What were/are your 'moments'?

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-25-2010
What were/are your 'moments'?
13
Tue, 01-26-2010 - 6:04pm

Hey folks,

I think and reflect a lot. I think maybe part of what got me into this was how much 'I live inside my head' (which makes perfect sense given how much of this is fantasy based, especially if it's LD as we have to fill in a lot of the blanks with our thoughts), I'm always thinking, analyzing and 'living up there' (sometimes as a grad student, it's kind of my 'job'). Anyway, I was thinking in the past bit about some of the moments in the past where 'I knew' things wouldn't work out or that if he were single that I probably wouldn't want to be with him anyway. For the most part, we chose to ignore these moments though we get a bit of a 'pang' at the time, we rationalize and sweep them away.
So, I'll start with some of mine (and I'm sure that I'll think of more over time!)

The 'he probably won't leave' moments:

- Continued to invest/work on his cabin on a regular basis, all the while feeding me crumbs of hope of how 'bad things were' and 'how good of a chance there was for 'us'' (how could he possibly be planning an 'out' if he was doing this?)
- Bought a truck out of the blue (well, out of the blue to me. Fairly sure it must have been a join purchase)
- Spoke about his job as if it was a god-send, that it would be unbearable to ever walk away from

The 'signs' that I should have saw that he was 'not for me', and certainly not good for me

- Part of this is my own fault, but I put so much energy into 'being there for him' whenever he needed to vent, to 'share things', to talk, needed a shoulder. No matter when, I 'was there'. In turn...I got very little. I rationalized with 'well, he can't really...', but it was so easy for him to 'take' what I was giving...yet, nothing in return. Or, very little at least.

- For his birthday (the day of) I did some art for him, something very personal and related to an inside joke. On top of that, I'd seen him a week before his birthday and put much effort into 'the perfect gift', which he appeared to love. Anyway, talking on his bday and he sends me two emails: 1) didn't get a gift, cake, anything from W, then follows up with 2) 'Can you believe I'm not having sex on my birthday?!'....wow, talk about entitlement much?! Also, how insensitive is it to say that, while I sit here and pour my heart out, want to be with him so badly, and put effort in to something I shouldn't be...and he's bemoaning that fact to me as if I were 'one of his buddies'

- Had some emotional issues, drank as a coping mechanism. Sometimes a lot.

- It will be two weeks ago this Friday that we saw each other last, that visit things got physical and when I left I was having mixed feelings. I felt...wrenched out of some sort of context, I felt adrift, lost. When I expressed this to him, I got 'I feel the same'...and nothing more than that. Work got 'too busy', too stressful. I was falling apart, but it always got turned around into me helping him, me supporting and fixing his hurt. We were 'safe' as safe can be...but what if I did get pregnant? He told me at the time 'he would be there for me', and well...obviously not, since he didn't stick around to find out if I am or not.

It's weird...because I feel as though I love/loved him, and I wonder what it says of me to love a person like that. However, it's probably more the case that I loved the person I thought he was, the person he was when he said (what ended up to be) empty words, I loved the potential that was there. So, it was some sort of love...so it feels weird to 'speak ill of him', since I'm sure he's not 100% bad, just like I'm not either. 'Generally good people' who did a not so good thing. It's....confusing to get through, the 'good feelings' I have/had towards him as they fight it out with the hurt, some anger, and a whole load of confusion. But, thinking on these moments help me see that when it came down to it, he wasn't who I thought he was, or wanted him to be. Both a fault of him for putting up 'that front', and me for believing it and not seeing those signs. But then, that's what the fog hides, right?
I know that relatively speaking this A was 'short' (but intense...it's hard to get out of the habit of 20-something emails a day, texts, and at least an hr on the phone. Sigh. It's diverting my energy that is the hardest!) and I don't have quite the list that some might have. But still - Add your own if you'd like!

----
'It may be that when we no longer know what to do,
We have come to our real work,
And that when we no longer know which way to go,
We have begun our real journey'
- Wendell Berry

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iVillage Member
Registered: 02-20-2005
Tue, 01-26-2010 - 10:09pm

Jodi - right on! I agree with all the posts about our denial and our fantasy land stuff. We did because that's what it was, fantasy.

Another thing...we could recycle that same conversation from his W but I also knew I couldn't trust him and wondered if he was doing the exact same things with yet another woman or more on the side.

