had died. I never could understand why I was conducting a relationship by text. I rarely even spoke to him on the phone (he said he’s “not a phone guy”.) How could I believe a man who told me I’m his soul mate, but whom I never felt welcome to call out of the blue? How could I be so blind?
We’d often break up because he “couldn’t give me a timeline.” He’d say things about how long the divorce might take, and when the deadline passed and I’d bring it to his attention, he’d fly off the handle and turn it around on me. I’d ask if I should date other people who might meet my needs and he’d ask me to pass on those opportunities, I was The One but the timing was bad, blah, blah, blah. Now I feel like a fool because he was just keeping me on ice.
His wife (of 26 years) just discovered some of our emails and he dropped me like a hot potato. I love him and hope that if things with her don’t work out he’ll come back to me. I know it’s unhealthy and he’s a liar, and I’m just being a Fallback Girl. I’m spinning it in my head that he loves me but is staying with her for other reasons. I hope that this pain starts to fade. This blog has been a lifeline for me. Thank you so much.
Fearless, Bah hahahahahaha!!!! What else can I say. If you can laugh about it, you can live through it (Bill Cosby, I think.) I know you weren’t even trying to be funny….but damn. Good Stuff Fearless, thanks.
Complicated, I assure you I’m not laughing at your situation. You want to laugh at someone…..I got jokes. Lots and lots of ammo. I guess i’m just tired of crying.
Complicated
Think about what Nat said to you. You can’t send him a text complaining that all he does is text you. It’s just a text. Stop trying to goad him into being a decent person. That NEVER works.
Also, you are not permitted to comment again unless you mention his wife in every sentence! Just kidding – I’m not the blog police, but he is married and this is all highly inappropriate.
You have your own agenda and are blocking out all our cries to the contrary. We’ve said that he is married, not to text him, that this is crumbs, that you are better than this but because you’re locked into your own agenda, you’re not hearing us 100% . HE has an agenda too and is blocking out all YOUR cries. It’s not mutual!
I am telling you with 110% certainty that what you feel is not what he feels. It takes a lot more than sex, fibbing to his wife, sneaking around, a few texts and sweet gestures in a restaurant to elevate this above another standard affair. Let it go! And don’t go running to him to try to prove me wrong. I’ve been down that route as well, you’ll just end up kicking yourself!
How long has this been going on – is it four years? Do you really want it to be five?
Grace,
If I’m in your head I know I’m on the right track! You are so right. We end up in these “relationships” all by oursleves – riding solo to Miseryville (quoting Nat) because we are completely set on our own agenda and we block out what is so obviously his agenda.
I remember, months ago now on BR, the slow dawning of the ridiculous irony of my ‘solo’ relationship: when I started to see that every sinlge thing I grumbled about regarding him and his ‘relationship’ behaviour was actually equally applicable to me. I was horrified at this realisation!
I complained about the texting – but I texted to make the complaint! I complained he didn’t do anything to solve the situation, but neither did I do anything! I complained that he didn’t think I deserved better, but plainly I didn’t think so either! etc. etc.
I just wanted him to stop wanting what he wanted and start wanting what I wanted… and what a cheek he had not to pay attention to what I wanted from him! Pft… Yet I didn’t pay one iota of attention to what he plainly wanted (rightly or wrongly) from me – I wanted, pleaded with him, to change the record and stop being so cruel playing the same record over and over and over – but he only had one record! That’s the only song he had! A shitey one!
As Nat often says, which is very clever, we miss the top line information (the actual disease) in these situations and appoint great importance onto the symptomatic stuff (that is what complictaed is doing). The top line is that the relationship has no where to go – he is a cheating MM or a chronic EUM or an AC – there can be no mutual relationship to be got out of these men. Yet we complain about what? Texting (!!). Who texted who/who emailed who/who said what in the email/who didn’t answer an email. Mutual relationships with two people in it are not run my emails! It’s like sitting there at the scene of an accident with your leg broken in five places shouting for some ointment for your swollen toe.
Grace and Fearless,
I`m printing those two comments off for my own use! Brilliant!
Complicated,
I read your posts and the brilliant replies from a distance because I didn’t trust myself to answer… I feel for you, for sure and I do not deny the pain you feel is real …but it’s not raw, because you know that you’ve been living with it for a while..
Grace, is spot on, as always…you need a reality shot..and while you slug it back, you do need to think about his wife.
You do have your own agenda and so does he, for a while, I do not doubt, that it’felt’ as though these agenda’s dovetailed. The MMAC, that you waste your time considering, had a vested interest in making you feel that…it appears from all you say that he no longer does. For reason’s of your own,which believe me, need exploring you seem unable(or unwilling) to strive to realise that.
Fearless’ analysis of your situation is a true blueprint of what you have experienced…believe it.
Finally, her blueprint is typical of what many of us on site have gone through and strive to recover from. I have been entirely up my own arse about relationships too, Complicated,completely self absorbed in my own island of pain. I regret that. What helped was truly reading and understanding some of the posts on site, finding true empathy and congruence with other situations and learning from them.
Complicated, it is not complicated, it never has been, it is simple….
Hi Grace,
No, I don’t want to go another day being the OW. I want to be the woman a good DECENT man wants to dance with…in public…in front of lots of people. He knew from the start how I felt and obviously had his own agenda. Sadly, his agenda was filled and he got what he wanted from me and can now go on his merry way and spend lots of fun family time with his wife while I’m left here to pick up the pieces of my broken heart. Yes, he was married but unfortunately my stupid choices didn’t stop me from developing feelings for him and ending up being in love with him…or the idea of him. I asked him two or three years ago, “Do you love me?” What was his response you ask…here’s what he said: “I’m not sure if it is that or the idea of that.” Those were his actual words. No mention of love. You’re right, he doesn’t NOR has he ever felt the same way for me as I do him. I’m done making the visits hoping he’d see me and finally realize he felt the same for me as I have him all these years. I actually wrote that in my email I sent a few weeks ago. Didn’t text him today and made it through another day of NC. Here’s to another day of NC tomorrow :).
People like him don’t feel compassion, empathy or sympathy for someone lying on the ground in pain, they feel CONTEMPT or NUMB or DISGUST. He doesn’t have the ability…it’s like asking why your stereo won’t make a sound when you have the volume all the way up, but it has no speakers. He’s missing whatever components are necessary to express any care for your pain, which is probably what is attractive to you about him in the first place. It’s familiar.
Download Nat’s “Unsent Letter” and work it, it is AMAZING. I’ve written more than one to the same person….and with the ex that drove me to BR, I have written different variations of the same apology letter (oh, I am so sorry I lost my temper with you one time after being treated like crap the last 4 mos of our 7 month relationship…!) a few dozen times. I have, at least two or three times, written the letter over and over again in succession. Anything to express and acknowledge the feelings to MYSELF, and stay NC.
I would say I was mentally ill, I obsessed over an ex for over a decade after a 1 year non-relationship, was involved in very abusive relationships (one ex, long ago, when I was 17 beat me so badly my baby was stillborn, the recent ex had an FBI record and domestic abuse conviction)…and going and staying NC with the guy from last year has done more to heal my whole self and instill a sense of self-worth than anything I’ve ever done. PLUS, if someone as unbalanced and sick as I was can do it, YOU certainly can. Read Nat’s post about seeing yourself as strong, repeat I CAN do this, I CAN do this, sign up for the NC emails…honor your weakness and fortify yourself every way you can.
I changed my ex’s phone listing on my phone to”DON’T YOU DARE ANSWER THE PHONE OR CALL THIS NUMBER”, and his email nickname to, “DON’T YOU DARE SEND THIS F*CKING EMAIL HIM CHECK YOUR DRAFTS FOLDER!” and had a long letter to myself saved in my drafts folder to remind me why it was a Very Bad Idea to break NC.
Don’t just hope he won’t call…have a plan. Imagine rejecting his call, or walking away from the phone, and deleting any voicemail. Tell yourself you CAN do it and you will not die. The worst that will happen is that you will feel some uncomfortable feelings. Have a friend on backup to call ….keep a feelings journal…get out and take a walk…meditate, whatever it takes. The rewards of being on your own side are priceless.
Sunshine:
“The rewards of being on your own side are priceless.”
Well said! Yes, they so are!
Hi Sunshine,
You are an inspiration. Thank you for commenting. I do the visualization alot. I like to visualize his text coming through then going online to block his number through my cell phone provider. That would be my response. I’m hoping the pain and wanting to hear from him will subside with each passing day. Just hate feeling he’s off having a great time, possibly out to a dinner and movie with his wife, while I’m crying on my couch and hurting. I hate, hate hate that!! I realize I was wrong to get involved with a married man. So, I guess this pain, longing, and wanting to hear from him and having to ignore and push past it, is my punishment. I feel like a shattered piece of glass that has been superglued back together with cheap glue and on the verge of falling apart any day. With each passing day, I’m trying to focus more on me to take my mind off him and wonder what he’s doing/thinking/feeling.
Complicated – if you *feel* like you may break NC you might want to do (or re-do) some excersices from this site: write that unsent letter (again, if you have to), keep posting here instead of texting (tell US exactly what you want to say to him, just DON’T say it to him). And then from me personally: why do you want HIS validation of YOUR pain? Stay NC. No matter how hard it is. No matter if it hurts. Sit on your hands if you have to. Seriously. It absolutely does get easier if you allow yourself to get through the rollercoaster. Be in the rollercoaster for now. Don’t get off it. Stick to your promise TO YOURSELF. Your self-esteem will thank you.
When I was right where you are – wanting him to really get HOW MUCH he hurt me, wondering how he could be so callous etc., wanting him to feel like I felt – I realised that I was so used to giving him the power to make me happy (which he never could) that I was expecting the same of him in my pain. But if he couldn’t give it then, he can’t give it now. You have to be with you, your friends, your family, people that love you and care about you and SHOW it. Like Natalie said, he REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY….REALLY!…isn’t that special. Will you regret breaking NC? Will breaking NC make you feel worse or better? Will he have changed between last weekend and this weekend? Will he understand you more this weekend? Answer these questions and you’ll have the answer you’re looking for. We’re all here for you. xo
@Complicated,
How are you doing? Please listen to all the advice you’ve got here. I relate to your anguish and bewilderment, but you really have to see your MM for what he is about and then it won’t be so shocking– expect nothing but the worst from him. He stands for sports banter, sexting (do you really want this frivolous one-dimensional creature?) and treating you like an option. He chose to marry someone whom he’s no chemistry with? (what a low-life, hypocritical coward! How can you respect this man?) By continuing to remain in the situation (and that is all he has to offer, Fearless’ ventriloquism of his reply is true), you are choosing all that, you have the agency to walk away. Believe you do! Habits are hard to break but you can do it.
I hear you spinning words over and over in your head, you keep quoting what he said to you numerous times on this forum. I did it too (because I had nothing else to go by). We think the reality doesn’t correspond to words, but when we think of all the void, the periods of absences, disappearances, non-accountability, then it all adds up. It is all consistent, logical. We shouldn’t grab onto or insistently replay these sporadic crumbs to tell ourselves why the situation isn’t as shitty as it really is. Like you, I suffered the ignominy of 2 hour meetings over 4 day trips when I forked out money to travel to see my ex-EUM who’d lure me over with “I really want to see you” smses, promised to pay for my journey but never once did reimburse me, would pull last minute cancellations, reply half a day later, or not reply until he knew I was actually getting on the train (in tears) and going back home. I repressed a lot of this trauma but at some point, it’s worth it to revisit these memories, not to inflict more pain on oneself, but to see the situation for what it is. Write a list of all the things he’s actually done for you, not said. Think of all the past instances in which you were ignored– why should the recent email be any different?
NC can be hell, but as many women here have testified, it does get better with time. Responding to his text will send you on another downward spiral, “rinse, lather, repeat”. There was someone else here who said that there were moments of illumination, epiphany, amidst the chaos. Please start choosing yourself and not devalue yourself any further. I think we need…
Hi JadeSesame,
I made it through another day of NC! I mentioned earlier, I feel like an alcoholic going through recovery. I’m taking it one day at a time. I can soooo relate to everything you said. Yep, I’m spinning words over and over in my head. Even reading our old emails and texts over and over trying to figure out how I could’ve made this “whatever it is we had” out of crumbs. His words and actions do not and have not ever matched. He was very inconsistent, which kept me guessing (and hooked I guess) all the times. The highs when I would hear from him and the lows when I didn’t. He played the disappearing act so well, doing it several times over the past few years. If anything, I could count on him to be inconsistent and disappear. I knew he wasn’t someone I could call on if I was in a terrible car wreck in a hospital and wanted to say goodbye. He wouldn’t even answer his phone for fear his wife would be nearby. OOOH, I had forgotten until now. This summer, I accidentally pushed the “LIKE” button on a posting he was tagged in (by another friend) on Facebook. This only happened because I was scrolling down the page on my cell and touched the screen on the wrong place. Anyways, he promptly, texted me and asked me to: “Please remove your ‘like’ from my friend’s posting, he asked who you were. Awkward.”
That was like being punched in the stomach. I did quickly remove it and when I asked what his answer was to his friend, he said “Don’t worry, it’s all good.” Wow, another red flag right there folks! I almost feel stupidier and stupidier with every epiphany and realization that these feelings I had for years were not mutual.
@Complicated, you’ll make it. I know it’s emotionally eating you up, but the more clarity you have of the situation, the further you’ll go in freeing yourself from it. I felt really disgusted by him and pained on your behalf, reading about that dismissive facebook encounter- don’t ever let reduce yourself to become someone’s dirty little secret! Are you not repulsed by him? Outraged? What audacity he has and how dare he treat you like that? Banish him from your life. Make a list of all these incidents and what sort of person he shows himself to be. At some point, you might start to even loathe the person you’re becoming because of the situation– it’s not about roller coaster rides, or unrequited love, it’s about you feeling so thoroughly degraded, ruined and hollowed out, that you know you have to save and raise yourself! I feel it’s crucial you ask yourself honestly, what is it you “love” and miss about him? Why do you want him? What does he represent to you? How does he make you feel? Has anyone else made you feel the same way? Does he remind you of anyone in your life? I hope I don’t sound didactic, but NC isn’t just sitting on your hands, deprivation, suffering.. I think it can be an intense journey of self-discovery and self-knowledge. You will emerge, I believe.
snh,
Thank you for being here and commenting. When you said, “Will he have changed between last weekend and this weekend? Will he understand you more this weekend? ” My lightbulb came on! I get flickers every now and then, but this time, it came on and actually stayed on for awhile. NO, he hasn’t changed in 15 years since we first dated before reuniting, so I know he hasn’t changed in a week. If he hasn’t understood all my four years worth of trying to express how I feel, he wont understand it now. He couldn’t give me what I wanted when we were BOTH single and dating years ago and he can’t give me what I want now. I’m doing my best to ride this rollercoaster of emotions and realize there will be ups and downs. Today was another day of NC so I’m enjoying that accomplishment.
