Seven months down the drain...

[buglet78]

I just made the point of him not intentionally leading her on to try to help reduce her anger towards him. In my experience around here, recovery is quicker when anger can be got past.

 

Agree with you about the 7 months. Compared to some stories around here, this is a pretty early escape. I'm sure it still hurts though.

 

Good luck (buglet)

 

It is interesting - I would say that most of my anger is towards myself. I am angry that I had inklings that this whole thing would blow up, and I did not end things. I am angry that I did not stand my ground regarding the original October 1 move-in date and stand up for myself against the needs/feelings/whatever of his church. Above all, I am angry that I did not pull the pin on this whole thing when I found out he was "still" married.

 

Reading the other stories here, I am glad I was able to escape early. It does still hurt, but I know that that will subside in time.

[ShatteredLady]

I think that everyone who looses love has to go through the stages of grief. I'm NOT convinced that trying to rush through the anger is a good idea. I know others don't necessarily agree.

 

For me, I got stuck in self-loathing & depression. Embracing anger was a relief & saved me in many ways. I think this is way some of us are overly harsh about the MM to begin with. Isn't it easier to let go if you can blame him more than yourself? I don't know...

 

At the end of the day even if he did 'love', his brand of love wasn't enough, he wasn't brave enough. HE wasn't made of strong enough stuff to keep true to his promises to you OR to his wife. Two women are left mourning & broken. He's hurting probably but I don't want to start a debate of who hurts more in these situations.

[buglet78]

I think that everyone who looses love has to go through the stages of grief. I'm NOT convinced that trying to rush through the anger is a good idea. I know others don't necessarily agree.

 

At the end of the day even if he did 'love', his brand of love wasn't enough, he wasn't brave enough. HE wasn't made of strong enough stuff to keep true to his promises to you OR to his wife. Two women are left mourning & broken. He's hurting probably but I don't want to start a debate of who hurts more in these situations.

 

I think we have to go through all the stages, on our own timetable. I find it interesting though that I went through the denial stage before things were officially over (Friday and Saturday, I had this sense that things were not going to pan out, but I thought to myself "he has started to bring things over. It took him a while to unload his car. He wouldn't do that if he wasn't serious about this").

 

I think everyone hurts in these situations, but the why and the hurt are different. Wife feels betrayed because her husband had an affair. Me as the OW is hurting because I was bamboozled into believing that this would be a real relationship. xMM is hurting because he lost a source of attention/ego feeding/sex.

[beautiful_day]

I think you have to avoid skewed thinking though. He didn't stay because his wife persuaded him - many a betrayed spouse knows to their cost that you can't nice or guilt them out of an affair - or because he came to Jesus. He stayed because when the moment finally came to act, he decided that he'd really rather stay home. He chose for his own happiness, not anyone else's.

 

This was not the best version of yourself. How are you going to make right with the universe?

[Cyra]

His wife sounds like a doormat, he told her hed been seeing another woman and was moving in with her and she begged him to come back. At that point she should have kicked his a$$ out. However by not doing so she made you a huge favor. Let her have this weak man, i doubt there is much happiness going on there atm. But youve been set free from what that burden. You can move on to better things, they are stuck with each other.

[buglet78]

His wife sounds like a doormat, he told her hed been seeing another woman and was moving in with her and she begged him to come back. At that point she should have kicked his a$$ out. However by not doing so she made you a huge favor. Let her have this weak man, i doubt there is much happiness going on there atm. But youve been set free from what that burden. You can move on to better things, they are stuck with each other.

 

I think he's equally the doormat in this scenario. He had started to move things into my house, and seemed prepared to turn this into a legit relationship, but let his wife, pastor, and presumably the rest of their church congregation walk all over him. You are right that she sounds like a doormat too - I think she is one of those that values the financial stability and the idea of being married above all else, and could not put that aside to just let him go.

[buglet78]

Let's not forget, he's hiding behind religion. Talk about spineless.

 

It is interesting:

 

1. Religion didn't seem to matter when he initiated all of this.

 

2. Religion didn't seem to matter when he had sex (and there were times when he was DEMANDING it) with someone he was not married to

 

3. Religion didn't seem to matter when he was making plans to move in with someone he was not married to

[aileD]

I've been called a doormat on several occasions for wanting to save my marriage and for pursuing that while H was running off apartment hunting with someone half his age.

