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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

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Original poster

Baggage reclaim assclown

101 replies

Justjump · 15/02/2014 23:05

A mess of a situation and I've acted badly.
Had an ea rel and never fully moved on despite good advice here, counselling, reading up, hypnotism, weeks on end of Nc- after breaking up we never really broke up, despite the fact he's now with someone else.
Anyway, I guess it's the classic situation that everyone and anyone on the outside of can see straight through but I'm in the fog of it. He says he is obsessed sexually, has me on his mind all the time and we must be out of contact again for a while and etc. The control was often in this sort of push me pull you thing. You'd have thought I'd have had a reality check often enough but apparently not. However big and busy I make my life I always miss him and however much I feel it's safe to go back into contact, it always gets in a mess. Now I need to walk and never look back. it's not as if I haven't done enough reading and soul searching, self flagellation, etc so what now?

OP posts:

Lovingfreedom · 17/02/2014 11:16

This guy is a loser and you are wasting your time with him. He hasn't got a hold on you. He's not thinking about you the way you are about him. You're not special to him and you don't need him. If you were my friend is be telling you to get a grip by now.

RandomMess · 17/02/2014 11:23

I wondered if throughout your life you struggled with certain emotions and feeling numb yet with him you got to experience/feel strong emotions and that has been part of the addiction?

Sounds like you need to get in touch with your anger and pain that he has caused that will certainly be one way of staying away from him!

MorrisZapp · 17/02/2014 11:23

Hello OP. Is this a guy you have always been in EA with, or have you ever actually been in a normal relationship with him? Ie you've been his girlfriend/ partner?

scornedwoman67 · 17/02/2014 11:35

I think you just need to ask yourself how long you want to go on feeling tormented like this. You must just walk away. I can absolutely promise you that things will get easier. I had it done to me a few years back. It is amazing how it messes with your head. Now I look back and wonder what on earth I saw in him. Keep posting on here if you need people to keep supporting you.

DistanceCall · 17/02/2014 12:03

Sorry if I'm blunt, but have you tried sleeping with someone else? Not as a prospective relationship (in principle) - just sex with someone you fancy for the pure fun of it.

Original poster

Justjump · 17/02/2014 12:22

Thank you all. Sorry morris by ea I meant emotionally abusive as opposed to emotional affair. Yes the relationship lasted about 18 months though was LD then sort of carried on in a non existent yet existent sort of way, with Nc periods. The abuse was horrendous but because I thought abuse meant hitting I just did not get it for a long, long, long time.

As for sleeping with someone else, I'm pretty sure that would help cure me tbh but I don't get any opportunity and don't often meet people I fancy/new people.

The emotion I originally felt with him random was utter freedom and joy and aside from the joy of the dcs I haven't ever felt those much. Exactly as I'm told heroin is, then you go chasing after that feeling and never get it back.

OP posts:

piratecat · 17/02/2014 12:26

who ends up getting back in contact with who.

if he's in a new relationship, do you mean he has a new ow?

piratecat · 17/02/2014 12:27

oops i thought this was an emotional affair.

DistanceCall · 17/02/2014 12:36

"As for sleeping with someone else, I'm pretty sure that would help cure me tbh but I don't get any opportunity and don't often meet people I fancy/new people."

Internet dating might be a good idea, then.

MorrisZapp · 17/02/2014 12:38

Oh my goodness. Well, you've done all the usual stuff like Lundy, counselling etc and you seem self aware.

I'm not sure what to suggest apart from seeing other people. You say you don't have time, but you do. If this vile specimen was in town you'd have time then?

Make time. Shag somebody normal. I can't see how you would regret it.

DistanceCall · 17/02/2014 12:40

And no, it's not like heroin. I've been in a similar situation. It took a rebound relationship (which should have remained a friendly tumble in the hay) and a purely sex-based relationship to get it out of my system. Nothing to do with drugs, I can assure you.

Original poster

Justjump · 17/02/2014 14:25

Ok I could try the internet but job makes that tricky with pics etc.
It could work. However, it didn't for him, apparently, in that he still claims to think of me etc- more headsoup. Poor woman in the relationship with him. I wonder how many times I was unaware that he was thinking of/shagging someone else while we were together. I suspect many- easy for him during the silent treatment phases for example, or when he was away.

OP posts:

AtrociousCircumstance · 17/02/2014 20:30

He blew his budget on his advertising campaign. The actual goods? Pathetic. He has nothing to offer you.

All the excitement, the feelings of freedom? Just a dull old illusion.

It's as if he's flogging a fake timeshare in Spain to a gullible pensioner. It's the same psychology. And you're falling for it.

And it's the sunk loss fallacy - you've invested so much already, you can't walk away. So you choose the illusion.

