BS called my friend, trying to call my H

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-04-2010
BS called my friend, trying to call my H
8
Mon, 08-30-2010 - 7:34pm

Hi guys,

First off, i want to mention to TU (if she reads this), that i am so sorry for what you've been going through recently. you have been an inspiration to many on this board, and i am sorry your AP wont let you move on.

for the others, i wanted to share a few things. i think that throughout my A, there have been tiny little blessings and ways in which I've dodged bullets, but the longer i stayed in the A, the the closer i get to things getting more and more messed up in my life. if i had ended my A in May when i first started thinking "hey, wait a minute...this is not okay..."(6 months in), i would have managed to get out without anything even close to a D-day, and a host of other issues. if i had ended it in July, when i really really wanted to, i would have avoided the incredibly awkward confrontation with his BS, when she caught us having lunch (no, thats not a metaphor, we were actually having lunch). and now, 2+ weeks after that, the BS texted my friend. she apparently was going through my xAP's phone, trying to find evidence of my H's phone # (why on earth she thought i would call my H from HIS phone is beyond me...) but she found another phone number with my area code, and she texted it, basically saying she had information about me, that she felt he deserved to know, that she would be open to talking, etc. so, my friend called this morning and said "wtf...whatever this girl wants, you better beat her to the punch and tell your H everything" (friend doesn't know the story, but has obviously figured it out now!)

i remember when i was lurking here in June, before i first tried to end the A, i'd see a lot of posts about what it takes before people end their As, and does it take a D-day, or can we do it without one? i think it may not necessarily take a D-day, but the threat of your life falling apart, the very real threat, certainly has a different effect on you. for anybody here who is lurking...there are moments to stop. moments where your gut tells you, its time to run and hide. and your AP will never understand why you ended it. mine still doesn't.

i know a lot of posters here are disappointed in my wavering commitment to NC. i also know others here have struggled with it as well; i refuse to believe i'm the only one who has broken NC and had to get back on the horse. so now, BS calling my friend is the final bullet i think i can dodge. my 9 lives have run out, and the next one will get me.

thank you all for your continued support. i promise to commit to ending, really really ending, because i know my life depends on it.

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-15-2010
Mon, 08-30-2010 - 10:33pm

Dear EX,

Thank you for your kind words and your support.

Your post, I hope, is taken up and taken to heart. I know that there are many lurkers here who are just waiting for the 'right' moment to end their affairs. They want some pretty ending, some definite moment that will let them know 'now is the time'. You know, the only good time is NOW and the only way is NC.

I wish beyond words, that I had taken just one of those little chances I was given to end it - before and after DDay. It was too late, by the time I found this board, for my marriage. But it wasn't too late for me. I came to this board in Dec. I faltered. I caved to his fishing and I broke NC. I tried 2 times to end it - before this last time, I dealt with his suicide threats and a planned DDay for him to leave W for 'us'. Point being, I have been exactly where you have been. I have struggled with NC - I faltered and I got more hurt each and every time I did.

But, like you, I kept coming back here. My ego and pride had ruined my life. I knew that the women here were speaking the truth. I believed them. I knew my thinking was all messed up. I was completely open to the process of change and just how hard it was going to be. I knew I was dying a sure death. I was ready to be done.

I hope for you, that you will find peace. I know that you're insightful and courageous. I know that you are strong enough to walk this ending path. You have been a welcome addition to the board. We all contribute to this board. If we all ended perfectly, we wouldn't need this board. My tough love comes from a place of wanting people so desperately to clear the fog before they end up experiencing the losses I, and others have faced.

As adults, I hope we can learn to lose from the mistakes of others.

Much love,

TU.

LC/NC since April 14, 2010

"I can be changed by what happens to me. But I refuse to be reduced by it."
— Maya Angelou

LC/NC since April 14, 2010

"I can be changed by what happens to me. But I refuse to be reduced by it."
— Maya Angelou
iVillage Member
Registered: 01-04-2010
Mon, 08-30-2010 - 11:05pm

TU,

thank you so much for your kind words. i am having an incredibly difficult day, partially because of my evil monthly visitor, making me hyper emotional, partially because i cannot believe my incredible luck that BS's attempt to find my H's number actually led to my old college roommate, a good friend of mine who would never "rat me out", and partly because i got another email from AP, apologizing for his wife's behavior and wishing me well ( no, i didn't respond, but clearly the BS told him about her mishap ).