Complicated
As you say, he couldn’t give you what you wanted when you were both single. Same with my returning sweetheart/MM. He forced me to revisit the original relationship and all the things that were annoying me in the present (with the added fact that he was married) were the things that wound me up in the past – the showing off, the sense of entitlement, the drugs, the irresponsibility. In fact, I think he’d gotten worse as he got older!
Natalie has posted on return of the childhood sweetheart. She raised a very valid, painful point – why, when he was looking for an ego stroke/attention/ sex did he pick YOU? Is it because he loves you so much or is it because … he knows you are amenable (or a doormat to put it more bluntly)? I think my MM knew I would not kick up a fuss or make trouble for him. And I did not. Of which I am glad. Thanks to Nat and my counsellor I only met up with him the once and we didn’t do the deed, but all the sexting was very inappropriate.
Contrast with another ex (also married) who friended me on facebook. There has not been a whisper of impropriety. My family all know him as well, so that helps. No secrets. But I doubt I’ll meet up with him when I’m next in his neighbourhood (another country). I just don’t feel comfortable with that. I don’t want him to have to make the decision “Do I tell my wife that I’m meeting up with my first girlfriend?” and I don’t want to cause his wife even five minutes of anxiety over it. It’s just not worth it, I don’t need to do it!
I am in the thick of it right now and today’s post couldn’t be more fitting for my current situation. I have been “seeing” a guy for nearly a year where I have invested myself emotionally and financially. I know that I fell deep for this EUM and his feelings are unmatched. The relationship has me feeling like a shell of myself and I am so confused, hurt, and empty. This a$$hole is actually going to visit his ex girlfriend in another city. And, I am at my wits end. I have decided that as soon as he boards that plane that I will begin NC and never look back. His reason for going is so self serving — that he needs to get away…this is such BS. It is a kick in the stomach.
I have compromised my integrity and my authentic self in a desire to love someone who isn’t interested in loving me. There is a part of me that feels he doesn’t love this woman either that he is merely an opportunist taking advantage of people for his own needs. I am very mad at him, but mostly I am mad with myself for being so desperate to involve myself with him and joining the “harem” of women who stroke his ego. This is one of many failed relationships for me, and I constantly seek out EUM knowing damn well what the outcome will be. I recently bought your book and I’m planning to get started on the work I need to do for myself. Not necessarily to prepare myself for a loving relationship with another man, but, to prepare myself for the ultimate relationship – loving myself. I am now making this the last relationship that I will be the pursuerer. And, I’m going to finally face myself and do the necessary work to empower myself and get out of this rut. I keep going back and forth in my mind about him. But, I know I can’t continue to demoralize myself for him any longer. I am hurting so much right now and I feel like a fool.
D – Just wanted to check in and say good for you for choosing NC, welcome, and the feeling of having been fooled will subside quickly with each day on the other side of cutting him off.
“The sense of feeling owed and wanting redress, is something that I really relate to.”-JadeSesame
These posts have resonated with me. I had a few weeks after my last contact with him where I really didn’t care. I suppose I expected him to start calling again and maybe that I would have it out with him at that point. I’m angry. At him for stringing me along and treating me so badly, then pretending as though it hasn’t happened. And I’m angry at myself for putting up with it. I know that telling him how selfish, rude, arrogant, mean, etc, he’s been will not change anything, and I know that he won’t agree with what I’m saying and apologize. But I can’t help feeling that at least saying it might have some positive effect for me. But of course, I’m not going to contact him to do it.
I have days where I wonder whether I was right to ignore his last phone call, but reading this site usually stops those thoughts. He went from talking about how he wanted to make this work, have a talk about things, sort it out (it didn’t occur to me to ask flat out “you want me in your life when we’re 90 as WHAT, exactly?). Then after popping by one night when I had asked him not to, snooping around, trying to “sleep” in my bed, he left saying “we’ll talk tomorrow”. He did not call until one week later to ask me for help with something–no acknowledgement that he had just disappeared for a week. When I said “what happened to wanting to make things better, having a conversation, ‘we’ll talk tomorrow’?”, he just pushed for me to answer his question and said he would call me back. He did call back a little while later, but I couldn’t be bothered to pick up. Even IF he was not in the position to talk for very long he could at least given me some brief explanation as to why he was asking for what he was, or why he had not called for a week.
I suppose this venting stems from me thinking about it all too much: I still don’t really understand what happened. I have a hard time reconciling “he meant it at the time” with him just walking away. How can a person supposedly want a future and have these feelings, and then just flip a switch and decide to move on? Nat’s articles help a lot, and I’ve read many things that probably give me as much of an explanation as I’ll ever get, but still….I can’t fully wrap my head around it.
Hi A,
I read your post and wanted to say I understand the amazement you felt at his’fade’especially after what he’d said or promised and what you felt you’d gone through together. The ultimate 4wk demise of my 16 months was very similar. He contacted me saying’We had to talk’ and pressed me to arrange a time..he missed me, had never loved anyone more…
We had shifted to communicating by texts and e mails again and I asked him to phone me, that I was sick of cyber analysis…we were to meet on Friday and I needed details because of work arrangements.
He phoned and we spoke for ten mins, he was upbeat,still keen to meet. See you soon GoodLookin’ he said.
Approx one hour later I got a text from ‘The toilet of Peggy’s kitchen’,somewhere in North of Scotland’…he said’ L, you have made me feel vulnerable, despite my desire for you, I will articulate my thoughts by EMAIL!!!to you tomorrow.x
I was stunned, first to silence, then got on phone, (his was switched to answer…ha, ha.) I sent a text, ‘What the eff is going on now?’ and asked him to phone me. As I write this, I am still waiting…
I have of course gone NC, been for a while, doing good, feeling better than I have, for years…
A, this week, for a day or two I felt like you and wanted explanation, for all the ‘There is no end to the depth of my love for you’ crap and the promises of marriage, connubial bliss…
Reality bit, he was an avowed EUM,when I acted like an adult, he scarpered. When I called him on promises made…he would have shinned down drainpipes to remove himself.
I was an EUW, for putting up with it, and any rumination on’Why’, unless it directly benefits me…is a waste of my time. And of yours. I think of him now like a weathervane, turning this way and that, depending on his own version of the weather. He had no empathy for me at all.
Natalie – you’re amazing. This article is spot on and this site has helped me so much over the years. I finally gave up being the fallback girl and am happy and healthy with a wonderful man who loves me. It wasn’t easy accepting it at first because I was so used to dyfunctionality, but now I’m loving myself and living accordingly. I still check back here and send it to all my girlfriends. It’s so helpful to know you’re not alone, but that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Thanks again for all the work you’ve done!!
Hi Complicated,
Just now saw your post and wanted to comment and hopefully by doing so, perhaps help or at least make you feel a bit better.
Like yourself, I question how someone who “seemed” to be very much in love and/or lust with me, could then act completely oblivious to the pain and suffering I was (and still am, even now, you are so right when you say that it is not linear at all, I struggle with this so much myself) having as a consequence of his actions.
As others have posted, “Where is the empathy” or, in lieu of that, “Where is the decency and common regard for another person who is suffering”…and I wish I could tell you this, I really truly do because if I could, then I would have a better understanding myself. I think maybe it might be this: people do not want to accept responsibility for having hurt another, they just don’t.
Either that, or they see themselves as being “good” people and therefore, have not “done” anything wrong. As I have had to learn, both in romantic relationships and also friendships as well, if there is not reciprocity between the two people, then it is simply not worth the time, energy or effort required. NML wrote about “Going back to the source of the pain” and I think this is very true.
Like yourself, I also wonder if this other man who hurt me, misses me or even thinks about me. It wounds me deeply to think that he has obliterated me from his heart and mind. All I can tell you is from my own experience, which is this: being NC has been one of the most difficult things I have ever done for myself and yet, in the midst of it all, while the questions still exist, there is also a certain inner quietness too, the internal chaos of emotions has abated.
My best advice to you is this: block his number, his email, and any other contact info you have for him. Change your number if you have to, that is what I did, as my provider would not block international numbers. You must think of yourself FIRST. Protect your heart and your emotions. You deserve no less than this.
Many hugs to you 🙂
Hi Lessie,
“People do not want to accept responsibility for having hurt another, they just don’t.” You are so spot on with this comment. It’s so true, if my EU/MM accepted responsibility for how he’s hurt me, he would feel obligated to discuss his feelings and apologize…something he’s told me many times he’s not comfortable with expressing or good at doing. The second time we “met up” he even said “I’ve always considered myself a loyal man.” So in addition to accepting responsibility, he’d also be acknowledging he was cheating on his wife with an ex girlfriend he once almost married then reunited with. He called me “the one that got away.” I wasn’t just some one night stand with no feelings involved. There’s not a day that goes by I don’t think the same as you Lessie and wonder if he’s thinking of me and missing me. I’ve asked him before how he can disconnect so easily from me and he said “I don’t know.” You see, he’s gone three years in a row ignoring me for 3 to 5 months and then the communication starts up again. Mainly because I continued texting and trying to reach him and he said he got “tired of fighting it.” So it’s a mind f&*#ery to me because I think he must truly care if he is having to “fight the urge” to not communicate with me. Then when we’re back to communicating again, he starts to blow hot and cold. This was the first full year in four years we communicated every single day until I sent that email 2 weeks ago saying I couldn’t handle the roller coaster anymore and had to cut contact because he didn’t feel the same. I could tell he was getting scared and starting to pull away again and I wasn’t going to repeat the previous few years’ actions.
How long have you been in NC?? At what point do you find it getting easier??
Again, thanks so much for being there for me today at least via blog haha. It helps to know I’m not the only one who’s gone through this. Good thoughts and hugs to you too on your journey :).
Complicated,
Oh sweetie, I see so much of myself in your words as I am sure the other lovely ladies here would attest themselves. I think most of us have been (or still are) where you are now, with regards trying to understand and sort through it all.
You asked how long I have been NC…the break up occurred at the end of June and so it has been since then. Within two weeks of that, I had changed my number, blocked his email and sent back (via post) some housewarming gifts he had given me (I had recently moved). I don’t even feel as if I had a summer at all, since I was in such great shock and distress.
I have really only started to gain both a sense of perspective and a very slow healing process as of late (and it is very much a day by day thing, as some days I feel strong and sure of myself and other days, I am crying, biting my nails and feeling sad). I don’t think there is a set formula for anyone.
What I CAN say to you is that it does get better, with time and especially, with much tenderness and self care for YOU. Take time to be good to yourself. The other day I was feeling quite low and made myself a chocolate pudding graham cracker pie and ate it over the course of that day! While that may not be the healthiest thing, at the time, for me, it soothed my spirit (and my sweet tooth)…take long walks, read and watch movies that make you feel good, take nice long bubble baths, buy some new nail polish, talk to a friend.
Ultimately, I think you have to value YOU more than you value him. You have to put yourself (and thus your most valuable heart) above any regard for him and what he thinks/feels.
Please continue to come to BR, you’ll find much support and encouragement as I have and its made all the difference 🙂
As always, many hugs to you.
Hi Lessie,
Thank you for your kind words. Congratulations on your continued success of NC! I hope one day in the near future to be providing this type of encouragement to someone else. Here’s to another day of NC tomorrow with hopefully a little less heartache. He may have been a married man, but my heart didn’t seem to recognize that fact, but my head did. So now, I’m paying the price for falling for someone who didn’t (and couldn’t) fall for me.
Complicated,
We all know how you feel. You’re in the middle of the worst part of the journey. It gets better. Honestly, it does.
“if my EU/MM accepted responsibility for how he’s hurt me, he would feel obligated to discuss his feelings and apologize…something”
The problem is he is not and will not accept responsibility. He is having an affair, cheating on his wife after only two years of marriage; that’s how much of a “responsible” person he is – that’s how obligated he feels to the women in his life.
The OW is looking for accountbility, responsibility and obligation from a patently irresponsible source. Has he apologized to his wife yet for his deceptive practices and his gross betrayal of trust? Do you think he ever will? Perhaps, if he gets caught out being the cheating liar that he is. He is not “scared” of his feelings for you nor is he is trying to stifle them – he’s scared of this affair getting all out of his control and him getting caught and having to beg his wife for forgiveness. He’s been keeping you at arms length for a reason – and it’s not because he is crazy in love.
And try to consider your own level of responsibility and obligation here. How responsible has your behaviour been in all of this, would you say? How obligated do you feel to do the right thing? You too are cheating with (and seeking the love and attention of) another woman’s husband. With rights come responsibilities. He wants all the rights (the rights of married life with his wife and also the right to sext another woman) without the responsibility for either of these women’s feelings. And what about you? What rights do you think you have in this situation? What are your responsibilities and obligations? Or don’t you have any?
Regarding his ‘you are the one that got away’. You are focused on the “you are the one” part of that sentence. But that’s not what he’s saying, is he? He’s saying you “got away” – he is with someone else now, so he can’t be with you. And I guessing he said this 3/4 years ago – how long can you cling to that meaningless sentence.
My ex arsehole once told me “you are the love of my life”. I could cling to and believe that throwaway remark forever or I could heed the shed load of evidence to the contrary. Believe what he does, not what he says.