The reality is dull, is everyday.

I'm sure you are an exciting interesting woman. But not right now. Not talking about this very recognisable type of bullshitter.

Go be interesting in a new way, on a new path. Not this tired old gubbins.

Original poster

Justjump · 17/02/2014 20:52

atrocious that was brilliant, exactly what I need to hear and realise- I need more of this stuff, it got me through Nc before and will again, it's that crap cutting talk I need as the counter balance to all the moonshine/bollocks.
All this oh I think of you nonstop, we're this, it's confusing stuff, I have let it mess with my head. If a word of it was true there'd be no looking back, he'd be here. And a man worth anything doesn't have sex with someone else when they are in a relationship. A person who could do that has nothing real to give, surely.
Reality isn't dull, but it feels flat sometimes when there's no one intimate to share it with.

OP posts:

AtrociousCircumstance · 17/02/2014 21:35

I meant the reality of him is dull - the reality of what he has to offer.

But coming down from the excitement and pitfalls of hanging onto a fake 'connection' can feel really flat, I understand.

You've just got to take that on the chin I'm afraid.

There are times when we have to fall back on our own inner resources and just deal with letting go, and rebuilding.

BOFtastic · 17/02/2014 21:48

I recommend SGB's creative visualisation technique. It might sound humorous or silly, but it actually works.

AnnieLobeseder · 17/02/2014 21:54

Original poster

Justjump · 17/02/2014 22:00

Haha annie no just a run of the mill tale of suggestible idiot and charming fake merchant with strong whiff of too much earnest reading of Wuthering Heights. It's also hard to decide who the real assclown is in this story... Sorry to disappoint!! I expect you were one of many!

OP posts:

BOFtastic · 17/02/2014 22:04

Have you ever described him as "Byronic"? Because to clear-headed people that just means "moody and self-obsessed". I do think you have got a bad case of Too Much Literature.

Original poster

Justjump · 17/02/2014 22:16

He is Byronic though....! If Byronic means switching in a nanosecond from ardent, passionate and gorgeous to, well, sulky, ranting, withdrawing, saying vile things, punishing for something you inadvertently did weeks ago, threatening violence and making you feel you have something burning in your throat all the time.. Yes. If Byronic means being on a nonstop roundabout of abuse where you go round to that point all the time.
I just need to remember what it really felt like to be in that relationship as opposed to getting the intermittent charms since. Because it felt incredibly painful.

OP posts:

BOFtastic · 17/02/2014 22:25

Oh, he sounds just horrid. Honestly, that childish and manipulative behaviour does not equate to passionate. It is entirely possible to choose a relationship in which all the enthusiasm and passion is focused on how fabulous you make each other feel, it really is. Wouldn't you rather be in one of those relationships where you can still dance to your song in the kitchen when it comes on the radio, and not one of those with blazing rows and silent sulking?

Original poster

Justjump · 17/02/2014 23:04

Yes. That's what I wanted when I was in it, just found my hopes were often disappointed and I had to be a certain way or life would be made hard- very hard indeed.
It was a long time ago now, really. I just miss 'him' a lot and 'is' a lot although I appreciate I am missing a non existent thing.

OP posts:

Original poster

Justjump · 17/02/2014 23:36

Ok am going to sleep, hoping I will awake to many messages reminding me that he's not a good man and I can move on (fingers crossed)
When I started a thread last year, giving the all the details (had it moved to other place and since ncd) it helped enormously. I wish I had kept it.
From last time, I know that these first days are impossible, then with a dip after a month, then very bad after more than 6 weeks. Last time there was actually less confusion to deal with though, it was clearer, and I was in counselling. This time hurts far less but it's also final and that's scarier.

OP posts:

JackyDanny · 17/02/2014 23:41

You have a problem with seeing the truth here.
As has been said it's not some big love story, he has abused you, is probably quite good at it and you are still falling into the 'traps'...
This is not love.
It is an obsession and an illness.

Remind yourself of this each time you want to contact him.
Taking that call, text, meeting, is just like smoking that cigarette...taking that line, drink or whatever.

Have you heard of sex,love and relationships anonymous?
Get help.

Original poster

Justjump · 18/02/2014 09:16

I am not going to contact him, and am going to avoid potential run ins although I can't avoid them all. I'm not so much worried about contacting him.
I'm just worried about the feelings that are going to roll in, if they are going to be the same as last time (s) They may be easier because last time was the end of all illusion that he was normal, reasonable etc, and I think the final cumulative impact of the whole thing hit me all at once.
This time I know he's a person who could cheat as well as all the rest, instead of suspecting. I am just having to process the gap between his words and actions.

OP posts:

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