Getting "together" with the ex.

iVillage Member
Registered: 06-08-2004
Getting "together" with the ex.
12
Mon, 08-15-2005 - 3:14pm

I keep hearing people talk about how common it is for separated or divorced couples to "hook up" after the initial separation. Is it common? Has it happened to people here? My ex and I are still in the same house til it sells, and he asked to sleep together the other night. I was couldn't believe it (well I could, but thought it was a lousy idea) and he couldn't believe that I had a problem with it. He chalked it up to a "mars and venus thing". I told him we are supposed to be disentangling ourselves, and I didn't want to have relations without an emotional connection. he said he still loves me, so there is an emotional connection.

MEN!!!

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iVillage Member
Registered: 02-19-2004
Mon, 08-15-2005 - 3:16pm
I think it's common for people to have a hard time breaking that emotional connection, and therefore they sometimes keep sleeping together. It is usually a bad idea and makes breaking that emotional connection even harder IMHO.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 03-11-2004
Mon, 08-15-2005 - 10:26pm
I slept with my ex until he signed the papers. It was and is very hard to stop. I miss him so much and still love him. Somewhere deep in my heart I want to believe he still loves me and will come home so we can be a family again. We slept together for about 4 months after he threw me out of my own house and took my children. I guess I thought it would make him change his mind. He still asks to sleep with me. I am trying to stay strong and not do it. It's not good for me. I need to move on even if it is alone. I am so lonely somedays that I really have to fight the urge to call him and sleep with him. Sometimes I think that sort of contact would be better than no contact. I know better. At least your ex tells you he still loves you. Mine tells me he doesn't love me, he just wants to have sex with me. I could see a relationship like this going on for years between us. That's why I had to stop it. He would have all the benefits of marriage without the paper and expense. I miss being close with him and as I said I still love him very much. I have gotten down on my knees and begged him to come home, but he still says no. I don't know what I am going to do without him. Sorry about the speech I am a little lonely tonight. Hugs, Brenda

Hugs, Brenda 

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-28-2005
Tue, 08-16-2005 - 7:03am

I think it's quite common, at least amongst the folks I know. I was in the same boat and I found it strange because I knew there was no real connection and I also knew that he'd sleep with me just because he could. He had affairs and that's what caused the divorce. He was living with one of his OW and coming to visit--supoosedly--my daughtr, but he'd sleep with me on those visits.

I ended up confused and angry at myself because I knew he was a liar and I knew that he'd never be faithful to anyone yet I kept doing it. it took all the way up until he married the OW and then came for a visit and tried to sleep with me as he usually did. That's when I finally came to my senses and ended it. I wasn't going to be anybody's other woman.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-19-2003
Tue, 08-16-2005 - 7:32am

My EX would've loved that..... We, too lived together while divorcing until our house sold... and slept in the same bed!


Karen ~ wildlucky4me ~

iVillage Member
Registered: 06-08-2004
Tue, 08-16-2005 - 12:03pm

I'm glad I'm not the only one sleeping in the same bed waiting for the house to sell. I lied to my family on that score. I did tell him that if he's out and I'm sleeping when he comes home, he has to sleep on the couch so he won't wake me up. (go figure, I'm having trouble sleeping).

I feel very strong and very vengeful at the same time. we didn't sleep together at all for months, and he concocted this lame excuse about how he's always had this deep-seated problem (stemmign from his grossly overweight parents) with being with someone who's got a few extra pounds. Was hurtful and was a load of BS to make him have a reason for being miserable in the marriage and too depressed to perform. So I took some great delight in shooting him down.

But it was hard. I am lonely. I miss the intimacy and the actual physical act.

we are moving right along on the house and I am working my tail off to have it on the market for Sept 1- Thanksgiving. He's helping sporadically, and I'll just take what I can get.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-19-2003
Tue, 08-16-2005 - 2:49pm

Hang in there!....