Oh, Complicated. I just keep thinking about you. I have been where you are many times over. Not necessarily with married men. (a few) It begins with how we feel about ourselves. I met a man who seemed to be the perfect “catch”. He was newly divorced, handsome, wealthy, and seemed to be interested in self-growth. HOWEVER, he stated on our first date, “I can’t be exclusive.” I should have walked away. But, I didn’t. (I am always the exception.) He could have said, “I am married.” or “I live with Mama.” or “My ex did this Blah blah blah blah!!” we know the drill. And I continued to see him, investing time and (what I thought were true) emotions into this psuedo relationship. Mind you, I heard, “I think I’m falling in love with you”, “you are the ‘full meal deal’ “, (can you imagine that coming from an important business man?? Hee hee!!), and everything we all LOVE to hear. Very flattering and I, being the single mother of two kids, (never married), couldn’t imagine, that anyone so wonderful could fall for me. Then one day, just MOMENTS after scheduling our date for that evening via telephone, I saw him meeting another woman for lunch. Kissing her. I was devastated. Of course I couldn’t ask him about it. My eyes may have been lying to me. And then, I would have HAD to have faced the truth. But he had known I had seen him because my friend who I was with had blown her horn at him as we had passed. So during dinner that night, at least he had the decency to bring up the topic of not being exclusive with me once again. And of course, I went into hysterics, (low self-esteem, immaturity mixed with two vodka drinks) and I wound up in the bathroom stall for 20 minutes. On the drive home, I cried out, “Its because I don’t look like Shania Twain!!” and blamed MYSELF!! LOL!! Oh, what a sad, sad evening. All along, I knew he was sleeping with other women. But I never asked. Because I would not give myself a voice or have my own power. I was devastated for a long time and made him out to be so wonderful. Do you know, a year later, I heard he married. And I assumed it was probably that woman he met for lunch. And I still felt like there was a deficit in me. Somehow. But, 3 weeks after their Hawaiian honeymoon, still sporting his Hawaiian tan, he knocked on my front door. No wedding ring. And I knew. I…
holy cr@p, what a cliffhanger! He knocked on your door after his honeymoon?
Believe you me LoJ, that comment of yours’ Its because I don’t look like Shania Twain…’you will dine out on that for years!!! Absolutely cracked me up…thanks you have cheered me up tonight. Stay Strong.
and you have just written what I was thinking Ixnay…. Hells Bells…he knocked on your door after his honeymoon, what the eff???
Never mind Hawaii, he’d clearly been vacationing in Psychoville!
Oopsie! There really IS a 2400 character limit!!
After showing up on my front porch sans wedding ring (I’m certain it was in his pocket), though my self esteem was not completely in tow, I was on my way, I knew then, IT WAS NOT ME. HE was a bona fide JACK ASS. And I had been spared. Though he HAD told me he couldn’t be exclusive in the beginning to free him of any guilt, he continued to sleep with me. A DECENT man would not have done that. HOWEVER, had I been a DECENT woman WITH MY SELF ESTEEM IN TOW, I would not have slept with him or continued to date him. Then he showed up on my doorstep without his wedding ring. And I called him on it. And I was glad I wasn’t the unknowing wife. Several years later, I saw him at jury duty. I pretended to not hear him calling my name, chasing after me as I made a phone call to my mother acting like I had something to tell her important as I told her about him standing behind me waiting for me to get off the phone. I owed him nothing. He owed me nothing. There was no reason for this married man, (with twins I later found out) to speak with me. I didn’t care if his feelings were hurt, if I looked stupid avoiding him or pretending of his nonexistence. It did not matter. I did it for me. I did it for HIS WIFE. Because those were MY VALUES. Our values did not match. In order for us to have a great, loving, real, HONEST, respectful, relationship, WE HAVE TO BE all those things. We can’t expect those from somebody else, if we aren’t that ourselves. Hope this all posts!! LOL!! Take care, Complicated!! Be true to yourself.
And by the way, I don’t look like Shania Twain, but I am HOT, and I get HOTTER every year!! And the better my ‘insides’ get, the better my ‘outsides’ get!!! HEE HEE!!!
Hope everybody has a fantastic day!!
Hi Lo J,
Thank you, thank you, thank you for sharing your story…and telling us how it ended :). I keep telling myself that he isn’t a decent man or he wouldn’t have said/done these things with me instead of his wife. But when I think about it, that would make me a dishonest and disrespectful person too wouldn’t it because I did all these things with a man who was married to another woman? I’ve always thought of myself as being a pretty good person. I think that’s the part I struggle with the most and can’t seem to wrap my head around what’s transpired over the past few years. If he’s horrible, I must be horrible too. Because we both did these things to his wife. But, I treat everyone with kindness, tell them how I feel, turn the other cheek when they treat me badly and even pray for them. This is the first time, I have ever been involved with a married man. I just thought it was different because we dated years ago and almost married. But, it doesn’t matter. What matters is he is married and not to me. His poor wife. I should count my lucky stars I didn’t marry him all those years ago, because he’d probably be cheating on me right now. I mentioned in an earlier post that I feel like a Halloween pumpkin that’s been hollowed out, void of anything right now. My heart aches for the way he’s treated me and my heart aches for the way he’s treating his wife. But, he probably treats her with more kindness and respect. Afterall, he did choose to marry her and not me. When I last saw him in person this Spring, I asked “What was it that made you choose her and not me, I mean what does she have that I don’t?” He answered this by saying “Oh, woman….I’ll have to think on that.” Never did get an answer by the way. Wow, all these conversations are flooding back to me tonight. Not great feelings associated with them either 🙁
Complicated
It must seem I’m stalking you to disagree with everything you say! You have built up a mythology around this man. He’s not treating his wife with kindness and respect. He’s lying to her and cheating on her. At least you are out of it now, keep it up.
He’s not that special. He’s not even average. Do you need him to be special for YOU to feel special? I know how that goes. I wanted the reflected glory from what I perceived to be an extraordinary person. What he is or isn’t is separate to you. If he really is God’s gift, that doesn’t elevate you. And if he really is a cheating clown, that doesn’t make you less of a person either.
You are your own fine woman and you will find that out with NC. Have faith.
I love this post Natalie. 🙂 I’m going to save it and read it often. It feels so good to have finally gotten to the “give up” point. It took me a long, long time to get there, which I hate – but I guess I had to go through it.
I’m glad it’s done – for me. I don’t feel anything for him anymore. It’s sad it had to get to that point. I will always be on this site – there is so much to learn about myself. Thank you for helping me. You are a blessing.
Natalie. Tumbleweeds. Ha!
So. Funny. Because. It’s. True.
I find the poem Antigonish wry and useful.
Yesterday, upon the stair,
I met a man who wasn’t there
He wasn’t there again today
I wish, I wish he’d go away
When I came home last night at three
The man was waiting there for me
But when I looked around the hall
I couldn’t see him there at all!
Go away, go away, don’t you come back anymore!
Go away, go away, and please don’t slam the door ….. (slam!)
Last night I saw upon the stair
A little man who wasn’t there
He wasn’t there again today
Oh, how I wish he’d go away.
Thank you Waltzing Matilda for the poem. It is going on my mirror.
It so captures many moments on my stairs with the guy who wasn’t there. We loved my stairs. Oh, how I wish he’d go away. Everytime I look down the hall, he isn’t there at all…Thank you for posting this. So haunting. Natalie, you have created the most amazing space for such amazing folks. I learn so much from you and everybody who posts. Thank you. Wow!
I just keep reading this over and over.
WM, wow. awesome poem. Thanks for sharing it. Wikipedia says it was “inspired by reports of a ghost of a man roaming the stairs of a haunted house in Antigonish, Nova Scotia.” Emotionally unavailable poeple are really like ghosts. They come and go, controlling when and who sees them, disappear at will without any promises to return and haunt your mind during their absence (and returns). You only ever see the spectre of a real, whole self.
Hello All again,
Just an update…I’ am still NC, but she did manage to text again to let me know that she was not going to show up to my office after all and would be sending her brother to make the delivery. I’ am not sure why that bothers me so much. It’s almost as if she is saying since you didn’t bother to reply to me earlier text, then I have no need to show up to your office. I shall send someone else. I am glad and sad that I didn’t see her, but a side of me feels rejected again… just venting. This is why it is best to follow no contact to the letter because any little contact from them really can ruin the hard work we put into no contact.
Your comments are welcomed.
freetobe
yep, NC is the way to go. Everything from them is toxic. Also, fresh out of a break up you’re still too vulnerable to deal with her. By the time you ARE strong enough to deal with her – you won’t want to. But at this stage it’s all about self-preservation so it’s a good thing she isn’t coming in. Who cares why?
It’r probably emotional cowardice but I try very hard to discourage psychoanalysis of someone who isn’t even in the room so I’ll leave it at that. Especially if all you’ve got to go in is … another flippin text, people!
I know the feeling freetobec…these people are master manipulators! Mine was showing up in places where he knew i’d be, giving me those puppy eyes, that hurt look…trying to make me feel guilty!!! What works for me is to remember WHY I’m doing NC. Feel that pain, own it…do you really want to go back to that?? NO WAY. Keep strong 🙂
Hi Tania,
It’s sad to think that we go blindly into a relationship with people like this. The lesson learned is that going in blindly into anything is not a good idea. All the signs of being an EUW and Future Faker were there, but I was blinded by her manipulation and crumbs, in the end I was shut out , short tons of money, and less of an ego. I don’t think she is wanting me back thou. I think her attemp was to gauge the situation after NC. There’s a side of me that says I’m flattering myself. Maybe she was just reaching out to simply warn me she was going to be in the building and it had nothing to do with me. It was just business. Doesn’t feel any better knowing that either. Besides it was her who shut me out after I confronted her about her inability to cut ties with other men and her need to “put herself out there” where you not in a relationship with me??? Was I not doing for you and building a future?? That was just the respectful thing to do no? Yes a true manipulator and I was the easy mark who wanted it so much that I ignored all the signs.
Thank you for your support and replied.
freetobec,
These people can’t love. It’s all about CONTROL. Once you start realising that, it doesn’t matter whether they want you back or not anymore… they simply can’t give you what you need. I actually feel sorry for him now. He can’t change: he thinks there’s nothing wrong with him. But we can. That’s why we are all here.
Hi Grace,
Agreed. The more I think on it the more I’m sick of how much of our relationship carried on via text. We had our personal moments but how much would I not have enjoyed a call saying good night and I love you instead of a text! I’m starting to think now that I’m flattering myself into thinking that she reached out to gauge the situation. The more I think of it she may have just wanted to make it clear that she was going to be in the office on business and had nothing to do with me. Then again it sounds like I’m making excuses for her. Ugh!
Truth is she broke contact with me and shut me out when I confronted her about her careless ways and how I was feeling disrespected. So for her to take the business in my office was thoughtless. She should have passed on the business as it was not worth it. Sorry I’m all over the place here but that’s how hearing from her has left me. Thank you for your support. It is a good thing to hear that my post are read and replied to as well. They are welcomed and needed.
freetobc
“it’s as if she is saying since you didn’t bother to reply to me earlier text, then I have no need to show up to your office.”
Yes. She didn’t get the attention/ego stroke she wanted – you were supposed to be thrilled about her offering you a chance to see her and to kiss her ass one more time – you ignored her so she is withdrawing “the prize”. Ignore her some more!
Hi Fearless,
Thank you very much for your support. That’s exactly how I interpreted which actually helped me further want to stay NC. I think once we can predict their next moves it helps us regain some power over the situation and can be better prepared for an expected blow to come. NC is not easy because you want to say “Hey what the eff are you doing?” but again when you take away their power it gets easier by the day. My sincere gratitude to your reply and support it was much needed.
freetobc and everyone,
Yes, the predictability of their nothingness is heartbreaking when you are in the midst of your love bubble but when you stop trying to force them into changing their gift of nothingness into something tangible then that same predictability of nothingness becomes quite freeing when you are making your escape. The sheer amount of nothingness they can keep on giving is really quite astonishingly predictable. Once you see it for what it is – a stream of empty packages tied up with string – you stop rummaging around the empty boxes thinking there must be gift or a message in here cos why would someone keep giving me empty parcels. But they do! They have nothing of any meaningfulness whatsoever to say to us – it’s astonsishing.
Fearless,
I found myself applauding. Well said. Well said indeed.
Thanks again.
Freetobec
Amazing Natalie as always, Thank you 🙂
I don’t hang around anywhere that I’m not wanted. I don’t have time for ambiguity or games. Plain & simple.
I use to listen to the “I Can Love You Better”, but those days have passed! Another good song to listen to when you are feeling down is this great anthem: “I WILL SURVIVE by Chantay Savage. The video is on youtube and VEVO. http://youtube“I will survive” byChantaySavage” VEVO. This video will definitely pep you up!!
COMPLICATED:
IT IS NOT ABOUT YOUR WORTH. He is not anymore respectful to his wife than you. She has not won anything over you. Both of my parents were EU, my father cheated on my mother, only once to my knowledge, but she spent years of being emotionally neglected by him. He blamed her for his affair. But she was left at home caring for 3 children, one SEVERELY physically, disabled, and he did not support her. He COULD NOT. BECAUSE HE WAS BROKEN. For whatever reason. And so was my mother from childhood experiences. Two sick people who found each other. And they have continued to put up with each other all these years. And been miserable and BLAMED each other for EVERYTHING that has gone wrong in each others lives. AGAINST each other. Instead of having a loving, caring relationship and working TOGETHER like a marriage should be. So, as Natalie has said, if you actually WIN the EUM, as the wife has DONE, (YIPPEE), she DOESN’T get love, respect and support. She has a battle the rest of her life. BELIEVE me. QUIT making him out to be something he is not and quit making this about YOUR worth. Forgive yourself for your mistake, WORK ON YOU! Do things positive to build up your worth and make better choices in the future. This is about YOU.
Hi Grace,
The Return of the childhood sweetheart is the first article I ever read on this site. I found it when searching for others that had gone through the same as me. Luckily I found so much more along with wonderfully, inspiring people here! Well, I made it through another day NC and will be so happy when one day I realize “wow, I haven’t thought of him today.”
Hi Lo J,
My head knows this isn’t about me, but I guess it’s my self esteem that has suffered the most. I’ve empathized with so many other women on this site that said “if I were good enough, pretty enough, smart enough etc, he would choose me. But choosing me means he gives up his family and friends (he and his best friend each married female best friends). All others in his circle of friends are somehow related or are also close friends. So even if I had won him, I would never be accepted and always be the outcast. I believe thats why he ‘chose’ her. His lifestyle didnt have to change after marrying. He goes out several times a week to golf and is also in several sports leagues and atttends concerts a good bit. It works because the wife isnt left home alone, she’s left with all her friends who happen to be married to all his friends who are on the same sports teams. I keep telling myself the most important thing is he is married and not to me. I’ll keep saying it until it sinks in.
