The pain of the OW

[Ailsa1983]

The heartache of the OW

 

We know it's wrong to interfere in a marriage and most of our A did "just happen" they weren't meant to and we didn't want to hurt anyone but we fell in love, stupidly and hopelessly. We fell for the flattery and we fell for the excitement of something new. We knew we would get burnt in the end but the addiction is too powerful sometimes.

 

We wait for them like pets, we await their texts and calls and start to get paranoid and anxious if they do not. We love our time together the highs of an affair are extremely powerful, the sex is even more powerful and intense. We both know it's wrong we both try to split up numerous times but we just can't get enough of the highs of the addiction. We learn everything about each other in a very short period of time as we yearn to know every detail of each other's lives because we know this what we have is short lived. We know he won't leave his wife and most of us are quite content with that but we still feel extreme jealousy when he says he's off out with his wife or he can't meet, speak or see us because he is with her family etc. In our hearts though we push ourselves to our limits we give him everything of ourselves our minds bodies and souls hoping that maybe someday we will be enough for him.

 

 

D-day the dreaded day we fear and also take a sigh of relief, he has to choose now we have given him everything in our being please choose us. But as we all know this is the least scenario we are usually left with an abrupt note saying "sorry, I love my wife please don't contact me again" then that's when out worlds and "fog" shatter, when the tears fall and the anxiety starts, we are in pieces broken like a china dolls, left abandoned, feeling used, feeling dirty and even full of revenge. Our minds play everything over and over and over again "why did he do this" "I knew he wasn't going to leave" "I thought I was enough" most of us end up in individual counselling trying to deal with the after math of the rejection and humiliation. The days followed by weeks followed by months of a severe depression of self loathing and crying ourselves to sleep at night "how can he just act like nothing happened" "how can he just cut me off like that" "I really thought I meant more than that". Most of us never get closure and are left in a state of denial and pure agony, life doesn't seen the same, we can't function, we have just had the highest highs of our lives suddenly to be dumped in the gutter with no explanations and never knowing if everything was just a big fat lie.

 

Maybe we did mean a lot and the reality of the situation was just too much for the MM to bear. I was one of the lucky ones who got closure who got a chance to speak with him before permanent NC became. But I also remember the months of darkness the months off pain and grievance.

 

Eventually the guilt hits when we are over our own pain, and we feel disgusted, ashamed and extremely sorry for doing this to BS in question. I again was unfortunate as I seen the damage of our actions on the BS you can bet I wasn't the only one on medication and individual counselling to get over this ordeal.

 

Affairs seem harmless and the best times of your life while experiencing them but when the glass shatters the devil rises and burns us all.

Edited July 8, 2014 by Ailsa1983

[hippetyhop]

You hit the nail on the head with the post.

 

Although it was an A, it was a R with a bond and chemistry of one sort or another. Its a breakup that hurts.

[SammySammy]

Excellent post. It very accurately describes the intensity of an affair and what makes them so enticing, so difficult to leave and so devastating.

[snappytomcat]

thank you for posting this alisa,i know some bs wont agree,but now that im in a really good place in my marriage,i understand that affairs hurt a lot of people,and this includes the ow/om,some say that ow/om bought this on themselves,but I have did a lot a shyt,that im not proud of,and I didn't mean for it to happen.

 

 

when I first found out about xws A,he told me he didn't know how it happened,it went from just talking like friends,and then turned into a full blown A,at first I called this b*ll****,this doesn't just happen,but I now believe that most affairs do just happen,unless you are just a piece of crap,and go out looking for one,but I don't think that's the norm,i don't think that those involved in the A,say lets just hurt the bs,as much as possible who cares,and I do understand your pain even as a bs,I feel bad you are hurting,and I hope and pray for healing for you,and I wish you well stay strong

[Ailsa1983]

No we don't, think back to when you were dating your husband, the feelings, the excitement, the awaiting phone calls etc. that's what it is like, a new born relationship unfortunately built on lies and deceit but the excitement is too much the fear of losing the highs in the affair are strong. That's why most affairs will not end unless a d-day occurs and it's always the OW who is left out in the cold.

 

I am by no way saying the BS does not experience pain I know that is not true her life is more so shattered. This post is merely about the pain of ow.

[waterwoman]

Hi ailsa, you are a compassionate wise human being and this post proves it xx

[Ailsa1983]

Thank you WW you are very kind soul as well your posts are always compassionate wether they are for OW/MM or the BS.

