Two women unknowingly hurt by yours truly

[collegeswing]

Hi all,

 

I'm mostly writing this to air my thoughts and try to think things out while typing, but don't have a problem with feedback, even if it's only to curse me.

 

To start, I'm 28 years old and have been married for just over a year to a woman with whom I've known been in a monogamous relationship with for about a decade. Almost exactly one year ago, at a Christmas party thrown by one of my best friends' girlfriends, I met an interesting woman a few years younger than me. I remember thinking that said woman (let's call her Laura) was attractive and down to earth and would be someone I could have had an interest in at another point in life--honestly not giving her more than 3 minutes' worth of thought after I left the party. Fast forwarding three or four months, I stumbled across a column Laura writes for an extremely popular news blog, recognizing her as I saw her photo as I scrolled through the site's staff biographies. The biography had a link to her personal site and I checked it out, at first only peeking in once a month or so after that initial visit. As I'm sure you could guess, I started checking in more and more frequently as I became increasingly aware that her writing clearly resonated with me on both very superficial (she's a good writer) and meaningful levels (similar life philosphies, interests, etc.).

 

Where this takes a huge turn for the worse is when, for reasons I'm still trying to understand myself, I wrote her from an assumed name, telling her how much I thought of her work and that I appreciated her keeping up with her site and her column. Why did I write from an assumed name, you (and I) ask? For one, I had the impression that my friend (the boyfriend of the girl who threw that initial party) thought I had a tiny, innocent thing for her based on his knowledge of the two of us, our similar interests and how long we spoke at the party (rare for me, as I'm generally pretty reserved) and I didn't want to fuel his thoughts should she have gone back to him and said, "hey I received a note from your friend..." Second, he would have been right, as I did develop a platonic crush on her based on one meeting and reading her thoughts over several months and I didn't want that known.

 

At this point in the story, meaning the point where I first wrote her, I had just finished an extremely arduous, yet rewarding period in my professional career and was irrationally exuberant at finally being able to move on and have some free time for the first time in several years. Cutting to the chase, she wrote me back from that initial email and we exchanged polite notes back and forth (from the assumed name, remember) once a week or so for a few weeks before, having revealed enough about ourselves to start to feel comfortable with one another, the correspondence exploded into something much more frequent and well, great. Several emails a day were exchanged between us for several months and interspersed in the conversations were admissions by both of us at how impressive our rapport was and the notes began to take on a somewhat romantic vibe, with me never revealing anything about my marriage because I didn't do so in week one or two of the correspondence and quite honestly a) thought she'd rightly run for the hills at my dishonesty (having come to know her better, she probably wouldn't have, though the rapport would have disappeared, mostly) and b)feeling great about this fresh, new connection with a woman who seemed pretty perfect.

 

This correspondence went on for a total of 3 months and over 300 emails--thoughtful, time consuming emails. It finally ended when, after the second month of correspondence was partially spent by her asking me to hang out at different functions around town and month three was spent by me apologizing for not being able to hang out (making up stories about conflicts) and being quite honest about the connection I felt to her, she became sick of being confused (and mildly hurt) by the incongruence between my words and actions and we stopped writing each other. I'm now forty five days removed from our last correspondence and I'm still consumed with thinking about it.

 

I feel incredibly guilty about depriving my wife of all the thoughts and insights I shared with this woman and of course, about leading this woman (who i still think is wonderful) on for so long. I went through a very long period of insomnia for the first time in my life during the months spent writing Laura and remain absolutely disgusted with myself for my actions and continue to think about little else other than a) how I could have gotten to this point, b) coming to the realization that I didn't know myself as well as I thought I did, c) questioning whether I got married too early, d) thoughts of Laura, as she continues to write on her blog and in her column, and e) looking at my wife and knowing how wonderful she is and questioning how I could make such a mockery of our life together.

 

Apologies for the long confessional--anyone reading this still only has 1% of the relevant details, but certainly enough to realize how disappointed I am in myself and note that I'm still feeling rudderless.

[Cobra_X30]

Tell me about your wife!

 

This whole thing seems ego driven. As though you needed the attention. Why do you need attention?

[whichwayisup]

I remember thinking that said woman (let's call her Laura) was attractive and down to earth and would be someone I could have had an interest in at another point in life

 

Fact that you allowed yourself to have that thought, just proves that you aren't really happily married to the woman you're married to now. People don't think those types of thoughts unless they can't see a full future with their spouse.

 

Go talk to a counsellor and sort this out. Obviously you are not happy in general, or with your marrriage otherwise you wouldn't have allowed this to happen.

 

Good luck.

[Tripper]

To start, I'm 28 years old and have been married for just over a year to a woman with whom I've known been in a monogamous relationship with for about a decade.

