Single ExOM in EA - on breaking NC

[Difficultstuff]

Thanks again Elaine and notmyfinestmoment. I really take on board what you say.

I told her in my final texts that I'd not be in touch unless she was. Both to reassure her I wasn't going to be chasing her and to prevent myself from doing that because I knew I'd want to. Also because I wanted to give her some power, as it were. She's someone who struggled to feel in control, overcompensating by being hyper-organised and efficient. That's my impression at least - some of that description fits me at various points in my life.

I guess I had an illusion that I'd feel I'd done the right thing and thus feel automatically better after a couple of months. (I have seen some posts here where people say that, but admittedly not many.)

Don't know if this makes sense but I just miss the feeling I was constantly learning new things about the world and myself when I was with her - she's changed my outlook on life really. And, as I said before, it was upsetting to both of us to part ways - wasn't a case of 'the relationship has run its course' or 'I don't feel the same for you anymore' which are things I've been on the end of.

I trust the universe that what has happened is just preparing me to be able to move on to a maybe healthier future. It's hard to balance what I genuinely believe were very real feelings and experiences with the actual situation as a whole. Drawing on (but not idealizing) the positives while accepting (but not condemning or demonising) the negatives - so again, acceptance and forgiveness.

[notmyfinestmoment]

6 hours ago, Difficultstuff said:

I guess I had an illusion that I'd feel I'd done the right thing and thus feel automatically better after a couple of months. (I have seen some posts here where people say that, but admittedly not many.)

Don't know if this makes sense but I just miss the feeling I was constantly learning new things about the world and myself when I was with her - she's changed my outlook on life really. And, as I said before, it was upsetting to both of us to part ways - wasn't a case of 'the relationship has run its course' or 'I don't feel the same for you anymore' which are things I've been on the end of.

I trust the universe that what has happened is just preparing me to be able to move on to a maybe healthier future. It's hard to balance what I genuinely believe were very real feelings and experiences with the actual situation as a whole. Drawing on (but not idealizing) the positives while accepting (but not condemning or demonising) the negatives - so again, acceptance and forgiveness.

Ideally, doing the right thing does feel good, but unfortunately that doesn't seem to apply to ending an affair (EA or PA).   I'm not going to lie, when I read your original post,  I was pretty early into my NC (still am I guess at a month) and saw that you were up to 6 months of NC and still didn't feel relief.   It was so discouraging because like you, I thought each passing month would bring us to a place of peace.  This morning I woke up feeling worse than I have.  It's like you know you did the right thing by ending it when you did, why isn't there relief in that?

What you are saying does make sense.  If you feel like she brought out the best in you, that is really hard to let go of or to duplicate with someone else.  I don't know if it is the nature of an A?   

As far as it ending on a high, that absolutely makes it harder to let go because the relationship didn't run it's course.  It's like driving down the highway going 100mph and abruptly throwing the car in reverse.  It is a whiplash like no other.   While I don't have any words to make you feel better, I do want you to know that what you are feeling, many of us can relate to and sympathize with.

 

[Daisydooks]

On 2/13/2020 at 9:43 AM, Difficultstuff said:

I also assume by now she's confessed to him and is dealing with all that.

No she hasnt. She dropped you like the bad habit you were and is happy with her partner. He knows NOTHING. What makes you suspect she told him any of this?   

On 2/13/2020 at 9:43 AM, Difficultstuff said:

I feel that I should have found a way to be there for her even if she hadn't  (yet) chosen me - because she loved me.

This is called delusion. A cheater loves themselves. She loves her. She doesnt love you, and its questionable whether she loves her partner. She comes first. 

 

[Difficultstuff]

Thank you. I really relate to what you say too. There's a bit of self-indulgence on my part in all this that I see - that writing here keeps me looping round. 

Not to give false hope, but the first 6 to 8 weeks were hell, a blur, but I was socially busy. Then my social life went more inactive, which depressed me - I withdrew from the world too much. And the winter months are always tough for me. But it's getting lighter and I'm living more realistically now, less utterly destroyed, remembering some of my own strengths and talents.

If I'd found this site earlier it would have helped. And I do have different perspectives now. Example: I only realised very recently how much I wanted to demonstrate our relationship publically (just by being a couple, nothing extreme). And how not being able to hurt.