 

I just wanted to write something about the agony of the OW I am in no way undermining the pain of the BS, I can almost (and only almost) understand why some OW can go a little crazy after d-day, it's mostly closure we crave the abruptness is heart wrenching. I know it is our own faults we got ourselves into this situation so we must deal with the consequences. Sometimes we just fall head over heals and think with our hearts instead of our brains especially when we were already in a vulnerable situation, the same goes for the MM he usually is vulnerable as well and that's how the A happened at that time.

[SammySammy]

Everybody hurts.

 

Even OM who inadvertently end up with a MW can be deeply affected by the relationship.

[MayP]

Thank you WW you are very kind soul as well your posts are always compassionate wether they are for OW/MM or the BS.

 

I just wanted to write something about the agony of the OW I am in no way undermining the pain of the BS, I can almost (and only almost) understand why some OW can go a little crazy after d-day, it's mostly closure we crave the abruptness is heart wrenching. I know it is our own faults we got ourselves into this situation so we must deal with the consequences. Sometimes we just fall head over heals and think with our hearts instead of our brains especially when we were already in a vulnerable situation, the same goes for the MM he usually is vulnerable as well and that's how the A happened at that time.

 

Do you think it is mostly the women who are too emotional? Using her heart, ignoring the brain. Men are wired differently.

[Ailsa1983]

Do you think it is mostly the women who are too emotional? Using her heart, ignoring the brain. Men are wired differently.

 

Yes I do but I also think men do this at the beginning of an A also but when d-day hits men seem to start using their brains again while women are controlled by their hearts. Not all of course but I think most of us.

[MayP]

Yes I do but I also think men do this at the beginning of an A also but when d-day hits men seem to start using their brains again while women are controlled by their hearts. Not all of course but I think most of us.

 

 

Sometimes I wish I can be more manly listen to my brains and logic more. That heart just behaves like a little kid more often than not!

[Ailsa1983]

The heart wants what's not good for it !!

[Star2880]

Thank you for writing this. You have exactly described how I currently feel, the questions I ask myself daily about myself and xAP.

It has been 5 months NC and it still destroys me every day!

I still find it hard to comprehend how you can move forward after a very deep 3 year affair as if it never happened and that person is never to be in your life again. A void in my heart.

Your post actually made me cry... Even being on the medication!

[enya46]

Ailsa, I read your post several times and want to thank you.

It really helps me see that I am not the only one having these feelings.

 

Friends who haven't been in an A do not seem to understand how much pain I am feeling. They throw out stats saying: they never leave their W, you knew it, you need to think about yourself now, etc.

 

I was also lucky to not be left in the dark after D-day. My MM never stopped contacting me in one way or the other, even after telling me that his W asked him to make a decision. He decided to stay with his family.

 

I feel even more confused now because after D-day (4 months ago), after 1.5 month, we started seeing eachother again. He still texts me, although not in a romantic and sensual way he used to before D-day. But when we meet, it's like nothing ever happened. The promises he seem to has made to his W seem to disappear.

 

What hurts me most is that he stopped saying ILY, that he doesn't text me good night, those little words I was used to every single day during the 7 months before D-day.

 

At first he asked me to keep the messages down and that I could call him at the office. Now we are back to texting again, but I do try to avoid texting him during weekends or at night, unless he starts.

 

All this makes me very sad because I do love him dearly. I was somehow hopeful that if he came to be with me after D-day, after all the hurt he said he caused his W, then that would really mean that he cannot make up his mind.

 

He always said he would not leave his family (he has two teenage daughters) but his actions and the time he dedicated to me made me feel so special.

 

I don't know how to stop this. It's really like you say in your post: we wait like pets. I feel miserable and I miss him so much. But when I text him an *i miss you!*, he sends me a kiss. In feb it would have been *i miss you too, so much. I can't wait to hug you again*.

 

Sorry for this rather unstructured post. I'm trying to put my emotions together.

[MayP]

I feel like a pet now.

 

Waiting for him to sort his marriage out, giving him time to fix on his side. Telling him I am fine.

I decided to be kinder to myself over this first weekend. I quit checking my email box (he is the only sender), resisted the urge to log in JUST IN CASE he needs me. I know it is childish that I forward the emails to my usual account that I will check on and off, weekdays.