i also appreciate the sensitivity regarding my difficulties with NC. i know the women here are wise and have traversed long and difficult terrain to reconnect with themselves and their families. i hope to be among the victorious, but it seems that just when i can see the top of the mountain, i fall back down again. i like to be honest here, but sometimes its hard to stomach the tough love when you already know how much you've screwed up!

i feel like the universe is sending me "signs" (i realize that sounds ridiculous) but when i think about the little ways in which i have not been discovered, i thank my lucky stars over and over, and only see this as an indication that somebody up there is giving me a chance, "get out now, get out while you can". i remember one morning, H and i accidentally took each others' phones (we have iphones). luckily, i was able to look up AP's work phone # from his office website and tell him to NOT text/call. he literally said "wow, i was just starting a text to you". i've had so many close calls like that, where everything could have blown up, and i feel that there is a reason i've been given these chances.

i'm sure, if all of us here think back, we can see little close calls like this in our own A histories. for many of us, it takes a big explosion to get noticed. there is something about being able to "get away with it" that appeals to even the most well behaved individuals, but, at some point, you stop "getting away with it", and then you look back and realize you never "got away with it", because even though nobody else knew, damnit, you knew, and you betrayed yourself worse than you betrayed anybody else.

i'm contending with all of this now, and i'm trying to keep positive. AP continues to fish. BS continues to loom over me in fear (maybe she will look my husband up and call him in 5 years? maybe she'll send me anonymous hate mail? maybe she'll kidnap and eat my cat?). and of course, there is the shell of my former self that i have become, a once confident, brilliant, strong young girl, ivy league graduate, sister, daughter and friend. now, i'm that dumb girl i used to make fun of, the dumb girl who's always whining about some guy, who made stupid choices and then cries about it. if there is one thing that this A has done, it has humbled me. i am nothing special. i am so painfully human. we all are.

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-29-2010
Tue, 08-31-2010 - 3:14am

Hello EX and TU,
I am not sure what constitutes a hi-jack, so if this is one I assure you it is of the Robin-Hood variety. I just have some things to say, and I hope they help. I hope it can help either of you during your down times of this moons cycle, or one of the other familiar faces who have much more wisdom to offer, or even one lurker that EX used great bait and a proper pole to try and real-in in the noblest of fishing attempts. Or maybe I am just hoping it helps me…helps me sleep on this night I need it so badly. My mind is my livelihood; I get paid to think and to think deep. When my mind gets revved up, it is tough to bring back down. Occasionally at times like this that I wished that I drank (although we have learned of possible A related dangers to that poison this weekend too :), drank enough to just shut the mind off! But I don’t, so instead I read…and think…and read…and think (sleeping often takes a back seat). I read every day, every post here. I read blogs that extend like healing roots from off this board. I read books suggested by wise women. I read emails sent to me by total strangers concerned for my well being. Well when revved up my mind is like a sponge, and sometimes I absorb too much. I would try to find a way to express myself or comment on a thread, but then would read something else or a different response and it would alter by entire thinking. So I guess sometimes the sponge just needs to get rung out and that is what is happening right here, right now, after reading this thread mid-insomnia. It has given me the desire and inspiration to focus and to speak (and comment on the contents of the thread eventually I promise). It is the culmination of a 4 day, total A-thought consuming mind bender that started on Friday .

Why these steps toward Ah Ha moments hit me like storms I don’t quite understand yet. Last time it was a title wave of pure sadness and missing the “high” times. A last hurrah, a resin toke off the pipe, one last tap at the vein. And with lots of help from here I rode that wave far inland, where I stood to watch the ocean roll back, and looked down to know that the vein was dead. This time, Friday hit me like a tornado. Thoughts flying in from every direction and so fast that I could not hold onto them for more than 5 seconds. An (reluctant) embrace of the shift from obsessive thinking about XAP to obsessive thinking about the A, trying hard to catch the answers to the “whys?” as fast as they were coming.

Without a doubt one of the thoughts swirling around was about Karma. The things you posted Friday EX were picked from my caged mind. I didn’t know it then, but reading “i feel like i've incurred enough bad karma to last the next five lifetimes” was the catalyst that led me to here. All of the lives attached to us that XAP and I risked for our own selfish gratifications were there, their faces swirling in the funnel cloud around me. TU you reinforced this when you opened up on another thread about your self-loathing and how you could not believe what you had done to those around you. In that response you first mentioned missed chances and said “All the chances I got to end it - and not one did I take. This will haunt me forever.” This took the karmatic thinking to the next level for me and forced me to see the real risks and consequences of my actions. And with that it brings me to the connection I feel to the both of you through your thoughtful sharing with each other in this thread. In fact I somewhat feel I stand here at a crossroads between the two experiences you described above.

