Losing my man to another woman, help!

[ArtsyLady]

Hello ladies,

I am new to this forum. I'm not married and I don't have children but I am going through something and could use some help.

I'm 29 and in a relationship with a 40 year old man. We've been together close to a year and I'm certain that he's the one. He has never been married but I've been hoping and trying to get him to commit.

Things have been great between us - we have good chemistry, we've traveled together, did some exciting new things. This has all changed recently, he has lost interest, doesn't contact me as often, even our sexual relationship has cooled.

I recently discovered that a new woman has entered the picture. She isn't actually "new". He has known her for many years. She is recently divorced but was already married when they met. They were introduced through mutual friends 7 years ago and he helped her apply for a job where he worked. She then got the job and they worked together for a period of time. Apparently, during this time he developed feelings for her, but she was happily married then and he couldn't act on these feelings. He then got a new job in the city and moved and has hardly seen her for years.

Now she's newly single and has moved into the city herself. What really made me mad is that when he reconnected with her, they were both invited to dinner with some mutual friends. He knew she was going to be there and didn't invite me along (even though he normally would). Since then he has been spending time with her, I don't know how far it has gotten.

I got all this information from a friend who knows them both. I have confronted him but he claims that nothing is going on, I don't believe him.

What do I do?

I'm sorry but it sounds like the difference is for whatever reason he loves her and not you. You deserve someone who values you for YOU. There's no way you can find out what it is about her that appeals to him and take those qualities for yourself. That's not you that's a mirror of her. Can you settle for being second best? That's what you are right now. Ditch him and find someone who is crazy for the person you are.

When a relationship is right, there is none of this competing, insecurity and game-playing. You just talk openly and honestly with each other and treat each other with a degree of respect that doesn't lead to insecurity.

It is always better to be on your own than with someone who makes you doubt your worth.

Not even talking about me now...I know this girl who has the same relationship crap i've had..

she's sweet, talented, knows what she wants from life...yet she spent years with this guy who cheated on her and had no plans to commit. She was even willing to convert to his religion to make his family happy and be with him but he didn't commit. Then he met another girl, "fell in love" and is married to her now!

I just don't understand that...if a person is willing to give you everything, why treat them like that?

See below. He has no respect for her. Probably because she enables his shit treatment of her.
And if she had LTB at the first transgression she would probably be happy with someone else by now instead of being stuck with the loser she is with.

Sorry
Missed the bit where he left her for someone else, but that was always going to happen in that scenario.

Think of it this way...you get dumped and he starts seeing her. Then, a year or so down the line, he gets bored with her and chases another woman who he has just met leaving more heartbreak behind him.

It is not you, it is not this new woman...the problem is entirely his. Please try and move on or at least get tougher with him.

Have you thought of counselling? You said in your past relationship that you loved the man but felt like you had to push him into things and now you want to do the same again? You want to struggle and fight and win?
It doesn't matter whether you do fight and win this time but you need help to understand why you feel the need to keep fighting and winning and struggling?

You have some odd ideas.
What do you mean by someone 'willing to give you everything'?
If you don't love that person, no matter what they 'give you' will not change their feelings. You can't create love in someone. They either have feelings or they don't.

Are you very successful at work? I bet you are because I get a sense that you try to manage people ( boyfriends) like a work project- put enough effort in and it will work- they'll love you and want to commit.

People are not projects.

This is another telling line from your earlier post
one guy I really loved..I tried to make him grow up and it failed. I felt like he was using me, for support, sex, emotional intimacy....I did so much for him and he wouldn't change.

You TRIED to change him. You did so much for him- what, like a parent?

You seem to think you can control people and their emotions, and that the more effort and the more scheming you do, the more you try to win them over by doing everything 'right' the more likely it will be that they fall for you.

It doesn't work like that.

You can't make anyone commit to you.
You have to chose people who will commit to you. It's different.

While you are spending time with a person who won't commit to you, you won't let those who would commit to you into your life.

You don't see the difference...

She is acting like an adult, you are acting like a teenager

... or someone deliberately winding people up.

OP you seem to think you can manipulate relationships. It doesn't work like that. If you find the right person it's easy, you should never have to try and change someone, or want them or force them to be something they aren't. You clearly haven't met the right person.

As another person said, people aren't projects, but you seem to treat your relationships as if they are.

It sounds like he's held a torch for her for a long time. If he was a decent bloke he'd break up with you before he saw her. But he isn't doing that. Instead he's stringing you along, whilst having a relationship of whatever sorts with her.

You can't make someone love you. You need to stop thinking like this.

loopy - we may have disagreed on that other thread but I have to say I'm in total agreement with you on this one.

Artsy love isn't rational. It really isn't.

On a biological level you can explain the hormone reaction that creates the foundation for falling in love. On a relationship level you can explain why relationships are more likely to work if both partners have a high emotional intelligence, good communication skills, similar goals and similar values/attitudes. But this has little to do with the emotion of love - what people actually feel.