Thinking about removing the forward function all together, I have to be nicer to myself! Even if he emails there and see no reply, there are other ways to get me (my usual account and my phone number). I still care too much, to let him go at this moment when he is hurting and needing some avenue, and I trust that he is not telling any lies.

 

I don't know, but I am going for a real good hair treatment and facial this/ next week.

[atreides]

Please, My post is not to berate, but i have questions after reading your well written post.

 

We wait for them like pets

 

This, made me pause with how you reflected back upon the A... assuming of course not seeing it that way while it was going on, your mind must be out of control during the A and for you to describe it as such, really made me pause and feel for the mental torture that must be felt.

 

 

We learn everything about each other in a very short period of time as we yearn to know every detail of each other's lives because we know this what we have is short lived.

 

In the A's i know of, everyone felt like then did not "really" know their AP. For one, most were for "on the side fun" and well tamed, for a lack of a better word. Is it not in the end that to which you conclude, that you are left with nothing... in that "really" knowing someone takes much more time and as i like to say the test of the mundane of life? To this day, 16 years with my wife, I learn new things. Perhaps it is that we change and thus we learn these changes as something new or perhaps was never discovered in the first place.

 

 

 

 

when the tears fall and the anxiety starts, we are in pieces broken like a china dolls, left abandoned, feeling used, feeling dirty and even full of revenge.

 

Why? Especially dirty, what was so dirty? I am sure the moments while it lasted were fulfilling and overwhelming or it would not have gone on. I don't understand, "dirty" this is i ask in conjunction with my question below and I assume it has to do with the feeling of being "used" and not the wake up call of D-Day in the realization that the A was the wrong thing to do.

 

Our minds play everything over and over and over again "why did he do this" "I knew he wasn't going to leave" "I thought I was enough" most of us end up in individual counselling trying to deal with the after math of the rejection and humiliation. The days followed by weeks followed by months of a severe depression of self loathing and crying ourselves to sleep at night "how can he just act like nothing happened" "how can he just cut me off like that" "I really thought I meant more than that". Most of us never get closure and are left in a state of denial and pure agony, life doesn't seen the same, we can't function, we have just had the highest highs of our lives suddenly to be dumped in the gutter with no explanations and never knowing if everything was just a big fat lie.

 

Maybe we did mean a lot and the reality of the situation was just too much for the MM to bear.

.

 

In the context of an A, what is meant by "I meant more than that", than what exactly? Clearly there was meaning or it would not have gone on. But also in regards to being used and "dirty" is that the MM must make a choice, one you already knew would come to fruition make the meaning less? and why would it? Now as for used, how so? Was it not mutual?

 

What is closure in this context? What would suffice really in the end?

 

If I may, most of the affairs that have happened in my circles are by women and by very planned, manipulative and controlled situations for what they would define it as. I guess, while all A's are wrong it makes more sense to me while again... as i said as tragic as A's are, these women would start and stop on a dime. No real attachments and I guess for a lack of a better word no internal contradictions about it. With morals aside, there was some logic to it.

 

It goes to show the varied dynamics behind A's but the realization of such in how one plans or the "it just happened" of which I am more critical of, they both are a process and posts like this with heart felt stories of joy to pain make it that much harder to grasp.

Edited July 14, 2014 by atreides

[Ailsa1983]

Please, My post is not to berate, but i have questions after reading your well written post.

 

 

 

This, made me pause with how you reflected back upon the A... assuming of course not seeing it that way while it was going on, your mind must be out of control during the A and for you to describe it as such, really made me pause and feel for the mental torture that must be felt.

 

 

 

 

In the A's i know of, everyone felt like then did not "really" know their AP. For one, most were for "on the side fun" and well tamed, for a lack of a better word. Is it not in the end that to which you conclude, that you are left with nothing... in that "really" knowing someone takes much more time and as i like to say the test of the mundane of life? To this day, 16 years with my wife, I learn new things. Perhaps it is that we change and thus we learn these changes as something new or perhaps was never discovered in the first place.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Why? Especially dirty, what was so dirty? I am sure the moments while it lasted were fulfilling and overwhelming or it would not have gone on. I don't understand, "dirty" this is i ask in conjunction with my question below and I assume it has to do with the feeling of being "used" and not the wake up call of D-Day in the realization that the A was the wrong thing to do.

 

 

 

In the context of an A, what is meant by "I meant more than that", than what exactly? Clearly there was meaning or it would not have gone on. But also in regards to being used and "dirty" is that the MM must make a choice, one you already knew would come to fruition make the meaning less? and why would it? Now as for used, how so? Was it not mutual?