Karen ~ wildlucky4me ~

iVillage Member
Registered: 02-17-2005
Tue, 08-16-2005 - 2:55pm
Dear Faith-Hope-Joy,
You have to explain to me your chosen name. I tend to think of faith-hope-charity - which may also make some sense in this - and is never out of place. That is why I saw your first post with - well, I don't really know what: knowing smile, warm feeling, memories - maybe all of these. And in a way, I was happy that this still happened. What I see in divorces nowadays is usually far from the human and feeling remainder of a relationship that you indicated. And this one is better than all these family court battles, claims of abuse etc, whether true or not.
Mind you: I still don't know why you divorced him - or was it the other way? I mean, when I had that same experience I knew why. He was so fixed in his relationship to his parents, esp. his mother, that he had to go back to where they lived. He could not bear it to be out in the wilderness of far countries. I, on the other hand, had followed in my Dad's footsteps who left home to buy a plantation in East Africa, just to get away from the family ties. "Ties" can be bonds that are too hard to carry. I understand that, and there was no hate or rancour. - And yet: we were still in one bed. There is a Chinese proverb which says: "Same bed - different dreams". There may still be a happy sleep. We parted - but I often wonder: Was it necessary? Not that I am lonely. I have been married again - this time for twenty years and blessed with two more children - but are we nowadays too rash, too quick, too stupid and misguided. I see so many breaking up - what for? Mistakes do happen - women as much as men, let's not be silly. And they do not even have to be someone's faults.
I have just read about a Señor Diaz who was released from prison after 25 years. He had got a life sentence for eight rapes . But he was totally innocent. Mind you: his wife had re-married, i.e. divorced him. I can understand her: being alone and socially branded as a rapist's wh... is too hard. It could be killing.
Mind you: she knew and believed he was innocent, and his son called in the Innocence Project who proved it.
What does that remind me of? My mother - the value of marriage - and of love. You see: my father was badly mangled in the war - after the war, 15 years in hospital - then years at home as a cripple. I was still young, only, well, 16 and looked after him when I came back from school or, later, university. So, my mother was robbed of the life a normal woman could have - apart from us three surviving children . She could have divorced my Dad. Her burden was surely enough for any person. She had offers of marriage from a number of decent men - but her love showed in a faithfulness beyond it all.
That is how I learned to value and cherish LOVE above anything else. - I admit: I myself broke away from this once - but only once! And that is the way it will stay. I admit one breach of this law. We both had made a mistake - and overslept it in friendship - but there will be none henceforth.
Good night then,
JoBoost
iVillage Member
Registered: 11-02-2004
Tue, 08-16-2005 - 2:58pm
I think it's common. I know I did it after I filed and we were still living together. There was nothing there emotionally and it was hard for me to get over feelings of guilt, but I kept telling myself he "is" my husband, I'm not doing anything wrong. I think some of it stems from the familiarity of the situation.

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"We probably wouldn't worry about what people think of us if we could know how seldom they do."

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iVillage Member
Registered: 06-08-2004
Tue, 08-16-2005 - 3:29pm

We have struggled for years. We have overcome a lot of problems/obstacles, but neither one of us is happy. We started down the path again of becoming bitter and resentful. He didn't want to admit it and withdrew from me and the marriage (again). I am tired of the constant struggle to have a happy relationship. I asked for the divorce, but he was relieved because he was too cowardly to just admit to me how miserable he was.

I have come to understand he will not change and be the husband and father I am looking for. Or more realistically, if he changes, it will be because of him, and not because of or for me. I don't want to be miserable any more while I wait and see if things improve, if they stay improved or if we just only drift so close.

I struggle every day with the thought that I am being selfish to divorce because I am not happy. In many times and places this would be a typical marriage, if not a good one. He has been largely unemployed through our marriage, and I am sick of paying his way plus doing all the housework and most of the child care adn child rearing. He is very angry and I don't want to be with someome like that. He hates my family and makes me chose, although I did need to separate from them in much the same way you describe.

As for my name, I have done a lot of self-examination and analysis. This name just popped out, I guess, but it reflects who I am at this point in my life. I have finally become myself. I have faith in myself and my abilities. I have hope and optimism for the future. And I have joy in life and living. Especially in my daughter.

iVillage Member
Registered: 02-17-2005
Wed, 08-17-2005 - 1:22am
Dear Hope!
- although it can hurt this is still the most important one in your "Trinity", because without it the other two just could not exist. I can understand quite a lot of what you say: some of it are problems that we all have to face at some time, such as "moving away from each other", in thought as in feeling. The other seems to be a recent one coming in: unemployment. I think it hits men more than us. For them it is their life taken away. We can still live for the home and our children. The new "house-husbands" might have a chance to get that too, but in reality they dont get it: all talk of "equality" aside, this is still our monopoly. And I think: that causes a lot of that anger - mainly anger against themselves, because they are left "worthless" - at least, that's how they feel.
As I said: I have been married again now for 21 years - and want to keep it that way! But it has not been a "rose garden" all the times. Unemployment nearly crushed us, because he felt as I said above and was, you might say, paralyzed - I, on the other hand, wanted to enforce activity, called him "lazy" - and it all wasn't true! He wasn't lazy - and I was a bitch. We were trapped in our (false) expectancies. - We needed somebody to show us a way out - not out of our marriage, but out of that catch22. And we found a friend who could be our counsellor - and still is our friend - even more so now.
That's just it: sometimes we cannot see what is really going on in each other's mind - and heart - nor what is really going on in our own feelings, ourselves. That is when decisions should be postponed, help sought. Life has become so complicated that I think we all need that at least once in our lives. It is also good because it should help us to open up - and then we may know what we need to know. - No guarantee for that - but, definitely, worth a try - DEFINITELY!
JoBoost

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