 

But I could not my make my husband do anything he did not want to do. He came back under his own free will. Out of love, out of guilt, out of a sense of responsibility and for our family and our history and the fact that he DID NOT do the work to see if our relationship could survive BEFORE he has the affair.

 

Your MM choosing to stay married and work on his marriage is his choice. He isn't being forced into it by god or church or wife or anyone.

 

Because he was already out the door. He just couldn't make that last step..something holds them back . It can't be blamed on outside people.

 

If he loved you enough, he would have taken the last step. He didn't. It's good you got out now.

 

Hope for healing for you

[BTDT2012]

His wife sounds like a doormat, he told her hed been seeing another woman and was moving in with her and she begged him to come back. At that point she should have kicked his a$$ out. However by not doing so she made you a huge favor. Let her have this weak man, i doubt there is much happiness going on there atm. But youve been set free from what that burden. You can move on to better things, they are stuck with each other.

 

Don't be so certain that she is a doormat.

[Grapesofwrath]

Bug: I remember reading somewhere that if an affair goes on for longer than 3-6 months, then you know that the MM is comfortable with the deception.

 

When I read that, I realized that most A's probably last at least this long, and then I read on LS that most last longer. If it helps at all, please know that 7 months is not that long. You are on the path toward healing, and someday this will all just be a blink of an eye.

[Southern Sun]

It is interesting:

 

1. Religion didn't seem to matter when he initiated all of this.

 

2. Religion didn't seem to matter when he had sex (and there were times when he was DEMANDING it) with someone he was not married to

 

3. Religion didn't seem to matter when he was making plans to move in with someone he was not married to

 

I always find it interesting when you hear someone in an affair saying how, due to their religion, they just can't divorce. No way.

 

Things that make you go, hmmm.

 

I do think there is something to a need to maintain a "good person" image. Or maybe not even an image...if you think of yourself a certain way...you go to church, you generally live right, you're nice, thoughtful, kind, etc...when you are faced with the reality of what you've actually done if you've had an affair, all your big ideas can really go down the tubes.

 

Like others, I don't know that he is a con man. Maybe he is, maybe not. But maybe he's one of those people who considers himself a "good guy." Yet he found himself in an affair, something he never thought he would do, but he rationalized it because he wasn't in love with his wife anymore. So he made plans to "do the right thing" - end his marriage and move on with his new love. He wasn't even going to stay in the cake-eating situation! He was actually going to do the hard thing and choose.

 

But when D Day hit, and the world came crashing down on him, he may have realized that he just couldn't let his marriage go out like that. If it was going to end, he didn't want to be the guy trouncing it with an affair. It just wouldn't be the "right" thing to do. The right thing would be to try to reconcile first. And then if it didn't work anyway, at least he would feel like he tried. This way, his image of himself remains intact.

 

It's still all horribly wrong and ended up hurting you. Be glad you are only 7 months in. Be very very careful about him trying to come back to you once the dust settles, because you could end up devoting more months and years of your life to this.

[buglet78]

Bug: I remember reading somewhere that if an affair goes on for longer than 3-6 months, then you know that the MM is comfortable with the deception.

 

When I read that, I realized that most A's probably last at least this long, and then I read on LS that most last longer. If it helps at all, please know that 7 months is not that long. You are on the path toward healing, and someday this will all just be a blink of an eye.

 

I am so grateful that things ended when they did (even though one of my regrets was not ending things sooner - I was starting to chafe even at one month). I have been reading some of the stories on here, and there is no way I would have been able to last for years in that situation.

[buglet78]

I always find it interesting when you hear someone in an affair saying how, due to their religion, they just can't divorce. No way.

 

Things that make you go, hmmm.

 

I do think there is something to a need to maintain a "good person" image. Or maybe not even an image...if you think of yourself a certain way...you go to church, you generally live right, you're nice, thoughtful, kind, etc...when you are faced with the reality of what you've actually done if you've had an affair, all your big ideas can really go down the tubes.

 

Like others, I don't know that he is a con man. Maybe he is, maybe not. But maybe he's one of those people who considers himself a "good guy." Yet he found himself in an affair, something he never thought he would do, but he rationalized it because he wasn't in love with his wife anymore. So he made plans to "do the right thing" - end his marriage and move on with his new love. He wasn't even going to stay in the cake-eating situation! He was actually going to do the hard thing and choose.

 

But when D Day hit, and the world came crashing down on him, he may have realized that he just couldn't let his marriage go out like that. If it was going to end, he didn't want to be the guy trouncing it with an affair. It just wouldn't be the "right" thing to do. The right thing would be to try to reconcile first. And then if it didn't work anyway, at least he would feel like he tried. This way, his image of himself remains intact.

