Ending a 6 yr affair...need support!
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Ending a 6 yr affair...need support!
| Tue, 10-19-2004 - 1:18am |
Hello,
I am new to this board and have tried to post many times but I rambled on so much that I was cut off. I think my 6 yr. story is a better book than a post. One common thread that I have found with many of the other posts and my situation is how contolling a lot of the OMM are, yet how difficult it is to end the relationship. I was raised in a very abusive household but in my adult life I have been very much in control and determined to not take any crap from anyone..then the OMM comes along and all that goes out the window.
For me it started with him contacting me on the Internet 6 yrs. ago. I didn't THINK I was having problems in my marriage but the more this man sweet talked me, the more he talked nasty to me in ways my husband didn't, I FOUND reasons to be unhappy with my husband. I even stuck it out with OMM when he and his wife made the decision to have a baby together. I refused to have a physical relationship with him while his wife was preg. and neither one of us knew if THAT would ever happen again....but it did. Since then, he has started working from home (his wife also works from home). I am not allowed to contact him by phone but if I do not return HIS phone calls or do not email him after so many days, a titalwave of anger is unleashed upon me. He can go a week or more without contacting me but LORD FORBID I should go 2 days without responding to his phone call or email. The first of Sept. is when I made the break in my heart and mind.
We had been "together" on a Weds. and I got a call from him on Mon. which I decided NOT to return. Two days later I saw him online. He unleashed on me like never before. I told him that he was being verbally abusive and that I would not stand for it. He accused me of being too "thin skinned" and "dramatic". He tried to say that our relationship was over via the Internet but I insisted that he look me in the eye, face to face and tell me. Well of course then he said, "maybe we can be friends, play it by ear". In my book, that means: You are good for sex and not much more. The sex is really good so I'll put up with your drama. Since Sep. 1st he has gone from "Its' over" to..."let's be friends" to "I'm going away for a week can we "see each other" when I get back?" (I was like, yeah, what ever). Today was the first day he was back and I did see him online, but I was on a S/N he doesn't know. I resisted the urge to contact him and I have not heard a word from him. I know all about his controlling game. He is waiting for me to contact him and beg him to see me. If I don't, he will be furious with me. The only difference this time....I don't give a s**t what this jerk thinks about me. Through all this I have come to realize that the man who worships me and loves me no matter what is the man I married 22 yrs. ago. Yet, I know I am weak for this other man.
My big question to all you women out there is WHY? Why do we women put ourselves in a situation to NEED, CRAVE a man who treats us like crap? I just don't understand it. Are we in love with this person or a dream? My bet is that it's the dream. Sad thing for me is that I know as soon as the OMM contacts me, I will be putty.
I emailed my husband today for the first time ever with some steamy messages. His reply has me waiting for him to come home. I sure do hope we can revive things enough to make me absolutely be repulsed at the OMM. BTW, OMM started out very handsome and in the last 6 yrs. has been balding, gained weight and looks older and is in worse shape than my husband who is 12 yrs. older than the OMM. Yet I still long for him sometimes??? Go figure. Anyway, I am very much NEEDING to end this 6 yr. mess and I need the help of my sistahs out there.
I am new to this board and have tried to post many times but I rambled on so much that I was cut off. I think my 6 yr. story is a better book than a post. One common thread that I have found with many of the other posts and my situation is how contolling a lot of the OMM are, yet how difficult it is to end the relationship. I was raised in a very abusive household but in my adult life I have been very much in control and determined to not take any crap from anyone..then the OMM comes along and all that goes out the window.
For me it started with him contacting me on the Internet 6 yrs. ago. I didn't THINK I was having problems in my marriage but the more this man sweet talked me, the more he talked nasty to me in ways my husband didn't, I FOUND reasons to be unhappy with my husband. I even stuck it out with OMM when he and his wife made the decision to have a baby together. I refused to have a physical relationship with him while his wife was preg. and neither one of us knew if THAT would ever happen again....but it did. Since then, he has started working from home (his wife also works from home). I am not allowed to contact him by phone but if I do not return HIS phone calls or do not email him after so many days, a titalwave of anger is unleashed upon me. He can go a week or more without contacting me but LORD FORBID I should go 2 days without responding to his phone call or email. The first of Sept. is when I made the break in my heart and mind.
