The person who cares the least always has the upper hand. ... just something to think about.
This, completely. I currently have the upper hand in my A because I care less than AP. Unlike you, I am the single OW and AP is in a long term, committed relationship that he is both unwilling and unable (as far as he's concerned) to end. Like you, I got into my A because I longed to feel desirable and interesting. I am recently out of my own failed M (that ended for reasons that had nothing to do with any A), and the last couple of years with XH were very, very bad for my self confidence. I did not (and do not) feel that I was ready to get into a "real" relationship with a man who was really available, but I craved the excitement and attention of a relationship with a man who really wanted to be with me. Enter AP. We work together in an occupation where we see A LOT of each other, and things got off to a passionate, emotional start a few months ago. I mean, it was based on physical attraction at first but we are both very emotional, expressive people so it quickly became a tangled mess of our feelings in addition to the amazing sex :) For the first month or so, AP had the upper hand. I cared WAY more. I waited around for his every phone call, dropped plans with my friends to see him, and lived like a slave to his limited schedule. I knew deep down that this was not making me happy but he's like a drug. I was/am not only extremely into him physically, was/am also falling in love with him. I really longed for the day that he would realize that he will never be as happy in his current R as he could be if he was with me. I thought that I needed to just give how ever much I could of myself to make him realize this. Then we went through a D day of sorts. It wasn't AP's gf who called us out about our A, it was our boss. He pulled us both aside separately to let us know that while we are both adults who can do as we please, he was witnessing how our relationship was distracting us from the job (true) and that he would hate for us to
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Thanks again to all for more good feedback.
This, completely. I currently have the upper hand in my A because I care less than AP. Unlike you, I am the single OW and AP is in a long term, committed relationship that he is both unwilling and unable (as far as he's concerned) to end. Like you, I got into my A because I longed to feel desirable and interesting. I am recently out of my own failed M (that ended for reasons that had nothing to do with any A), and the last couple of years with XH were very, very bad for my self confidence. I did not (and do not) feel that I was ready to get into a "real" relationship with a man who was really available, but I craved the excitement and attention of a relationship with a man who really wanted to be with me. Enter AP. We work together in an occupation where we see A LOT of each other, and things got off to a passionate, emotional start a few months ago. I mean, it was based on physical attraction at first but we are both very emotional, expressive people so it quickly became a tangled mess of our feelings in addition to the amazing sex :) For the first month or so, AP had the upper hand. I cared WAY more. I waited around for his every phone call, dropped plans with my friends to see him, and lived like a slave to his limited schedule. I knew deep down that this was not making me happy but he's like a drug. I was/am not only extremely into him physically, was/am also falling in love with him. I really longed for the day that he would realize that he will never be as happy in his current R as he could be if he was with me. I thought that I needed to just give how ever much I could of myself to make him realize this. Then we went through a D day of sorts. It wasn't AP's gf who called us out about our A, it was our boss. He pulled us both aside separately to let us know that while we are both adults who can do as we please, he was witnessing how our relationship was distracting us from the job (true) and that he would hate for us to
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