We've only just met, what do I do?

[Mme. Chaucer]

OP - step away from the melodrama.

 

Good luck to you, I hope you find a real relationship. I read your other posts; it seems you haven't experienced that yet.

[whichwayisup]

I wish he was single when I met him. That's what I wish.

 

Stop wishing, stop hoping. He isn't single. He's a taken man and not available, so the sooner you accept this and stop wishing and hoping the better you will be later as time goes on. Face reality, even though it hurts. Break the fantasy that you've created in your mind.

 

Not that he will leave someone who probably loves him and he probably loves her too. That's not part of the fantasy.

 

He isn't going to leave. He has been with this woman, his common law wife for 18 years. That's not just a 'girlfriend' that's a person, a woman who loves him and is IN his life, met his friends, they are family, he has step kids, he knows her family and she knows his. They've created a life together.. Like it or not, you need to accept this and please stop hoping he's going to throw all that away and come to you, start a new life with you. Plus he's older than you so that's another issue too..

[Ludmila]

Mme, why do you talk to me in that way, it sounds like you're trying to be hurtful. I have had one real relationship when I was 18-21 and I was miserable during it and very insecure but it was a proper two way relationship. Since then I have not had anything lasting longer than a few months, with someone unattached, and most of them have been unpleasant or unsuitable people.

 

I hold my hands up to inexperience and ineptitude, so please don't try and point out my huge failings. It doesn't help, I'm after guidance and advice.

 

WWIU, thanks again, do you really think he was being manipulative? I think he was just saying it. Looking at it in the sense of manipulativeness would also make sense so I will put that angle on the other things he does and see if it plays out/seems to fit. Many thanks.

 

I read the NML article. Though it seems to be about relationships that are only one way (I've done those too) and this is at least superficially, two way, and he is providing what I am expecting, in most ways, parts of it make a lot of sense especially the para about being afraid to let go.

 

Thankyou so much for all your thoughts this evening, it's nearly 10pm here so I'm going to sign off for tonight with a lot of gratitude. Mme I'm sure you don't mean any harm, sorry. Maybe you're just trying to show me I need to get back down to earth. I am trying to but there is resistance.

 

Night, all.

[Ludmila]

The 'responsibility dodger' post on BR is very fitting I think

 

I shouldn't pin all this on him. Taking back control etc.

 

Argh but these feelings and this awful pain when I think of being without him.

 

It's stupid as we only just met. I guess I was very lonely and it's like trying to throw away a piece of bread when I haven't eaten for weeks, because I know it's stale and will give me belly ache..

[Owl]

Sorry, I missed a question...I've only told one friend who didn't give her opinion really as we only had a quick conversation and had to run.

 

My parents aren't the kind of people I can take much advice from on this sort of thing. They are very straight and religious. So I guess that's why I'm asking you guys.

 

I thought you would have the rounded perspective I need.

 

I am realising writing all this down that it would be wrong to take him from the person he is currently with.

 

It makes me really sad.

 

Why CAN'T you take advice from them on this subject?

 

You know what advice you came here expecting to hear...and what advice you've received. There's no "miracle answer" here that makes what's going on OK.

 

You already know what people are going to tell you. You probably just don't want to hear it...and are really kind of hoping to hear what you'd rather hear (that what you're doing is OK), rather than being told what you already know.

 

I say...act on what you already know/knew...act on that advice that you don't want to hear from your parent's, or from other friends and family members.

 

You already know your answers, you already know what you SHOULD do...posting here is actually a distraction from acting on that information that you ALREADY HAVE.

[bentnotbroken]

If you don't want advice from your parents because of their faith and standards, then it appears that you are hear hoping to get someone to tell you what you want to hear. Like Owl asked, what is that exactly?

[Mme. Chaucer]

If you don't want advice from your parents because of their faith and standards, then it appears that you are hear hoping to get someone to tell you what you want to hear. Like Owl asked, what is that exactly?

 

That's why I'm not so "nice" about your posts. I looked at your posting history, and this is true to form. I'm sorry, but something seems very … off about it all.

[Ludmila]

Thanks. I've just woken up and read what was written last night after I last posted.