Hi Fearless,
I definitely have had more of a relationship with him in my head than face to face in real life. Let me clarify, he and I texted everyday of the week for about 8 hours a day (during his workday week). We didnt ‘chat’ as he called it on the weekends much because he was usually with family and friends. Every weekday morning he’d send a morning text (usually about sports) and our conversations would continue throughout the day. In addition to sports, we talked about news, life, weekend plans, how much he cared for me, and i for him & anything that came to our minds. He rarely mentioned his wife (if he ever did). We even kept up our daily chats when we both traveled out of the country for separate vacations this past summer. This daily ‘chatting’ has gone on for a year (previous years we only chatted a few times a year) up until 2 weeks ago when i sent my email saying i had to cut this connection between us. The week before that i could tell he was starting to pull away and i wanted to get out before he had the chance to disappear as he has in previous years. The last time I saw him face-to-face was April of this year. He gave me 10 minutes in his office lobby…after I had flown to town to see him. We’d made plans months before that of everything we’d be doing and visiting, but of course something came up and he couldn’t see me except 10 minutes out of my 4 day visit to his state. This visit was for his birthday and i had brought him gifts. Yes, it was just as bad as it sounds. It was a few visits before that where he only gave me 2 hours out of my 4 day visit. Other than our visits, it was just texting. He would never call me. Nor would he come visit me. I did all the work. One of his bday presents I had given him was a calling card, which he never used on me. Hopefully this clarifies things some…it has certainly brought me pain and suffering just writing it out.
Oops, meant to say in previous years, we only chatted several times a week (not several times a year). This is why I’ve felt something missing out of my daily life.
Complicated
yes it is painful to write down what is actually happening – it brings it home to us in all its stark reality. Natalie’s has a great commandments for dating on the right side of the page here. “Don’t let yourself be managed via text/email etc.” strikes me as one you could pay attention to; it sure helped me to see that my ex man was more about avoiding getting into a relationship with me than anything else.
His level of contribution to your “relationship” has been worse than woeful. Your tale about him giving you ten minutes (out of 4 days) of his time is one of those BR reading “Ouch!!”moments (cos it’s more about him wanting to avoid you than meet up with you) And same goes for when he gave you two hours – “ouch’ again. With time and distance, Compie, you’ll come to see that you two really are at cross-purposes with this man’s agenda.
Also, be wary to of making assumptions about his marriage – why he is in it/why he chose her/why it works – they are part of your wishful thinking fantasy and they feed into that fantasy; they are not based on any hard evidence that you have. If you don’t believe me, try writing down a list of exactly what you DO know about his marriage / why he ‘chose her’ / why he still ‘chooses her’. Include only *hard evidenced facts* – you cannot hang any truths on what a MM tells (by text) an OW about his wife and his marriage. He will not tell (text) you anything at all about her if he can avoid it. He will not want to discuss it!
whether he has been texting you once or ten times in a working day – these are still text messages. That’s all. And for all this time that’s how much he has extended himself in his contribution to this “relationship” – he texts you when he is at work. A lot of these men keep appeasing the ‘mistress’ for longer than they want to because they are afraid that she’ll do a bunny boiler thing on them – or that she will simply ‘dob him in’. A lot of it for them ends up being more about keeping you just sweet enough so that you won’t cause any bother for them. I’m getting that sense from this man.
Let’s face it Compie, it’s time for you to put much more value on yourself than than daily texts from another woman’s husband. you need to deal with your own lack of self-value – not on getting him to value you. Keep up NC!
I’m cracking up. The Bunny Boiler comment did me in. I’ve been thinking that my MMs wife probably thinks I’m a Fatal Attraction case because I texted him last week after he broke it off with me when she discovered we’ve been having an affair. Actually, I didn’t know they were still together until it all blew up, and I’m still attached to him emotionally. She’s been checking their phone records, so I knew she’d see I texted him, and I felt bad in the morning. I sent her an email to explain that I’d texted him but we hadn’t been in contact (well, we had, a little, but not in over a week and it wasn’t romantic.) Ahhh! Now I’m doing a weird email relationship with his wife, too. I just realized this. Seriously, I want to ditch email and text.
Here is the correct link to the video “I Will Survive”. This is for anyone that has been hurt by assclown, MM, EUM, etc. Things do get better!
http://youtu.be/TMyCXqM8AKM
Darkness,
Just checked out the link. That’s an amazing rendition of I will survive. Thanks for sharing!
Grace:
“What he is or isn’t is separate to you. If he really is God’s gift, that doesn’t elevate you. And if he really is a cheating clown, that doesn’t make you less of a person either.”
So true Grace. Well said. In order to stop pouring ourselves into the abyss with these ‘relationships’ we have to focus on valuing and validating ourselves – independently of him!
Complicated ~ Me, again. I am so hoping you get this soon, girl!! I LOVED what Grace said. “What he is or isn’t is separate of you.” I have done this a thousand times. When we have no boundaries or self-esteem, we want others to define who we are. We want others to tell us we are okay.
Hi Grace,
You’re not stalking me, I really appreciate your continued support! I think most of all I wanted him to want and care for me as much as i have him all these years. But, now I’m at the realization that he in incapable of being emotionally available to me and any other woman for that matter. He is married and not to me. Going to fake it with being ok until I make it. Keep your comments coming!
Hi Fearless,
Yes it’s time to put the focus on me. It’s obvious he and I want to completely different things out of this “friendship”. I hate even calling it that because I don’t treat my friends the way he has treated me NOR do I ask them to sext me! Wouldn’t you know last night I got a text that he had updated his status on FB (I haven’t turned off that notification yet). Both of our statuses have always gone to each others phones so we could keep in touch where ever we were. He said: “Im not an X sports team fan in the slightest, but the fact they beat Y (insert my team here) is great with me!”
I know what he was doing. I recognized he was trying to get a response out of me because ive always replied back with a fiery text. He lives halfway across the country and doesnt even cheer for that team so its all a childish game. I did not reply nor will I. The status was removed by morning. Its like he’s trying to f*$# with my head. Wouldn’t he be glad that I wasn’t around pursuing him and wanting something from him that he can’t give?
Comp,
Sorry for the stalking here too, but I am following your comments!
“Wouldn’t he be glad that I wasn’t around pursuing him and wanting something from him that he can’t give?”
Comp, You’re not quite getting the point. He does not want you to pursue him for what he cannot and *does not want* to give you. That just makes you a pest. He wants what he was getting from you – some texts and sexts. And only when it’s convenient for him. He’s checking if you are still up for that. That’s all. It’s good for his ego if you are. It’s very bad for your ego if you are. He wants to know you are still available for him to toy with. You didn’t take the bait which made him feel like a twit so he removed the status. He is extraordinarily selfish, manipulative and I would say too that he is verging on if not full-on emotionally abusive. If he had any heart and empathy for you and your feelings he would leave you alone and stop wasting your time, ruining your life and shredding your emotions. Sadly it’s all a sport to him – he enjoys the game. For you this is no game – it’s seriously damaging for you.
If you think that his poking you on f/book like that is a sign that he wants the same as you want but is so inept that he’s simply incapable of expressing that desire in the normal way, try telling him that if he attempts to make any contact with you again (including baiting you on f/bk) you will contact his wife – you wouldn’t see him (or get a text from him, I should say) for the fifty foot cloud of dust flying up from his heels – but you know that already, so stop kidding yourself.
You need to think about how serious you really are about NC and getting yourself to a healthier place. Consider blocking all means of communication between you – I have a feeling he will keep on poking you for some ego stroking and sex(t)ing for as long as he feels like it and as long as you’re up for providing that service – at great cost to yourself and no cost to him.
I am sorry, Comp, if I sound harsh – and I too feel like I am stalking you! But I am always oddly intrigued by the MM/OW thing, I think it’s the epitome of what Nat’s blog is mainly (or often) dealing with – it encompasses every characteristic of the EUM/FBG dynamic. If you haven’t read this book yet – you should get it and read it asap. It will help you. Really, it will.
Hi Fearless,
Please don’t worry about stalking me on this site, I really appreciate yours and everyone’s comments during this difficult time. Keep them coming!!! I read and write on here when I feel myself struggling with NC. I am confident after 4 years that he does not want the same as me. In fact, if I was to even respond to his attempts with a sports banter he’d be gone. That’s his MO. He would be scared just to hear back from me. So the way I look at it, I might as well just stay gone. Don’t get me wrong, I am still struggling everyday with the whole situation, wanting to contact him, get some closure and answers from him, but I just leave things be. I know it’s healthier for me this way. I just feel emotionally drained right now. I can’t enjoy anything. It’s like I’m a zombie going through each day. I don’t feel any excitement about the upcoming Christmas holiday and my birthday before that knowing things won’t be the same this year. Just seems doing the right thing and leaving a MM alone should feel good. It feels awful right now. I don’t even have the tears to cry anymore. Btw, I never did ‘sext’ him THANK GOODNESS. He just asked and I changed the subject. My gut instinct was telling me not to go there. Did you say you were involved with a MM? If so, then you’re aware of these horrible horrible feelings of not understanding, wanting closure, did he ever really care, etc. How did you get over this and move on?? I’m tired of feeling like this and want to feel alive again. Thanks again for your help. It is and has been so very much appreciated :).
You and any other woman acting as his mistress enable this ass and others like him to stay in his marriage. Let him go. Get someone capable of giving you what you need. Many single men have the same bs tactics as the male you have been writing about. Choose with care.
Hi Complicated,
It sounds a bit like the fog is starting to clear? Stay with NC. The FB post is just another crumb. He’s just sniffing around seeing if you are still hungry for a crumb. Don’t bite. You deserve more…much, much more with an unmarried/unattached available person, of course.
Dear lord, when I read about your trips to see him and he didn’t have time??? You just hung out by yourself? With a “friend” like this, I sure wouldn’t want any enemies!
Sending you the strength to block, delete, defriend and othewise thump him on the head with a heavy kitchen appliance.
I’m going to have to join BR-ANON. I can’t take this. LOL! GET MAD COMPLICATED!!!
Oh SWEETIE!!! You deserve better. READ READ READ and READ all of Natalie’s stuff. Over and over and over. It is not to win him, it is to heal YOU… you need to heal yourself. And you can’t do that when you are fixated on someone else. DELETE HIM, BLOCK HIM, and CONCENTRATE on YOU.
I am not commenting again. Prayers for and hugs to you. I’ve been there.
Hey Fearless, I’ve been wondering the same about the MM/OW dynamic but I thought it was just me. As a former OW, I was resolute in how unique my situation was until BR. The MM/OW is “the epitome of what Nat’s blog is mainly (or often) dealing with – it encompasses every characteristic of the EUM/FBG dynamic”. In my experience, every single characteristic of the EUM/FBG played out in stereotypic fashion which is why I think I resisted at the beginning. How could my story show up in cyberspace? There was no way to continue being a OW after reading Natalie’s books, this blog, and the comments from folks like you. Thank you. It is odd how the MM and the OW do such a synergistic dance. It was like dancing with the devil or a cockroach.
And Complicated, he’s a cockroach who will continue to bite you via cyberspace as long as you let him. I speak from experience. I have the roach bites to prove it. Fearless, is spot on about ratting him out to his wife. A few months ago, I recieved a message from another MM who contacted me via FB (before I learned how to defriend) about how unhappy is with his wife and needs me to be there for him. I responded that the next message he sent would be forwarded to his wife. 50 feet of cloud dust. I’ve said it before but cheating MM’s are bottom feeders, the lowest of the low. I don’t think I’ll even give another cheating MM the courtesy of telling him that I’ll rat him out. I’ll just forward the message to his wife. A year later, it is clear as a bell: There is no way anything to do with a MM has anything to do with a mutual relationship based on trust, honesty, and care. The OW is in it on her own with a vivid imagination and a propensity for fairy tales.
Hi Runnergirl,
It’s good to hear from you as always! Right now, I feel like that song “I’m alive, but I feel mostly dead.” As I mentioned to Fearless, I feel empty. Void of excitement and any happy feelings. It’s like I’m struggling to get through each day so I can consider it another day of NC. Yes, I made it again today. I have a counter on my phone now telling me how many days NC I am. I know I shouldn’t even be thinking of him, but I am. Why can’t he be hurting and pining for me, have a headfull of wonderful thoughts of me and a heartfull of wonderful feelings for me??!! I actually treated him wonderfully and was there anytime he wanted me to be day or night. So if anyone should be hurting we’re not communicating anymore, it should be him!! He’s the one that’s missing out, but NOOO, he’s enjoying himself with friends at a concert tonight (he told me about this event a month ago). Oh how I just want to scream and feel nothing when I think of him!! Yes, the two times he was unable to visit with me except 10 minutes or 2 hours out of those trips, I spent the remainder of my trip alone. Sad and alone and crying. Would you believe the time he came to my hotel (which he was supposed to pay for, but didn’t…long story) and spent 2 hours with me, as he was leaving he said “don’t just hang out in here by yourself all day ok.” I said “what am I supposed to do walk around town and take in the sights alone?” He didn’t say anything. Even more horrible was when I texted him that night to see if he was going to get to return he said “Wow, you keep texting me, I just sat down to dessert, sorry not going to make it. Enjoy the rest of your trip.” Looking back, how completely disrespectul and insensitive and just plain SCREWED UP can you be to give someone 2 hours of face time, stiffing them with a hotel bill, and leaving them alone for the remainder of the trip??!! I have to admit, I was very tempted to send the hotel bill to his home asking for repayment. But, I didn’t. Oh, I’m too nice for that. Oh yes, it was after this visit he ignored my attempts to communicate for 5 months. Ugh! This is just ONE little example of how he’s treated me over the past 4 years. And I was always there for him with open arms when he came back to me. Excuse me while I vomit…
Conp,
yes, excue me while I vomit too!!
“I actually treated him wonderfully and was there anytime he wanted me to be day or night.”
Sitting alone crying in hotel rooms for four days hoping some MM would give you more than ten minutes of his time is not called “treating him wonderfully” – it’s called “treating yourself like shite”. Being availaible night and day to respond to a text message from some MM is not callled “treating him wonderfully” – it’s called “treating yourself like shite”.
You have a lot to say about how he treated you Comp. But it’s plain that you have been the pursuer here – relentlessly in pursuit of this man and laying yourself at his feet. And you want him to respect and love and want to be with this woman? Why would he. You have been telling him (showing him) every day for four years that you have almost no value at all. He believes you.