We had been "together" on a Weds. and I got a call from him on Mon. which I decided NOT to return. Two days later I saw him online. He unleashed on me like never before. I told him that he was being verbally abusive and that I would not stand for it. He accused me of being too "thin skinned" and "dramatic". He tried to say that our relationship was over via the Internet but I insisted that he look me in the eye, face to face and tell me. Well of course then he said, "maybe we can be friends, play it by ear". In my book, that means: You are good for sex and not much more. The sex is really good so I'll put up with your drama. Since Sep. 1st he has gone from "Its' over" to..."let's be friends" to "I'm going away for a week can we "see each other" when I get back?" (I was like, yeah, what ever). Today was the first day he was back and I did see him online, but I was on a S/N he doesn't know. I resisted the urge to contact him and I have not heard a word from him. I know all about his controlling game. He is waiting for me to contact him and beg him to see me. If I don't, he will be furious with me. The only difference this time....I don't give a s**t what this jerk thinks about me. Through all this I have come to realize that the man who worships me and loves me no matter what is the man I married 22 yrs. ago. Yet, I know I am weak for this other man.
My big question to all you women out there is WHY? Why do we women put ourselves in a situation to NEED, CRAVE a man who treats us like crap? I just don't understand it. Are we in love with this person or a dream? My bet is that it's the dream. Sad thing for me is that I know as soon as the OMM contacts me, I will be putty.
I emailed my husband today for the first time ever with some steamy messages. His reply has me waiting for him to come home. I sure do hope we can revive things enough to make me absolutely be repulsed at the OMM. BTW, OMM started out very handsome and in the last 6 yrs. has been balding, gained weight and looks older and is in worse shape than my husband who is 12 yrs. older than the OMM. Yet I still long for him sometimes??? Go figure. Anyway, I am very much NEEDING to end this 6 yr. mess and I need the help of my sistahs out there.

Sounds very familiar to me and rung a number of bells. I, too, sought to replicate my own childhood environment. It felt like what love was supposed to feel like. It felt very much like "coming home." I put myself in a position where I might just be able to prove to my abuser that I had worth and value so I tied up my self-esteem and value in my affair.
"Everyone has a mental love map in which is represented the ideal lover, love affair, and way of making love. Punishment and neglect of healthy love map development in childhood allows the love map to become distorted and unhealthy, resulting in widespread love map disorder and sexual malfunction in adulthood." ~John Money, Ph.D., Medical Sexologist~
Well, my mental love map was a mess. Individual counselling has been enormously beneficial in righting my own love map.
And just like you, the man I'd always longed for, the one who WAS always there for me no matter what, the one who walked the walk as well as talking the talk, was actually the man I'd married. I'd already been rescued but hadn't the tools or the knowledge to actually understand it and then there was that map thing confusing me!
You're amongst friends, CGU. Some of us (me for example) are the type who will tell you flat out your butt looks big in that, but there are plenty others who'll be far kinder about it.
Welcome to the board, hon.
Wishing you strength & peace,
Posie
Thanks!
Thank me when I start telling you your butt looks big...LOL
Wishing you strength & peace,
Posie
Worst part is, I slept with another guy after the first time exMM and I broke it off (I was separated from H by this time). This man has been harrassing me and holding my "secret" of my A against me for months (long story but we know some of the same people and he knows my exMM). He's bitter b/c I stopped seeing him as soon as exMM came back on the scene. So I've had that to deal with in addition to ending my A.
I am an otherwise intelligent, educated, sophisicated, and mature person...and look what I've done to my life. I guess all I'm trying to say is, we all have needs we felt the A would fill. You have to find out what void in your life you were trying to fill, and address it in a healthy way. I have forgiven myself for my lapse, but I am still seeking to find all the answers of why it happened.
You say you'll turn to putty if you talk to your MM...well, I would do the same. That's why I am avoiding him like the plague. Don't get me wrong, in my heart, I DO want to see him. But I know that it would be disasterous for me and would undue all the healing I've done over the past 2 months.
Like any habit, it takes time to break. Its like losing weight...people want it to happen overnight...but you have to be patient. It hurts like hell, but it does get better.
