Cheaters Anonymous Community Group
This is a support group for cheating spouses looking for understanding and strength. Betrayed spouses are welcome to post ONLY if they can do so in a supportive manner (no bashing...these posts will be deleted), and please do not comment on 'Cheaters Only' posts.
Hello, I’m a serial cheater. I may be a sex addict.
Never is enough enough. I have ruined every relationship I have ever been in, because of my addiction to sex. I rarely find satisfaction mental or physically from a sexual relationship or affair. I used to say that it was because she wasn’t good enough, experienced enough, or whatever. But the truth is, I wasn’t good enough. I didn't feel like I was loved or able to love myself enough to let someone love me.
I am an expert at not getting caught.
For years, and years, I would always be in relationships with people that were loose and non-committed. But that really didn’t matter. If the relationship got too real or committed, then I would just cheat on the person, sometimes for year snap dryers with multiple partners, sometimes multiple partners in the same evening or afternoon. It never made me feel good about myself, except in the most passing minute of feeling like a Grand Male Sex God. It was all a lie. I was lying to myself. I was lying to whomever my partner or partners was or were. But the hardest thing was that I was lying to myself.
I couldn’t understand how so many of my friends could be with only one person. How could they get married and be satisfied with only one person? I dated a lot. I often dated people who shared my polygamous ideas. But rarely would any of these women feel the same extreme pull that I had with me all the time. I would tell myself and whomever was supporting my behavior that I was just “Doing my own thing.” and that “I never made anyone any promises of fidelity.” But in truth, if I had made these promises, I would have broken them. I would have broken them all.
I also feel that it is likely that it will come as no surprise, that in every other aspect of my life, I am a stand up guy. I am true to my word and my friends and family, neighbours, and stagers would all come to my side and say similarly positive things about my behavior and about my character.
I cheat. In every way imaginable I cheat. At least, I did cheat. Why?
I used to say it was cool to have many, many lovers. I was being an Alpha Male, getting women into bed all the time. I loved it when every woman who said something about sex with me said, I was the best they had ever had. But it was still never enough. I had a job that allowed me to be around many single or sort of single women and I took every advantage to get as many of them into bed as possible. The only consequences I ever worried about were sexually transmitted diseases and pregnancies. I have never had any STDs, lucky and prepared, and I have only had one pregnancy, my lovely daughter. Her mother had told me she was on the pill, but her mother had wanted to get pregnant. She had her own level of deceptions that she put on me. But either way, I am speaking about my addiction.
I have been in therapy for years about any number of issues. But the main focus of the past few months has been on me learning the reasons I needed to cheat, the reasons I needed ruin my relationships. Why did I feel the need to take the chance to destroy the happiness that was given to me? For decades of my adult life, I had avoided committed relationships. When I found myself close to someone and it ended, I always blamed the other person. I never looked into myself for any blame, for any guilt. I would just feel badly for a while and move on toward the next, new pre-romance, romance, break up sequence that I know so well. I hate myself for bringing myself so frequently to “Rock Bottom,” but I have never been able to stop myself. I see what Im doing. I hate the feelings it brings up in me. But I know that it is only a matter of time, before I start looking up old phone numbers and preparing new dialogues for old flames about “How much fun we had when we were together.” It was all a lie. I used to have a lot of long and very long distance partners, who were never a threat to my autonomy or my cheating. And since there was never a conversation about commitment, I was always OK in my own version of this truth.
Finally, at the beginning of June 2015, I met someone. I was scared. This person made me feel unlike any other person I had ever known. The sex was good. It was not the most exciting. I never had the desire to race toward her and have the regular physical contact with her. Instead, I found myself wanting to be with her, honestly and completely. After two months, I introduced her to my daughter. She introduced me and my daughter to her mother and family. We had met a lot of each other friends. I was thinking to myself, I want this relationship to work. But I still found myself not cutting all ties to other women completely. At first, I thought I was just being careful. Maybe she was “The One” and maybe she was just another pretty face, another temporary pretty face.
When all my conversations about her to my friends, became conversations about her and me and our future together, I realized, she was not just another pretty face, another temporary pretty face. When I would talk to other women, in the standard way I had of implying a chance to meet up in our futures, when the time was good for both of us, I would leave the conversations feeling sick to my stomach. I felt a desire to not hurt my current partner. And yet, I was worried that it would only be a matter of time before I did. This wonderful girl told me very early on in our relationship that infidelity ruined her first marriage and she would never tolerate it again. I did not know when we were committed to each other and only each other. She is now 37. I am now 47.
