What we all have in common

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
What we all have in common
20
Thu, 03-25-2004 - 2:58pm
1) we must all have a tremendous capacity to love and be loved

2) we must all be interesting, funny, resourceful and fun (otherwise who would want us?)

3) we must all be reasonably attractive in order for XMM, MM, etc. to even risk their marriages and lives just to be near us

4) we must all have strong values and ethics otherwise we wouldn't be here trying to sort all of this out

5) we must all be smart, as we managed, somehow, to find this board

6) we must all be lovers, dreamers and romantics

7) we must all have had gaps and emptiness we felt we didn't deserve in our marriages

8) we must all be committed as we continue, day after day, to work thru one of the most exhilirating, challenging, lovely and difficult times in our lives.

I fantasize that someday we can all meet somewhere--mid country--like Kansas for a conference. Can you imagine what an amazing group of women we must be? Can you imagine that the talking and hugging and crying would never stop.

Thank you to all of you. You helped me thru this last summer and also this spring.

xoxo

Clarice

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iVillage Member
Registered: 05-11-2003
Thu, 03-25-2004 - 3:13pm
Thanks, Clarice.

You are very right on.

I was just thinking this the other day.

What I have learned from the A was my ability to love, my capacity to want to love and how I had to allow myself to be loved in order to truly feel what love is.

These are powerful realizations.

Perhaps if we can continue to allow ourselves to learn from our experience and each other we can find the answers we so wish were readily available.

I appreciate this site more and more all the time and I, too, wish we could have a big EMA conference in some Secret Garden!

-L

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-08-2003
Thu, 03-25-2004 - 3:27pm
I'm with you girls! We are something special! But I just have to laugh thinking about an EMA conference. What a hoot! Thanks for so much support.

mo 7-18-10

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-01-2003
Thu, 03-25-2004 - 3:52pm
Oh, please, can we get maroon t-shirts with big 'A's on them to wear at the conference? ;)

We can sit around by the pool drinking Screaming Orgasms all day long. Oh, it would be so much fun. Everyone can point their fingers at us and say, "Look at those people, Dear...with their big 'A's on their chests and their Screaming Orgasms. Can you believe how disgusting they all are?"

It would be a laugh...

Bird

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-25-2004
Thu, 03-25-2004 - 5:15pm
How bout the word SURVIVOR on our tees? No Scarlet Letter for me - - I'm movin on!
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-16-2004
Thu, 03-25-2004 - 7:09pm
Clarice! Great post!!! You've been SUCH an enormous help to me (you specifically, and everyone else too) in the short time since I've found this board. I feel stronger now than I have in the past 4 months, a little less lost. Thanks!
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2004
Sun, 03-28-2004 - 7:39pm
i def. got chills from all of ur posts! im new to this board and recently got a couple replies back and i am already so greatful! its things like that make me thankful to be a woman... specially a women that has access to the internet!! i am feeling more empowered now then ever! thank u!
iVillage Member
Registered: 11-19-2003
Mon, 03-29-2004 - 10:09am
Those are all of our obviously good qualities but at the same time, we also lack the self-esteem, self worth and self confidence to just say NO! I'm worth more then the mere crumbs you're offerring me!





iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
Mon, 03-29-2004 - 2:38pm
I did say No. I ended the emotional affair. I don't think i fell in love with XMM because i lack self esteem. I have tons of self esteem. In fact, i think i fell in love with him--and allowed that love to go so far, until we backed off--because of that self esteem! I have been in a loveless, emotionless, touchless marriage (13 years married; 5 years living together prior to that). I deserve more than i am getting from my H, that is why i opened myself up to the advances of this other man.

I have found my desire and want for this A to be healthy. It's been painful, yes, but living in this marriage has been the most painful of all. You can only take so much of not being loved, until you finally say, I am worth more than this! Did i wish i had fallen in love with an unmarried man? Yes. That would have made life simplier.

I don't know what i am trying to say here, except, the experience of this A has been painful but it made me feel alive and loved and it reaffirmed for me, that i am all of those things. In all of this, i have never felt so in touch with myself--even if some of that is very, very painful.

The reason it is hard to stop and to say no and to not wish for more, is that for me, this relationship with XMM as the first time in nearly 2 decades that someone told me they loved me, confided in me, shared with me, wanted and desired me and needed me. that is intoxicating indeed. But i know now, i must feel all those things about myself--not from words or actions from H or XMM.

I don't need/want either to make me feel good about myself.

Clarice

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-16-2004
Mon, 03-29-2004 - 2:57pm
One thing that is becoming clear the more I read this board is that there are many different kinds of affairs. In some, we are the OW, nothing more. In some, we HAVE the OM, and we are the ones who are unwilling to leave our H. In some, the MM is a jerk. In some, the MM seems to be the man of our dreams. Some are just about the physical relationship. Others go much, much deeper.

I wish sometimes that my OM would have been a jerk, offering me nothing but crumbs and treating me like a second-class mistress.... It would be easier to get over that kind of relationship, I think.

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
Mon, 03-29-2004 - 3:11pm
I agree Katie. My MM said some stupid things mostly becuase he is human, a guy and very, very mixed up, but he was always kind, loving and considerate to me. We became best friends. He trusted me with everything. It's hard for me to get over, because quite frankly, it only sort of happened. I've seen from reading these boards, i really didn't have an A, i fell in love with a man i wanted to spend my life with. I think it would have been easier to get over, at least for me, if there had been a clear start and stop to this A, rather than the emotional feelings that I think still linger on and on for both of us. It's just something out there that still floats around.

While he was in Europe last summer--I ended the realtionship when he got back--he told me he prayed for me daily. I often light candles at church for him and his wife.

The painful thing, i think for us both, is that we would have been great together and we can't be--never even really tried to be, but for a few kisses, some touching and lots and lots of talking and sharing. We were connected in each and every way.

Every A has its story and they are all painful, not matter what. For me (and i've posted this before) it was like an amazing gift that had been dropped at my doorstep (a gift i had yearned for but not sought) that i could never open.

Clarice

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