I can give you the answer to why you had your affair. It's exactly the same for every one of us. It never ever differs. It's not a big secret or anything but in the utterly simple answer lays the key to beginning to accept full responsibility. And believe me, there's a huge difference in saying you accept responsibility and fully owning that onerous responsibility.
Some of us were bored. Some of us were abused at home whether in childhood or in our adult relationships (some even both of these). Some felt entitled to some fun & enjoyment. Some were looking to fill a void or fill a void in someone else. Some thought we recognised "love" and pursued it. Some of us wanted no-strings sex as a bonus. Some of us pursued and some of us were pursued. Some MM/MW or OM/OW were nice and some were not so nice.
The one thing that does not differ is that all of us without exception had our affairs because we wanted to do so.
Regardless of reasons or justifications for it, no matter how we dress it up, the fact remains that if we hadn't wanted to do so, we wouldn't have had an affair. It didn't just happen, we were certainly not innocent bystanders to the fate that we chose, we all of us made active choices to have an affair.
It happened because we encouraged and enabled it and it happened because we let it, often a combination of both.
We are the reasons we had our affairs, working out which bits of us were susceptible at that particular time to that particular person is another matter and that will vary a great deal between us all.
There's an age old saying on these boards to the effect of:- "Something unhealthy in me was attracted to something unhealthy in someone else." Figuring out what that unhealthy bit is in ourselves can be the roughest part of the journey.
When we know why we had our affairs (and understand that it is because we wanted to do so), when that penny finally drops into place, THEN we can begin to understand the rest of the package.
Wishing you strength & peace,
Posie
Regardless of reasons or justifications for it, no matter how we dress it up, the fact remains that if we hadn't wanted to do so, we wouldn't have had an affair. It didn't just happen, we were certainly not innocent bystanders to the fate that we chose, we all of us made active choices to have an affair.>>
I completely agree. It did not just happen...I MADE it happen (as did exMM, it wasn't one-sided but I take my half of the responsibility). I am just trying to figure out WHY I wanted it to happen, why it was so easy at first to throw away all my values and do something I NEVER EVER thought that I would. Its hard to forgive myself such a lapse, but I know that I am a good person...I just made a huge mistake. The biggest one of my life, in fact.
But its over, it happened, and I can't undo it. All I can do is move on and learn from it, in order to make my life better. And observing NC has definitely helped. I am embarrassed to say I do still miss the SOB. The heart doesn't always observe logic, because heaven knows, I should despise him for how he treated me in the end. But part of me understand why he did what he did, and so I can't be as angry as I'd like.
I used to worry minute by minute how he was feeling. Dying for him to contact me. I thought it would help my healing if I knew he was upset too. But it would not have, and I am glad that I've stuck to NC (except for my one lapse).
I am rambling at this point...I guess all I really want is to use this experience to make myself stronger and make my M stronger. I pray that I can accomplish that in time.
Both of your posts send chills down my spine. I feel as I I wrote them about myself but your words say it so much better. I am SO happy I found this place, it's like going to a therapist and finally understanding things about myself that I've been trying to figure out for years. Keep it coming please.
Mostly the ladies here helped me to realize that my A was not "different" like I thought it was. What I experienced, was exactly the same, as was the end result. I have yet to read about anyone's A ending anything but badly.
What's funny (not ha-ha funny, but sad funny) is that when I first started the A, I lurked on the "My A" board, and read all these posts by women who finally met the "best man ever" and were "so in love." It caused me to wonder if we were all just living in a fantasy world...I mean, how could so many people suddenly feel this way and have it be real? I wish I'd listened to that voice in my head, which I now recognize was a warning bell...but like a fool, I ignored it.
I try not to be too hard on myself about that, but sometimes its difficult. I let SO MUCH of my values and standards go by the wayside for the exMM. I mean, our backgrounds and lives were so different...he's not the kind of man I normally would've found attractive as a long-term partner. Why on earth did I ignore those things about him that I never could've lived with??
Anyway, I tend to ramble here but its very very cleansing for me. I encourage you to do the same, and you will learn there's nothing new under the sun...we've all had the same experiences and feelings. Its almost scary sometimes how scripted A's are...
Take care.
Thank you so much for your words, I need to know I am not alone and that others are going through the exact same as me. I thought I was starting to go crazy or something. This is very healing.....thanks again!