Anyone else trying not not to contact a guy part 2??

[YouAreAllMySymmetry]

Hey loves @namechangeforthis5 @Frith2013 and whoever else I can think of.

How we all doing?

I'm having a weird night; I've been drinking and guess what skill it reminded me I've developed: crying out of one eye. It means that people generally don't notice, in the car, or lying on the couch or in bed.

That's sad, isn't it.

Had to change a few wee identifying details. Funny how writing is easier when you've had four drinks 😆

🤣

Not sure if this is anything to do with ‘he who must not be named’ but I realised today I feel so much more carefree and happy.

That's great @lovelymango 🙂

I am back to considering blocking. Can't be arsed with the disrespect.

Thank you. Five minutes ago in the shower I was thinking maybe now I feel like this I could text him as a friend 🙈. It’s weird. One minute I’m fine then I’m thinking about texting him again to tell him how fine I am. Why?!
Whats happened with you? Disrespect?

Nothing major, it's just...the lack of response, or minimal response to things. When I compare it to 6 months ago, we literally couldn't reply fast enough, our messages would cross over all the time because we had so much to say.

And now it's nothing? Or a stupid emoji?

Nah. Take everything else out of it, and just think about the level of friendship that signifies: very, very little. Acquaintances really. And I'm done with trying to hold on to something that doesn't exist.

Although it's very sad. I've made quite a lot of new friendships recently, but for some reason, absolutely nothing and nobody fills the gap.

I hate it.

I got the stuff of mine together and put it in my car. I was going to drop it off at his house tonight, as I knew he would be out.

Couldn't quite bring myself to do it, in case he was in and opened the door! I'll have another chance in a couple of days.

I lost a best friend of over 37 years and didn’t feel like I needed to keep texting her! She was a complete bitch to me but still. I think as pathetic as it is I know no one will ever make me feel as sexy and attractive as he did bar my husband and I don’t want anyone to and he was also horrible to me at times but I’m getting older and won’t ever get that again. But I don’t need it either- gah! (Slap in the face)

I lost a friend along time ago, and I'll say it did take me at least a year not to feel angry and sad. But never once did I consider contacting him I guess is the difference.

That’s interesting. Yes I was sad and angry about her for a very long time. It was like grieving. This with him is not. It’s more a need to talk to him. To get some kind of validation or closure

The validation is killer because you'll never get it. It's never quite enough.

Actually it's interesting; I'm reading a book by an artist who lost a child, and he talks a lot about how grief feels and in the stages of it I recognise so much of how I feel/have felt.

I know that's abominable, to compare grief in that way, but I was very struck by his descriptions and just recognised it immediately. It is a real grief - and we all know that only time helps that one.

That sounds interesting and no it is fair to compare on some level. I know that if I message he will either not respond or bit care and I’ll be back to begging for answers or stressing and it’s not healthy so the only choice I have is to keep on. I’m pissed off actually because when this started I didn’t care. He kept on after me. It’s always ok when he’s in pursuit of me but never the other way around to him.

Just have to post here as I've come to a realisation about OM.
So I dreamt about him last night, a really amazing dream that means I've not stopped thinking about him all day....however I've realised I'm "in love" with the idea of him, with the him I've created in my head, in my dreams but not the real him. In real life he acts nothing like the OM in my dreams.
Anyway, 15 weeks since we last messaged, very open ended last conversation which does leave room for either of us to start up a chat but I've held strong (and so has he).

Hi all, just wanted to check in and say this thread has given me strength! Esp the wise words of @Thewookiemustgo . I have not messaged for over 2 weeks. He's not either. I know he likes me, but I think he's being guarded. There have been chats on a group chat were both in, but nothing direct between us. I am trying hard at home to appreciate what I have but also kick OH up the butt a bit (merrily skipped out this morning having pointed at full washing basket) so thanks all, I will get over him (untill I see him or drunk text lol) we can do this!!

This really resonates with me as l feel the same. Reading that has made me feel stronger again to not message him .... so thankyou 💐.

Nothing from mine in a week, but l know he will be in contact with other friends. I'm just not important enough.

And this resonates so much too!! He brought to my life a little bit of excitement that l can't get elsewhere.

A friend said to me I'd fallen in love with how it made me feel (appreciated, sexy, wanted etc) as opposed to actually him.

And this is so true for me. FWB actually does nothing for me inperson conversation wise or really sexually... but having someone saying nice things and getting a kiss and cuddle met a need.

He doesn't meet that need anymore as l haven't seen him.

@NeedToAskPlease I think this is very true in a lot of cases. Being in love with the excitement of the situation gets centred on the person in the situation and when people say “I love you” they probably mean “I love this.”
Affairs are new relationships on acid and the very forbidden/ secret nature of it all adds to the excitement, but nothing blows our minds more than to have somebody fancying you, showering you with compliments, telling you how fabulous you are, love bombing you and making you feel like the best thing since sliced bread. Words are easy, lying gets easier the more you do it.