The only defense I have is pathetic. We never had the “Let’s be boyfriend/girlfriend” conversation. We never had the “Let’s be monogamous” conversation. But it was implied. And I knew it was implied. She said to me just the one time, “I love you.” It was about 6:45 AM on the morning of July 29, 2015, as she kissed me and got out of our bed, my bed. She kissed me on the cheek and said, “I love you, baby.” I played like I was still asleep, and I didn’t respond. I was scared. Did I love her? If I loved her, then she could hurt me. Everyone else who ever said she loved me had hurt me. But there it was, out there. And I chickened out. For weeks, we never mentioned it. She never said it to me again. She stayed at my house close to 100 of the 130 nights we were together. The only nights she didn’t stay at my house were the nights that my daughter stayed at my house. As we both thought it was inappropriate for a child of 12 to see her and me together without being married. Yes, it was completely implied that she and I were together as a
couple. And I was terrified. Please, please don’t backslide into cheating on her.
It got even more serious to me, when one evening about 10 weeks into our dating, at the end of August, she said to me, as an answer to my question about why she didn’t have any children, “I do want children.” And then, it hit me like a ton of unavoidable bricks. This wonderful woman, the most wonderful woman I had ever known was wanting a family. And she was wanting a family with me. What did I want?
I needed a moment to process this information. I didn’t know, if I wanted to have another child or more children. And now, this woman who clearly and truly loves me is implying that she wants to have children, and she wants to have children with me. Now, we’re off to the races. Can I be a loyal and good husband to her? As far as being a father goes, I am exceptional. But then, there is the lingering anger at myself, What would I think if my daughter were dating someone like I am, or like I had been? I would hate this guy. It was the love for my daughter that finally pushed me toward demanding better relationship behavior from me. And here I was facing its first true test. I kept saying, “This is a man’s decision. I need to take a moment to really think about whether I want to have more children or not. And if I don’t, then i don’t want to waste some of my girl’s “baby making years” wondering if I wanted to grab hold of her hand and jump off a cliff together in to the unknowns of parenthood.” There were other concerns that were not as important. But there were other concerns.
There had always been shadow women in my life. Women, who if all the stars lined up perfectly, then I would have taken advantage of the situation and had a quick and maybe in a few years, a repeatable fling or affair. But these women were not my concern. This new nearly girlfriend of mine had removed all or most all of the temptations of other women, merely by how much she showered me with love, regularly and consistently, and how strangely wonderful it felt to feel so much love directed at me, all the time. The only fault that I can give her is that she did all this very quickly. I had no frame of reference for such happiness. It scared me, threw me off “my game,” and swept me off my feet. But I was getting used to it. And it was wonderful. The hitch came with a woman. This other woman was a very good friend of mine. She had known me through some of the most dark and sad periods in my life post divorce and terrible custody battle issue with my ex-wife. She was a long distance and every few months friend with benefits. This woman loved me and I loved her. But when i met my new girlfriend early in the summer, I could no longer see my long distance friend as anything other than a distraction and shamefully on my part, I began to see her love and emotion to me as an annoyance. Over this past summer of 2015, I tried on several occasions to tell my long distance friend, that things had changed and that we should see other people, and that I had started to see other people. i never mentioned that I was seeing only the one other person. I was trying to spare her feelings. I was trying to spare both of their feelings.
After four months of a wonderfully growing relationship with my near girlfriend here in New Orleans, and blowing off offers to visit and come to visit my “special friend” in Florida, I knew I needed to end things with her. I felt I needed to end things with her face-to-face. I thought that an email or telephone call would have been the coward’s way out of doing the man’s thing of facing my situation and giving her the respect and courtesy of a face-to-face goodbye, and I do hope we can remain friends, but knowing that retaining a friendship was unlikely. I was saddened by this decision I made and the drive i was going to take, but I had made up my mind. I wanted to be with my near girlfriend. I wanted to come to her with a clear heart and conscious and ask her to be my girlfriend, knowing that this decision would lead to her becoming my fiancee, wife, and mother of our children and step mother to my daughter.
I didn’t tell my near girl friend what I was planning to do or why. I just told her I was going out of town for a few days. I needed some time to think, The open road has always been therapeutic for me in this way. When I arrived in Florida, we began a three day conversation of “Goodbye.” On several occasions, she tried to convince me that we could stay long distance friends and she would take whatever love I had to spare for her and she would be happy with whatever I had to give her. I felt that this exploitation was completely unfair. She tried very hard to convince me, and I nearly let her. I did break her heart. My idea was not to tell my near girlfriend, who is warm and sweet and with a kind and loving heart that I was going to Florida to tie up some loose ends, which would likely involve breaking a girl’s heart so I could be with you freely and clearly. I didn’t want her to think that there was any negativity attached to our relationship. I never wanted her to feel badly about anything that had to do with her and me. It seems like I managed to screw everything up completely. The best laid plans of mice and men. The road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Insert third generic literary cliche here.