(As I said initially we were away with about 20 other people for a week last summer, and were very publically doing a sort of push-me/pull-you. She told me everyone thought we were having an affair. I suspect now she was hoping it'd all get back to her SO - the usual story of someone trying to provoke a reaction.)

I knew she was often hard to deal with before I got deeply involved. I'm sure she still is. And I've also had a sense of disgust a few times thinking about her - I've seen others mention this. It's not pleasant but it happens. So yes, a lot is the potential loss, not an actual one.

Hope your afternoon and evening is more peaceful than your morning!

[Difficultstuff]

1 hour ago, Daisydooks said:

No she hasnt. She dropped you like the bad habit you were and is happy with her partner. He knows NOTHING. What makes you suspect she told him any of this?   

This is called delusion. A cheater loves themselves. She loves her. She doesnt love you, and its questionable whether she loves her partner. She comes first. 

 

Thanks for this. I guess these are unanswerables. I get what you say and I'm very willing to consider what you write as potentially true - I'm not clinging to 'she loved me' as a romantic life raft here, more what I felt true at the time - and obviously she's not with me now!

[Daisydooks]

8 minutes ago, Difficultstuff said:

Thanks for this. I guess these are unanswerables. I get what you say and I'm very willing to consider what you write as potentially true - I'm not clinging to 'she loved me' as a romantic life raft here, more what I felt true at the time - and obviously she's not with me now!

Dont cling to anything said by a cheating asshat. What you feel may be valid. What she felt was a need for validation out of boredom. I guarentee had you pressured her to leave her comfy relationship, she would have ghosted you, become a different person and definitely would have shown her true colours. You backed out and made her life easy so she didn't have to end things.  

[Difficultstuff]

2 hours ago, Daisydooks said:

Dont cling to anything said by a cheating asshat. What you feel may be valid. What she felt was a need for validation out of boredom. I guarentee had you pressured her to leave her comfy relationship, she would have ghosted you, become a different person and definitely would have shown her true colours. You backed out and made her life easy so she didn't have to end things.  

I want to respond but am not sure how. I don't really want to vilify or praise her - or myself - too much on here. At least we parted civilly. But I do agree with the last statement.

[SummerDreams]

How do you honestly believe she loves you while she chose him? If she really loved you, she would move mountains to be with you. It seems to me you had some fantasy relationship with her while she was just having some fun before marriage. She is too young for you and you need to wake up and find a decent woman for you.

[notmyfinestmoment]

@Difficultstuff  Remember that no one is in your shoes or knows your AP.   Meaning, she may not be a horrible person and her feelings for you may have very well been real.  Sometimes, feelings take over and people get in over their heads and make poor choices.    It happened to us as AP's, it could very well be the case for MAP's as well.   She may have wanted to be with you, but walking away from her current situation wasn't something she was prepared to do (time invested,  disappointing people, etc.).  Walking away is never as easy as people make it out to be.   I saw something interesting about forgiveness and not being bitter.   It said the difference is separating "they did a bad thing" and "they are a bad person".  Just something to think about.  

You walked away in a peaceful and loving way before you got even more involved.    And you may be thinking maybe if I would have shown her more of who I was, she would have had a better insight and would have wanted it to be more.  I get that, really I do.   Most of us have had that thought...There are plenty of 'if only's".   Letting her go was the healthiest decision for both of you.  

 

[elaine567]

35 minutes ago, SummerDreams said:

If she really loved you, she would move mountains to be with you.

She was not married, she did not have kids, she was essentially a free agent.
She decided to go with the best option for her.
She chose HIM, not you. she weighed up the pros and cons and chose him
Yes you can choose to believe in this great love story, this fantasy, or you can choose reality.
At 6 months you need to start seeing this for what it really was. 
She is no saint, she was just some cheating woman basking in the adoration of two guys for a while.
What a great ego boost for her! 
How could you ever trust her?

When push came to shove, she didn't want you.
She just disappeared, no pleading, no tearful late night texts/calls, no breadcrumbs, nothing.
Time to bin that fairy tale and get on with your own life.
You are already 42, you can't afford to waste valuable time mooching about after some woman who thought it was OK to keep two guys in tow.
Next time find someone closer to your own age, who is actually single. 
 

