So close but so far

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-24-2011
So close but so far
18
Thu, 04-07-2011 - 6:43pm
So I pieced together that BlueRoses is gone. I'm going to be honest here because I need everyone to help keep me on track: I do miss exAP, if he contacted me there is a chance I'd go back into the A only because now, at almost a month out, the anxiety I remember from the A was hard but not as hard as my hardest moments now. A small part of me is jealous of BlueRoses, she isn't hurting herself anymore (her family yes). I know I'm just having a weak moment because had to work with exAP today. I thought I was doing so much better that I actually greeted him this morning... His indifference hurt. I don't know, I'm doing better but not as good as I thought I guess. I keep wanting to text him to see if he'll talk but I know he won't, he's done with me. Unlike everyone else's concerns about "fishing" I know my exAP won't do that. Trying to hold on... Thanks for listening.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 01-24-2011
Thu, 04-07-2011 - 7:15pm
Tuff, I've had similar feelings about other posters who resumed contact with their APs. I felt sad for them and I felt sorry for myself. Our brave Mama Bear Iddy told me with all the love and kindness in the world to SNAP OUT OF IT!!! We've pulled ourselves out of the deceipt and indignity and disrespect of the A, we've made it this far towards a happier and healthier life, and we're NOT going to give it up and put our children in harm's way just to ease our craving for a shallow high. By coming here, we made the choice to put ourselves and our families first and that's what we're going to do. One day at a time.

Hugs and strength to you

Kat
iVillage Member
Registered: 01-31-2011
Thu, 04-07-2011 - 7:37pm

And, THIS is why newbies shouldn't be visiting the MAS board.

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-28-2010
Thu, 04-07-2011 - 7:53pm

Tuff,

You're kidding yourself if you think that you'd be pain free if you slipped back into an affair. IN FACT, once you commit to trying to end it once, "slipping" back into an affair is an even MORE painful experience. It is the worst kinda short term relief - the LOWS are SO MUCH LOWER ... because you realize that you had gotten yourself out, but couldn't stomach the pain, and so chose the more cowardly route.

In order to cope, you twist your mind even more to make it all seem okay, to make it seem better.

The rationalizations are all the more distorted. I am sorry Tuff, but you are fogged in if you think the anxiety of the affair is somehow less than what you are feeling now. It's like comparing apples to oranges. The pain you are experiencing now is associated with growth, and the abandonment of unhealthy ways of coping. It is scary - sure. Like peeling off an infected scab to allow the wound to air out and form a healthy, non-infected covering. Hurts like heck, but so necessary to prevent further damage.

There are NO short cuts to healing from an affair.

It is facing the harsh reality of you and your life from a sober perspective.

You wanna run back into the affair fire? That's what started this Tuff. You have lost so much of the sense of what it really means to be happy & healthy, that you actually feel drawn back into the very toxic pool that destroyed you & if you let it, will continue to destroy the relationships with your family and friends.

I am sorry, you can't be happy if you're living a life that in any moment, could destroy ALL that you know, all those that you love and trust you.

SO, in order to cope, people in affairs employ extraordinarily messed-up ways of justifying why living in the affair is more tolerable than facing real life.
Why their actions really aren't that bad, why they aren't hurting anyone, why they are entitled to behave however they want blah blah blah.

The sad thing is, the overall theme is this: Learn to have NO expectations, NO standards, NO bottom-lines, NO boundaries, NO sense of self, NO feelings related to how one should be expected to be treated, NO desire for security, predictability, NO integrity, NO respect for self or others (including our children), NO sense of a future, NO right to even the MOST BASIC elements of a friendship. LEARN TO EXPECT NOTHING BUT RISK EVERYTHING AND YOU'LL BE SET.

... instead be grateful for the smallest of signs of "care" - often found in the lamest of texts, the bluntest of emails and the most degrading romp around a hotel room/truck/office floor ... because hey, if they didn't care about "us" why would they risk so much?

PLEASE. An ego-stroke addict is an ego-stroke addict.

At the end of the day, you gotta have some serious courage to end an affair.

You gotta have blind faith in those that have gone before you that we ARE living proof of the life that awaits you post-affair/post-fog. Tuff, I swear on all those in my life that I hold dear, that my life is SO MUCH BETTER now that I am taking responsibilities for my choices.

And some serious HUMILITY - to maybe admit that everything we were

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-30-2006
Thu, 04-07-2011 - 7:58pm
Great post TU. Thank you from someone who slipped one too many times. You are so right....each time you go back because you can't handle the pain, the worse you feel. Plow through it! There's no other way- I had to learn the hard way and my hands have been almost burned off.
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-24-2011
Thu, 04-07-2011 - 9:02pm
Thank you TU, that was what I needed.
iVillage Member
Registered: 10-16-2010
Fri, 04-08-2011 - 1:35am

Tuff that list of how he actually treated you is needed on your person at all times!

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-01-2011
Fri, 04-08-2011 - 4:25am
Hey tuff

I am still here with you and we will go forward together. Tough reminders for sure and we do need to hear them. We are listening and we will go forward. We will stumble a bit and your post echoes my stumblings too. BUT we will work through these thoughts post here honestly, accept the tuff luv and move forward.

We'll donut together hun. Will miss blueroses - but when she comes back we will be here for get too.

Thinking of you today am just about to go into work so needed to touch bade with you all as xap will be there.

theyellowone xxxx

"Not until we are lost do we begin to understand ourselves." ~Henry David Thoreau~

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-01-2011
Fri, 04-08-2011 - 4:26am
Sorry for all the spelling mistakes lol!

"Not until we are lost do we begin to understand ourselves." ~Henry David Thoreau~

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-11-2010
Fri, 04-08-2011 - 10:15am

You are what you consistently do
iVillage Member
Registered: 01-23-2011
Fri, 04-08-2011 - 10:35am

Thank you for this POWERFUL post TU. Another gem in which I identified with EVERYTHING you wrote. I'm another one who fell back in when AP fished about a month after Ending. I'm now pulling myself out of the LOWEST of LOWS I EVER felt during my almost-5yr affair, including the gut-wrenching lows of a 'mini' d-day back in December

http://forums.ivillage.com/t5/General-Discussions/Trying-to-come-to-terms-with-how-I-ended-long-term-affair-with/m-p/116699007#M145183

I took him back because I thought it would be the cure-all to the void, depression and terrible sadness I felt with him gone. In fact when he fished and then began getting cold feet claiming he couldn't risk seeing me get hurt again, I pleaded with him to change his mind. He did. Talk about self-cutting. It might as well have been a death wish as it's been nothing but a 2-month downward spiral. I just ended it again this week after the public and private humiliation, total loss of dignity and self-esteem became too great to bear.

My 15yr old DD is the 'victim' in all this insanity.. she 'knows' of the A, his kids don't.. and has been battling an eating disorder, depression and anger issues stemming from her own pain watching me 'F-up' our lives. That alone would make any parent in their 'right mind' SNAP OUT OF IT but the ADDICT in me rendered me a weak, selfish and gutless coward incapable or unwilling to even put my own child first. It wasn't until I realized AP was 'grooming' another OW to have waiting in the wings to replace me that I found my 'courage'. How lame and SICK is THAT??! Ugg.

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