Here’s the rub. My near girlfriend, who is not just loving and kind , warm hearted and beautiful is also smart and scarred. She added up the possibilities of me being a cheater and the motive and opportunities i had created and came up with a logical, and if she had known about my past, historically accurate assessment of what I may have been doing when I left town on any of my road trips, and specifically this road trip. Her feelings were crushed. Her heart is broken. She will not speak to me. She has even let me off the hook for blame, citing that “You never made any promises to me. I just thought this was going somewhere and clearly it is not.” I am sure there is some huge Karma that I am paying for here and now for all the lies and cheating I had done in the past. But truly, and with all the love in my heart for this girl, my hand to God, I was trying to set things straight, do the manly thing, save my long distance friend some integrity and give her proper closure. I was just a big dummy. Had I known that what I was doing would have had the exact opposite effect, for which I was aiming, then I would have never done it. I did lie or at least mislead my current partner. But I rationalized that it was the kind of lie like, “I’m not planning a surprise birthday party for you.” Rather than the lie, that ‘I’m not driving to Florida to cheat on you.”
She has broken off all communication with me. Refuses to see me. Has blocked my number from her phone. She and her friends have ‘unfriended” me from the Facebook. I have tried every avenue to reopen communication with her, writing a letters to her, a letter to her friend, even a letter to her mother, but nothing has worked. I feel now, as she has put it to me that any further attempts to contact her are frightening her that I must let her be alone, either permanently or for a good few weeks. The irony of this result from what I had hoped would be a new start with a woman I would love for the long run is crushingly sad. And now I hear that she is back with her old, ex boyfriend, only three weeks after this transpired between her and me.
I hope that in a few weeks or a month or so, she will speak to me and I will be able to explain what I did and why. Right now, She doesn’t hear anything I say. I am proud of myself for the way I did handle the situation. The outcome could have been a lot better. She taught me that it is OK to be vulnerable and to open myself up to love and being loved. Because for most all of my life, I have never felt worthy of love from a romantic partner. It is a long shot that she and I will be able to mend this fence and move on toward a life of happiness and fulfillment together. But it may happen, if I don’t make things even more of a grand mess. Yet, if it doesn’t work out with her, then I do know that I have grown, somewhat, in baby, baby steps to becoming a man, who deserves to be loved well, and who in turn can openly and without fear, love someone else. Maybe in a few weeks or a few months, I will be in a happier place. I know that I need to stay in therapy, to keep talking about what triggers or what used to trigger my poor behavioral choices. And if I can sit in another welcoming group again, then I will do that as well. The worst thing for me right now, is that I hurt someone who clearly and truly loved me. Even though my intentions were good, I didn’t know yet, how to be honest with her about who i was and what I was working through. I mean seriously, how do I tell your partner, who is scarred from infidelity, which broke up her first marriage that I struggle impulse control. But with her with me, it was easier than ever before. I should have had the courage to talk to her. I love her. She loves or loved me. I just couldn’t bring myself to say it. “Hey, I’ve cheated on every girlfriend, whether real or implied, I’ve ever been with, but I’m in therapy now, I’ve recognized I have a problem, and I am working to manage it. Please, trust me not to break your heart. Damn…
Thank you for your time and attention.
Never is enough enough. I have ruined every relationship I have ever been in, because of my addiction to sex. I rarely find satisfaction mental or physically from a sexual relationship or affair. I used to say that it was because she wasn’t good enough, experienced enough, or whatever. But the truth is, I wasn’t good enough. I didn't feel like I was loved or able to love myself enough to let someone love me.
I am an expert at not getting caught.
For years, and years, I would always be in relationships with people that were loose and non-committed. But that really didn’t matter. If the relationship got too real or committed, then I would just cheat on the person, sometimes for year snap dryers with multiple partners, sometimes multiple partners in the same evening or afternoon. It never made me feel good about myself, except in the most passing minute of feeling like a Grand Male Sex God. It was all a lie. I was lying to myself. I was lying to whomever my partner or partners was or were. But the hardest thing was that I was lying to myself.
I couldn’t understand how so many of my friends could be with only one person. How could they get married and be satisfied with only one person? I dated a lot. I often dated people who shared my polygamous ideas. But rarely would any of these women feel the same extreme pull that I had with me all the time. I would tell myself and whomever was supporting my behavior that I was just “Doing my own thing.” and that “I never made anyone any promises of fidelity.” But in truth, if I had made these promises, I would have broken them. I would have broken them all.
I also feel that it is likely that it will come as no surprise, that in every other aspect of my life, I am a stand up guy. I am true to my word and my friends and family, neighbours, and stagers would all come to my side and say similarly positive things about my behavior and about my character.
I cheat. In every way imaginable I cheat. At least, I did cheat. Why?
