taking baby steps again..need help
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| Thu, 10-14-2004 - 10:47am |
we talked and all the feelings came right back. i wanted him so much.
i messed up and told him i was having problems with my marriage and wanted him to give me advise. we were good friemds before the a started.
the next day he sent me an email telling me he tried calling me at work but when they transferred him the line fell. he told me he was going to a meeting. i replied and aked him if he wanted to call again if not that i understood and i gave him my direct phone number at work. well he did not call.
when i spoke with him i asked him if he would check for me today and he is on now and he hasnt. i am appearing off line.
sunday is his girlfriends wedding shower which i will be attending.
i wanted so much to talk to him. a part of me was upset that he didnt call because i thought we were friends and he knows i needed to talk. the other part knows he didnt call me because he knows my talking to him will not resolve my problems with my dh since he is my problem.
why is it that i cant let go? please help me understand why i want him so much when i have a dh that wants to work it out. why dont i have any feelings for dh?
i feel like a fool that i told him my marriage was in trouble. i did it because i wanted to talk to him.
i desperatly need advise.
i miss what we had. we had great times together and i want them back.
thanks for listening.

I am sorry your hurting again, setbacks are normal and wanting them as well. Its up to you to want to stop the NC. As you see I had my setback on Friday after almost 4 weeks, but I know I can beat this. Keep posting and venting together we will get through the heartaches DONT GIVE IN TO TEMPTATION. Good luck on Sunday, you sure are a brave sole for doing that. I will keep you in my prayers.
Take Care
Ladybug
My XMM had some great qualities, don't get me wrong. He was extremely handsome and had a great body, the sex was unbelievable. BUT all those things did not a loving relationship make. Like sooooooooo many people have been posting in response to Sad's original post for help, the A is like an addiction. And you can take it from me, because I'm a bona fide drug addict and alcoholic. Being in an A gives you an incredible high. And I've spent my entire life chasing that "high" feeling, willing to go to any lengths to feel good.
Recovering from my drug and alcohol addiction really helped me end my A, believe it or not. Because, heck, if I can kick that habit, certainly I can get this man out of my life. I did it the same way. I made up my mind not to contact the XMM Just For Today. But I told myself that if I really, really, needed to contact him, I would do it tomorrow. And eventually it got easier and easier not to contact him, and eventually I wasn't obsessed with him anymore. And just like magic, my marriage started to get so much better.
Today I remember why I married my H 18 years ago. Sure, the A was exciting, but I KNOW that thrill was going to wear off. Eventually, all relationships turn ordinary. Try not to glamorize the time you spent with him. Try to focus on those things about him that weren't special at all, or those qualities that even annoyed you. And one thing I found helped me more than anything else was figuring out exactly why I felt so compelled to be with my XMM. Once I unlocked the secret, it wasn't such a big deal anymore and I found other safer and more positive ways to face my problems without escaping to my XMM. And I feel much more dignity today.
Best of luck and keep posting. Love, Mo.
It is inspiring to read your post about overcoming your addictions...I am addicted to the initial love highs. What I am wondering is this, after your A ended, what did you find to do for yourself to keep from fiending for that high feeling? Like you, I logically realize that those feelings WILL end but they are so easy to get sucked into and so much fun.
Good luck on the shower, my thoughts will be with you.
I think Free said something to me that makes so much sense. Not that it makes it easier but just that YOU Have to do it for your sanity. To help you, to help you M. I keep wondering to myself if after our kids are grown will be end up together. I keep telling myself that it is only 10 years away and I'll only be 45, but then I remember that is probably a fantasy too and I have to go on from here. Up, I am here is you need to vent. Hang in there, you can get through this.