 

I'm not sure what to say. There seem to be a lot of assumptions, I've already said I don't feel I know him well enough to feel this way about him. That I don't feel he should leave her, that I just wish it hadn't been an issue.

I have no assumptions about his 'wife' at all. I feel sorry for her that he is sneaking around with me. For all I know she is a really great person.

 

please don't assume I'm something I'm not. I don't 'want him in my life' at the expense of something else or someone else that should take precedence.

 

My folks are not just 'people of faith'. My mother is extreme. She doesn#t believe in sex out of marriage or even very much in it. So nothing I do will be right, whether he's attached or not.

 

You guys keep asking what I expected to hear, and the truth is I don't know. I am trying to learn. I don't know what is Ok in terms of, you meet someone, you fall in love with each other, they are seeing someone but unhappy, they leave that person and start properly seeing you...so many of the people I have known have met their husband or wife when the other was in a relationship, which then ended and they stayed together. I'm not talking affairs, I'm talking an overlap.

 

But at this stage I don't know if this is the case for us or not. It'sd too early to tell.

 

I just wanted to know,

 

1. Do I tell him to go away until he is available, and cut contact completely,

 

2. Do I tell him no sex till he is available and continue seeing him as a 'friend' and talking about being together, until he either leaves his relationship or doesn't - and really, I know that anything much more than a few weeks is too long. That's my instinct anyway. Is that about right?

 

3. Or do I just do what he says and we carry on seeing each other for the next few weeks or months while he slowly breaks it off with her?

 

I am sorry if I have pissed anyone off. I'm not making any of it up, I am useless at relationships, I just want to get better at it and do the 'right' thing, but people seem to be reading it as though I'm playing some kind of game on here, and I already know the answer.

If it helps at all I'm probably on the autistic spectrum somewhere, so while my IQ is really high, and I'm fairly clever in some ways I am as thick as two short planks when it comes to human relationships.

 

Again I am sorry if I sound like a freak. All I have said is literal and genuine and just my feelings. WWIU has understood where i am coming from and been really helpful. Please read my posts as exactly what they say, I'm not being anything but honest, and basic answers you probably all think are obvious are what I needed.

 

I have not slept thinking about how crazy this is and what I am putting on the line here. And no, I have not slept with him while my children were in the house. We managed to find 10 minutes one day when he was working here and they were at school. That was a couple of weeks ago. Just so you know.

[Ludmila]

you claim all these things he says about his 'wife' (which she is for all intense and purpose) and you are making all these judgements about her and acting like he isn't a big boy who can make his own decisions on his life. you want him to love you. you want him to be in your life. but you do not know him at all. some stranger around her children! he could rape you, he could harm you, he could hurt your children!!! please wake up and see what you are doing. .

 

Sorry, but what judgments about his wife? What have I said about her? I have told him that he is a grown man and old enough to make a choice. I have told him I don't believe he can love us both, at once, and that if he doesn't love me I'd prefer to leave it as it is, and he stays with her and admits to me that he still loves her.

That way I can keep him as a friend, or a nice memory or something and no one gets hurt. He's not listening so if he doesn't follow through with this love he claims to have for me (I haven't claimed he loves me, he has though and yes I do want to be loved, and I want to believe it's real, though from the replies here it's seeming very unlikely) then I will not continue to see him, well maybe as friends, but not as lovers.

 

He wanted to get intimate yesterday evening, before I posted on here, and I refused. I want to do the right thing here. I really do, but I am not entirely sure what it is, because it feels very complicated to me at this stage and as though I don't have enough information to know whether he genuinely loves me or not.

 

My feeling is that he feels something for me, not love, maybe excitement, attraction, he knows I am attracted to him and he is all for it.

 

But I'm basically something like a toy for him, he isn't going to leave her, and in the meantime he wants as much action as he can get, as much love, he is as desperate as I am for that sort of validation - maybe? But it won't change his set-up, because it suits him to be acting like a single man, and not be answerable to her. thus the 'let's see other people' argument they had... he said this to her and I can imagine it really hurt her, I thought it very unkind...it only caters for his interest, no one else's. I told him I thought it was unfair and the wrong thing to do, and that it doesn't solve anything, and he needs to be honest with her.

 

He said he was thinking about whether to just tell her about me. I don't feel like he will.