[Difficultstuff]

Well, she said the words and I believed them then. I never said I think she loves me right now! Yes, there was an age difference - but I know a few stable couples with similar or bigger age differences, some with kids. I get you're trying to jolt me out of what you see as a fantasy. I'm aware I'm unlikely to hear from her, don't want to revisit the past, not sure I even want to be with her. I'm really just here to gently work through all the conflicting feelings.

[SummerDreams]

Ask yourself this: If in these 6 months you had found a good woman to be your GF, would you be thinking about that girl still?

You need to start caring about yourself and find some hobbies, meet new people, in general socialize and have fun. Leave the fantasy world and live the present.

[Daisydooks]

1 hour ago, Difficultstuff said:

I want to respond but am not sure how. I don't really want to vilify or praise her - or myself - too much on here. At least we parted civilly. But I do agree with the last statement.

Civil departures are always nice but it's also left you hurt and missing her 6 months later so I am hoping to open your eyes because you have placed her on a  pedestal you never should have had her on. That happens in Affairyland. You're hurting, while she is planning her wedding and you're silly enough to think "she is dealing with the fallout from telling her fiance about you." She didnt. She got a pass from you when you decided to back out, and she had no reason to tell, so she didnt. I can guarantee she didnt. Also, love? Her behaviour doesnt make sense when speaking about love. You dont do this to someone you love and her words were empty. 

My advice is to take her off the pedestal and wake up. You came here to tell us how much you are struggling with NC after 6 months with a woman 13 years your junior, who has a partner and has for a very long time. See it for what it is and you'll have an easier time getting the heck over it. I am not attempting to argue with you, but to open your eyes. The relationship to you was much different than it was to her. She didnt care. You did. Her life didnt change much. Yours did   

 She is not the person you have made her out to be. She did not love you. You were a fantasy, albeit short lived with no sex to my understanding. 

You NEED to understand that. I share this because you're sitting here, on this site, having issues with no contact with an EA that went nowhere. You've got to give your head a good shake, friend.

On 2/13/2020 at 9:43 AM, Difficultstuff said:

That was six months ago now and I'm still devastated despite moving on with life.

 Like you're 42, wasted 6 months of your life on some young 29 year old engaged chick who threw "I love you" around (while cheating on her fiance with you) and you very much placed her on a  pedestal "where you learned so much about yourself and she was so amazing and she no doubt loved you." I'm calling BULLCRAP is all. Maybe if you see this for what it was, you would have a MUCH easier time with no contact because you'd see her for what she is and what your little escapade was. I dont care if you put her on a pedestal or vilify her. I'm not the one struggling with it. For your sake, I am asking you to see her and it for what it was... which was a fun little distraction from her fiance for a bit

[Difficultstuff]

1 hour ago, SummerDreams said:

How do you honestly believe she loves you while she chose him? If she really loved you, she would move mountains to be with you. It seems to me you had some fantasy relationship with her while she was just having some fun before marriage. She is too young for you and you need to wake up and find a decent woman for you.

 

31 minutes ago, elaine567 said:

She was not married, she did not have kids, she was essentially a free agent.
She decided to go with the best option for her.
She chose HIM, not you. she weighed up the pros and cons and chose him
Yes you can choose to believe in this great love story, this fantasy, or you can choose reality.
At 6 months you need to start seeing this for what it really was. 
She is no saint, she was just some cheating woman basking in the adoration of two guys for a while.
What a great ego boost for her! 
How could you ever trust her?

When push came to shove, she didn't want you.
She just disappeared, no pleading, no tearful late night texts/calls, no breadcrumbs, nothing.
Time to bin that fairy tale and get on with your own life.
You are already 42, you can't afford to waste valuable time mooching about after some woman who thought it was OK to keep two guys in tow.
Next time find someone closer to your own age, who is actually single. 
 

There's nothing here that's new to me, it's mostly things I've said to myself many times. The words are harsh to read from someone else but I guess that's your point. I'm not going to categorically label what happened as a 'fantasy' opposed to 'reality.' I'm also never going to think of it as some romantic fairy tale. I had a lot of scepticism about that narrative even during it, though maybe I haven't portrayed that very well here. 