(((UPSIDEDOWN)))
Sorry you are going through this, Sweetie! I know it's tough- when things were up in the air with my xOM, I'd be doing ok, then he's contact ME, make plans to email tomorrow, get together, etc. and he'd disappear. I like to think that they are confused, but the truth is mine, at least, probably knew exactly what he was doing. Either way it really doesn't matter. This isn't good for you, you've given him more control over your emotions than ANY person other than YOU should have, and you've got to stop torturing yourself! I know you miss him and want him, but you said yourself that you have a DH at home who loves you. And you have kids. I'm (slowly) learning that we don't always get what we want and that we can't act on everything we feel. I had my feelings for xOM up on a pedestal..."but we are so compatible, we are so attracted to each other...how can i just turn my back to that? it can't be that wrong if it feels this amazing!", etc...well, if everyone acted on every urge they had we'd all have 100 children with 99 different fathers and 101 stds! LOL! Please don't think I am preaching here- these are just some things I have VERY recently realized and just my opinion. You've got to do the right thing now, UpsideDown! Put your energy into your marriage and family and stop wasting it on this engaged man who continues to dishonor you. All of your precious emotional energy is just hemmoraging out for someone who will never appreciate it.
"why is it that i cant let go? please help me understand why i want him so much when i have a dh that wants to work it out."
I want to address that because it's something I was feeling on Friday and was talking to a friend and we FINALLY figured out why we were both feeling that way. I shared a part of myself with xOM. He may have just seen it as a physical thing that I shared, but I also opened my heart to him. Either way, I shared myself with him intimately. I didn't want either of us to fall in love, but I did want to feel like I had some value to him. That I was, in some small way, important to him. He shared with me physically, but never emotionally. He never let me in, so I never felt that I had any value to him. I never was important, so I felt rejected. Here I was opening up and sharing, and he was closed down. That hurt. Rejection never feels good. Something that makes me feel a LITTLE better (although maybe misguided) is that in his eyes, we were strictly physical. We always agreed on that. In his eyes, he did reciprocate. He gave himself physically to me, I gave myself physically to him. He never accepted any emotional crap from me, so in his eyes, he never took what he wasn't willing to give. Sadly, we all get emotionally attached and blinded by the high. So that's why we're here! I don't know if this applies to you at all, or helps to answer your question, but it was kind of a light-bulb for me.
"why dont i have any feelings for dh?"
Because you are unfairly comparing your feelings for him to the high you get with xOM. Real life isn't always exciting, and you will have to work on things with your H. It won't be instantaneous. But the feelings you have for xOM are not real. They are a fantasy, and you are in that fog caused by all those crazy little chemicals. You have to break this addiction in order to get anything back with H. I didn't start feeling warm and fuzzy again about H until I had made the decision to end things for good and got some distance and perspective from the A. The A is just not real life. H is. You can't compare the 2, or expect a happy marriage until you're out of the A completely.
PLEASE let me know how the shower went. I am so sorry you have to go through this. Sending you big hugs and wishing you strength today!
I knew when I started the A that it could only end badly. But I went through with it anyway. And after me and exMM "fell in love" we both thought our A would be "different." Yeah, right...
I admit that I do still miss him. We had phenomenal sex and he had a GREAT body. He had a good sense of humor and we had a lot in common. But his bad points definitely outweighed the good, I just chose to ignore those for a long time, foolishly telling myself I could live with those. Well, in the long run, I would NOT have been able to overlook those.
Focus on YOUR future. He's not going to be a part of it, so any energy you direct towards him is wasted. Even if you end your marriage, you won't be with exMM. The A's were slowly poisoning all of us...we all just chose to ignore it...don't kid yourself that your situation is any different.
I wish I'd seen clearly months ago...but I didn't...everyone needs to do things in their own time, but frankly, the sooner you institute NC and move on with your healing, the easier it will be...not that its easy EVER, but if you know its over, why not start getting on with your life NOW?
I feel like I want out. Nothing happy or good ever comes on any day with any communication I always feel that I want more I want a REAL LIFE with him. and since he is not part of REAL LIFE--I had just better turn away and face REALITY.
He seems to be really suffering and I think he is just one very unhappy person and likely will continue to be. He says life is "hell" Well he made his own hell--but I will not continue to be there with him.
Try to remember your life before you ever fell in love and the person you were with self esteem and goodness. I am going to be me again and I am going to make a good life for myself.
Survive