EX, I too saw the signs and ran straight through them, hell I even put some up myself and still didn’t obey the traffic laws. I really only had one scare of being found out from my end, an embarrassing moment when my W barged in and demanded to use my phone while I was mid sexting session with XAP (…ugh…shakes his head). I faked no service, and dealt with some heavy crap from XAP for having to ‘disappear’ quickly, but avoided any revealing to my W. My W and I actually met on the stage, and I am a good actor so I know that I was very good at hiding things from her. The problems on my XAP’s end never really stopped however. With each time something was discovered, I would count my blessings and try and back away, but it wouldn’t stick. She convinced me we had “gotten away with it” and would move on to another form of communication every time one got shut down. And each time Karma would shake its finger at me. Even then, and more so now I think to myself how could I do this to XAPs H? Talk about feeling like a scumbag. Maybe it was one to many; maybe that’s why it ended. I will never know. I get good insights into possible feelings of my XAP by reading the thoughts of MW with children here. But what I do know is that after riding that last wave ashore, I can look back and hope will full heart that my XAP too becomes one of the “victorious” ones who “traversed long and difficult terrain to reconnect with themselves and their families.” Although reading the blogs (including that of our Jane) of women in this situation it is tough to even consider it “victorious”. But I do hope that her H has the strength and love for her to re-build. I can think this partly because he never once contacted my W. He threatened to once in an email, and maybe he just never actually knew how to get to her, and I hope it stays that way. Yeah, I’m out…and I “got away with it”. But what does that do for me and my M? Well this is the point where I turn my head away from your path EX, and look toward the long road that you are traveling TU.

Somewhere inside of me I know too that I did not get out in time, even though it may seem like it with a lack of DDay on my end. TU in the same thread when you opened up, both you and Clarity gave your opinion on the ‘to tell or not to tell’ issue (of which I know there is a lot written and have read a lot on it and do not wish to turn this thread into that). But it made me realize that I guess deep down I agree. Now my M is not perfect, and I am still unsure about the ability to fix the problems which were prevalent before the A. However, if total truth is needed for re-building, well then my chips are cashed and I have to start thumbin to catch up with you TU. My chances of that went out the window when I crossed the line from EA to PA. If I admit, my W walks. No doubt. Not because I am a serial cheater, this was my first and only A, but because if there is one thing I know of my W after 12 years is that she is stubborn. She will walk based on principle. I knew that, yet ignored every sign, and missed every given opportunity to get out. I know that my actions have real consequences and will too haunt me forever. So yes, a combined sadness of losing an XAP that I know I would never get, and a DW and M that’s future is now out of my hands have been picked from the tornado of thoughts flying around my head. I was able to finally understand these feelings and follow the thoughts to the end because of your openness and compassion for each other, so thank you. I also thank each and every poster who over the last 4 days added a drop of water to the sponge. Also help and support from a cyber-buddy, and a timely inspiration sent to my inbox that assured me not to hide from my fears, but to stand and face them straight on and conquer them. Coming to this board is facing your A (and XAP) each and every time, and that takes courage, so I thank you all for having it. Some people may see this board as a bunch of people coddling each other’s bad behavior. To me it is pure signs of human compassion. Each of us could have slinked away to hide in our secret shame, instead we come, and face our fears together in hopes of healing not only ourselves but each other. So EX, while being humbled by facing those fears is a good thing, never say that you are nothing special. Every person is special. And just like TU said that if we were all perfect enders we would not need this board, I say if each of us wasn’t special we would not need humanity!
So if you are a lurker bite that bait that EX put out there so perfectly for you, we will real you in and you will be thanking us for it later. If you are a regular and made it this far, I am sorry for the diarrhea of the mind, but I hope it helped someone…or at least helped me. I know that one thing I have is respect for myself that my XAP could never come here to tell her story and have anyone say “i am sorry your AP wont let you move on.” And this sliver of respect will grow, just like a tiny piece of root that when saved can become a new tree, and I will re-sprout. Maybe some day I will even once again put out a flower. A lotus perhaps? As a sign of full forgiveness and enlightenment.
So again, if deemed so, forgive the hi-jack, but thank you for the opportunity to give the sponge a good twist, enough to at least release some pressure…and finally sleep. Now you can all get back to the regularly scheduled programming, or my status as a "thread killer" will be cemented :)