[notmyfinestmoment]

When reading comments, remember not everyone has walked in your shoes, or even as an AP for that matter, so they will have a hard time relating to what you are going through....even more so if they are a BS.   As much as people want to paint a black and white picture, these situations are anything but that.    Your feelings are your feelings.   Don't let anyone take that from you or judge you for it.     

Please keep in mind, not everyone is a diabolical or a manipulative person.  For all you know, she isn't fulfilled in her relationship, but finds it too difficult to walk away for different reasons (maybe they are financially intertwined, maybe the wedding is already planned and paid for, maybe she is worried about disappointing everyone, and the biggest culprit is fear of change).  At the end of the day, yes, she chose to stay with her fiance, but we don't know why.   

I know you are just struggling through coming to terms with it and finding a way forward.     If you really feel like telling her how you feel will give some clarity, you can do that.   You just have to be prepared for the outcome.   And keep in mind there is something to be said with the idea of "no new contact = no new hurt".    I had a friend once who contacted an old love (it was her one that got away).  She contacted him a few years later because she still couldn't get him out of her mind.   He didn't share the same feelings.   BUT, she was able to move forward now knowing he wasn't sharing the same "what if"  thoughts that she was.   

I have to hope that with time, things will get better.   I know, you are thinking "it's already been 6 months!".  And I get it!!     You fell hard for her and it is not hard to do when you have experienced something you have never felt before.   It's hard to let a connection like that go so that is why you are struggling.   You start thinking I have never felt this way my entire life, what if I never feel this way again.   It's hard, it really is.   

[Difficultstuff]

3 minutes ago, Daisydooks said:

Civil departures are always nice but it's also left you hurt and missing her 6 months later so I am hoping to open your eyes because you have placed her on a  pedestal you never should have had her on. That happens in Affairyland. You're hurting, while she is planning her wedding and you're silly enough to think "she is dealing with the fallout from telling her fiance about you." She didnt. She got a pass from you when you decided to back out, and she had no reason to tell, so she didnt. I can guarantee she didnt. Also, love? Her behaviour doesnt make sense when speaking about love. You dont do this to someone you love and her words were empty. 

My advice is to take her off the pedestal and wake up. You came here to tell us how much you are struggling with NC after 6 months with a woman 13 years your junior, who has a partner and has for a very long time. See it for what it is and you'll have an easier time getting the heck over it. I am not attempting to argue with you, but to open your eyes. The relationship to you was much different than it was to her. She didnt care. You did. Her life didnt change much. Yours did   

 She is not the person you have made her out to be. She did not love you. You were a fantasy, albeit short lived with no sex to my understanding. 

You NEED to understand that. I share this because you're sitting here, on this site, having issues with no contact with an EA that went nowhere. You've got to give your head a good shake, friend.

 Like you're 42, wasted 6 months of your life on some young 29 year old engaged chick who threw "I love you" around (while cheating on her fiance with you) and you very much placed her on a  pedestal "where you learned so much about yourself and she was so amazing and she no doubt loved you." I'm calling BULLCRAP is all. Maybe if you see this for what it was, you would have a MUCH easier time with no contact because you'd see her for what she is and what your little escapade was. I dont care if you put her on a pedestal or vilify her. I'm not the one struggling with it. For your sake, I am asking you to see her and it for what it was... which was a fun little distraction from her fiance for a bit

This is helpful. As I've said in another reply there's nothing you're saying I haven't said to myself. I'll dispute 'putting her on a pedestal' - I knew she was likely playing games. I thought I could handle it, until she seemed to show me, and then told me she also had genuine feelings. At that point, immediately she said she had, I wanted a commitment. (I get that there's an argument that all that was itself just part of the game).

I'll dispute that I've not learned much about myself. But that's for me to know, really. It's conceivable she didn't tell the fiance, but yes I think she was using me tactically to fill a gap or possibly to change up things in their relationship (again, it's a pattern I've known about before, not one I've really been in) so maybe she did.

The feeling of devastation has been I think because of the oscillating between conflicting ideas. That is, going back and forward between the idealisation and the denigration (of both her and me.) I don't think either are realistic positions to hold. But after a few days of posting I'm getting to the point of just wanting to shrug and move forward now...

