Having a hard night...

[OWW]

Most days I can be fairly zen and accept less. Sadly because I had gotten very used to it in my own (ended long before this) marriage. I get more now from her than I used to get from my wife. I am still healing from the loss of my marriage and the life I had built but was forced to flee. I have written before that I am not ready for a full relationship with anyone yet because I don't have 100% to give myself.

 

This was, of course, not supposed to become what it has. It was supposed to be a fling - maybe just a one night stand with a long lost friend who was in town on business. Something to help me in letting go of the past and preparing me, reminding me of the potential for the future.

 

But we fell in love some time after, and now I live in her home with her family.

 

I accept, generally the limitations of what I have. I encourage her to work on her marriage. I truly want what will make her happy.

 

But tonight I am weak. Another tie to my old life that I had to flee from was likely severed today. A good thing to sever those ties, but I believe that my home of many years was auctioned today. I am dealing with it fairly well, but of course it has been on my mind.

 

So, tonight, what I want most is for her to come back to my room, my bed, and sleep with me and hold me tight. She did tuck me in... Sweet woman that she is... but I hated for her to leave... I am having a hard time being alone tonight...

 

Tomorrow morning, I am sure I will feel better. But I know it is unfair of me to burden her with my needs, and so I write here, instead.

 

Thanks for listening...

[whichwayisup]

I know it's just a house, to some, but I am sorry to hear that it was auctioned off. Guess look at it as another part of closure of your previous life with your spouse..

 

Sorry, I'm abit confused here, you are living with/staying with MW and her husband and family? If this is the case, this isn't an easy situation for you to be in. Are you sure this is a good thing for you? To be staying with them?

 

I hope tomorrow you feel better.

[OWW]

You are not confused. I don't know the answers to your other questions - the answer may very well depend on the day. Most days, despite the complications, this is a good place for me to be. But of course I often ask myself the same question. The friendship -on both sides- is too important to lose. I have lost a lot of my friends with my marriage who were not strong enough to remain my friend when they heard just a fraction of the trauma I experienced in the last few months of my marriage.

 

She was the first person not only not to run away as I told her more details, but instead pulled me closer, figuratively. I am still struggling to start over, and her family has been more loving, supportive and understanding than my own family.

 

For those reasons, it is a good thing for me to be here. So much more than what I wanted to expose...

[whichwayisup]

It's great you have support, her family has taken you in .. I assume that also means her husband as well..And the kids.. Problem is, eventually you two will be found out, somehow.. And when that day happens, her H is going to flip out and feel betrayed by not only his wife, but you as well. To live in their house and feel like part of their family, yet be having an A with his wife .. Sorry, I don't mean to sound harsh or anything, it's just that this seems to be a ticking time bomb, just waiting to go off..

 

Friendships are wonderful, when they are platonic. problem is, now what you have with her is NOT platonic, it's far from it. Sounds like you have been through alot of pain from your past, so please ask yourself, is being in this situation, in their house going to cause YOU more pain? Where is it heading? Do you really see the two of you getting together and being a family, being step mom to her kids?

 

Just seems like it's going to add to your heartache at some point in time.

[jennie-jennie]

How are you today, OWW?

 

I very much identify myself with you. Perhaps because I too came from an abusive relationship into the EMR. The EMR for me too is so much more caring and loving than my prior relationship.

 

I hope you continue posting on LS.

[OWW]

How are you today, OWW?

 

I very much identify myself with you. Perhaps because I too came from an abusive relationship into the EMR. The EMR for me too is so much more caring and loving than my prior relationship.

 

I hope you continue posting on LS.

 

JJ - thank you for asking. I am sorry that you, too, have experienced some of what I have experienced.

 

I am feeling mixed. I am also anxious about posting too much identifying information on here and risking exposure, too.

 

Hating all of the complications. The BSes on this site can feel some measure of "happiness" that they have helped to reinforce some of the potential consequences of this situation, although I still find it hard to balance what is and isn't appropriate, what I do and don't deserve, what is and isn't selfish.

 

For the first time this weekend, I wished she were single. Not that she would divorce H and toss her life upside down. None of that. But that she and I had reconnected at some other point in her life. Or my life.

 

I don't know if it is possible to extract without losing the friendship, or if wanting to retain the friendship, even, is selfish. I can't imagine what would happen if I lost everything at this moment - I don't think I could handle it right now, I am too vulnerable from everything else.

 

Everyone says there is someone else out there for me, and I hope that they are right. But it is really hard letting go of someone so special when I have been with so many who have not been so special. I understand how rare she is, and I am so scared that I won't ever find someone else as special. It's not fair to her. I understand that. But it is hard to let go of after my marriage.