Actions bragged about and promised in words are harder to accomplish and harder to fake. Hence the action “Of course I’m going to leave my wife for you” becomes “I’m going to leave my wife when/ after/ xyz “ And “I can’t leave yet because of xyz” Then nine times out of ten they never do.
People tend to do what they want to do, whatever they might say.
Words are cheap and easy but actions really do speak way louder.
People left ghosted after an affair end up scratching their heads and just can’t believe that the guy who said all those amazing things to them, all the text messages and wining and dining and gifts etc, all the promises of a future, suddenly vanish once they are discovered and go back to their marriage (if they get given the chance to) and switch the whole thing off.
The brutal truth is that they do what they really want to, which is usually to save their primary relationship and stop their lives turning into a shitshow, whilst trying to pacify the OW with how much they love them but they just can’t leave their kids or that their crazy wife will kill herself if they leave or any other bullshit excuse to stop them looking like they just used you.
Some abandoned OW are then left reeling from the abrupt about turn, trying to convince themselves that “he really did love me, but he’s so noble and honourable he just couldn’t leave his family” or similar when the truth is more likely to be that the whole thing was just an escape from normal life, a midlife crisis reawakening of a long lost youth, a parallel fantasy life which is fun but he wouldn’t trade in a million years for his real life. If they ever admitted that, the game would be over and nobody would stay in the affair with them. Both parties say what each other wants to hear, believe what they want to believe and get addicted to the dopamine rush, the longing, the forbidden excitement and romanticise something which is actually just another common or garden affair. They think the other person makes them feel this way, but the situation is the heady addictive thing, the person could be anyone you find attractive who pays you attention.
There seems to be very little which is ‘unique’ about these relationships, they seem to follow a very similar script and end in very similar ways.
One party is usually relieved to get out of it and back to reality and the other has no idea how they can just turn their back on it and go home after all they said/ did etc.
Some do affairs translate into the real world and go on to be long successful relationships, but they tend to be the ones where people already wanted out of their marriage anyway. The majority are escapist fantasy island scenarios and the intrusion of reality implodes them resulting in at least one party legging it into the distance.
Examine closely what people do, not what they say or text. Even busy people prioritise according to importance. They do first/ more of what they absolutely need/ want to do. It takes seconds to text someone. Nobody is too busy to send a quick text. If they didn’t reply within a few hours, even to say “Sorry this is brief but I’m really busy so I’ll send more later, didn’t want you to think I didn’t care.” I’d say you’re not a priority. If it’s game playing then they’re being shitty to you anyway and messing with people’s heads like that is awful behaviour. Nobody deserves that.

Obviously just to reiterate from earlier posts I realise not everyone here is in an affair/ post affair situation.
I do however think that it benefits everyone to examine why the huge focus is on the actual person they are trying to forget. It’s absolutely possible to be “in love with love” and the focus of it becomes that one person.
It’s hard to be brutally honest with ourselves, but sometimes when a relationship ends we long for being back in that situation itself when it felt good, without realising that a new relationship with a different person might feel as good, or maybe even better.
That’s a scary risk to take, however, so it’s easier, even though painful, to stay stuck hankering after the last time we felt great. Way safer than risking investing our hearts in a new, unknown person. Think it’s in the novel ‘Gone With The Wind’ which was written in the thirties about the American Civil War era and the quote is something like “how women cling to the very chains that bind them’ and references the Bible. Humans have known this for centuries.
I don’t think it’s just women, though, I think most humans prefer the safer known to the unknown and prefer predictability to change, at least until they can no longer stand it.
If these situations are painful, if they interfere with your ability to feel free to choose for yourself and live your life fully, then ask yourself what benefit are they to you? The answers to these questions are tough and ask a lot of you and require effort and courage, but if we are honest with ourselves we probably already know what the best thing to do is.
I stayed with my husband after his affair, I carry no shame for that. It was the right thing to do and still is. I will be honest with you though and say that initially I stayed for the wrong reasons, he had a shitload of work to do on himself and I was afraid to enforce boundaries (except for the obvious one of ending the affair) and push for answers, I feared what I might lose by doing that. I feared that I wasn’t strong enough to deal with any of it alone.
I was afraid and compromised myself and my integrity and probably my dignity, and told myself all sorts of nonsense to avoid risking loss and avoid painful changes for me but especially for my children. By not doing that I nearly made myself ill.
You can’t lie to yourself forever, the tiny voice you squash down inside because you don’t want to hear it becomes louder and louder until you can’t ignore it any more.
I found my strength and enforced boundaries with consequences I was prepared to follow through. I found my worth basically and took the risk. Things improved dramatically all round and I realised that whatever happens in life the worst thing you can do is not be honest with yourself. Or others.
I got so focused on his lack of honesty in a bad guy/ victim sense of my own righteousness, that I avoided looking in my own back yard and how honest I was being with myself. I’m not proud of any of that, but I know why I did it and I’m proud of turning it around and finding my feet again.
Grit your teeth and carry on, everyone here, it’s worth it and you’re all stronger than you think.

