I've always been addicted to unavailable men. The current one was a friend of mine from 10 years ago who, I'm ashamed to admit, was married at the time and I slept with him regardless. We lost contact for 9 of those years and recently stumbled across one another in myspace. Thinking I had changed a lot since, we started talking and started a long distance relationship (I'm in Alaska, he's in NC). In the beginning I expressed concern that if he was willing to cheat on his wife with me 10 years ago, what is to stop him from doing it to me? He laid out a whole bunch of reasons and...lo and behold...4 months later he cheats on me. To his credit, he told me immediately so he isn't ENTIRELY like the other assholes I've dated. To MY credit, when he told me I was calm, unwilling to accept responsibility for his actions or to blame myself, unwilling to be pulled into any drama, and unwilling to get back together with him. We do still talk, however, because we do communicate VERY well and in some ways I've grown more because of some of my conversations with him than I think I would've done otherwise. And we can talk about anything..or so I thought. Evidently, me talking about pursuing new men doesn't sit well with him. Not in the sense that he gets mean or jealous, but in the sense that he suddenly starts saying that he misses me, that I'm beautiful and amazing and all that (he is right about the last two...I fucking rock, even if I do say so myself). So of course, the addict in me is drawn to this validation and, after a time, the conversations start taking a sexual turn. Sometimes I instigate it, sometimes he does. Regardless, he is still seeing the girl he left me for (who, incidentally, I have no hard feelings toward at all....she is as much a victim of his behavior as I am...she just doesn't know it yet). Anyway, like drinking too much at the company party, its fun at the time, but you regret it in the morning, right? So after the high of these phone sex type conversations wears off, I feel guilty mostly because if she knew, it would hurt her, and having been on the receiving end of that, I can't NOT feel like an asshole for being party to it. I want to stop being so insecure that the only time I feel safe is as the other woman but I can't seem to stop doing it. So I mention to him that I am s disgusted by my behavior and disappointed in both of us because we're both playing the same old roles, namely I'm a serial homewrecker, he's a serial cheater. I'm disappointed because even though there is no future for him and I, I want to believe that somewhere inside each of us is a good person who has been wounded and is acting from that wounded place rather than believing that both of us were just born an asshole. THinking that has gone a long way toward not only forgiving him, but forgiving all the men and people who I've been slighted by. In short, I don't believe that he is a bad man anymore than I believe I'm a bad woman. WE are both just a little fucked up right now.
Anyway, my comment about him being a serial cheater pissed him off because he feels like "I'm pointing fingers" and "blaming him". And on some level perhaps I am, because when I'm honest, there is no question that the subtext to what I've been saying is that he is more guilty because he actually has a girlfriend to answer to while I don't owe her or him anything (except compassion for her as one who has also been cheated on). So now I'm panicking because 1) he's very angry and I HATE conflict, 2) I'm questioning my own assessment of his and my fundamental charachter, which makes me fear that we are, in fact, simply irreparable as people and I may as well not bother trying to fix me, and 3) because I've realized that in trying to make him see that he is a serial cheater,however, obtusely I try to phrase it, I'm trying to FIX him again, dammit, and I thought I was starting to get over that compulsion.
ON the up side, I've told him that regardless of how mad he gets I won't be railroaded into accepting more than my share of the blame. That's good, right? At least one step in the right direction, yes?