First Love

[Iwentby]

If you have married a while have children and things have'nt been going well for a few years and you can't see anyway back,do you stay and try and work it out for the sake of the children?

Especially when you know your first love is single again but has children and lives about 3 hours away from you.
Also you know he was the one and regret having left him.

Logistically it's wrong,moneywise would be difficult,childrens welfare,upset for all,emotional baggage both sides,years have passed so different people.

It can't work can it?

I know people get divorced all the time but I expect if oyu can avoid it for the childrens sake you should.

I suspose what I am asking is am a selfish to even thik about it even if it was an option which at the moment is just what if's on my behalf?

Should I stya and put up with my lot and forget about my happiness for the sake of the children?

I know that Nabster I really do.

I realise I am being very selfish but since having contact with this guy it made life more bearable.
Just his messages were enough to get me through the day somehow.
Even if it meant just friendly messages and nothing else that would be enough to know that he was happy.

I swear you are me.

I would smile when he called. Think about him all the time. Be sad when no message came and angry that I still let myself be bothered.

I never stopped loving my husband in all this and that got me back to the real world as he would never hurt me in the way this other man had.

Perhaps he just doesn't want to overstep the mark, as he knows you are married.

Coming from someone married the message about still loving him might be interpreted as rather dubious iyswim - as though perhaps you're after a way out of something, or even an affair.

Be honest - do you really want to drop everything you have and start over?

If so then you'll need to do that before you even think about being with the other bloke.

If he has any self respect he won't want to be part of an overlap.

It just seems all so silly really.
Other people reading this would think I need to pull myself together.

Maybe that's the romantisist in me.
You hear stories of people meeting up with first loves after years apart and I suspose I want that to be me.

I feel I am going mad,all my thoughts have been filled with him.
I am walking around in a daze.

x posts flightattendant27-I have also thought a lot of what you have said.

I realise especialy has he himself has a broken marriage behind him so knows all to well what that entails.

The last thing I want is to make things hard for him.

I expect he is being careful about what he says as does'nt want to be held resonsible for my split up with my DH.

IWB: look, this bloke by the sound of it is essentially a nice person who doesn't want to have to get to the point of sending you a mail which says 'Will you piss off and leave me alone you mad stalking woman?' He's doing what most people do when confronted with advances made by someone who they don't dislike, may indeed be well-disposed towards, but DO NOT WANT ANY ROMANTIC INVOLVEMENT WITH. If you keep refusing to take the clear hints he's offering, then he's going to feel he has no option but to be unkind to you.

please listen to the unanimous opinion here.
He is NOT interested in rekindling a romantic relationship with you.
Why keep torturing yourself?

I am sorry you are at such a low point in your life you are grasping at (non existent)straws

I agree...you are just torturing yourself here....you should have just left it at that and waited if he writes and is interested in contacted you, rather than sending such pathetic and needy E-mail, sorry...I know I am being harsh and unknd...but you are not doing yourself any favours...

I think sometimes it can be nice to jsut have a bit of a fantasy....you know, it lifts you up and all that, but you are obcessing...and that is NOT good...

I recognise that I may sound needy and no that is not good.
He is a decent guy who like you say is trying to let me down gently.

He actually made the request to speak to me but probably just to catch up after all these years.

I have probably missed the hints he is giving me because of course I am reading it with hope and interpruting everything differently to how I suspect what I want it to mean.

I just wish he just said maybe it's not a good idea to message each again but it's been nice catching up with you.
That would have been clear cut to me.

In answer to many who have asked about sorting things with DH .
Let me just tell you briefly about tonight.

He went out at 3pm to the pub,came home at 7.30pm could hardly stand.
Went up to bed after chucking his coat at me and telling me to piss off because I asked him to go up to bed as the children were still up.
I got the children to bed.
He comes back down at 8.30,gets another drink and proceeds for the next 2 hours to call me
a silly cow,a fu.k.n bitch,that I don't look after the house,the children him and that is my job.
That he would get an order to take the children from me.
He kept gonig up to bed and coming down over and over again about 12 times and shouting in my face.
This from a man that over the last 2 weeks has gone to the pub after work and not had a meal with us in the evening over the time.

This is not an isolated incidence.

Sorry ,my spelling was all over the place on that post.

ok your husband /marriage is a BIG problem.

You can not live like that. if that is a typical evening I for one would not stay . I can't think of anyone I know who would.

The first love is clouding the issue.Forget him for now.

Your husband is behaving appallingly

jasper-this has been an on going thing throughout our marraige.
Something I have tolerated but of course when you have children it's a different story.

It has been bad on and off for a long time but has been every night to varying degrees over the last 2 weeks.

So when last week this guy contacted me I suspose it was a release from my real life.

I know it is unfair of me and have not told any of my problems in detail to this other guy only once did I say that my marriage was not working.

We generally talk about times when we were together which he was quite happy to do.

I rightly or wrongly have been dealing this past week with DH's behaviour a lot better as this other guys messages have kept me going.
Without them I would have gone under.