He is treating you badly; I agree. He should leave you alone. Yet when he does that you pursued him like a dog with a bone, chasing him and pestering him until he contacts you again. It’s like saying to someone, ‘look at me! Look at me! I am a doormat! Why are you ingoring me? Why? Why? Why? How can you be so cruel? Can’t you see I am placing myself here at your disposal asking you to wipe your feet on me? How dare you refuse me! What is is wrong with me? Why are you not choosing me? Look what a wonderful doormat I am? All I ask is that you wipe your feet on me once a day! That is all. How can you not see how wonderful my doormat qualities are! Do you think you’d easily find another woman who can be such a willing and wonderful doormat? Do you?! No. Of course not! Do you imagine for one minute that your wife would make such a wonderful doormat? No. So why have you chosen her? Why do you not prefer a doormat!
He might be have been treating you badly but you were rejected once when you flew to his state to meet him – and yet you went ahead with a repeat performance. He didn’t do that to you – you did it to youself. Maybe it’s time to stop being angry with how he has treated you and start looking closely at how you have treated you. You might find that you are much less of a victim than you think. I know that’s what I discovered. I can think my ex is an arse – cos he is; but I can see that I treated myself way worse than he ever did.
I am dying here! Even though I’m horribly depressed over what I’m going through, Fearless, you are amusing me like nobody’s business. I admit I have been a total doormat in my MM scenario. I’d chalked it up to how I’d changed so much, because in my last two relationships I had been the cheater/EUW and I was now “making good” by treating a man like a prince. So pitiful, and payback is a bitch (forgive my language.)
I wouldn’t call it being nice, I would say its announcing your willingness to be his doormat. We tend to martyr ourselves in this way. I have always been ‘too nice’ and have too often been repaid with muddy foot prints on my back. I’ve learned that what I thought was being nice in the face of disrespect, was really acting desperate to earn someone’s affection or approval under the guise of being nice, or just plain having no backbone. Be nice to you, Complicated. Block. Block. Block. Flush the turd.
Wow Complicated, your description of visiting the MM only to be dumped (because he was having dessert) sounds precisely like what Natalie is describing in this post. It may be that as OW’s we feel these intense, all emcompassing, consuming feelings but they don’t. As Natalie says: “And maybe that’s what’s so incredibly difficult to get your head around in these situations; how can you be feeling these feelings ‘alone’?” You have been alone, even when you went to see the AC. Even if he hot footed it back to you, it would consist of daily texts weekdays from 8 to 5? That’s it? Not that anything else with a MM is expected but geez. He was having dessert and it wasn’t you or with you. He was having dessert with his wife as a married man should. I’d turn in your OW and returning childhood sweetheart cards. Listen to Fearless and the others. Don’t be a doormat and hope for an upgrade. I’m still dusting my backside off from doormat status. You really will see a difference if you can turn the focus to you. Think of something you can do for yourself tomorrow. One tiny little thing. It’s been amazing when I do just one tiny little thing for me.
Complicated
Block him.
One day, if you still remember it, you will laugh at that time you got upset over a FB update about a freakin sports team.
It’s not even a crumb Complicated, it’s a tenth of a crumb.
Take charge of your life, you don’t have to be jerked around like a puppet by every FB update, every measly text, every disappearing act, every reappearance, every false promise, every ambiguous statement.
You don’t “keep in touch” with him. You don’t “talk” to him. You’re not friends. It’s FB updates and texts. If you’ve been following the comments here, you may have noticed that there’s been a sudden epidemic in overuse of texting. It’s not that special. Okay, I did accidentally see a special text on my sister-in-law’s phone as I was looking at photos of the dog:
“Wifey, it was so nice lying in bed with you this morning, cuddling and chatting”
I was embarrassed, cos that’s my brother saying that. But I was happy for him. And proud of him for being a good husband.
These are not the texts we are getting!
“Wifey, it was so nice lying in bed with you this morning, cuddling and chatting”
Yes, Grace, ain’t that a whole different message! That’s what it looks like when there are two people in it, mutually! Good reminder of what it’s suppose to look like. In contrast, two days ago I got: “Right. I am an arsehole. I don’t know why anyone would want to know me”
How sad and solo is that – for him! So glad I no longer feel compelled to deal with those kinda gloom and doom messages. How depressing. For him!
Well, I had a “suck it and see” moment. I did break NC and reply to that text saying “I’m sorry. Is that my team in first place?” that was sent to me last night.
I replied: “Was that a personal apology or are you saying sorry because your team’s ranked higher?”
His reply: “Seen as I don’t think I have to apologize for anything cause I haven’t done anything wrong, I was talking about the rankings.”
**I did not reply again**
I wonder if his wife would agree with that statement of him not doing anything wrong? The wolf is completely out of sheep’s clothing and yes, I finally, finally, finally, see him for what he is. A complete total waste of human life on this earth who is incapable of even acknowledging what he’s done or how he knows I feel. No mention of the email I sent 2 weeks ago pouring out my feelings and how he’s contributed to this.
I’m off to the cell provider to block his number. I’m giving him the big EFF YOU by never again responding!! I just hope the feeling I typically get of “Oh, I hope he doesn’t think I’m mean by not responding” stays away. Somehow I always end up turning things around on myself to look like the bad guy. I don’t want to do that anymore. I once saw a glimmer of potential in him, of the man I wanted him to be, a man I thought he could be with me. But, I’m not betting on potential again. He saw me as a sports buddy with fringe benefits. I will no longer be the one who enables him to do this to his wife. Here’s me turning in my OW cards.
Complicated
Yay, no more texts!
Go team!
*applause*
There is nothing else to do with OW cards, Comp, but turn them in cos they are useless. You are at least starting to see the crap more for what it is.
He is misbehaving and his wife would be rightfully furious with him – and with you! But he would tell his wife that there was nothing in it, that all he did was send you sports update text messages.
I had a ‘boyfriend’ once many years ago who I realised was also seeing someone else… he told me “but she’s just like one of the boys” – funny that comes to mind right now thinking about what this jackass would have to say to his wife – just one of the boys. On the topic of the post – your MM would present this to his wife as nothing remotely like a mutual relationship; that you may have been in love with him – that wasn’t his fault – and that you were in it all by yourself – that he had barely clapped eyes on you. And he wouldn’t be all that far wrong. He has covered his own ass!
Hi Fearless,
Yep, he treated me like one of the boys alright except for the fact in addition to the sports bantering he planned for us to meet in hotels, sightsee while holding hands, and asking me to sext and text him ‘pictures’ (sooo glad I didn’t do the sexting and sending pictures…he probably wouldn’t have just looked at them to get him excited before heading into the room with his wife). Oh, that hurt to think about. Also, when I think about how cruel he treated me, I now have a list of things he did to look at when I feel weak…it angers me (to say the least). He threw out the bait and I took it hook, line and sinker like a desperate fish in water. The feelings I developed for him may not have been mutual but he was definitely making the effort to reel me in (when he wanted to 4 years ago). He was able to disconnect whenever he felt like it. It wasn’t just one-sided, he made the effort to win me over…he just didn’t want to make the effort to keep me, nor should he have since he was married. I don’t want to guess what he was thinking, because I’ll never really know. All I can go by are his actions and they said loud and clear, “I don’t want to make the effort for you, I just want you to be there when I want an ego stroke or a little distraction.” Just don’t understand why he did on a daily basis for a year. Oh well, it doesn’t matter anyways now because I’m not his option anymore. Even though I still hurt and probably will for sometime, I’m getting through this. Wish I’d never agreed to be his friend in the first place knowing it would end like this. Hindsight really is 20/20.
Comp,
“asking me to (sext) and text him ‘pictures”
Okay. Am going to say it – What. A. Scumbag.
Any guy – maybe other than your husband (but even that would give me the grue) who asks you to send him “pictures” makes me want to be sick. I feel very angry about that on your behalf Comp – what a slimy ming-mong this man is. He can’t show up for more than ten effin minutes after you’ve tralleved across the country to see him and he thinks he can ask for “pictures” – Eeeewwww! Thank God you did not provide!
I had a horrid dream once: it was morning time; I was getting married that day to the ex arse, my mother was getting things all ready – I felt anxious and stressed cos I didn’t know how to tell her not to bother as I knew he wouldn’t show up! (that was the short version). Yep, that was my subconscious telling me I was in this ALL by myself – and I knew it! (he was actually never late and always showed up when he said he would; the dream was not about that – but about me knowing he was not ‘in this’ with me. He was a ‘no show’)
When I was in the worst of NC I had ghastly full-on images in my sleep of great shards of broken glass scraping, scratching, screeching through my brain. I would wake up trying to shake the glass out of my head.
During the ‘relationship’ I had lots of dreams about the ex arse being an arse to me; usually based on a theme of ‘rejection’. All very Horrid. I never had pleasant dreams about him come to think of it. All very indicative of being ‘in it on your own’. Our dreams tell us a lot about what we are anxious about and trying to suppress- they are warnings.
I hear what you’re saying Comp. I know he did not entirely discourage you and tried to keep you invested for his own FWB agenda. Bottom line is he is a no-gooder. He is responsible for his behaviour, yes, but equally you are responsible for yours. He has treated you badly but so have you. That’s all I saying.
You will get past this. You will! Time and distance. And a daily does of reality. Honest conversations with yourself – get yourself on a bullshit diet! Stick with it! Life is better than this!
Thanks Fearless,
Yep, the ex EUMM asking for ‘pictures’ was a BIG red flag and I at least was smart enough to notice it. Can’t help but wonder why he would ask that now after all these years. He’s never asked for pictures before. But, one of my friends had a good point saying that is his way of getting what he wants from me without having to spend time with me. I’m not sure what I’ll do when comments are closed off for this topic!! It is so beneficial to me right now in the midst of NC to hear back from all of you. I guess I’ll just have to continue writing about my journey on another article Natalie posts :). I didn’t sleep well at all last night. My sports team played and I knew if they won, which they did, they’d be ranked higher than the ex EUMM’s team. That’s one of the things we always bantered about alot. It’s probably habit (mixed in with a little hope) that I look at my phone to see if the text notification light is on. No light was on. But, I caught myself asking why I would want to hear from him anyways. Is this a normal part of NC? To still want to hear from them even though we’re the one’s who’ve decided to cut contact? What do you do in the middle of the night when you findd yourself having these thoughts and wanting to hear from a scumbag (if you did want to hear from them)? I’ve recognized early morning and late night to be my triggered times to think of him. In the morning, I get on here and read and write, but nighttime has become the worst. I wish there was a live forum we could all chat on (Hint, Hint, BR admins) :)!!
Wow. So many parallels. Just before I learned my MM was lying and playing both his wife and myself, I had a horribly disturbing dream about large equipment crashing through my windshield and disfiguring me. I woke and wrote down my memories of the dream, and upon rereading them the next day, I was shocked to see that I’d wrtitten something about how, in my dream, I knew my MM was a “snake” and that “I DID NOT TRUST HIM.” I even dreamed that my cell phone was broken in the accident, and that I was so upset because “it was my lifeline.” Pathetic!
And yes… I sent the nudie photos he wanted and his wife and her friends found them on his computer a couple of weeks ago. I’m mortified. 🙁
Now that the EU/MM has been blocked, I just downloaded Natalie’s Mr. Unavailable and the Fallback Girl 2nd Edition. I already have the first edition. Hopefully, all the tools she provides me along with reading, reading, and more reading here on BR, and blogging til I run out of things to say haha, will get me through this difficult time. Thanks everyone for your comments and inspiration. Without all of you, I’d probably be trying to book another flight to see him and try to “win him back”..even though he wasn’t mine to begin with. I plan to save that money and buy a few manicures and spa treatments for myself :). The hardest part will be learning how to manage the anxiety and panic attacks that happen during the day/weeks when I realize I haven’t heard anything from him.
I do know what you are going through, Comp. I, too, had an affair for eight months with a married man who never had any intention of leaving his wife. Although the affair was of shorter duration that what you describe, I got over it by deleting contact and just reminding myself constantly how f***ing awful it felt to be with him, how sick to my stomach I felt after sleeping with him, knowing it would be weeks before we would see each other again, that he would ignore any of my attempts to contact him and dictate our meetings solely on his terms. I used the unsent letter and read postings from BR. I carried a “cheat sheet” (Ha) detailing the most abusive, mean texts, comments, lousy ways he treated me, etc. and read it when I was feeling low. I worked out, partied with my girlfriend, got pedicures and just generally treated myself with love and care. I’m a singer so I went to karaoke nights as much as I could. Pushing yourself to get out and do things you love and are good at helps. It was difficult but I learned that I never want to feel marginalized and disrespected in that way again and have no desire to be with a married man again. Gradually, you will feel your self-esteem rising. Love & give to yourself. I’m not someone’s option and neither are you! Natalie’s great quote became my mantra: “He is not that special and you are not that desperate.” Good Luck! I know you can do it!
@Complicated.
congratulations on blocking his number! Suggest you de-friend him on facebook too. What was your life like before you met him? Were you not happier and lighter and do you not miss that side of you? If you find yourself crying over your loss of him, maybe it’s more of crying over the loss of yourself/dreams (nothing to do with him the person)? I see so much of myself reflected in you, what you narrated about crying alone in his city, the 2-hour face times is precisely my experience too. At some point we have to wake up and not further humiliate ourselves. There’s a psychosis in some of us that maddeningly needs a reply, response or attention, from first-class assclowns– that issue of why we need this, is far more worthwhile, real and interesting to explore than trying to squeeze our brains dry as to why our feelings aren’t reciprocated, by an assclown! That kind of love isn’t love, its suicidal obsession. Don’t grovel in the mud for love. Don’t let anyone degrade you (everyone is right here– think of how you’ve been abusing yourself!) Don’t turn yourself into a beggar child desperate for love, crumbs, or fluffy sweet-nothings. No one is worth that.
Hi JadeSesame,
It’s always good to hear from you :). It’s funny you ask what life was like before him because I’ve been asking myself that question alot lately. I was definitely lighter, but not so much happier (well, comparing that to how I feel right now wouldn’t be fair, because I don’t feel so good right now). I have good friends but I was lonely. I do remember not having the anxiety of why I haven’t heard from him that day or being on the emotional rollercoaster of ups and downs when I did hear from him (and he just bantered without anything of substance). But, I also remember the feeling I had before as if something was missing. Before we reunited, I had dreams of him for years. We were never together in these dreams. In one I can recall, I was in a RV driving uphill trying to get to him and the roads being so icy I kept slipping downhill. In another dream, I went to the church where he was being married but the crowds were so thick I couldn’t get to him. There were lots of dreams of me trying to get to him over the years before we reunited 4 years ago. I have said lots of things on this website about how badly he treated me, but we did have good times and he did make me laugh…not as much as he made me cry though and I’m holding onto that feeling as much as possible to keep me strong. I enjoyed the daily laughters, bantering and just talking about what was going on in our lives and that’s the part I miss most. That’s the daily void I’m feeling right now. I still wake up and look at my phone to see if somehow a message got through and the notification light is going off. Sad, but I’m just being honest. I agree with you, I believe I find myself crying at the loss of what I wanted/dreamt/hoped to have, etc…albeit with someone who wasn’t available. My bad. My feelings weren’t reciprocated and bottom line, I deserve someone who is capable of having feelings for me..and being able to express and acknowledge those feelings.