I think it suits him to live far away and just go back occasionally. That's not someone who ought to be married to anyone, and equally I don't think I am suited to marriage as I am a loner and tend to struggle with managing someone else's needs...except my children's, and even that is hard, well, that's the nature of it.

 

So to leave her and start up with me, would mean he was out of the frying pan and into the fire, and I might not give him the same freedom, though he seems to think I would and actually it might suit me quite well to have that sort of relationship. He has said she is very unhappy with him being away all the time, which I understand too.

[Mme. Chaucer]

and he stays with her and admits to me that he still loves her.

 

Huh? Why should, or would he "admit" to you anything?

 

You have certainly showered a lot of words and false emotion on this sordid tale of yours, but if you just pare all that away, here it is:

 

You met the married handyman and jumped into bed with him a couple of weeks ago. You're still screwing him.

 

There.

 

If you want to know why I am not "nice" and don't even believe your stories, take an objective look at "yourself":

 

You had a baby by a married man.

 

You broke up with the married man and then had another baby from a "fling," the father of which doesn't even warrant a mention in your romance tales.

 

Your formerly married babydady divorced and remarried, so you then resumed an affair with him.

 

That ended.

 

You started a sort of babysitting in exchange for sex relationship, which you aggrandized about as much as you are this quick sex with the married handyman scenario. This drama also included some kind of hanky panky with the guy's brother.

 

Now this.

 

Sorry, I'm just able to take you seriously. "Relationships," even if they are extramarital affairs, don't look like these stories.

Edited February 15, 2012 by Mme. Chaucer

[Ludmila]

Why then do you post on the threads I start, and not just allow the people who can offer advice, which I might find helpful, to respond? Why are you compelled to have a go at me?

 

If you don't approve why not offer something remotely constructive? I don't expect approval, and it's obviously Ok to put someone in the frame and throw crap at them on here just for the hell of it, but some people have been kind and they are the ones I take seriously.

 

You have summed up my romantic life pretty well. What do you want, a round of applause? Or just to point and laugh and make me feel like crap?

 

I don't really know what to say.

[Ludmila]

Sorry, I've just realised you (and 'stargazer' apparently) just don't believe me at all.

 

So what's the point of me saying anything more? You're just going to think 'troll' whatever I write.

 

There may be people out there who would make up things like this but I don't know why they would, and I don't. But clearly you're not going to believe that either.

 

Why am I even talking to you? Why are you posting on this thread> are you trying to stop others wasting their time on something that's entirely nonsensical?

 

I guess so. Listen I know how damaging trolls are and all I can say is I am not one. But it doesn't matter because everyone's taken a hike anyway.

 

Is there a way to delete my entire posting history on here? I feel completely ridiculed. My fault for sharing, yes, I know.

 

Thanks for that.

[Owl]

OK...simply put, bottom line advice here.

 

He's married.

 

Don't have sex, or any kind of physical or emotionally intimate relationships with married men.

 

Once you START a physically or emotionally intimate relationship with someone, it's nearly always impossible to "go back" to any other kind of relationship with them.

 

So...add those up...they = end the relationship with him and move on.

 

There ya have my advice. Simple, summed up, easy to understand and unmistakably clear. Hope it helps.

[Ludmila]

Yes it does, Owl, thankyou for being so clear. So just end it - yes? Maybe that would make sense. Then if he becomes single, of his own accord, I can decide whether to start again with him?

 

I can't really see a down side to this, only that I'm a bit scared because I already told him I wanted to do this and he talked me round. and I don't want him to get angry about it. I guess if he did I would have my answer about how nice he is though.

 

Thankyou for answering seriously. I'm feeling wretched about being told I'm making up stories. I've asked the mods, or whatever they are called if they can just delete all my threads. I don't suppose they will.

 

But it is good to have someone just answer my question. Thankyou.

[Ludmila]

I am thinking back to when it began and if I had had that attitude to start with, I would have made him cups of tea, and kept a distance emotionally because that was where it started. Talking and sharing too much.

 

I should have started off being much, much more distant and stayed that way. I didn't know his relationship status then though...maybe once I found out, I should have kept distant.

 

See next time this sort of thing happens, if it does, I will know that and I can try doing things the right way. It might just work, it might stop me getting into another situation like this.