 

I have thought of it as a bridge - to show me what a relationship can be like - to teach me new ways of being in one. (You mean I can stick up for myself and it won't mean that I have to endure a barrage of emotional abuse about how I don't care a thing for her?) I had assumed or hoped that I would then grow out of it as I began to heal from my marriage. I thought I could do this (let go and grow out of this relationship)on my own time frame, but it seems that this is not on my schedule.

 

And I do think, often, that it isn't the sex that I crave (although it's the best I've had, the best she's had, and a lot of fun) but just feeling physically close to someone. Feeling connected emotionally and physically.

 

Not sleeping alone. Having someone warm and safe to snuggle with... Simple needs, aren't they? Is it too much to ask? No. But from this person, I know, yes.

 

I wish that the BSes could understand that sometimes for the OW it really isn't about them. It's about us and someone whom we have found who is special. They rant about what we are taking away from them, but I think sometimes that assumes that it was theirs to begin with, that if we weren't there their spouse would be giving it to them. And I can't help but think that if they were giving it to them before then it must not have been enough since they ended up looking somewhere else for something else. I understand being bitter about what you have lost, but I guess my question to you is whether you lost it before or after the A. Clearly there are always stories that fit the mold - where an WS is seduced and drawn away by the AP. But I guess what I am trying to suggest here is that not all affairs fit the mold you try to hammer them into, and not all OW or OP fit that mold either.

 

As much as we would like life to be black and white, not only is their grey, but there is color. I don't think it is reasonable to think of love as a limited supply, and that love given to someone else is necessarily love taken away from someone else. It can be. But I don't think it always is. I don't think it's concrete choices A or B. I might have before, but I don't now. You can love more than one child. You can have more than one friend. You can love both your parents, your cousins, etc. Why are we able to love so many other people in those settings, but it is impossible to believe that you can love more than one person romantically? (Apparently replying indirectly to another thread where someone wrote that if the WS really loved the AP then they'd leave BS - and I just don't think it is that simple. It's not always one or the other.)

 

Well, now I have gone from answering your question about how I am doing to rambling. I guess part of how I am doing is processing what I have been reading and figuring out how it applies or if it applies to my own situation.

 

There are no easy answers... I don't want her to leave her husband, I don't want her to turn her life upside-down. But I do want to explore further what possible ways we can be in each other's lives in a way that is helpful and not hurtful. To everyone. And, yet I still, selfishly, want to have "fun".

 

One question I asked her recently, because she is working hard to make H happy, is that if he is happy, and if his needs are being met, then why is it wrong for her to be happy and have her needs be met, too? Sometimes, if she demands her needs be met by him, it rocks the boat and they quarrel and no-one is happy. So what is wrong with her satisfying what he wants, and then satisfying herself elsewhere?

 

Makes sense to me, but then I have a selfish motive in that...

 

Time to get things done this morning.

 

Thanks for asking, JJ.

[jennie-jennie]

Thanks for the update, OWW. You have a lot of interesting thoughts. I started reading on LS last spring, and have gained a lot of insight from reading and posting here. In the beginning I was not sure if I was interested in being a member here or not, because of the often harsh tone of many of the posters. Once I found my own platform I realized that I benefit from participating in the discussions here, even from reading posts of those who have a completely different view than mine.

 

Your views and mine are very similar. From what I see above where we differ is that I believe it is (at least for me and my MM) difficult to be romantically interested in more than one person. I have seen how my MM has moved more and more of his emotional, sexual and romantic attention to me. The same has been true for me with my exSO and my MM.

 

For the first year and a half of the EMR I continued to have sex with my SO, but finally found that I had no interest in it whatsoever. I remember the last time we had sex. I did not enjoy it at all. I knew it was over. All my romantic and sexual attention had moved to my MM.

 

However crazy it might seem in the eyes of some of the posters here, one result of our NC this fall was that my MM and I made an agreement of sexual exclusivity. He no longer has sex with his wife, and he expects me not to have sex with anyone else either.

 

My MM claimed when we started our EMR that he was happily married. Now, 4 years later, he states that that was not the case. He has now realized, just like you say, that something was missing, something was not enough, something was wrong before the affair. Otherwise he would not have gone into the affair. He says he will never go back to the way it was. If he decides to stay with his wife, things have to change. He will not accept their relationship as it was.

 

I hope to see you continue posting. I hope we can be of help to you. I believe that noone should be ashamed because they love someone else, even if that someone is married. And we should not be ashamed for wanting a relationship with the person we love. Marriage is just a construct by man, love is a force.

 

Hugs,

Jennie