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-25-2010
Tue, 01-26-2010 - 10:27pm

You make a good point/good points.

It is more about how or why I was able to ignore them in the first place. Or push them aside, that is where was I/how did I get into this situation?
I'm starting to think on those things, and I think that a part of that is being able to 'see those moments' and then reflect on how/why I was able to ignore them/rationalize not having paid attention to them in the first place. For me anyway, it helps to know that there were moments that I thought 'hm, not right' in order to think through why I got into it in the first place and/or continued with it.
As for me, I'm S, he's (x)MM. As I think I'd mentioned in my first thread, we had met on a common interest site and it started off as talking about said site/common interest. Which then moved into other common interest areas, he was easy to talk to. So, we spoke a lot which then developed into an online/EA (though we eventually spoke on the phone quite a bit and met up a few times as well). If I read journal entries from the past few months there are signs there too, moments where I wanted out but got pulled back in. I'm not sure where this need/desire comes from, but I think a lot of it for me was 'helping', it started off listening about his day, and then moved into deeper issues and I bought/allowed myself to buy all the lines about 'you are always there for me/you actually 'get' me'. And every now and again I'd have a moment of recognizing that it was sucking out so much of my energy that I had to pull back, but then I would (allow) myself to get pulled back in with the latest 'problem', or when he started to disclose some elements of his M which made it seem emotionally/financially abusive. I then got pulled in by thinking 'if I care about this person, how can I walk now while they are going through this'. I'd said he needed to 'get out' regardless of 'us', though I'm sure that underlying that was always the hope that 'us' would be a factor. But, as time wore on I felt myself getting more sad and 'being there' (and getting nothing back) was no fun and I was hurting and feeling more than a bit used. I knew it needed to end, I know it needed to end.
As for how I got into it in the first place, or what the appeal was. Well, at first it was the appeal of talking to someone with so many common interests, we were almost 'twins' in that way. And, I had thought of myself as such an 'odd mix' (er, don't want to go into too many details, but mostly comes from having a really rural background, but doing grad school stuff. So, my interests are really mixed between the two and anyone I've met in grad school doesn't 'get' my rural interests and 'self' and vice-versa). Actually, the week before we met a friend and I were talking about dating and so forth and she had mentioned how 'difficult' or 'what are the odds' that I would find anyone interested in the same 'weird mix' that I was. Week later, I met him. I think that, in part, set me up to fall hard. I know towards the start as we spoke more I thought 'really, what are the odds?'. So that didn't help, to set him up as some sort of anomaly. I mean, really now that I think of it - *I* have these weird interests, why shouldn't a bunch of people? But I think that's what really pulled me in at the start. We had a lot in common, a lot to talk about, and not just one week before a friend was saying 'what are the odds?' and I had set myself up to believe that they were 'not that great', so when I 'found it'...well, here we are. So I developed feelings for him and he for me. The 'what are the odds' does not excuse the fact that he was obviously taken and I/we had ignored the warning signs and continued to talk. Further to that, and I think this has to do with 'living in my head so much' that the fantasy element of it really 'worked',or my mind was 'good at it'. I think part of that comes from my life choices/grad school, and another large part of it was the relationship I was in prior to this (ended it 6mo prior) lasted for almost 7yrs, and a good chunk of that (about 60-70% of the time) was long distance (had two 2yr relationships before that that were not LD), so perhaps I was 'used to' a relationship that mostly was on the phone/net/in my head. I don't know if that is for sure a part of it, but I'm only starting my beginning thoughts on that.
Sorry, that was really rambly and a bit off-topic! But, I see your point Iddy. I guess what I was trying to get at was to look at these moments and from there think 'why did I ignore these? why and how did I get here?'. How do any of us ignore these moments? Make sense?

----
'It may be that when we no longer know what to do,
We have come to our real work,
And that when we no longer know which way to go,
We have begun our real journey'
- Wendell Berry

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-26-2010
Wed, 01-27-2010 - 7:05am

'I know that relatively speaking this A was 'short' (but intense...it's hard to get out of the habit of 20-something emails a day, texts, and at least an hr on the phone. Sigh. It's diverting my energy that is the hardest!)'


I could have written your post, especially the last paragraph that I've quoted above.


I won't repost my story on here, but I have started another thread with all my moments in... under 'I've lost my best friend too'.

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