[Daisydooks]

Good!!! You deserve that. I think when we are able to see situations and people truly for what and who they are, we can think more clearly about what's happening. I just hate that you're hurting 6 months out, and she is probably thinking, "God I hope he doesnt message while I'm with my fiance and doesnt blow my world up" to avoid conflict (which is a big trait for cheaters... conflict avoidant behaviour.) I have no doubt there was an attraction to one another but I am also sad to see you sad over someone who is a cheater and taking anything she said or did at face value. Nothing a cheater says is ever all that "honest." If a cheaters mouth is moving, she is lying. It's a good rule to follow. Once someone actually does the work to be better, do better and act more appropriately, fine, maybe you can work on trusting them, but in the depth of an affair, you couldnt pay me to believe a word of their nonsense. 

[Difficultstuff]

40 minutes ago, notmyfinestmoment said:

You fell hard for her and it is not hard to do when you have experienced something you have never felt before.   It's hard to let a connection like that go so that is why you are struggling.   You start thinking I have never felt this way my entire life, what if I never feel this way again.   It's hard, it really is.   

I think - being as affirmative as I can - I'd like to feel something similar, but different - without the context of seeing her always go home to someone else, or reading a text - and none of them were sexual, just kind of intellectually and emotionally involved, affectionate - and thinking, 'I wouldn't be happy if I were with someone and they were texting another man like this.' Thanks again for the support.

[Difficultstuff]

16 minutes ago, Daisydooks said:

Good!!! You deserve that. I think when we are able to see situations and people truly for what and who they are, we can think more clearly about what's happening. I just hate that you're hurting 6 months out, and she is probably thinking, "God I hope he doesnt message while I'm with my fiance and doesnt blow my world up" to avoid conflict (which is a big trait for cheaters... conflict avoidant behaviour.) I have no doubt there was an attraction to one another but I am also sad to see you sad over someone who is a cheater and taking anything she said or did at face value. Nothing a cheater says is ever all that "honest." If a cheaters mouth is moving, she is lying. It's a good rule to follow. Once someone actually does the work to be better, do better and act more appropriately, fine, maybe you can work on trusting them, but in the depth of an affair, you couldnt pay me to believe a word of their nonsense. 

Thanks for being sad for me. I've not said specifically what she told me to make me believe her feelings were genuine, but the extent to which she was at one point yearning for me (without telling me at the time), and some of what she said she had done made me sad for her that she couldn't tell either me or him anything, and scared at the intensity of her emotions for me. Anyway, we're just blank spaces to each other now I guess.

[HadMeOverABarrel]

Hi OP. A theory is that when we are conflicted about love and commitment (like you said from your childhood), it's easier to be more open with someone unavailable because we know subconsciously it won't go anywhere. That way we diminish the fear/anxiety while fulfilling a need. 

I hope for you that now having experienced the joys of connecting, you will feel ok with trying this with an available person. I read that you would like this. 

Your story, in this way, reminds me of a boyfriend I had who was also my neighbor. I knew from the beginning he was not "the one" for me, but we "played house" for a couple of years: regularly cooking dinners together, celebrated his  kids' birthday parties and holidays together, walking each other's dogs, etc. One of my biggest surprising takeaways was how much I actually enjoyed the housewifey role, especially after many years of being a very focused career-gal. So it seems you have a similar takeaway from your experience here.

I've been an OW. It's gut-wrenching! Try your best to focus on what you've gained, learned, and who you've become from this experience. Forgive yourself and remind yourself you are not responsible for any other adult's reality (i.e. hers), only your own.

You really did the best you could with what you had. You should regularly remind yourself that you have succeeded in staying away from a very painful, self-deprecating situation...and that takes a lot of strength! Take the good and leave the bad. All the best!

[Difficultstuff]

6 hours ago, HadMeOverABarrel said:

Hi OP. A theory is that when we are conflicted about love and commitment (like you said from your childhood), it's easier to be more open with someone unavailable because we know subconsciously it won't go anywhere. That way we diminish the fear/anxiety while fulfilling a need. 

I hope for you that now having experienced the joys of connecting, you will feel ok with trying this with an available person. I read that you would like this. 