That's why otherwise very intelligent people end up doing things that defy logic because of love. That's why nice people end up with shitty ones who don't deserve them. Why people from vastly different cultures end up together despite the obvious difficulties that creates. Why people without huge bank balances fall in love with age gaps of 50 years.

Love defies explanation. If it were easy to explain someone would have made a fortune out of it years ago.

Oh OP. You're making the same mistake probably lots of us made in our 20s, you find a guy you think is perfect for you, and you try to make yourself into his ideal girlfriend so he will commit.

But you're doing it backwards. What you want to do is be yourself, and find someone who really likes you for who you are.

And if, like in this case, after a while he seems to not be so keen on you, then you move on.

Just because you haven't found the right guy yet doesn't mean you never will, it doesn't mean you're 'doing it wrong' or anything like that, it just means you haven't found the right guy yet. Don't despair! It will happen someday. Of course, every day you spend fighting for some guy who isn't into you is a day you're not living your life and meeting new people. So move on.

Are you into science or mathematics, by any chance?
You seem to be treating this like a problem (i.e. getting him back) which can probably be solved if only you could be resourceful enough to find as much information as possible first so as to enable you to hit on the right formula or algorithm to lead to a solution.

I actually think he'll be a confirmed bachelor, but that's clearly just a feeling and a wild guess.

Has he told you recently that he loves you, I wonder.

OP what you don't seem to realise (and if you read relationships you'll know this) is that people can be in a relationship for years, their partner can treat them perfectly and all of a sudden their OH will go off and marry someone else. Why? Because they were with the wrong person, it's not that they didn't want to get married, they didn't want to marry them.

It's shit, but that's how it is.

There's something very attractive about an independent, interesting person who is comfortable in their own skin. There is something unattractive about people who come across as needy, desperate to please and insecure.

You should draw a line in the sand and let this man go. But you're not going to.

Relationships aren't a function of your effort, they either work or don't work. You have given it a year, feelings are on the wane and it does sound like he's not so keen.

I think it's better to be single than second-choice, I would back right off and see what happens.

Move on.

The longer you stay the more hurt you will be.

Find you own inner strength. You don't need a man who is more interested in another woman.

Dahlen Yes I agree.

It's all very simple I'm afraid. You see yourself as ArtsyLady. He sees you as BackBurnerLady.

You are the fall back woman. He's quite happy to be with you for the time being, nice and easy for him, you doing all the work. Sex when he wants it, no big commitment.

This woman has always been in the picture. She is FrontBurnerLady and he is just waiting for her to simmer and then boil. As soon as she clicks those fingers, he will go running. And you will be dumped like last night's left overs.

Wake up.

Dahlen and loopy, only the OP disagrees, apparently.

It's quite a consensus for relationships.

Ahhh...so I spoke to my "source" about this whole thing and she is telling me exact same thing you guys are!!!

She is a good person to talk to because her husband used to live with my bf back in the day so they have known each other forever. Plus she knows OW as well!

She said that she doesn't like getting involved in other people's lives and that the only reason she told me about OW is because she felt bad for me and was hoping I'd have enough sense (as she put it) to let go of him!!!

I got a bit of information from her but not too much. She says that she genuinely doesn't know what is going on between them. What she does know is that they have been spending a lot of time together (already know that!) and that his feelings are pretty obvious. She said she doesn't know how OW feels about him, but that she really is going through a hard time and probably won't jump into a new relationship right now with anybody.

I really wanted to know about OW's marriage, but the woman wouldn't tell me. She just said that nothing overly dramatic happened...the relationship was difficult with a lot of external stress (no idea what), which is also why they didn't have children. Apparently, OW couldn't take any more and decided to start a new life. She just said that there was a lot of love between them, but they couldn't make it work.

I asked her is OW is a complete b haha...but she said no. Apparently, she's "lovely", very warm and sweet

Now about my bf...the woman said that she has no clue what will happen between him and OW. But she also said that she doesn't know what anyone will ever do, so it was kind of a non-answer. She did say that it won't be easy for him if he does want to be with her but if he's willing to wait for her to get through all this mess, then he probably will commit to her. She said she believes he loves OW but that it's obviously not something he openly talks about.

Obviosly this isn't what I was hoping to hear! I was hoping that she would say that OW is a nasty B, who cheated on hr ex and is now using my bf....but she actually seems like a nice person

You asked upthread why men 'treat you badly'. The answer is that you are so utterly fucking desperate to have a partner that you make an arse of yourself, and healthy, desirable partners run away very fast. The only people who will put up with someone who begs for commitment, overthinks every single encounter, will do anything to please etc, are abusive.

What you need to do is walk away from this man (who is, if he is a decent human being, about to dump you anyway) and take a whole year off dating, sex and men while you work out who you are, what you want, what you're going to do with your life etc.

Sadly, what you're probably going to do is end up with a list of restreaining orders against you, whining in the corner of the pub about how all men are bastards.

So now what? Are you going to retain some dignity and end it or are you going to cling on like a limpit trying to be 'younger, prettier & more fun'?