I used to say it was cool to have many, many lovers. I was being an Alpha Male, getting women into bed all the time. I loved it when every woman who said something about sex with me said, I was the best they had ever had. But it was still never enough. I had a job that allowed me to be around many single or sort of single women and I took every advantage to get as many of them into bed as possible. The only consequences I ever worried about were sexually transmitted diseases and pregnancies. I have never had any STDs, lucky and prepared, and I have only had one pregnancy, my lovely daughter. Her mother had told me she was on the pill, but her mother had wanted to get pregnant. She had her own level of deceptions that she put on me. But either way, I am speaking about my addiction.
I have been in therapy for years about any number of issues. But the main focus of the past few months has been on me learning the reasons I needed to cheat, the reasons I needed ruin my relationships. Why did I feel the need to take the chance to destroy the happiness that was given to me? For decades of my adult life, I had avoided committed relationships. When I found myself close to someone and it ended, I always blamed the other person. I never looked into myself for any blame, for any guilt. I would just feel badly for a while and move on toward the next, new pre-romance, romance, break up sequence that I know so well. I hate myself for bringing myself so frequently to “Rock Bottom,” but I have never been able to stop myself. I see what Im doing. I hate the feelings it brings up in me. But I know that it is only a matter of time, before I start looking up old phone numbers and preparing new dialogues for old flames about “How much fun we had when we were together.” It was all a lie. I used to have a lot of long and very long distance partners, who were never a threat to my autonomy or my cheating. And since there was never a conversation about commitment, I was always OK in my own version of this truth.
Finally, at the beginning of June 2015, I met someone. I was scared. This person made me feel unlike any other person I had ever known. The sex was good. It was not the most exciting. I never had the desire to race toward her and have the regular physical contact with her. Instead, I found myself wanting to be with her, honestly and completely. After two months, I introduced her to my daughter. She introduced me and my daughter to her mother and family. We had met a lot of each other friends. I was thinking to myself, I want this relationship to work. But I still found myself not cutting all ties to other women completely. At first, I thought I was just being careful. Maybe she was “The One” and maybe she was just another pretty face, another temporary pretty face.
When all my conversations about her to my friends, became conversations about her and me and our future together, I realized, she was not just another pretty face, another temporary pretty face. When I would talk to other women, in the standard way I had of implying a chance to meet up in our futures, when the time was good for both of us, I would leave the conversations feeling sick to my stomach. I felt a desire to not hurt my current partner. And yet, I was worried that it would only be a matter of time before I did. This wonderful girl told me very early on in our relationship that infidelity ruined her first marriage and she would never tolerate it again. I did not know when we were committed to each other and only each other. She is now 37. I am now 47.
The only defense I have is pathetic. We never had the “Let’s be boyfriend/girlfriend” conversation. We never had the “Let’s be monogamous” conversation. But it was implied. And I knew it was implied. She said to me just the one time, “I love you.” It was about 6:45 AM on the morning of July 29, 2015, as she kissed me and got out of our bed, my bed. She kissed me on the cheek and said, “I love you, baby.” I played like I was still asleep, and I didn’t respond. I was scared. Did I love her? If I loved her, then she could hurt me. Everyone else who ever said she loved me had hurt me. But there it was, out there. And I chickened out. For weeks, we never mentioned it. She never said it to me again. She stayed at my house close to 100 of the 130 nights we were together. The only nights she didn’t stay at my house were the nights that my daughter stayed at my house. As we both thought it was inappropriate for a child of 12 to see her and me together without being married. Yes, it was completely implied that she and I were together as a
couple. And I was terrified. Please, please don’t backslide into cheating on her.
It got even more serious to me, when one evening about 10 weeks into our dating, at the end of August, she said to me, as an answer to my question about why she didn’t have any children, “I do want children.” And then, it hit me like a ton of unavoidable bricks. This wonderful woman, the most wonderful woman I had ever known was wanting a family. And she was wanting a family with me. What did I want?
I needed a moment to process this information. I didn’t know, if I wanted to have another child or more children. And now, this woman who clearly and truly loves me is implying that she wants to have children, and she wants to have children with me. Now, we’re off to the races. Can I be a loyal and good husband to her? As far as being a father goes, I am exceptional. But then, there is the lingering anger at myself, What would I think if my daughter were dating someone like I am, or like I had been? I would hate this guy. It was the love for my daughter that finally pushed me toward demanding better relationship behavior from me. And here I was facing its first true test. I kept saying, “This is a man’s decision. I need to take a moment to really think about whether I want to have more children or not. And if I don’t, then i don’t want to waste some of my girl’s “baby making years” wondering if I wanted to grab hold of her hand and jump off a cliff together in to the unknowns of parenthood.” There were other concerns that were not as important. But there were other concerns.