@Thewookiemustgo your posts are always so valuable. Thanks for taking the time to post from the other side! I appreciate your empathy and your patience with us while we dick about and try to get our shit together.

@Thewookiemustgo just to echo what @FourToTheMFingFloor said. I also value your comments and appreciate the time you take to post from the other side. I’ve never been comfortable with ‘affairs’ and never wanted to get involved in one so your posts have been invaluable to me keeping this in mind and keeping away from him.

Tell you what though. It's fucking hard innit.

Every day all day he's there, lodged in the pit of my stomach, lurking at the back of my mind the second I have a spare minute to think. I've spent the last year acting like if I sit still I'll burst into flames, so that I don't have time to think, and I'm fucking exhausted now.

It's never going away; he's never going away; I've been to therapy and there he still is. Every morning, every night.

Fuck's fucking sake.

@Thewookiemustgo wise words, thank you so much for your comments

@FourToTheMFingFloor thank you. Your ”dick about and try to get our shit together” made me laugh, sorry if it’s not appropriate. 😂
I’ve done my share of dicking about and trying to get my shit together and before I met my husband I was obsessed with a total arsehole and I couldn’t see it for bloody ages. I was the Queen of dicking around.
“The other side” posters refer to is a nightmare though and if I elaborated what it’s really like it would look like I was trying to guilt or shame posters and I’m honestly not.
I end up on threads like these because if one person reads stuff and avoids a world of pain and mental health issues and a shedload of wasted time, or avoids hurting somebody else more than they’ve ever hurt before, then it’s worth the time I spend on it. God, infidelity destroys people in ways I never realised or imagined. If I get anybody out of it, from whatever side, I’m bloody sure I’ll have done them a massive favour.
I believe in the black and white of wrong vs right, and bleating about in the “it’s more nuanced than that/ it’s not that simple/ it’s complicated/ people issues are more of a grey area” over stuff which really isn’t a grey area does my head in.
I’ve said many times that you can’t be “a bit faithful”, or “not really cheating” in the same way as you can’t be a bit pregnant or a bit dead: you either are or you aren’t. We can dress infidelity up however we want, it doesn’t ever make it right, no matter how much of a victim of a shit partner we think we are, or no matter how shit a relationship we might think we are in.
However despite my wrong vs right uncompromising view, I just don’t believe that humans (with the exception of true psychopaths etc) ever set out to do bad things or should be judged solely on the bad stuff.
We’re flawed creatures, we usually try our best but we make mistakes, make wrong choices, lie to ourselves and others, try to show our best side whilst minimising our worst.
I’m retired now but my career put me slap in the middle of the great British general public, some wealthy, some not, some educated some not, from inner cities to leafy suburbia and villages. I dealt with how they parented their kids and related to each other. Some did a stellar job, some really, really didn’t but most fell somewhere in between in that they generally did good stuff, tried their best, but cocked up occasionally. I met a lot of different humans with different issues daily, and I could have had a big judgy field day on what a lot of them said or did. But in reality I had no right, I was like them, tried to do my best and sometimes I did but sometimes I fell short. We’re all human.
So rather than judge the shit things we’re all capable of doing, I’m far, far more interested in what happens when we fuck up. I’ve learned it tells me far more about a person than whatever they did wrong. What happens next is a far better judge of a person’s character than the thing they did.
Do they learn, make amends, never do it again? Or do they just shrug, roll their eyes because they got caught out, blame others for what they did then keep on doing it?
Yes, what people do can be very telling about character flaws, but it’s not always who they actually are.
If it was and we’re all just reduced to the sum of our wrongdoing, then we’re all liars, all dishonest. We’ve all done stuff we’re not proud of but it wasn’t who we really are.
There are plenty of women here who seem really nice, maybe haven’t done the right thing, but they know that and don’t like what they’re doing and are trying to change that. I think that’s to be admired.
None of us are squeaky clean and that’s where my patience comes from. I love it when there’s a success story and behaviour and lives get turned around for the positive.
Whatever any of you have done or are annoyed with yourselves about, you all seem to want to do better. The men playing mind games or ignoring texts like massive men-children having a tantrum are not worth the air time from any of you.
There are better dopamine hits in life than finally getting a text from Toddlerman Terry, I can assure you.