Blueberry Girl,
I love the idea of a cheat sheet!! I made one for myself last night. The sad part is I know he’s not a bad guy, I’ve known him for 16 years, he just didn’t treat me the way I wanted to be treated. Because he was married. And he knew it could never go anywhere, and I really wanted it to. Maybe everything he did and how he treated me was to keep me at “arms length” as someone said so he wouldn’t allow himself to feel anything for me.
He’s not a bad guy? Why do you believe that, Complicated? Ok maybe things aren’t so clear and black and white and people aren’t so neatly divided into good/bad categories, but there’s overwhelming evidence to suggest that he’s a selfish, unfeeling cad. How badly must he behave before he qualifies as being a bad guy in your eyes?
This believe/imaginary construct, of “he does XXX deliberately, so he won’t allow himself to feel anything for me”, or “he does XXX but he’s actually feeling YYY” is just dangerous territory for one to be inhabiting, Complicated. What would it take for you to recognize what he is? I’ve often thought that I want rejection and NO practically spat on my face, which would make it unequivocally necessary to move on but no these guys, they don’t do that, they hang around and milk you for all you’re worth. So the onus is on you to retreat and save yourself! Why should they back off? There’s no reason to when they’re reaping all the benefits.
Hi JadeSesame,
Me again :). My mouth fell open when I read your sentence “I’ve often thought that I want rejection and NO practically spat on my face, which would make it unequivocally necessary to move on..”. That’s exactly what I have wanted all these years. I’ve even told him that several times over the years!!! I said “If you don’t want to communicate with me or hear from me again, just let me know and I’ll respect that.” But, of course, he never said anything like that….it’s easier to string someone along when you don’t tell them to go away point blank. You’re right again, why would he want to go away when he’s the one reaping all the benefits. I recognize and know what he truly is in my head…it’s the other non-logical part I’m working on. The part that remembers how he looked at me and how I felt when we were together, holding hands, when he said “You know how much i care, I’m just not good at expressing my thoughts and feelings to someone else,” etc. I believed it all. Insert shake head here. Gotta keep those memories out. It really is dangerous territory for me. I know he is not a good guy, I just really wanted him to be.
This is so painful to read because it’s so true, and I can identify with it all. I begged my MM to just “spell it out for me as if I were a retarded child” (sorry, I know how offensive that sounds) if he wanted to be done with me, because he kept stringing me along with promises.
I’m also kicking myself right now, because he used to always say things about how he showed me how much he loved me by making love to me; that by his physical ministrations he could express what he felt for me best. Duh. That’s because he couldn’t show me with trust, care, love, friendship and support like a normal man.
“Maybe everything he did and how he treated me was to keep me at “arms length” as someone said so he wouldn’t allow himself to feel anything for me.”
Oh dear.
Nat has a saying that I’m trying to recall – it helped me a lot, it goes something like: when someone can’t resist you they don’t resist you.
It doesn’t matter why he is resisting you – he IS resisting you. That’s the top line info. that’s what you need to process. You are making excuses for him now but you are making more excuses for yourself. If only I could make him see how much he loves and desires me and make him stop resisting what he really wants and feels?? If only I had a magic wand. Or some fairy dust?
Totally. I have taped this quote up in my kitchen more times than I care to admit when my MM broke up with me: “A man who loves a woman will move mountains to be with her.”
Another favorite is, “Here’s what guys do when they can’t live without you: they don’t break up with you.”
“They always choose their family,” and “Unless he’s all yours, he’s still hers,” are gems as well.
Uggghhh… this hurts.
Complicated
16 years is a long time to wait for someone to come up with the goods. I have an ex eum who has been waiting for me for over 20 years. He is probably still waiting. I got an email from him a year or so ago which I ignored.
In the end I had to do the decent thing and cut him off. I hope he can give up the fantasy of me. He was annoying me as well with his expectations and declarations of love.
I’m not a bad person either but I couldn’t give him what he wanted.
Mind you, I didn’t have sex with him and leave him crying in hotel rooms anywhere.
There are lots of men out there who aren’t bad guys who are also not married and who are also capable of a loving relationship. Why not go for the jackpot now.
PS as you know I have been following your comments and you’ve not said a single thing about this guy which makes his sound like he’s not a bad guy. In fact, the more you say about him the less I like him.
Hi Grace,
Thanks for sharing your experience with the ex eum with me. The more I think about what my ex EU has done, the less I like him too. I made a list of all the cruel and unusual things he’s done to me to read when I’m feeling weak. Don’t get me wrong, I haven’t listed out all the things I liked about him on this site. Yes, there were plenty of good things, but the bad far outweighed the good, which is why I’m here on this site. Also, I’m trying not to think of the good times and how he made me laugh, how I felt when we were together and had our quiet times because it makes me start to think maybe things weren’t so bad (yes, my head knows they were bad..it’s my heart that’s taking time to catch up) and I don’t want to go there. As Jade Sesame and I discussed, I wanted him to answer my question of “Do you want to stop communicating with me? If so, I will respect that and stay away.” He never answered me all the times I asked that over the years. I wanted him to at least say “No, I don’t feel the same about you” or “I can’t communicate with you anymore” but he never did that. I gave him sooo many opportunities to do this, but clearly he didn’t want to lose the distractions and ego stroke I gave. I don’t know what he’s thinking, I can only speculate and go by his actions. I’m just ready to not think about him anymore and I don’t want to feel anything for him anymore either. Seems it should be easy to let go of and not care about someone who treats us like crap…right??
@Complicated, no many how idiosyncratic and special his witticisms were, how much he made you laugh and all, what’s important to realize is that he was not good for you. Of course he wanted to keep communication channels open, but not the sort of communication you envision– to get a cheap thrill out of knowing you were still obsessed about him, to get a part time response to SMS sports bantering. You both were playing in two different fields, with no common game or goal. You can’t force him to play your game because he’s married.
“The part that remembers how he looked at me and how I felt when we were together, holding hands, when he said “You know how much i care, I’m just not good at expressing my thoughts and feelings to someone else,””.
Yes this can be the hardest to come to terms with. Maybe, maybe he *did* feel something in the moment, but the fleeting moment might be the answer to this man, all governed by cheap, vulgar romantic impulses. You see, I think most of us want this to be build upon/translated into something sustaining, meaningful, lasting, but that takes real effort and time, it’s a hell lot easier to spew out sweet nothings, easier to play love-struck, do these pseudo meaningful gazes, posturings. Ultimately, it’s a persona that you were dealing with, not a person. Your ex sounds abhorrent and no you don’t have to convince us by extolling his good qualities. The fact is that he has treated you shabbily. That is irredeemable.
I’ll say one last thing about “being nice” and having “good qualities”. I think they can be inflated and magnified, when the overwhelming reality is one of dysfunctionalism and rottenness. So when we get glimpses and sporadic glimmers of what appears to be goodness, we cling onto it for dear life and replay these instances over and over to ourselves. Sorry if I sound harsh, Complicated. I’m just trying to see if you can be a bit more objective in your assessment of this man whom you idealize and adore. You seem to be almost numb to his abuse of you. Why are you in love with someone who has abused you? Getting on a plane to pursue him at this moment?! I’m glad you found BR and that it’s provided a kind of intervention somehow. Take a vacation for yourself!!!!
@ Complicated
BLOCK HIM on FB if you haven’t already.
Facebook is really the tool of the devil and as long as you are friends with him and keeping tabs…you. won’t. move. on.
I know this from personal experience. I used to look at my exes page a lot. Sometimes mutual friends and EVERY TIME I looked I saw something I really didn’t like and it set me back a few days in recovery. Even seeing him commenting on a mutual friends status was enough to drive me to tears. So I blocked him and deleted mutual friends of ours I wasn’t close to.
NC equals NC. Facebook equals contact. Cut him off on FB and I promise you won’t regret it. Facebook is keeping you invested. I had to say I felt for you when you said you hit a ‘like’ on his friends page by accident. This used to be my worst nightmare. I wouldn’t even want him to have the satisfaction of knowing I was thinking of him.
Block. 🙂
@ Complicated
Jade Sesame is right to ask,”How badly must he behave before he qualifies as being a bad guy in your eyes?”
He took advantage of your attention and affection. He ignored your needs and feelings. He treated you with disrespect and disinterest. Get real about his contribution to your pain. He is a complicit guest at an all-you-can-eat buffet.
Delete. Block. Erase. Stop punishing yourself with “good” memories; save them for later when you’re stronger. By your own admission, they weren’t as frequent as the ones that made you cry. Tears trump “talking about about what was going on in our lives.”
Blueberry girl. you are so right – all the crap and the misery is no compensation for a load of texts messages about ‘what was going on in our lives’. The irony of that is what strikes me most because there married men are most definitely NOT telling the OW what is going on in his life. If the MM were to talk (or text) openly and frankly to the OW about that is going on in his life she’d die with her legs up!
Comp – he was not sharing anything of any consequence with you about what was going on in his life. Believe me. We really are on our tod in these ‘relationships’, sharing all what’s going on in our lives with someone whose over-riding objective is to make sure we discover as little as possible about what’s going on in his. We are sharing all by ourselves!
Fearless,
“Sharing all what’s going on in our lives with someone whose over-riding objective is to make sure we discover as little as possible about what’s going on in his.”
Funny you typed that one particular sentence. In my ‘unacknowledged email’ I sent a few weeks ago, I stated “I can count on my hand the amount times you asked how I was doing and about my weekend.” Every week I had to ask what he was doing over the weekend…it wasn’t offered up…nor did he hardly ever ask about mine. You’re spot on – he wanted to make sure I knew as little as possible about what was going on in his life and acted if he didn’t have any personal interest in me half the time. I remember him telling me one weekend he was going camping. The following Monday, I asked what he did camping alone (yes, I knew he wasn’t alone) and he responded with “I wasn’t alone, we went camping with some friends.” He has never used her name or said she was going with him. He always said “I’m going to do X or I’m going home”. His family lives a few hours away and I’m sure she didn’t stay behind every time he went. Just interesting because it was always portrayed as if he was a single bachelor even though I knew he wasn’t. I hate this whole situation. Can’t believe I allowed myself to end up here. I guess I wanted it to work out because that way, taking a chance on a MM wouldn’t have been wrong because it ended up working out with the two of us together as we were meant to be years ago. I wanted to be validated that my feelings and actions over the past 4 years weren’t just a waste. I guess they were and I’ll have to come to terms with that. Hopefully time and distance will put things into perspective and heal my stupid heartache.
Complicated, the only guys who have ever asked me to sext or send dirty pics with them have been attached.
It’s not the ‘good things’ that determine whether you can have a relationship or can be used as reasons to stay – if there’s the existence of ‘bad things’ or code amber or red issues, they trump everything, even the ‘good’ or your chemistry.
Ultimately, while I know you feel differently, your ex is a dickhead. His behaviour is abominable and manipulative. If you’re going to love someone, love someone with integrity that wouldn’t piss you around.
And I’m going to say something I’ve been meaning to say to you for a while – you don’t own him and I don’t see a ring on your finger. It doesn’t matter if you dated him ‘first’ – that doesn’t give you a claim. If you let go of what is quite frankly a flimsy history between you both where he also gave you a crap run the first time around, you will take this man off his pedestal and see him for what he is – completely unspecial and a fraud.
Hi Blueberry girl, Fearless, and Jade Sesame,
To be honest, I don’t think there is much more he could do to treat me worse. Everything I would never want a future daughter to go through, I’ve been through. I became the all-you-can-eat buffet and did everything you can imagine to win him over. I pursued, pulled away, gave him calling cards as presents so he could call me anonymously, flew ‘basically’ to his front door to see him (only my money was spent), catered to his every whim, forgave him when he treated me like crap every time. Damn it!! I deserved to be treated with some decency and human kindness. I want to be furious with him!!! Why aren’t I??!! It even crossed my mind last night to put all the email messages (there’s over 2000 of them…yep, 2000+….NOT including text messages!!!) into a zip file and email them to his wife. Oh, I kept them all! But that would only hurt her and make me look like the bad guy. If I could have one wish with the “magic wand and fairy dust” Fearless is going to give me haha…it would be to receive an apology from him. Yes, I put myself out there and was vulnerable for him to hurt me, but that doesn’t make it right that he in fact did take advantage of my feelings and attention. But, no that won’t happen because just two days ago he said “I don’t think I have to apologize for anything since I haven’t done anything wrong.” Wow. When will I get out of this grieving stage and into the hating stage?? That will come soon…right??
Ps. thank you all for sticking with me through this. I could never express my gratitude enough.
Complicated, It seems to me you are in the hate stage already. You are blaming him and ready to make him pay for something you willingly enacted with him. The best that you can do IMO is to go through your grief and NEVER fool around with a MM or an attached man again…use this as the learning situation that it has been. If you choose the vengeance please be prepared for the ugly results. Not long ago there was a reader/poster named Ms. Option who was also struggling with a MM situation. She and Ms. Runnergirl went through their struggles and only one of them seemed to really want to move on…what are you going to choose?
Complicated,
I do not claim to have kept up with the nuances of your relationship with this weak man and the painful separation anxiety you clearly feel but I balked when I read your comment about sending e mails to his wife…hold on there!!!
Hasn’t she been put through enough already? To thrive or even fantasize about thriving on how this would upset the applecart is concerning at least and sure to end horribly.
I recall your earlier comments about this same guy from a blog about fantasy relationships/being in a relationship that doesn’t exist(March/April 2010) last year when you also described yourself as ‘married with children?’ If you are still married, what are you investing in that relationship?
Do you pursue this fantasy relationship because of the nature of your marriage…what gives? It seems like you are ‘diverting’ energy,focus,positive force for good(not to mention hard cash!) to this worthless cause rather than concentrating on the reality of your commitment to your family and husband.