There had always been shadow women in my life. Women, who if all the stars lined up perfectly, then I would have taken advantage of the situation and had a quick and maybe in a few years, a repeatable fling or affair. But these women were not my concern. This new nearly girlfriend of mine had removed all or most all of the temptations of other women, merely by how much she showered me with love, regularly and consistently, and how strangely wonderful it felt to feel so much love directed at me, all the time. The only fault that I can give her is that she did all this very quickly. I had no frame of reference for such happiness. It scared me, threw me off “my game,” and swept me off my feet. But I was getting used to it. And it was wonderful. The hitch came with a woman. This other woman was a very good friend of mine. She had known me through some of the most dark and sad periods in my life post divorce and terrible custody battle issue with my ex-wife. She was a long distance and every few months friend with benefits. This woman loved me and I loved her. But when i met my new girlfriend early in the summer, I could no longer see my long distance friend as anything other than a distraction and shamefully on my part, I began to see her love and emotion to me as an annoyance. Over this past summer of 2015, I tried on several occasions to tell my long distance friend, that things had changed and that we should see other people, and that I had started to see other people. i never mentioned that I was seeing only the one other person. I was trying to spare her feelings. I was trying to spare both of their feelings.
After four months of a wonderfully growing relationship with my near girlfriend here in New Orleans, and blowing off offers to visit and come to visit my “special friend” in Florida, I knew I needed to end things with her. I felt I needed to end things with her face-to-face. I thought that an email or telephone call would have been the coward’s way out of doing the man’s thing of facing my situation and giving her the respect and courtesy of a face-to-face goodbye, and I do hope we can remain friends, but knowing that retaining a friendship was unlikely. I was saddened by this decision I made and the drive i was going to take, but I had made up my mind. I wanted to be with my near girlfriend. I wanted to come to her with a clear heart and conscious and ask her to be my girlfriend, knowing that this decision would lead to her becoming my fiancee, wife, and mother of our children and step mother to my daughter.
I didn’t tell my near girl friend what I was planning to do or why. I just told her I was going out of town for a few days. I needed some time to think, The open road has always been therapeutic for me in this way. When I arrived in Florida, we began a three day conversation of “Goodbye.” On several occasions, she tried to convince me that we could stay long distance friends and she would take whatever love I had to spare for her and she would be happy with whatever I had to give her. I felt that this exploitation was completely unfair. She tried very hard to convince me, and I nearly let her. I did break her heart. My idea was not to tell my near girlfriend, who is warm and sweet and with a kind and loving heart that I was going to Florida to tie up some loose ends, which would likely involve breaking a girl’s heart so I could be with you freely and clearly. I didn’t want her to think that there was any negativity attached to our relationship. I never wanted her to feel badly about anything that had to do with her and me. It seems like I managed to screw everything up completely. The best laid plans of mice and men. The road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Insert third generic literary cliche here.
Here’s the rub. My near girlfriend, who is not just loving and kind , warm hearted and beautiful is also smart and scarred. She added up the possibilities of me being a cheater and the motive and opportunities i had created and came up with a logical, and if she had known about my past, historically accurate assessment of what I may have been doing when I left town on any of my road trips, and specifically this road trip. Her feelings were crushed. Her heart is broken. She will not speak to me. She has even let me off the hook for blame, citing that “You never made any promises to me. I just thought this was going somewhere and clearly it is not.” I am sure there is some huge Karma that I am paying for here and now for all the lies and cheating I had done in the past. But truly, and with all the love in my heart for this girl, my hand to God, I was trying to set things straight, do the manly thing, save my long distance friend some integrity and give her proper closure. I was just a big dummy. Had I known that what I was doing would have had the exact opposite effect, for which I was aiming, then I would have never done it. I did lie or at least mislead my current partner. But I rationalized that it was the kind of lie like, “I’m not planning a surprise birthday party for you.” Rather than the lie, that ‘I’m not driving to Florida to cheat on you.”
She has broken off all communication with me. Refuses to see me. Has blocked my number from her phone. She and her friends have ‘unfriended” me from the Facebook. I have tried every avenue to reopen communication with her, writing a letters to her, a letter to her friend, even a letter to her mother, but nothing has worked. I feel now, as she has put it to me that any further attempts to contact her are frightening her that I must let her be alone, either permanently or for a good few weeks. The irony of this result from what I had hoped would be a new start with a woman I would love for the long run is crushingly sad. And now I hear that she is back with her old, ex boyfriend, only three weeks after this transpired between her and me.