.... I stumbled across a column Laura writes for an extremely popular news blog, recognizing her as I saw her photo

 

and remain absolutely disgusted with myself for my actions and continue to think about little else other than a) how I could have gotten to this point, b) coming to the realization that I didn't know myself as well as I thought I did, c) questioning whether I got married too early, d) thoughts of Laura, as she continues to write on her blog and in her column, and e) looking at my wife and knowing how wonderful she is and questioning how I could make such a mockery of our life together.

 

Apologies for the long confessional--anyone reading this still only has 1% of the relevant details, but certainly enough to realize how disappointed I am in myself and note that I'm still feeling rudderless.

 

 

Well CS, I'm not going to curse you, but I will try relate a few things that come to mind.

You've known your wife since you were 18. Ten years later neither you or your wife are the same person when you met; you've both matured and changed but not necessarily in the same way. And after 10 years some of the excitement and passion that you initially felt has dissipated from your relationship. Fact of life; it happens.

It's not a sin to meet someone and feel an attraction when your married. Acting on those feelings is. Sorry but I don't believe for one moment you "stumbled" across her blog. Maybe I'm wrong but I suspect you went looking for it. No matter, if I'm wrong I apologize.

The point is you acted on those feelings and played a dangerous game with Laura: you entered into an emotional affair and a fantasy world. Only you know why you did this and why you didn't follow through with an affair, though I suspect your moral value system kicked in.

From my perspective you need to do several things to get your life back on track. Get into therapy and do some work on yourself. Figure out why you did this if you can. I think you need to tell your wife and apologize to her, as painful as it may seem. This, you will probably need to do after you start therapy, so your wife can understand that you are truly remorseful for your actions. You also need to apologize to Laura.

Lastly you will need to do some work on your marriage. You need to try to recapture the feelings of passion and excitement you had when you were dating. There's the real challenge.

As painful as all this seems it really is the first step on the road to healing.

I'll also suggest you read "The Four Agreements". If you can embrace the message in the book you will have started your journey. Good luck.

[Tomcat33]

Yeah I'm with Tripper on this one, I doubt you just "stumbled "upon her blog and I doubt even less that the long conversation you had with her at the party made no impression on you at all. I think you walked away totally intrigued by her that day and you set out to get to know her more....but heck that's just what I see, it's not necessarily what happened.

 

 

I think we all develop attractions for people outside of our relationships at one point or another and that doesn't mean we are unhappy in our current lives, and your thought that "if I had met her at another point in my life I would have entertained this." is normal we feel that too even when we are happily attached to someone, it's ludicrous to think there is only ONE person who is right for us, there are many people who are right for us but if you make a person yours then really the search should be over. You can't help your feelings of attraction but you can help your actions.

 

It seems to me you were looking for intellectual stimulation which is why you sought out this woman in this fashion. Do you feel intellectually stimulated with your partner? Or was this just a little fantasy that you were craving to spice your life up?

[michaelk]

I agree with those who've said there's nothing wrong with feeling that tug from meeting an attractive woman. It's natural. Had you been completely above board with both her and your wife, who knows? You could have established a great friendship.

 

As it is, I think you were interested in more than that. You wanted to see if you two really would click, and not just platonically, and you didn't want anyone else (wife or friends) interfering by raising questions or making Laura aware that you were married. In my view, this is why you took those steps to anonymize yourself.

 

The fact that you're still trying to figure this out for yourself tells me that you don't see yourself as a cheater, and confronted with an impulse to cheat you came up with a series of rationalizations along the way so that you could continue your fantasy exploration with Laura. I think you're fortunate that, for whatever reason, you came to your senses. The next step would have been to start resenting your wife for some perceived shortcomings and using that as a justification for continuing your actions. That you didn't do this says that maybe you love your wife enough to see the writing on the wall and straighten out.

 

First off, recognize that you engaged in an emotional affair with this woman. We're all capable of doing terrible things (I know from personal experience), and you need to own the fact that you're no different. You hurt Laura and betrayed your wife. This does not make you a bad person. It makes you a human being who gave in to an impulse you should have resisted.

 

Second, take a serious look inside yourself to find out what is lacking and why you wanted this experience so badly. It could be something missing in your marriage (e.g. growing apart, as tripper suggests) or it could be something missing in you (e.g. maybe you feel insecure with women and Laura's attention bolstered your self esteem). Either way, talk to a therapist. I've been in therapy for nearly a year now, and it's been a very positive experience.

 

Thirdly, figure out how you're going to make this right. I'm not going to tell you to come clean with your wife, or Laura, or anything like that. Only you can determine what the cost/benefit of such a decision will be. But keep in mind that your deception will stay with you, perhaps not as guilt, but as a barrier to closeness between you and your wife. This is an area you should definitely explore in therapy, because left unresolved it can lead to much bigger marital problems later on.

 

Best wishes,

 

MK