 

It's still all horribly wrong and ended up hurting you. Be glad you are only 7 months in. Be very very careful about him trying to come back to you once the dust settles, because you could end up devoting more months and years of your life to this.

 

I have no intention of letting him back in. I blocked him from every communication channel there is (as well as our mutual friends - I don't want contact via third party/people going on fishing trips for info). I'm hurting enough as it is - I don't want to hurt again.

[buglet78]

It's been an up and down few days. I still feel very angry at myself (the anger towards him subsided once he finally got his stuff out of my house and left Sunday!).

 

I feel angry that I turned myself into a liar. I would tell people that I was in a relationship, but would leave out that this was an affair (there was enough of a semblance to a real relationship that I was able to pull it off, but it's the principle).

 

I feel angry that I lost my independence. Before xMM came into the picture, it never used to bother me to go to events solo and being alone never bothered me. However, I learned that there is a difference between being alone by choice and being alone due to circumstance (if that makes any sense).

 

(and the whole "planning my life around him"/blowing people off because he might text me (and we did have a fairly substantial amount of contact for an affair) - I'm really angry about that.

 

I feel angry that I gave into the forbidden fruit allure (and that the whole "conducting a relationship primarily through Facebook messenger" really appealed to me at first because I am a huge introvert and need a lot of downtime).

 

I feel angry that I let things get out of the friendzone (we were really good friends, and I burned I don't know how many bridges because of this).

 

I feel angry that I did not cut things off when I found out he was "still" married because I wanted to "accept him for who he was"

 

I feel conflicted because I don't feel like it is appropriate for me to grieve this (being the OW, I should have realized that this was bound to happen at some point, even though we came thisclose to being a legitimate relationship). As well, this was a very short affair too, so even among other OW, I don't feel like I can grieve.

 

As well, I feel like, if at some point I enter into a legitimate relationship with someone and that person strays, I don't have the right to be upset/angry with them because what goes around comes around.

 

I have signed up for a couple classes starting in early November (giving me something to look forward to/an opportunity to meet new people in a casual, make new platonic friends setting, but at the same time, letting me try to find some semblance of healing), so maybe I am slowly starting to regain my independence.

[Cyra]

Don't be so certain that she is a doormat.

 

Im sorry i am. The man told her he wanted to be with someone else. What type of person takes him back after that? One that doesnt value herself.

Edited October 20, 2016 by Cyra

[Cloudcuckoo]

Im sorry i am. The man told her he wanted to be with someone else. What type of person takes him back after that? One that doesnt value herself.

 

It's preposterous to make assumptions like that.

 

Nobody knows what went on in that house, let alone any begging or pleading by his wife. In fact it's usually the weaker of the two who wasn't strong enough to deal with any marital issues, if there were any in the first place, who does the begging frankly.

 

After all, the wayward spouse is the one who decided that shagging someone outside the marriage was the best way to handle 'trouble at home'.?!?)...

 

The fact is, this man had no intention of leaving when it came to it, no matter how caught up in his silly game he got.

 

Buglet, I applaud you. You have handled the situation with stoic dignity and I am so sorry that you've been subjected to this man's idiotic behaviour. It's dreadful that he led you such a merry dance but hold your head high.

 

You've done a marvellous job of handling it. You're stronger then you probably feel right now, but I say bravo! He'll try again I'm sure, but when he does I believe you'll be no fool again..

 

Wishing you better days ahead while you go through the fallout.

 

Cuckoo x

[BTDT2012]

Im sorry i am. The man told her he wanted to be with someone else. What type of person takes him back after that? One that doesnt value herself.

 

The type of person that believes in the value of forgiveness, grace and mercy. Trying to reconcile is hard work, and requires both parties to be all in. It certainly makes more sense than the OW's who allow MM to go back and forth.

Edited October 20, 2016 by BTDT2012

[buglet78]

The type of person that believes in the value of forgiveness, grace and mercy. Trying to reconcile is hard work, and requires both parties to be all in. It certainly makes more sense than the OW's who allow MM to go back and forth.

 

I hope for everyone's sakes, that both of them are all in. If what xMM told me about his (alleged) marriage problems was even a sliver true, then he was the one doing all the work to save the marriage before. If that should happen to transpire now, he is going to have to find some other sucker to be his OW because I am not coming back.