Sometimes it breaks my heart....

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-02-2004
Sometimes it breaks my heart....
5
Wed, 04-21-2004 - 6:28pm
When my affair was at its best, we would e-mail back and forth each day numerous times. Usually when I got to work there was an e-mail saying "Good morning, sweetie." We'd phone back and forth and always the last thing we did before leaving work was to call each other. We'd go to the gym most nights at 9 and then hung out and talked after we were finished with our work out. Other nights we'd go buy some beer and find a place to park and just talk and talk. I could tell him anything and vice versa. He was my absolute best friend and I knew he adored me and I adored him as well. Sex was wonderful. All in all, I honestly didn't know that a relationship could feel like that.

Then we started having problems and, as I've written in other posts, started fighting, breaking up, getting back together, etc. He kept thinking that he needed to get over me and then figure out what to do with his marriage so he tried very hard to stop caring as much. The fighting started happening more and more until we had a huge fight that ended it all.

Now he's getting a divorce but is still very depressed about it. I had worked on not caring as much about him and was pretty successful about that. We still see each other but it's just not like it was and sometimes that breaks my heart. To go from the best relationship that I could have imagined (except that he was married) to what we have now sometimes just breaks my heart.

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-05-2003
Wed, 04-21-2004 - 6:58pm
the thing about men who seduce you into extramarital affairs is that they are very very seductive. they have to be 10 times the "romancer" of a single guy to get you to over look that "tiny" detail of "oh yeah, except that he's married."

problem is it's NOT sustainable. It's not that there was a thing wrong with you, except that you were a little foolish to get involved with an MM. The relationship was "doomed" to go badly BECAUSE he's married. He's not a good guy and he's not a man who can sustain a healthy relationship.

Healthy, equal, one-on-one relationships aren't fantasies of obsessive involvement. They are real. They are day to day. They can be wonderfully exciting, joyful, sexy and they can be routine, hard work and frustrating. Thing is they're both and you learn and develop and grow together as a couple in a real relationship.

Think about letting go of the fantasy of the "perfect relationship ... except that he was married." There is honestly something better out there for you if you'll focus on living YOUR life and be open to truly living your own life fully.

I speak from experience after 3 years of a "fantasy" relationship with an MM that I also believed at times was much better than a REAL relationship. BUT I couldn't ignore the reality behind my fantasy -- I came 2d to everything else in HIS real life, I was a liar and a cheat and in love with a liar and a cheat, and I felt badly and guilty all the time (I just denied those feelings & stuffed them down and depended on the addiction of the affair). Think hard about whether that describes your life too.

I broke it off over a year ago and my life is about a million times better now.

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-08-2003
Thu, 04-22-2004 - 11:56am
Hi honey! I just posted this in response to someone else: I do firmly believe that the thrill of the A is that its so special from the outset but then, like all relationships, it gets ordinary. I also had wonderfully special times with my OMM. The thing I think I miss most is that we would fall asleep sending each other text messages "goodnight." Saying all kinds of secret things about what we "wish" we were doing, that he wished I could fall asleep in his arms, that he would love me forever, etc. I think for me it was just the thrill of hearing those great things that kept me coming back. When the thrill wore off, the relationship became ordinary. Suddenly it was a chore to keep exchanging text messages after I was tired and ready for sleep or trying to meditate or do yoga.

It takes something more than that for marriage. The kind of thrill of an A is way different than the satisfaction of a marriage, and you just can't compare the two. The marriage is lasting and requires work and commitment. With an A, you just bring the best of what you have and when you can no longer do that, you stop the A.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that it is sad when the relationship becomes ordinary. A's are thrilling by nature. The quality of the relationship is really determined by how well you can manage the ordinary relationship. Anyone can live in the bliss of an A!, it just doesn't last as long. JMHO.

mo 7-18-10

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
Thu, 04-22-2004 - 12:44pm
the process of your A sounds very much like mine--emailing, calling, talking, talking and talking. having a best friend that i felt truly understood what i was going to say even before i said it. We never met at the gym or had beers out--but we certainly would have liked to.

It breaks my heart too, as I am still in limited contact with xMM, but it's not the same. I miss my best friend sometimes. We never did fight, though.

I have had to get used to not receiving emails all day long--that my cell phone is not going to ring as i go to pick up my kids from school everyday--that the call around 6 p.m. while i would be cooking dinner and he would be driving home from work--is not going to happen. There are all these silences now, and one by one, i expect them less everyday.

Yes. it hurts. I understand.

Clarice

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-11-2004
Thu, 04-22-2004 - 8:03pm
Hi startingnew2004, What you are going through is exactly what I am fearing is happening to me and my MM. But how do you stop this from happening? We're not fighting like you guys were, as he just is not the type to argue. But, we've gone back and forth with me telling him that I can't do this anymore, to us not wanting to lose what we've found, only to find myself in the very exact same position. I think what I want more than anything is for us to be able to look back at our relationship someday and have great memories, whether we're together or not, and I'm afriad that if we continue as we're going we might not be able to do this. Debbie
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-02-2004
Fri, 04-23-2004 - 12:23pm
I don't think there's anything you can do to stop this other than end the affair and then take care of yourself. I know from experience that I can't make him make a decision to care for me or be with me by manipulating him....believe me, I tried. Seriously, we got to the point that the affair just wasn't working for either of us. Now that he's getting divorced, he's seriously depressed and confused and I get really tired of being in the middle of that. This sometimes makes me really sad and I definitely miss the closeness we used to have. I am trying hard, however, to focus on me, my daughter, my friends, and getting a job. I am determined that if he wants our relationship to continue at some point down the road, he will have to work for it. I don't mean to be manipulative, but I just can't be as available as I have been in the past.

The bottom line is that I want to be valuable to him, or whoever I end up with, and I've spent the last 6 months trying way too hard to make this work.