Boy, I sound harsh there and pain is pain, I get it.. but the only person who doesn’t seem to give an eff is the guy who wants the sex pics??
NML,
I love the advice you are after giving Complicated here (and very sound advice for Complicated too).
“It’s not the ‘good things’ that determine whether you can have a relationship or can be used as reasons to stay – if there’s the existence of ‘bad things’ or code amber or red issues, they trump everything, even the ‘good’ or your chemistry.
“If you’re going to love someone, love someone with integrity that wouldn’t piss you around.”
I’m going to copy and paste this and stick it as the background of my desktop lol!
Complicated, you asked: “Is this a normal part of NC? To still want to hear from them even though we’re the one’s who’ve decided to cut contact?”
A resounding YES, from my personal experience. I wanted validation and confirmation that I mattered. I think the first few weeks, first month is the hardest. Habits are hard to break, especially relationships based on dependency. You seem to be in a major (self-generated?) psychological entanglement, Complicated and while it’s important to fully acknowledge one’s feelings and not suppress them, I think there’s a risk of not thinking through issues with clarity and productively. So instead of channeling energies towards moving on, we become stagnant, replay out pain over and over again, asking the less significant questions (why doesn’t he want me vs. what the hell am I doing with a low-life loser like him?/Why am I in love with someone who shows ZERO interest in my life?)
I know it’s easy to glorify and romanticize first-loves, Complicated. You keep narrating how you met him before his wife and how special that was. In my case, my ex-EUM was the first man I really felt in love, was fully aroused by and wanted to sleep with/make love to, after being very indifferent to men having been in same sex relationships for 8 years. So I was quite adamant about his special status, that there was some magic in him, the only/first man who lit my loins on fire, something irreplaceable, special, extraordinary, timeless, infinite! I *didn’t* want to entertain the possibility of another man. It’s these stories we tell ourselves that keep us entrapped, prison-bound to these damaging self-destructive romances you know? Ultimately, we have to choose whether or not we want to spend our lives in some fantasy one-way relationship (being a part time SMS lover is the lowest of the low), or descend to reality.
You won’t get the apology you’re looking for. To make moving on contingent upon HIS apology, is still a form of dependency, fixation. He’s shown you time and time again he’s not interested in your business, whatever pain you have, is purely yours to deal with. He won’t “dirty” his hands. We find it in ourselves to move on, for autonomous reasons, we don’t ask him for assistance to help us to move on. That’s a death knell. In fact, I’d wager to say that I’m not sure if an apology might help you to move on!
Your inability to get angry, is something worth exploring for yourself, Complicated. Just as your ex-AC is severely deficient in his abilities to empathize, you seem to have your anger truncated, suppressed, misdirected, arriving belatedly etc. All those past incidents of being stood up, crying in a hotel room– were you not angry at all? Is this the first time you’re being aware of anger in yourself? Do you ever get angry with friends? Do you try to appease everyone and in general, internalize things as being your fault, when something goes wrong?
The greatest tragedy in all this, is not lost love. Feels like it when a man rejects us but it isn’t the end of the world! It’s the loss, degradation and dehumanization of our whole, beautiful selves to pathetic doormats, in such an encounter. *That* is what we should be shedding tears for.
We all say that we want love, respect and decency. The question that one can ask is, do we think we *really* deserve it? If not, why do we continue to throw ourselves at people who abuse (it’s important you recognize and face up to what he’s done to you!) us time and time again?
fearless, grace, jennynic, LoJ, complicated, blueberrygirl, runner…
thanks from me for the amazing comments in this thread. really, thanks.
this post is great, and the comments are just what i need. these situations can be so different, but they share the same dna and elicit the same longing and grief.
there’s something very compelling about the extreme asymmetry of complicated’s story that gets everyone rooting for her and bringing out the heaviest ammo, and it is inspiring and really helpful to me right now.
Hi ixnay,
I’m glad you are being inspired by the comments here on this site. It has been a godsend to me. If it weren’t for the people here, I don’t know where I’d be. It’s especially helpful to know most if not everyone on here has been through what I’m going through to some degree so it makes their comments and advice even more valid to my situation.
Comp,
re your post firther up the page: yes, it is normal to want to hear from him even when you realise that you have to end it. It’s about the validation seeking and also the sheer habit of it all and also the loss of hope and also the terrible need not to be ‘wrong’ about him and your investment in him- we spent a lot of time investing and we made big investments in these men; it’s hard to admit your investment was bad! It’s hard to admit that you were very very wrong and hard to cash in your chips cos you expected a return on your money! You have to realise, as I did through some tough messages on here from Nat and others, that you ARE wrong; that you have made a bad investment and you will NEVER see a return on it, so leaving the casino with what chips you have left is what you must do but it takes time to un-invest; it won’t happen over-night; it didn’t take you a week or two to get your head into this mess and it’s not going to take a week or two to clean it out. Be patient. Stop fighting it. Give up! Lie back (think of England!) and ride the waves.
I think the validation seeking is the thing that has to be conquered. This is what keeps us in these things all by ourselves; it’s not that we are really daft enough to really think we are having a mutual, both people in it relationship – we just hope it will be like that ONE day – we are betting on what we think the future could potentially hold; we are betting on what we perciev and imagine his potential to be, but his potential actually does not exist. This MM guy actually has NO potential for you and never has had (neither did mine for me!).
This post is getting a bit long… I wanted to say something re Nat’s post here about validation seeking but I’ll do that in another comment now as I do tend to prattle on! (and on… and on…!)
Ixnay:
“there’s something very compelling about the extreme asymmetry of complicated’s story…”
Yes, I think so too.
Smee again! I m thinking that I stopped being in love all by myself (with ex self confessed arsey man) when I kicked the validation seeking. I keep re-iterating to Comp that she has to put his behaviour aside for a moment (not that I don’t think MM is a toerag) and think about her own behaviour. I’m not trying in any way to minimise his shifty and manipulative treatment, but I think when we can really examine how badly we treated ourselves then we can begin to see that having thought so little of ourselves is the driver that gets us into and keeps us in these non-mutual/in love by yourself mind-sets.
It’s very hard to continue to be in love all by yourself when you can validate yourself, treat yourself with care, love and respect. We are in these situations because WE do not love, care and respect OURSELVES. So Comp can think as long and hard as she likes about how badly he has treated her – how he did not give her love, care or respect – but until she really gets that while his lack of these things is not good, the real cause of her current problem is not that he didn’t treat her with these things but that SHE didn’t treat her with these things.
And until she starts to get this she will be seeking validation from him till the cows come home; him or some other git-faced, using tosser coming along after him.
Comp, until I saw how badly I had treated me, I just didn’t get it. When I saw that I then saw that I was more a victim of my own shoddy treatment of ME than I was of his shoddy treatment of me. I don’t feel like a victim at all now (not that I don’t feel angry and right to be with the ex for his nonsense – but that is a separate thing); I feel more like: I did this to me/how could I have been so horrid TO ME’/ I need to love and care for and respect myself/I deserve that -from ME! I am owed that -from ME!. I will get that now – from ME!
So with that I derobed myself of my victim status. I stopped hoping he’d phone/text/email/I stopped needing his validation/I stopped feeling like crap cos he was not getting in touch… and I stopped being in love all by myself in a non-mutual, nothing more that FWB “relationship”.
The only person you should be in love with all by yourself is YOU. Comp, the answer lies with you (in here), not with him (not out there).
Hey ladies,
I’ve been refraining from commenting again on this thread for fear of being redundant but I couldn’t resist based on Fearless’ last execellent comment. I still remember being in the phase where I was blaming him for treating me like shite (in fact I still do at times) and hanging on his stupid words, while ignoring his arse-hole actions. I also remember when I woke up one morning with eyes swollen shut, hair on fire, and read an article in the paper about what a wonderful speech he gave at a black tie event the night before. He was out giving motivating speeches looking daunting, tall, dark handsome, although had gained some weight, with his wife by his side, while I was sitting at home crying and setting my hair afire and losing weight. What the what? It was that moment Natalie and all of your words sank in. What is/was my responsibility to me? I couldn’t only blame him for treating me like shite. I treated me like shite too. For me, it’s been a long road of realizing I could never, ever, ever be in a mutually, loving, caring relationship with a married man cos he’s married. A long road of realizing that the only one watching out for me has to be me. A long road of realizing that I really do deserve better than crumbs. For 2 years, I ragged on him about always getting the dregs, my word for crumbs. And then, a long road recognizing my accountability in accepting the dregs. I don’t know where I’d be without you all. Thank you.
Complicated, it really is about being accountable to you. As Fearless says, it is not to minimize his manipulation. Ixnay’s comment summed it up nicely for me: “there’s something very compelling about the extreme asymmetry of complicated’s story that gets everyone rooting for her and bringing out the heaviest ammo, and it is inspiring and really helpful to me right now.” It’s the similarity in extreme asymmetry of all of our FBG stories that helped me and helped me finally got me to root for me. Root for you Complicated. You can be your best fan. Go Team Former FBG’s.
I am with you runner!
“A long road of realizing that the only one watching out for me has to be me.”
When we are in these situations we put our hearts, our future and our own well-being into “his” hands. We hand over all our power, all personal responsibility, all personal accountability for ourselves and our own emotional well-being. What makes us think he is even capable of taking care of our emotional well-being or being responsible and accountable to take care of it or even that he wants to take care of it? In fact he shows us quite plainly that he doesn’t want the job, even if we were right to hand it over to him, which we are not. Our relationship behaviour with these kinds of EUM/MM/FBG situations amounts to self-neglect at best, self harming at worst.
What I have learned, like you runner, is that I was beyond foolish to hand that kind of power (and responsibility) over to another human being, whoever they are.
And if we were able to be honest with ourselves we would see that he is (for whatever reason) NOT in fact assuming ANY responsibility or accountability for our personal well-being. He hasn’t applied for that job! We foist it upon him. We ignore the information and communication (the red and amber flags) coming at us from “him” at out own peril. We turn a blind eye to the obvious fact that he is not in a position to and/or even capable of looking out for our emotional well-being – yet we let him do it any way – and he does a very bad job of it – like, what else would he do! It’s like asking (begging?) Jack the Ripper to see you safely home on a dark night because other than the cloak and dagger he seemed like such a nice man. It’s like leaving your house keys with a blatantly dodgy neighbour (who has given you no reason to think you can trust them) then being shocked and horrified and not a little amused when you get home to find you’ve been robbed rotten. It doesn’t make your neighbour right – but you should be more careful with what you do with your keys.
@ Fearless
“It’s like asking (begging?) Jack the Ripper to see you safely home on a dark night because other than the cloak and dagger he seemed like such a nice man.”
And then we wonder why we’re on the floor bleeding, right?
Complicated, I knew I’d grown when I looked back on one of my posts here and saw all the sentences beginning with “I” instead of a stream of “He did this” and “He said that” laments. To reiterate runnergirl, it really is about turning your focus away from him and onto yourself. Invest in you; you’re a sure bet. Gambling on him has been a long, losing prospect.
Lynda from L,
The comment regarding me sending his wife the messages was simply that, a comment. No messages will be sent to her. Yes, she has been put through enough. I’m on this site to find happiness within and learn more about why I put myself in this predicament to start with. Yes, I am married and put more effort into this than I ever did with the ex EUMM. The personal verbal abuse, neglect, and disrespect I have endured for over a decade has not helped the situation, but no matter what has happened, I am not going to blame my husband for my actions because they were in fact my actions. I am on this site to get understanding for myself. Hopefully then i can focus on putting forth my best healthy efforts on someone else.
Fearless, blueberry girl, and runner girl,
Thank you for being some of my biggest cheerleaders! You helped me to see it is important to focus more on ourselves that we do on others. For so long, I thought the more I gave to someone else, the more I would receive. I learned the hard way too many times this is not true. The only one watching out for me, is me. Thank you for helping me to see this.
I met this guy from a dating site a few months back, we’ve been on three dates now…so few because we live 2 hours apart. We have good times together and he’s said the same. I brought up recently that I’m not so comfortable with he idea of him sleeping with other people. He said he isn’t looking for a relationship because of the new job/business he’s running. Yeah, he’s focused on other things. He also said that girlfriends take up time and money, something he doesnt really have at the moment.
I wanted to see what he was looking for, it seems that he wants companionship without a label and possibly going on dates with others (but not many because of the time and money situation).
I thought this over and told him that it’s established that we like each other and so we will see what happens as it happens. I’m not so surprised by his not wanting a relationship, but it’s a bit confusing on the date issue. We had glod times together, he is sweet, etc…
Does he just like going out? What do you guy think of this whole situation?
Zoe, you just agreed to be the Fallback Girl. He told you HE DOESN`T WANT A RELATIONSHIP. He doesn`t mean anything else by it, that is it, the most important thing you need to know. Instead of trying to figure out what it is that he wants – sit down and figure out what it is you want for yourself from a RELATIONSHIP/MAN in general, NOT FROM HIM. You say you are “not so comfortable” with the idea of him sleeping around, this sounds really as if you are not comfortable with it, but you are bendable to accepting it. It`s a mixed message, it sounds like you are ready to twist yourself into a pretzel for him. Something like that you are either comfortable with or not. I think you need to think of your boundaries and do you want a mutual relationship or are you going to be happy being a long distance Fallback Girl. I also think this situation needs a decision now, waiting to see what happens is a big mistake, as you are already focusing on good things (nice times together) rather than bad ( he doesn`t want a relationship). Take care.
Hi Zoe. I’m always uncomfortable when I read stories like this – I think you have a very different view of what is happening here to the reality, which is this:
You’ve been on three dates in three months – saying that you’ve had ‘good times’ is to grossly exaggerate. You should be saying that you’ve had three good dates and however many conversations. To add to this – you live two hours apart and he has made it clear – he doesn’t want a relationship which means you’re not in a relationship, you’re in a casual long distance arrangement.
Because what has happened between you both has been enough for you to decide you want a relationship, you think it should be enough for him – it’s not though.
I would seriously evaluate what a relationship looks like to you. It’s not that people don’t decide to be exclusive after three dates but they’re in agreement about it.
Guys who are good fun and nice *can* not want to be in a relationship – he wants to have ad hoc sex and chit chats. You are in a fantasy world – you’re trying to push your own agenda through the back door. When this all blows up in your face, he’ll remind you that he told you that he doesn’t want a relationship.
Whatever it is that you’re trying to ignore closer to home, it isn’t worth the pain ahead. Unless you only want a casual relationship, leave this man alone and heed what he’s said to you.