 

What is closure in this context? What would suffice really in the end?

 

If I may, most of the affairs that have happened in my circles are by women and by very planned, manipulative and controlled situations for what they would define it as. I guess, while all A's are wrong it makes more sense to me while again... as i said as tragic as A's are, these women would start and stop on a dime. No real attachments and I guess for a lack of a better word no internal contradictions about it. With morals aside, there was some logic to it.

 

It goes to show the varied dynamics behind A's but the realization of such in how one plans or the "it just happened" of which I am more critical of, they both are a process and posts like this with heart felt stories of joy to pain make it that much harder to grasp.

 

 

I can't speak for every OW out there but from my own experience my A did "just happen" we got close, yes we chose to get close and the attraction was severe.

 

I think as time goes on most OW start thinking differently and start daydreaming about a real life with their MM no more lies no more deceit. Let's just be together. As for feeling dirty and used yes I did I shared my most inner secrets with this man I gave him my body like I have no one else, was it competition ? Yes probably but I didn't see it at the the I just wanted him, and used myself to get him.

We knew everything within a short period of time his whole life from a child we used to share stories everyday our likes and dislikes which therefor started a bond which I have never experienced before.

 

I knew he wouldn't choose me I always knew it but some small part of me hoped that after d-day he would come back to me, he wasn't physical with his wife and he definitely wasn't emotionally involved, how could he have been ? He was texting me all night while she was working and texting me all day while he was working.

[atreides]

I can't speak for every OW out there but from my own experience my A did "just happen" we got close, yes we chose to get close and the attraction was severe.

 

I think as time goes on most OW start thinking differently and start daydreaming about a real life with their MM no more lies no more deceit. Let's just be together. As for feeling dirty and used yes I did I shared my most inner secrets with this man I gave him my body like I have no one else, was it competition ? Yes probably but I didn't see it at the the I just wanted him, and used myself to get him.

We knew everything within a short period of time his whole life from a child we used to share stories everyday our likes and dislikes which therefor started a bond which I have never experienced before.

 

I knew he wouldn't choose me I always knew it but some small part of me hoped that after d-day he would come back to me, he wasn't physical with his wife and he definitely wasn't emotionally involved, how could he have been ? He was texting me all night while she was working and texting me all day while he was working.

 

Thanks so much for replying.

 

"Used yourself?" While the A is wrong, let's take that out of the equation, how would you use yourself? You wanted something, he wanted something, this is a mutual and reciprocating relationship. I would not go as far as used. Let's say this was not an A and a growing relationship that develops and again you give yourself, all of it. It may pan out to be a great relationship or maybe it does not but if i were on the other side of your relationship, i would not want you to hold back because you felt you were "using yourself." It's a risk we take but we should always give the best the whole of ourselves if we are going to have the best shot at a relationship.

As for the A, one can give 100% and I am sure he did to you, but just because a switch is triggered does not mean the 100% now in hindsight is really 50%.

 

For those OW, when a chose needs to be made and you are not the one chosen, does not equate to it did not mean anything or less of something. Many like to use "life is not black and white" but they misunderstand the context of what that really means. Life is black and white because we choose one way or another and decision x produces it's result at the opportunity of cost of a different choice. I think perhaps that is the hardest to swallow and much more comfortable to live in the grey.

 

As for the women i spoke of earlier, they only vested what they wanted which was not a relationship in the sense that would lead to something bigger. They too texted a lot, they were good at it. One H did not find out until she made a mistake after 6 years.

 

Perhaps, and again morals aside, as they say communicate, that what is given and expected in return should be made known so that nothing goes unrequited, but perhaps that is suppressed by the contradiction of the A itself.

[Ailsa1983]

I did use myself I gave my everything to this man only to be rejected in the end so I do see it as using myself. In the midst of the A I did not see it at that I just wanted him. Now the A is over and after the craziness of d-day and the months afterwards I see how desperate I became to keep to make him mine, to make him see me as his first and only choice I wanted him to want me as much as I wanted him. I do not doubt that he never loved me I know he did but the reality of things and the hurt caused was just too much for him to bear.

 

I wish them well on their recovery, I myself was involved with another man for a while but I ended it because it was a distraction and I would break his heart just like MM done to me and I wouldn't want anyone (including BS) to go through that agony.