[SouthernRomeo]

Hey all, this is my first post on these boards. I can probably guess 90% of the responses I'll get to this post. For me this is more therapy and an attempt to help myself move past the problem I'm going through. First off a little about myself. I am a 28 year old male living in Texas. I am currently dating a women of 10 years. Her health condition merits that we can not get married due to loss of her medical coverage. She has epilepsy and has had it now since she was 6 years old. She too is 28 years of age. I love her to death but we have had some major ups and downs. There was a year or 2 where her epilepsy was a constant 24 seizure-fest and it has in my mind caused a lot of emotional scars between us and weakened a strong relationship. We did start dating fairly young, at the age of 18 and in college. Most of our relationship was spent apart. It was not until 1999 until we lived close enough to be with each other.

I give this history to let everyone know the situation I am in atm and help you all understand the love relationship I have. I love her to death and would do anything for her. However recently this last year we had another weakening in our relationship. I have been working to lose weight. I lost my job in 2001 and didn't get another job until well into the end of 2002. So I started to suffer from depression and gained a massive amount of weight. I started to feel unworthy and it poured over into my realtionship with my girlfriend. Well, in November of last year I started talking to a friend online that I had known for about a year. She is a great woman and she helped break me out of my depression and made me realize I was a good person (to those wondering, no I have not seen a psychiatrist or on any medications due to the nature of my job). She helped me see that I had the potential to lose weight and get my life back in line. And she made me feel important and wanted. She was smart and witty and we just seemed to click. Another bit of history. Me and my current girlfriend have led the swinger lifestyle you might say. Not on an everyday level but the occassional thing. Well, this girl I speak of online was also intriged by this aspect of my life and soon our conversations moved over into the sexual side. As I started to tell her of my exploits she started to see me in a sexual light. Now it had been a while before I believed myself to be sexually attractive or wanted but talking to this lady online she made me feel otherwise. I showed her my picture and she still didn't run. This woman was so beautiful too. And here she was starting to desire me and fall for me. So naturally I started to fall for her.

Well, in December of last year, my girlfriend left for her homecity to go to an assembly for 3 weeks out of town. During this 3 weeks, I started to have more conversations and interaction with the Lady (I will call her "Red" as she is red headed). Well, me and Red soon moved our conversations to the phone. Then eventually to phone sex and finally the word LOVE started to come into play. I really was falling for this lady. But guess what ladies and gentleman, she's married. I can already hear the hisses and boos and the sound of heads shaking and the massive sounds of sighs. Yes I fell in love with a married woman. She had confessed to me that her and her husband had been through a rough time where they had fallen apart. Well, the more we talked the move we literally started to fall for each other. We opened up and started to share skeletons that we had kept from people that were close to us. I had never met one person (male or female) that I felt so open to talk to. This lady neither judged me nor ran when she found out the real me. So not only were we getting along so well in the sexual side of things but the emotional as well. What made this whole situation odd for me was I had talked with other females and had sexual relations with them but managed to walk away. Red drew me in and I was hooked.

Well, in January of this year, Red held a party for a group of us that would conversate online on an online game that we play. Well, me and my girlfriend showed up early to help her get ready for the party. Well, one thing I forgot to mention was, that I confessed to my girl that I had had sexual conversations with Red on the phone and such. To my girlfriend this was not much of a problem as I have stated we had the open lifestyle. Long as I told her what was going on and held nothing back everything was okay. What I failed to tell her was that I had started to gain feelings for Red.

Well, when we arrived at Red's house the first couple of days went fine. I literally tried to keep things on the down low. I literally tried to keep things just friends and nothing else. But one night, my girlfriend and Red's husband went to bed early to leave me and Red alone. We sat and talked and before we knew it we were close enough to hold hands. I felt a spark I had not felt in a long time. I love my girlfriend and she makes me feel wonderful and has stuck by me for so long through a lot but that one moment was such a new feeling I lost control and me and Red kissed. We kept our emotions in check that night and we tried so hard the next day.