Reading this is a good wake up call. But I myself am not exactly sure what type of “relationship” I want. I too have my own things going on at home and have things to focus on…which is also his issue as well. I need to figure out what I want, but at this point I’m trying to figure out what type of arrangement this would be. I’m not so experienced to know exactly what “casual” dating really entails. I would like a relationship, yes….but I don’t know if right now is the right time.
Is his not wanting a relationship something that’s part of his confidence level too? It’s not just me he doesn’t want a relationship with, it’s with anyone else that may come along too…right?
Thank you for your response, I wish I could stop my feelings for him…but it’s not so easy for me. Being with him for that short amount of time and talking like we have been is not making this easier for me because I see that I really like him and I only wonder what’s going on in his mind…does he only want casual relationships with everyone?
Is he looking for a fallback girl to his life rather than another girl?
Zoe
A casual relationship looks like what you’ve got. You don’t like it. Therefore you don’t want a casual relationships.
If you don’t want a serious relationship either I would hang up your dating shoes and think about what you DO want.
Don’t go out there with no plan and hope that something will happen. Something will happen all right, but you ain’t gonna like it.
I’m not going to entertain what he may or may not want. As soon as you start putting their halfwit statements on the same level as your requirements, you’re doomed.
Oh Grace! Thank you! – you just made me burst out laughing for the first time in at least a week (I’ve been in black hole recently). And it’s not that any of this is funny, really – just so farcically, ridiculously true!! (and… it’s the way you tell ’em!). Worth repeating:
“I’m not going to entertain what he may or may not want. As soon as you start putting their halfwit statements on the same level as your requirements, you’re doomed.”
Priceless.
How true is that! Zoe, you should listen up here.
Amen! Fearless, sending you a big squeezy hug xxx
Ah… a hug! Just what I’m needing! Thanks. And thanks some more. And same back to you. x
Zoe,
he is saying he doesn`t have feelings for you and is not planning on getting any. You are starting to like him. Save yourself a lot of heartache and stop it right there. Read all the comments people post on here and see where situations like yours lead. There isn`t a single happy ending to a story like yours. You are not an exception. Take care of yourself.
Zoe, you’re unavailable, hence why you are attracted to this guy *and* why you’re making up excuses for his behaviour and projecting your own mentality onto him. You’re both two separate individuals and based on only having three dates in a few months plus whatever contact, it is dangerously assumptive to decide that you’re both two peas in a pod.
You are talking in riddles – you say you don’t want him to sleep with other people which would mean exclusively sleeping with one another, which starts to take on the hallmarks of a relationship. He has told you he doesn’t want a relationship and has made clear that he doesn’t want to be exclusive – that’s what a casual relationship looks like, which is the one you’re in. You don’t need to ‘speculate’ on what it would involve – it’s what you have now, only more of it and with your requests for something *different* out in the open.
He doesn’t want a relationship because he doesn’t want a relationship. He may have 200 reasons for doing so, but based on the fact that he wants to shag around, use dating sites, and not spend money or have hassle, I think he’s given you four already… I’ll give you three more – he lives two hours away, he specifically says that he doesn’t have the time, and you’ve only seen him three times in three months. That’s seven reasons – there is no need to make up anything else.
“confidence level too” – Zoe, you need to turn off the clone machine. You may not want a relationship because you’re not confident – if that was his reasoning, it’s what he would have said.
You’re an option, which makes you a fallback. He’s sleeping with others, so they’re fallback’s too.
It would be more appropriate for you to seek help for your own issues rather than to investigate the crap out of why a man who lives two hours away that you’ve only seen three times and met on a dating site, doesn’t want to be sexually exclusive.
Yeah, I don’t want to be a fallback. I went to therapy to deal with some of these issues after dealing with another unavailable assclown. I don’t want to go through the same thing, I know I’m worth it, I don’t want to settle for being an option. I know that deep down it has nothing to do with me, he doesn’t want to be in a relationship with anyone but himself. I don’t like to see the worst in people, but your thoughts have put it in another perspective…he wants to go through dating sites to see what he can find. He may have told me that because of his time and money deterrents he won’t be going on dates like rapid fire, but that he likes them for the sake of them.
My feelings can’t just disappear overnight, but I don’t know what to do at this point, I don’t want to disappear…maybe distant friends.
I can’t tell what else is on his mind, but I don’t want to settle. I’m worth a lot more.
Zoe
Run like the wind.
Zoe
Natalie’s advice (and the other comments to you) is well worth heeding – you can’t pay for advice like Natalie’s – it’s as good as it gets! I suggest you read very carefully her current blog on heeding the top-line information and the comments of the readers here (including me) who ignored the top line info and are now paying the heavy price – this guy is telling you everything you need to know for you to make the right decision for yourself now – right now. He wants casual – non-committal – dates (and sex) with you and with other women on his own timetable and that is exactly what he will have, with or without you in the picture as one of his fallback options. Fine for him. Fine for you? Don’t you think you are worth a proper, mutual relationship? You are worth it – so why are you even considering this fallback girl position as maybe being okay for you?
I’d also say you must do as much reading as you can of Nat’s posts on BR – find the one about trying to get a relationship through the backdoor (as this is what you are doing, as Natalie has said to you – and it will not work!)
As an afterthought… does anyone, Zoe, really want the man we are having sex with to be actively seeking out his next date/shag on an internet dating site? Doesn’t the very idea make you want to go, yuck! Errr… no thanks?
fearless
yep, if any man ever trots out the “I haven’t got time and money for you, I want to see other women, I don’t want to see you very often, I don’t want a relationship,” I will either
a) disappear with dignity
b) laugh in his face and say “you got the wrong girl!”
c) tell him “Who do you think I am?”
b) and c) to be followed by a).
What I won’t be doing is
d) hang around, waiting to “see what happens” . I must have been OUT OF MY MIND to do that. There went my youth and my childbearing years.
Wait and see what happens? Pfft! Expect nothing, get nothing.
Fearless and Grace,
I just wish it was that easy, them actually rolling all this out in the open in plain view to see.
What I had was mixed messages, lots of good stuff, commitment on offer mixed with passive agressive mindfuckery and lies. And the fact that sometimes they actually believed in their own BS themselves, so it made it look really convincing. I ended up thinking it really was my insecurity and I wanted too much and wasn`t realistic. Down with the boundaries. I have been here for months, I still need this reality check ( which you two are great at) when will I REALLY believe in myself?
Sushi, mixed messages is a danger signal – it means you can’t trust the information you’re relying on for the fantasy of being together. Decent people with integrity who aren’t switchy, are consistent. Whether it’s mixed messages, mixed behaviour, mixed talk – it’s mixed, which means they’re backtracking, flip flapping, and bullshitting. Mixed means ambiguous, ambivalence, mind fuckery, and lies. You’re focusing on what you perceive as the ‘good’ messages. You should be focusing on the topline – mixed messages means shady means get the hell out. I’ve only ever had mixed messages from 1) unavailable people 2) assclowns 3) switchy, passive aggressive folk. For everyone else, they do what they say on their tins.
Thank you Natalie, I thought I needed to have faith in people. My problem also was that I would recognise that I need to leave a bad/ambiguos/shady situation due to inner alarm ringing, would bring the issue up with the EUM in case giving them a chance would magic the bad stuff away or actually try to leave. They would protest, dish out more lies, shame, blaim, accuse me of being too needy/unreasonable/having trust issues ect and I didn`t have enough self confidence to withstand the attact. Next lesson – now I know why you say don`t give them another chance It in fact gives them a chance to mindfuck you some more.
Sushi,
“What I had was mixed messages, lots of good stuff, commitment on offer mixed with passive agressive mindfuckery and lies. And the fact that sometimes they actually believed in their own BS themselves, so it made it look really convincing. I ended up thinking it really was my insecurity and I wanted too much and wasn`t realistic”.
I was in the exact same position as you by the end of my last relationship – I guess it’s basically Future Fakery that he was doing, and we colluded with it by embellishing and adding to the fantasies he came up with. And, yes, quite possibly he sometimes believed the BS himself at the time. All we can do is keep on reminding ourselves consciously about the reality of the whole shebang, until living with what’s real and being totally comfortable with/loving/caring for the people we actually are becomes a subconscious and automatic way of being. And I agree, coming back here to BR is a great way to continue getting reality-checks for as long as we need them. There’s no shame in having to keep revisiting and reminding ourselves, whether it’s for months or even years – we’re trying to kick the bad habits of a lifetime, and that’s not easy.
Grace: “Wait and see what happens? Pfft! Expect nothing, get nothing.”
Grace,
Me too did that. Groan. Well, I wanted to see what happened and I saw. It wasn’t nice. Never again will I be waiting to see what happens – all by myself. These guys aren’t waiting to see what happens – they know what’s happening – for them. Waiting to see what happens with these guys is like standing at the bus stop waiting for a train – one might come along!
I’m picturing the scene. Woman standing at bus stop in Glasgow asking the man next to her what time’s the next train to Waverley, he says ‘ye’ll no get a train tae Waverley here hen, this is a bus stop’. Woman answers ‘och, is that right, well, ah’ll jist wait an see whit happens anyway, jist in case’.
Zoe, I think we’ve all done it. You are not alone.
Is he just looking for a fallback girl to his life then? Not that he doesn’t want me personally, he doesn’t want anyone exclusively?
Zoe,
He wants fallback girls – plural. He’s going to find them on dating sites, which he’s not too busy for and is prepared to pay for (I imagine). You can be one of them if you want. But let me tell you, even if you were his only fallback girl, which wouldn’t be for long, it still makes you a fallback girl: someone for him to fallback on when he wants a shag, an ego stroke, his tummy rubbed, his ears tickled, some grapes…whatever. His needs would be met by you (and others) on his terms and you would wait in line – or just wait – until he texts/emails that he fancies a bit.
But what he wants is not the top line question for you – what is it *you* want? The answer to that is what matters. What has what he wants got to do with anything, really? And anyway, you already have the answer to that. He told you. (and see Nat’s second response to you above).
Zoe,
Have you ever watched the movie ” (500) Days of Summer”? It was on last night. Enlightening!
Hi Tania, I watched it last night as well. I was surprised that I enjoyed it and I think I will write something about a few of the things I noticed in there, not least because I think that as Zooey’s character is Miss Unavailable and he is the one betting on potential and pumping her up, you can see how this whole thing can go so wrong. He was crazy about her and almost immediately put her on a pedestal. She liked him but she had an ambivalent air about her. They had two totally different views of the same relationship. Fascinating.
Hi Natalie and all the fantastic ladies contributing to this website,
I just would like to thank you all for the invaluable help you offer to everybody. I’ve read every single bit of this website. Only two words to describe your advice: IT ROCKS.
Met my ex-EUM by chance at a party last weekend (after several months NC). He was there with another woman. Even so he was with her, it didn’t stop him trying to go and chat me several times, all met by my cold indifference. And that’s the thing: I NEVER though that one day I’d be able to say this, but I wasn’t scared, I wasn’t unhappy…I just felt NOTHING! Well, actually I felt sorry for the poor soul who inherited the rotten parcel. She seems so sweet! Poor lamb!! Ladies, NC does truly work.
Anyway, let me repeat this again and again: THANK YOU!!!!!
Radio Girl,
You are right, we future faked too, if you don`t have your feet in reality- no matter for what reason -you lie to yourself. I have had a difficult time getting my head around the fact that I was unavailable too when I was in my relationships. But I was, even if my intention was the opposite. So, reality now and I think a lot of patience for yourself.
Ha. I am so embarrassed right now by the self-recognition I’m experiencing. I, too, feel like I’ve been marooned on Fantasy Text/Email island. My MM and I have had a LDR for 16 months, during which he’s been pretending to be separated and proceeding with a divorce. We texted or emailed every day and it was all love and roses, but we only saw each other a few days out of most months when he’d come down to collect his rent checks and sleep with me.
After a few months of this, I put pressure on him because I thought, based on his future faking, that we were going to live happily ever after. He’d talk about the divorce, say he was moving back down to be with me, spoke of moving in together (“I don’t want to just date you. I move fast;” “I dream of what it would be like to sleep next to you every night. I want that, and hope you do, too.” Baloney.) Thus began a string of monthly breakups at the end of his visits, because I couldn’t understand why he’d never follow through. Duh, because he wasn’t really leaving his wife, stupid. Then a few days later we’d go back to the lovey-dovey texts and emails and we’d be “back together.” I literally lived for those. I sat here in my apartment night after night, not dating anyone because we were “exclusive.” Little did I know, he was with his wife some of that time, even though he’d tell me that there was no chance for reconciliation and that his love for her had died after she had an “emotional affair.” I never could understand why I was conducting a relationship by text. I rarely even spoke to him on the phone, because he said he’s “not a phone guy.” How could I believe a man who told me I’m his soul mate, but whom I never felt welcome to call out of the blue? How could I be so blind? Really, he just couldn’t talk to me because he was with his wife.
We’d often break up because he “couldn’t give me a timeline.” He had said things previously about how long the divorce might take, and when those periods of time passed and I’d bring that to his attention, he’d fly off the handle and turn it around on me. I’d ask if I should date other people who might be able to meet my needs and he’d ask me to pass on those opportunities, that he loved me, I was The One but the timing was just bad, blah, blah, blah. It makes me feel like such a fool now, because I’ve realized he…
Hey Blindsided,
No need to feel embarrassed. Unfortunately, your situation with the LDR MM isn’t unique. I’ve been marooned on Text/Email Fantasy Island and the exMM wasn’t LD. It’s just the sad sorry role of an OW to be managed by text and email while the MM is with his wife. Your comment described my life from 2008 to 2010. I broke it off on a weekly basis only to sign up the next day cos his text in the morning was so lovey. This exMM was a phone guy and would call all throughout the day…first thing in the morn..all throughout the day…last thing at night. The phone thing is totally irrelevant since he is MARRIED. Yeah, we were “Soul Mates” too, despite the fact that he went on a cruise with his wife to celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary, while he texted me. Even worse, he returned from the wedding anniversary cruise with his wife, admitted to having sex with his wife “cos it was perfunctory”, and I signed up for another two years. Now that’s stupid. These affairs all follow a sad, sorry script. I still think I want to kick his ass for misleading me, then I get a grip and go kick my ass for buying his shit. There’s no buying this soul mate shit from some lying cheating MM, if I am my soul mate. Blindsided, I was blindsided too.