Wishing you both (and everyone) sweetest of dreams on this night.
Peace&Light
Foggy

I do not know what is next in life...but at least I know what is NOT!
I do not know what is next in life...but at least I know what is NOT!
iVillage Member
Registered: 07-29-2010
Tue, 08-31-2010 - 6:46am

Like so many others here have said...I think there are stages we go through when ending things.

iVillage Member
Registered: 02-25-2010
Tue, 08-31-2010 - 11:05am

MMLIF


Loperamide is good for diarrhoea...MAN you can talk..................


i am confused ...............are you telling dW or not? or just saying

New Choices, New Chapter,


New Challenges,

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-29-2010
Tue, 08-31-2010 - 1:31pm

Hey NC,
Thanks for the tip...or Xanax, Valium, or Ambien right? :)
Yeah, it doesn't happen very often, but when it does I guess I use a lot of words to say very little.

Sorry for the confusion. I guess what I meant about being at the crossroads was that I did "get away with it", but not really. I have to tell DW. I just can not imagine getting past this without it. Every time she is sweet to me, or tells me she loves me it feels like another betrayal inside my soul. As we are in a transition to a new city I feel each new decoration hung or placed is a reminder of the mockery I have made of our M through my selfish actions. I know she would feel differently if she knew. Now believe me I have been "faking it till I make it" since the end 2 months ago, doing anything I can think of for my DW. And the irony of the timing of things, I feel like for the first time in 3+ years she is actually happy in her life, with her life, and with us (I did not even think she liked me anymore and had referred to me as her roommate so often over that time). So, I know you are probably thinking what a horrible time to drop this atomic bomb on her. And The last thing I would want it for it to just be to shift my own pain and healing onto her. But I spent 10 months building everything in my life out of lies, how can I spend the next 50 years doing the same thing? The other option is to bury, and bury it deep (way deep in order for me to fully engage), and I just can not see how that can be helpful to either of us.

And you are right, I shouldn't be sure of her reactions (I know the old saying about ASSumptions :) So I am understanding how it is not fair to HER for it to be up to ME to decide how she reacts to MY mistake. This is even more prominent to be because we don't have children involved. Did that help the confusion? Or only add to it as it did for me? LOL!

Ok, I guess this is now officially a hi-jack (sorry EX, I really do hope that you have/did dodge that last bullet!), and I should have just started a new thread called "Mind Diarrhea" to give everyone fair warning. But I did spew it here because I wanted to let EX and TU know they have helped me to process my thoughts.

But hey, if my long winded whirlwind made bored you to the point of a restful nights sleep then at least I helped someone! And I am damn jealous... I LOVE THEM KINGFISHERS SONGS!

Peace&Light
Foggy (MMLIF :)

P.S. I will be sure to be properly medicated before posting in the wee hours from now on ;)I do not know what is next in life...but at least I know what is NOT!




Edited 8/31/2010 1:32 pm ET by mmlostinfog
I do not know what is next in life...but at least I know what is NOT!
iVillage Member
Registered: 02-25-2010
Tue, 08-31-2010 - 6:29pm

Foggy


Dont you dare change your posts because of anything cheeky i pass comment on... your posts are highly interesting and very thoughtful. I do 'enjoy' reading them...all of them !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Re children adding or taking away from the confusion..... i think they were the glue that held both marriages together when things got to the pointy end of a dday. even if xAP had followed thru on his stance of leaving his W...it would probably have gone done that the A would have continued and either it would have REALLY blown up in my face and i would be TU2

New Choices, New Chapter,


New Challenges,

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-04-2010
Tue, 08-31-2010 - 6:49pm

thank you all for your responses and kind words. foggy, i enjoyed reading your post, it was very articulate, and i appreciate your honesty. i didn't mean for my original post to sound whiny, i wasn't fishing for compliments from other posters that i'm "a good enough end'er", although i appreciate them :) i was just thinking about my A, noticing when i had the signs, when the exit opportunities were there, and why i kept going, kept ignoring. each sign got brighter and more obvious, harder to ignore. and here i am, admitting defeat. life, you win. karma, you win. morality, you win. reckless self abandon? you lose.

we dont all need a d-day to come to this conclusion. i've come precariously close too many times. i'm done, and i think as much as we all struggle, we all are, or we wouldn't be here :)