Oh love your husband sounds horrible. It really isn't very surprising that you have been desperately clutching at the memory of your 'first love' in the hope that he will swoop down and take you (and your DC) away from it all. But he isn't going to. It's not his responsibility or a responsibility he remotely wants. You have to save yourself - you don't have to do it utterly alone, but the answer is not a romantic relationship. The answer is in finding the strength to not put up with abusive DH any more, and to know that you don't need A Man to be happy and have a good life. Have a look at women's aid for advice and support, and keep on posting on here for advice and support WRT sorting out your marriage/getting rid of your abusive DH.

yes I can totally understand that, about the messages keeping you going.

But they are a distraction from the real issue which is that you are stuck in a miserable marriage.

NOONE should tolerate being shouted at and insulted by ANYONE least of all their husband/wife.

Why do you think that you should put up with this because you have children? What sort of message are you teaching them?

My marriage ended for many reasons but one of the irreconcilable issues was the fact that I knew I didn't love DH as much as I missed my 'first love'.

Me marrying DH was an attempt to ignore the ache that my first love left me with when we separated.

I never did get back together with the 1st love guy but I did meet two other men between then and now that made the missing him go away.

For me that said that DH wasn't right, and maybe 1st love could have been, but if not someoene else might be. DYSWIM?

I've made a stinking mess of things over the last 8 years but I still don't regret my marriage ending.

I know I am not perfect.
I know I don't keep the house as tidy as he would want it.
My children were ill last week so all my energies were put into nursing them fetching and carrying keeping them amused.
I don't drive so had no shopping in as I normally do an online shop but had no money on my card I use which normally I would reload with housekeeping money at the post office.
But with the children ill I did'nt get out.
So at the weekend he goes mad that he has to do some shopping and only gets the bare minimum and sayd tonight that I have let everyone down because we have no food in the house .
Sorry am rambling.

I know it is not this other guys job to save me but I am still in love with him and can't help it.
Whether my DH was like this or not I still love this other man.

x posts hobbgoblin-thanks for sharing your story.

I already have the big regret in my life that I left the first love and did not marry him.
I did not want to look back after more years have passed and wish I had told this guy how I still feel and had double regrets.

I know it was the wrong thing to do and should have just kept the messages friendly and he would have probably still wanted to talk to me.
As it is I have probably frightened him away .
I messed up again .

He has still not replied so will take that as the answer to my question.

IWB: when you are currently in a relationship with a nasty man who treats you like a disobedient dog, why do you think that Another Man would make things better? And that being in a relationship is all about you obeying, pleasing and placating the man, and blaming everything that goes wrong on yourself? The fact that Mr Firstlove doesn't want a romantic relationship with you is not your fault, it doesn't mean you are a bad person - Mr FL clearly thinks you are a nice person, he just doesn't want a romantic relationship with you.
Your DH is unreasonable and nasty and wrong to behave towards you as he does. You don't deserve it.

I think if you can walk away from your marriage and make a happy future as a single woman and mother for yourself regardless ,all the fear of being Mr Rebound that the man you want probably has will maybe dissipate.

I'm not telling you to divorce but if that's what you want, then I think that your chances of being with and in love with this man ,or any other will be improved if you can get yourself in a good place with marriage behind you and the future as a woman in your own right ahead of you.

I just know what a great guy this other man is and when we were together it was so right.
So god knows what got into me 3 months before our wedding all those years ago.

When I had to move back home,which was in 1991, my mother would not have me stay at the house so I stayed at my sisters until I got a job and rented my own house.

My mother did'nt talk to me for awhile as she adored this other guy and could not understand why I did'nt marry him.
I should have listened to her.

My mother died in 1993,so never got to see me married or see her grand children.

I really should go to bed now.
Although these past few nights I have cried myself to sleep.

DH is in the spare room.

I will only sit here checking my e mail to see if he has replied.
If he does relpy I will be so scared to read it.

Given your last post I think you need to do some sorting out of your emotions. There is a link there between grief/your mother's wishes/your own decision and now perhaps regrets.

It's like having coffee and cake with a friend and choosing a chocolate cake instead of a flapjack despite your friend waxing lyrical over the chocolate cake and then not enjoying the flapjack much anyway, so next time you have the cake but that was still not what you wanted for all the reasons you gave yourself the last time.

The moral is - have an iced bun!

Hobbgoblin-I think you may right.
I have never really dealt with my mothers death and those issues.

Well he replied this afternoon.
He is now back home from working abroad.
His reply said

No that is not what I meant.
I meant I was pleased to get all your messages and do not have a problem with the things you said.
We all have good and bad moments so please don't worry about that.
I will answer some of them with more detail now I am back and have a better connection.
Looking forward to hearing from you again.

I have mixed feelings about his response.
I was overjoyed that he still wanted contact but scared as well.

God he is so cryptic! It would be driving me nuts too.

Am very glad that he replied, after all.

Yes it is very cyrptic but I expect he is being careful with what he says under the circumstances.

Knowing him as I do or did back then I was a bit surprised that he would just say thanks for the messages and that was that without more of an explanation.

Had a weird experience today.
We had to take DS to an appointment in the city I used to live in with my parents and on the way back DH had to take his laptop in to be fixed in a shop that was recommended to him.
The shop just happened to be about 400 yards away from the church were I was going to get married to this guy.
I had'nt been in that part of the city for years.
I was feeling choked when we drove past.

I had not read his reply at this stage.

Just a strange coincidence.