I hope that in a few weeks or a month or so, she will speak to me and I will be able to explain what I did and why. Right now, She doesn’t hear anything I say. I am proud of myself for the way I did handle the situation. The outcome could have been a lot better. She taught me that it is OK to be vulnerable and to open myself up to love and being loved. Because for most all of my life, I have never felt worthy of love from a romantic partner. It is a long shot that she and I will be able to mend this fence and move on toward a life of happiness and fulfillment together. But it may happen, if I don’t make things even more of a grand mess. Yet, if it doesn’t work out with her, then I do know that I have grown, somewhat, in baby, baby steps to becoming a man, who deserves to be loved well, and who in turn can openly and without fear, love someone else. Maybe in a few weeks or a few months, I will be in a happier place. I know that I need to stay in therapy, to keep talking about what triggers or what used to trigger my poor behavioral choices. And if I can sit in another welcoming group again, then I will do that as well. The worst thing for me right now, is that I hurt someone who clearly and truly loved me. Even though my intentions were good, I didn’t know yet, how to be honest with her about who i was and what I was working through. I mean seriously, how do I tell your partner, who is scarred from infidelity, which broke up her first marriage that I struggle impulse control. But with her with me, it was easier than ever before. I should have had the courage to talk to her. I love her. She loves or loved me. I just couldn’t bring myself to say it. “Hey, I’ve cheated on every girlfriend, whether real or implied, I’ve ever been with, but I’m in therapy now, I’ve recognized I have a problem, and I am working to manage it. Please, trust me not to break your heart. Damn…
Thank you for your time and attention.
Your story reminds me of someone I cared very deeply for at one time.
You say you are in therapy, does your therapist think you are a sex addict? Sex addiction isn't easy to diagnose or treat, but there is a set of criteria one must meet to be diagnosed. With that said, there are also SLAA meetings offered that you may want to look up the website and consider attending one.
As for the woman, that was an endearing story. Fairly so, it sounds like that ship may have sailed, but if you truly love her, you may want to give it one last ditch effort and pretty much say everything to her you said here- being honest without the nitty gritty detail, and mention you are in therapy, and tell her you love her, and tell her you are working to manage your issues. You actually have nothing to lose by doing that. Give her a number or an email address to contact you, then leave her alone and also tell you won't ever bother her again.
With that said, at 47, its time to think of where your life is going with this behavior. (I'm not one to talk right now, but I am trying to be introspective and it sounds as if you are also). If you open your heart, there may be another girl, another time, that you feel this way about. There is more than one person for all of us out there. Work on yourself right now, your choices, and goals for yourself. It is my belief it will fall into place.
You may want to use the journaling system on DS too. Its very valuable. Read the boards. The 'infidelity' board and 'Rebuliding' board can also help you see things from a BS perspective. That helps me sometimes, too.
There were a lot of sad people in that room with me, sad, damaged, scarred, but so very strong. I can't say I didn't feel alone, because I do feel deeply and darkly alone. But I did feel connected to other people who are suffering and struggling in painfully familiar ways. This feeling of connectedness to others was new. And it was good.
After the hour long meeting and before I had finished my coffee, I went home. It was then that I called my friend in Florida. The two of us together had a breakthrough moment. After 30 minutes of raw, tear-filled honesty with each other as I lay on my kitchen floor, I realized that I had found something, honesty with myself. I have done mean and hurtful things to people in the past and mostly without a care as to their feelings. But I haven't always been like that.
This compulsive behavior is learned. I learned to behave in this manner, in these situations. If it was learned, then i can be unlearned. I am unlearning this behavior.
Today, is a little bit better than yesterday, maybe as thin as a piece of loose leaf paper, certainly not as much better as a piece of construction paper. But today is better.
I didn't do anything wrong today.
i'm gonna start counting my first meeting, as my first day of recovery.
Today is my 3rd. day.
Good luck to you all.
I send you lots of courage, strength and peace to walk this new path. Be proud of yourself, you are doing a very good thing.
You sound awesome, congratulations!!!
Today is my 8th. day.
I'm have been looking very forward to my next meeting today. It has been a very hard week. Yesterday, would have been my near girlfriend and my six month anniversary. I imagine that everyday regardless of any specific temporal marker would be hard now. But yesterday, was hard. I called her cell phone. I just wanted to hear her voice mail prompt. I hadnt caled her in nearly two weeks, 12 days. She wouldn't have known either way. My number was blocked sometime a few weeks back. I never knew she had completely shut down receiving all communications from me.
I'm starting to feel things, where I used to just avoid feeling things. I have pretty much exhausted talking with my circle of friends about it. The general consensus is, "Tine to And over it." Or "Time to move on." Time is all I have left minutes, hours, days, months of it. Time just stand still here, like a snake sunning itself on the road.
I read the first 90 days are the hardest. And today, I am nearly scratching the 10% mark.
I shake. I cry. I have anxiety attacks. I crawl up in a ball in bed, or any n my couch. I barely leave my house. There are so many things that remind me of her. When I remember, I hurt. Because I am reminded that my behavioural choices hurt the girl I love, hurt her so badly that has has completely cut me out f her life.