[2sunny]

He's a taken man who takes advantage of younger gals while he finds work... Is THAT the kind of man you intend to chase? That's what you are doing...

 

Why would you allow any man inside your life and yourself while he's committed to someone else?

 

You set the bar very low - he now knows how easy this is with you.

 

I'd suggest finding an available and healthy man - and set YOUR standards VERY high for yourself.

 

IF you don't require great things for YOURSELF - why should anyone else?

 

He's offered you very little - that is what you should expect to continue getting as long as you allow him to "hang around".

 

How would YOU enjoy being treated the way HE is treating his gal? He's been wi HER 18 years!!! He's known you ONE MONTH!!!

 

Think about it - YOU willingly allowed HIM to use YOU for sex!

 

Stop allowing it. He's taken!

[Ludmila]

Thankyou, Sunny, that makes a lot of sense without being harsh or personal.

 

I don't know whether I should post again but I want to say I can see your point.

 

He has offered me very little, so far. I don't know if he will come to offer me more in time, or not.

Whatever, though, I'm going to speak with him tomorrow and maybe we can make some rules around what happens next.

I need to protect myself AND most importantly my children, and that means not having any more sleepless nights worrying about him and who he is and what the heck I am doing...things need to be clearer, in my head, as I think it has all moved too fast for me to keep track of the bigger picture.

Which as people have rightly pointed out, I am really bad at. Details, great - thus perhaps the overemphasis on the smaller things, guessing they mean something real/important? and completely missing what is actually going on on a larger scale.

 

I would not like to be treated how he is treating her and I have told him this, but if he continues to think it's ok to do it, I don't think I can be with him as he clearly has no compassion/empathy. (maybe even less than I do?) Being a coward is not something I find attractive in a man, or in myself.

 

Thankyou very much for your help.

[NoIDidn't]

Ludmia

 

I'm still stuck on his statement and yours that "they don't get on well because she always thinks he's cheating" and that "he has messed around a few times over the years".

 

If they've been together for 18 years and he's messed around with other women (including yourself) during that time period, he has cheated and she's correct.

 

Those things alone would have me running for the hills. There is nothing quite like having someone telling you who they are and choosing not to believe them.

 

Sorry.

[Mme. Chaucer]

Okay, so lets say you are a real person and your stories are all real.

 

Why are you here? Nobody is going to tell you anything different than this:

 

Quit having sex with him; don't be alone with him, don't bother "making rules about what happens next," MOVE ON.

 

If you can't or won't, then do whatever you want. But nobody here, even the most die hard affair- boosters, evidently, is going to tell you anything different.

[2sunny]

Theres not one single reason to see him or speak to him again... Unless you INTEND to ALLOW him to continue using you.

 

Is that your intent? Because that's the only thing you're gonna get by participating.

 

Choosing NOT TO participate sends him the clear message that YOU expect and deserve more than he can offer.

 

Stop talking to him...it's a waste of time and energy when a man is a blatant cheater!

[alexandria35]

Thankyou, Sunny, that makes a lot of sense without being harsh or personal.

 

I don't know whether I should post again but I want to say I can see your point.

 

He has offered me very little, so far. I don't know if he will come to offer me more in time, or not.

Whatever, though, I'm going to speak with him tomorrow and maybe we can make some rules around what happens next.

I need to protect myself AND most importantly my children, and that means not having any more sleepless nights worrying about him and who he is and what the heck I am doing...things need to be clearer, in my head, as I think it has all moved too fast for me to keep track of the bigger picture.

Which as people have rightly pointed out, I am really bad at. Details, great - thus perhaps the overemphasis on the smaller things, guessing they mean something real/important? and completely missing what is actually going on on a larger scale.

 

I would not like to be treated how he is treating her and I have told him this, but if he continues to think it's ok to do it, I don't think I can be with him as he clearly has no compassion/empathy. (maybe even less than I do?) Being a coward is not something I find attractive in a man, or in myself.

 

Thankyou very much for your help.

 

Good Lord! All this drama and harlequin romance drivel over an almost 60 year old man that you have known only 4 weeks. No wonder some men use and take advantage. Women like you make it so very easy. I know that sounds mean but sometimes I can't help but feel that some women just make women look bad in general. If he is almost 60 than you are in your forties which is amazing because you read much more like teenager.