 

I know this theory and agree with it. I've not spoken here about my childhood except in passing, but it was a traumatic, destructive family with much physical and emotional abuse over many years. I know too about how people can seek to recreate similar conditions in later life in order to 'redeem' them.

Thank you for the story of your boyfriend, it really resonates with me. I'm just here trying to learn from the experience and my reactions to it, healthy and unhealthy, and use it all as best I can so as not to repeat the 'bad' but also not throw away the 'good.'

All the best to you too.

[Difficultstuff]

Hi all - an update:

She mailed me tickets for an event we'd booked to go to in June. Told me in her short letter that nothing's changed in her circumstances and not to worry, she wasn't pestering me to be back in touch. Said she thought six months was long enough for me not to think she was trying to get around me. Hoped I was well.

Any comments?

 

[assertives]

Sounds like she's tying up the loose ends. Seems like she's putting effort and being thoughtful about her actions to ensure she isn't stringing you along or giving you false hope. Time to close the chapter.

[Difficultstuff]

Hi all

I first posted a couple of weeks ago. Basic story is I'm 42 and had some kind of year-long EA with a woman 13 years younger who is engaged. Had ended it 6 months ago but was struggling very much with NC.

Really appreciated all the responses I got here, from lots of different perspectives. Had thought I might be more attacked as 'living in a fantasy' than I was. Felt a bit under fire at times but only because people genuinely seemed to care. Also felt very supported and heard.

So this is an update: shortly after posting I got a very brief letter from (nearly)MW, returning some tickets for an event in June we'd planned to see together. It really upset me; she was clear she was still with her fiance, seemed to be washing her hands of me.

But I also felt she was both looking to assuage her guilt and, maybe, simultaneously testing the water. There really wasn't any need for her to be in touch - I'd told her not to be unless things changed. So it also felt like a kick in the gut, and that I was being dispensed with, very much cast aside - which chimed with what some posters here had said to me about the situation.

I didn't know what to do. Was in shock for a couple of days. Knew most people would say just to ignore it. But the pull was strong and I decided to write her a letter back. I wanted to tell her I missed her, give a sense of what she had meant to me, but also make clear, in so many words, that I wasn't available to go back into the kind of secretive relationship we had before. I tried to be as compassionate and as open as I could in what I wrote.

And it seems to have worked. I've lost the last bits of hope that I was still clinging to when I posted before, but without either rejecting the positives I see in what happened between us, or forgetting how hurt I was by her not being willing or able to make the leap into a future with me.

I don't even think that those feelings would change if I were to get a very negative response, or if her fiance were to contact or threaten me - we live miles apart and I'm not that concerned I'm about to get physically attacked or similar. 

And in a way, I'm grateful that she did write - it hurt like hell but at least gave me the opportunity to respond. She didn't ask me not to reply, and she knew me well enough to know I probably would. So I did, in a way that was truthful to my own experience, but without begging her for anything. 

I'll maybe run into her at some social events. I do still miss her very much. I still worry about her a lot. But I gave what we had all I could at the time and today I simply can't get dragged back into it - if she wants to be with me (which in all honesty I don't think she does), she knows what to do.

[mark clemson]

On 2/17/2020 at 11:24 AM, SummerDreams said:

How do you honestly believe she loves you while she chose him? If she really loved you, she would move mountains to be with you.

While I don't disagree this was just an affair for her, the above is really idealistic and IMO not true. Practical matters overrule sentiment very frequently in life. We pretty much all wish there were no wars and homeless people, right? Same with love. Two people can be in love, e.g. in college, but then their paths diverge and they go different ways in life. Happens all the time.

 

On 2/17/2020 at 12:23 PM, elaine567 said:

She was not married, she did not have kids, she was essentially a free agent.

Also disagree. As some who was a "perma-fiancee" for 11 years myself, I can tell you there can be a LOT invested in that relationship.

 

On 2/17/2020 at 1:49 PM, Daisydooks said:

Nothing a cheater says is ever all that "honest." If a cheaters mouth is moving, she is lying.

Also not true as a blanket statement IMO.

 

On 2/17/2020 at 12:23 PM, elaine567 said:

She decided to go with the best option for her.
When push came to shove, she didn't want you.
Time to bin that fairy tale and get on with your own life.

For clarity, all this and most conclusions above, including from others quoted, I DO agree with.