Sunday evening I found myself picking up dinner in thebrestaurant in which we had our first date six months ago. I fell into a series of happy, happy memories. And then, when I found myself smiling. Then, i remembered, I'm not happy. I'm sad, so very, very sad. And then...
When I find myself in need of leaving the house, "I've two days without coffee or milk. I should probably eat something that isn't cheese and crackers." I drive through our streets and I remember every little place we had lunch, or breakfast, or dinner. I remember each time we just walked around holding hands and laughing. And then I remember, I did this to us. I'm he reason she's so sad. I'm the reason I'm so sad. Well, I know I'm sad. I don't know how she feels. I hope she's OK.
I never felt this bad before. A close friend, my Breakthrough friend in Florida is helping me though. This time is her third trip through this wasteland. She tells me, I'm feeling things now more than ever before because I'm finally being honest with myself. This honesty sucks. Now, I'm dealing with my feelings instead of avoiding them. For years and years, I would avoid feeling the pain. Now, this pain is real, my constant companion. My honesty is real too. And it is also my constant companion.
I keep asking myself_"Hoe did I get here?" "What trigger evets can I avoid so that this 'Rock Bottom' feeling never returns?"
I need to heal.myself.
That is the mantra I keep repeating. It slowly helps from time to time. But sometimes the wmoitions are overwhelming, not to go out and repeat bad behavior and acting out. No, I'm not doing that part again. The overwhelming emotions come from my personal accountability.
I hurt someone I really love.
I hurt someone I really.love becisse I wasn't done hurting myself.
Now, I'm done hurting myself.
Now, I am healing myself.
And I hope one day to tell her about all the work I've done to improve myself.
Another good point from this week, I'd that my therapist doesn't think I'm a sex addict. I'm more of a broken heart addict. If I start feeling good about things, then I needed to remind myself of how badly I could feel. And I often took close loved ones down with me. Feelings of sadness and worthlessness led me to need approval from people, externally. Now, I understand that these feelings of sadness would never be solved externally. Now, I'm taking steps to feel better about myself. And I do. Tiny, tiny baby steps forward. And I am feeling things now. It's mostly sadness and shame. But there are brief momnets when I feel like I may feel better more often. And that people who trust me to love them will not be wrong. And the girl who trusts me with her heart will be right.
Today is better than yesterday.
Thanks k you for taking the time to read.
Keep coming, reading the boards, and gain insight.
Life is a constant learning curve and Rome wasn't built in a day. Like you said, sometimes its baby steps.
And celebrate that today is better than yesterday. You are doing a good job!
You are going to have bad days and bad weeks- for me it helps just to accept them and know they are coming.
When you try not to think about something its when you think about something the most.
Just breathe. You'll come out of this wiser and have insight into yourself, no?
I remain fascinated that at this age, I have so much self learning still to do....but I guess that's' a good thing, right?
Silence is deafening.
Everything is boring.
Food is annoying and bland.
I've slowly started telling people that my near girlfriend is gone.
It sucks.
When I tell people she's not coming around anymore, they want to know what happened. The story makes for a sad tale. And I regularly feel that I have a Scarlett "A" painted on my chest, like the heroine in Nathaniel Hawthorne's tale. I think everyone can tell that I'm only part of a team. And that someone how I'm the one who is responsible for breaking up the team.
I didn't make her feel safe, when she was with me. And she made me feel safe when I was with her. I thought she could see and feel how different I was when I was with her. But now I understand that there was no real way for her to know me other than the way we were together. She had no frame of reference for whom I had been with earlier partners. I guess she just thought I was dragging my feet to get into a full relationship with her.
She leaving me was the reason I hit Rock Bottom. I needed to get here, otherwise I would have kept repeating the negative cycle. From rock bottom the only way to go is up. She's gone. And I miss her so much. And she knows nothing about where I've been and how much I've changed for the better all thanks to her.
Yeah, so I've had some hard days, and some very hard days. I'm just crazy lonely and needing a hug.
I'm lonely because we were always together. Nearly five months of bliss. I see all the restaurants we ate at. Every TV show we watched together, especially college football and our NFL team. Even going to the grocery store, we did together. She stayed at my house every night except when my child was here. She'd drive home on those nights, late.
I have trouble doing new things. I don't want to create new memories without her.
I have trouble doing old things because everything reminds me of her and happily reminds me of her.
We never had a cross word during the entire time we were together. It did seem amazing the entire time we were together. I had never had someone who just made me feel so loved. I felt waiting for the shoe to drop. Everyone else I had ever dated, the shoe or shoes dropped within a few days to a week or a month or two. With her, the was nothing but a growth of love and happiness. When I realized she was different. I made my point to bring us together with a future, but she and I were on different time tables. It all makes perfect sense from hindsight. But I still needed to fall to this point, otherwise i probably would have made a mess of things in our future.