 

Rules? what rules are you going to make up for your fantasy harlequin romance life? I'm curious to know exactly how one makes rules in this situation. You have both acted without respect for yourselves or each other. Sounds a little late to be making up rules now.

[2sunny]

From your past posts - you seem to attach easily to men who don't offer you much.

 

How about having an available man "date" you? Have him make effort!

[Ludmila]

Thanks for the messages. It's 7am here now just so you know why I don't respond sooner.

 

NoIdidn't, your post makes probably the best point about this whole thing. He's clearly someone who is comfortable with lying. I'm not (ironic that I've been accused of making this all up ) and it is a huge, huge difference between us.

 

In fact there are loads of differences. Compatibility isn't something I can really put onto this relationship (such as it is, so far, I barely can call it that). There is an immense draw towards him, to each other maybe but it's irrational and it's stupid, because I can see straight away that he isn't like me, he's not honest and he's been staying in a long term relationship with someone else for Goodness knows what reason - either he is very attached to her and is lying to me about how well they get on, or he's not happy with her, she sounds miserable (I told him she does, and it isn't fair on her) and he is staying because he likes to abuse her trust, or take her for granted or just continually tell her one thing and do another.

 

I make no secret of the fact I think he is treating her like crap. I imagine he is very capable of treating me like crap, also. If you're not happy in something, you should just get out of it, right? Not work away and see whoever you like and keep lying to the person you're with.

 

But still I feel as though I love him, and I don't know why. I honestly, honestly don't know why I love someone who is doing all these awful things. It doesn't make sense.

 

I would rather love someone clean cut and innocent and well off and unattached, well, I think I would - that was the guy last year, I've never before dated anyone so good looking or successful etc etc. He was also a good person, well mainly...people would universally approve of him, but it never really got off the ground.

 

Total opposite to this man. I can't see anyone approving of him, or of me being with him. I don't want to hurt my wider family or even have them involved with him, as they just would not get on.

 

Can we choose who we love? Really? I don't know. There must be a heck of a lot of unconscious reasons.

 

Anyway I'm not sure what I'm going to do. He is going home tomorrow for the weekend and he is coming here today. I have to say that I don't really want to see him today. It makes me very uneasy.

 

By the way I am 38. I think what it is coming down to (I'm writing a lot down, by myself, trying to process it all) is that yes I adore him and that's something I can't choose to do or not. It just is.

But i don't have to act on it. I don't have to keep seeing him. I don't have to participate in the hurting of another person I don't even know.

I don't have to believe anything he says.

And I don't have to sleep with him.

 

I think that's where I am at the moment.

thanks again.

[Ludmila]

From your past posts - you seem to attach easily to men who don't offer you much.

 

How about having an available man "date" you? Have him make effort!

 

 

For some reason, I would feel deeply uncomfortable about that idea. I don't know if it's the thought of having a lot to live up to, if someone is available, and ready to start something 'proper'. I don't feel I am worth that.

 

Heck I don't even feel I'm worth this man dropping his partner for. (I don't want to call her his wife, because common law marriage doesn't exist in the UK so technically she isn't that. Though she has clear precedence over me in terms of 'owning' him, etc etc and deserves his and my respect no less than if he were married to her)

 

I am afraid first and foremost that he, or someone available, or anyone basically is going to get close to me, and suddenly look at me and say 'Oh my God, you're a failure of a human being, how could anyone even think of being with you?' and leave me instantly. So that's probably why the thought of being with someone available, normal, honest and good doesn't really resonate with me.

 

Not that I want to be with someone attached. It's just his failings don't really seem to bother me as much as they ought to, and adjunct to that, I don't see that I am good enough for anyone else.

[RRM]

Ludmila, I can totally understand being attracted to someone and not knowing why.

Ultimately though, you have to figure out what you want. Do you just want to be the Other Woman? He's not really indicating that he wants to end things with his current woman to be with you.

 

If you want to be with him, you need to lay down some ground rules and a time table for him to end things and stick to it. And if you feel that you are losing your resolve, you can always come here and post to get your feelings out and hopefully see things more objectively.