The next day came and me and my girlfriend and Red went shopping for party supplies. We get back to the house and my girlfriend falls asleep since we had been shopping for nearly 6 hours straight. Red's husband was at work so once again me and Red were left alone. After talking more and holding hands whatever resolve we both had fell through. I did the worst thing I possibly could. I slept with another man's wife in his own house. Something that every bone in my body said was wrong but felt so right at that moment. It was passionate and felt so good and I felt alive for the first time in a long time; I felt desired. That moment lingers with me even as I write this message tonight.

The party happened the next day, all the while we threw glances at each other. But soon my whole line of thinking would be thrown a curve when I returned home. For the next two weeks, Red ignored me and didn't return my e-mails and was cold everytime I tried to talk to her. She confessed about a month later that she had a reality check and was having to deal with "her depression". She had had a traumatic event in her life and felt she was over it and felt that that trauma had opened her up to neediness and I filled that void. But she also admitted that she truly loved me now but that she pushed me away for fear of getting close.

Since that confession and to current day our friendship has been strained. However we have strived to keep things close as friends and agree that we shared a special moment. BTW no she has not confessed her wrong doings to her husband. I confessed everything to my girlfriend and she is such a wonderful person and stuck by me still and for that I will love her forever. I didn't deserve to be taken back. And any other woman would have been done with me.

The problem I face now and I come to you all about is, how does one move on. I was coming to a point that I was moving past her, then one day on the game I said we play, I mentioned that a friend had taken her place in a group she was in. Well, immediately she replies "so how close is this friend??". To explain her reaction in some ways, this other friend was a mutual friend of one of Red's friends that she had (as I found out) had a small fling with as well. Well, I was dumbfounded by the question and the rest of our conversation on line was convaluted with mixed emotions and cryptic sentences. Eventually Red asks if she can call me. I pick up the phone to hear her crying and talking about how she's going to lose a friend and how she can't deal with that and how she really does love me. All the emotions I had buried and had pushed away flooded back in. That phone call really messed me up and has since made it harder to move on. I had come to accept that she had moved on but this confession really pulled up feelings that really hurt and yet made me feel good at the same time, leading to further confusion.

Recently I made a trip out to another party that Red and her husband showed up to. At this party I was very cold to her. I wanted to hurt her and make her feel that she wasn't the center of my life. But at the end of the party when we were all leaving we hugged, but we didn't want to let go. I could tell on my girlfriend's face and on her husband's face that it went on to long and with better judgement broke it off.

To sum up such a long and drawn out post, I sit here now thinking about her. I have since quit the game that we mutually played as I couldn't be around when she was around. It hurt too much. We rarely talk that much on other messaging programs and have since quit calling each other (even on a friendly front). I am passing up a 2nd party at her house due to the fact that we both confessed that the emotions are not gone and we should use good judgement. What I am wondering now is how do I move on. What is my next step. Obviously it seems like we can't be around each other but the thought of losing such a close friend (and when we have good conversations they are so nice and have really helped) kills me too. I'm torn. I have come to the realization that she will never leave her husband and everyday I am learning to accept that. I realize we can never have a sexual relationship either (although many times after I returned home we delved in the phone route). But I can't seem to get her out of my head. She's like a haunting dream. I feel so controlled by this woman in a time in my life where I am getting control of my life back (financially, emotionally and physically with my weight).

Do I cut off all conversation with her for good? Do I try to work it out with her and tough things out and just deal with the nights I get weak? I realize I have made her and I sound like such an emotional wreck. While I agree we both have baggage, we are of sound mind. But the thought of her is consuming me and my heart longs for her too. Any advice at this moment would help and if I can answer any questions to clear things up I don't mind. Again thanks for any advice and I'm welcome to criticism too. As I said I know what I did was truly wrong and I'm lucky to still have someone in my life that still wants to be with me. Thank you all.....