I can't even sleep in our bed yet. Too many memories. I've been sleeping in the guest room for weeks now. It's hard to sleep alone, nearly impossible. i still wake up many times during the night and start the conversations with her again and again.
The things I'm lacking about her not being here with me and the things I think that could heal this wound in me are that I think now that one thing that would help heal me is... If she knew how much I changed because I loved her so much, solved her trust issues, and we could get back together, live happily ever after.
Breakthroughs work.
People can change.
Love conquers all.
The perfect romantic comedy.
It starts with us talking. And she's not talking to me. The illusion of control I had in the situation is gone. It has been replaced by honesty with myself and for others.
Yes, I'm hopeful someone will get through to her or she will change her mind and think to at least give me an audience She blocked my number. We never had a proper talk a out what happened and why she broke up with me, just an email, which i didn't receive until 24 days after she went it to me. I don't know if she blocked my email back to her or not. So, I have no idea what she heard or missed. Whatever she knows, is not pushing her to contact me, rather to continue to avoid me. This ghosting sucks. I can't grieve properly without closure. So, my pain goes all over the place, even reexamining things that were already good.
One thing I've learned is that it's OK to feel happiness as my primary emotional setting I don't have to sabotage myself to feel badly, just when things are starting to be good.
I'm doing better. It sucks that she doesn't get to reap the benefits of my evolution that she inspired. I just want her to know.
Breakthroughs work.
People can change.
Love conquers all.
I'm looking forwawrd to my 30 day chip.
Thank you for taking the time to read.
Good luck, everyone.
Keep yourself busy--surround yourself with those who love you. Distractions and diversions can be very therapeutic. As can journaling, writing letters to her, but not sending them.
I do feel that you have learned a lot from this experience, a big thing being that a woman needs to feel safe in a relationship. I know how adversely a woman not feeling safe can be. In my relationship where my boyfriend cheated; one of the reasons he was able to go down that road is that because he did not make me feel safe, I could not open up to him like I really wanted to. That "holding back" was interpreted as disinterest, which it was not. Only after a lot of talking did we uncover this part of the trouble in our relationship. It is difficult for some of us to trust, and sometimes it takes more time to build trust in a relationship than it does in another relationship, depending on the people involved. 5 months is really not all that long, though at that point, I would think that there should be some progress being made in the trust department.
In the future you may have the opportunity to reconnect with this woman again---or you may not. But it sounds like you have learned so much, and this is very valuable stuff to carry into your future. I wish you well, hang in there, things will get better, even though it might not seem like it now.
As for the old boyfriend, if she is back with him, chances are that he is being used to fill the void she is experiencing, or they might just be friends and whoever you heard that she was back with him from might not have the story exactly right. Take it from someone who once called upon a longtime ex-boyfriend-now-friend for support during a very hard time immediately following a breakup. Things are not as they can seem sometimes. In my case, even though we spent some time together, went out, etc., it was a friend thing--there was no romance there at all, just some moral support.
I went to my third meeting last night.
I still find the most basic things that I need to do as monumentally difficult. Time moves so slowly. Holiday parties are nearly an impossible activity to contemplate. So, I have avoided them. There is one tonghit to which I would really like to go, but that would entail leaving the security of my own self imposed prison.
I'm either thinking of her while I lie around here, or when I go out. I have found myself trying to bargain with the universe for some hope of reconciliation. But the universe moves at its own pace. And I am both nervous about getting my request granted and anxious about not getting it granted.
Loving myself and forgiving myself are such incredibly huge tasks. It would seem that Hercules got off easily. He was never told that he would have to love himself. Butnteuly, hope is in the work. It is hard. But nothing worthwhile ever came without huge sacrifice and effort
I know a lot of people are working through similar challenges, the names, dates, and places are different, but the situations and struggles are the same.
One thing I keep coming back to is a desire to both proove my growth and apologize for my hurtful behaviours. Again, these things are on the timeline of the universe and not mine. But I do keep returning to the desire to control the situation. This is my recovery. Shouldn't things be done on my time? No, not really. I feel I have been punished long enough. But then truly, would I ever have thought I needed to be accountable unless the accountability had been forced on me? No, I need to let go of my need for control, my desire to be in charge. Since, not only is my control an illusion, but when another person is involved in the equation, then that other person's time and energy are equally as valuable as mine own. I'm just working to feel good about myself, while at the same time holding myself accountable for the hurt I've caused others. It is a most difficult balancing act. And I miss her terribly.
Thank you for reading.
Good.luck to you all.
I want to propose a hypothetical question. If you had been wronged the way that you've wronged others, and your abuser came to you asking for forgiveness, and you knew that not only were they truly sorry but were making efforts to reform their lives, would you forgive them? If so, why not grant yourself the same forgiveness?