Women who Love too Much Community Group
WHEN BEING IN LOVE, MEANS BEING IN PAIN... This group is to help women through the journey of realizing they can love themselves. To help realize that they are capable of having a happy, healthy, whole relationship and break the cycle of abuse and heartache from loving emotionally unavailable men.
I'm a single mom to a wonderful 3 year old, soon to be 4. His father is not the man I'm currently loving too much but he was one of them and I left him when my son was 5 months old. After 4 long years of severe verbal abuse and moderate (whatever that means) physical abuse, I kicked him out and never looked back. I sore I'd never get mixed up with an abuser again. Which is why when I met my current boyfriend, I thought he was gold.
Let me just describe myself a little here. I'm a good looking woman, very successful, very independant. I come from an amazing italian family, I'm well spoken, intelligent and generally a good person. I feel the need to say all this because I don't understand how someone like me could stay addicted to someone like him.
We met online last June after I had been single about a year. I'm very weary of men in general, because of my son. His father is NOT present, at least not in the way or nearly as much as he should be. He does not provide any financial support for him. Which is why I wasn't actively looking for a relationship but I was curious to see what was out there. So I met M (my current bf) on a dating site and we hit it off instantly. The fact that he and I share the same culture and literally live 5 minutes apart was a huge bonus because I have neer been with anyone who spoke my mother tongue (Italian). I thought he would speak the same language, literally and otherwise. And we did at first. It took a month for us to actually meet. We only chatted on line and texted for a good 4 weeks, which was fine. I got to know alot about him. But I noticed from the get-go that he wasn't very curious about my life, my career, my family, etc. Yet he was very forthcoming about his. Maybe that was the first red flag, who knows...but I still don't understand it to this day.
Anywhow, when we finally met, it was explosive and it remained that way for about 2 months. We saw each other every day, and mostly at night after my son would be in bed. At first I was very adament about him not meeting my son as I wanted to be sure he was worthy of it. But then as time went on, I tried to make it happen, and M would subtly steer away from it until one day he told me he wasn't ready for him yet. He said he needed more time. I didn't think much of it at the time.
About 2 months into our relationship, something happened and I had a slight suspicion that he was being unfaithful. To thsi day I'm not even sure it was realistic, I never had proof. I confronted him and he was hurt and offended. I insisted. He denied. I broke it off.
We were apart for about a month but he kept contacting me, and so did I. At thsi point, it was clear I was completely addicted to him.
We reunited but this time it was different. We hardly spent any time together. We fought alot and there was alot of silent treatment. He would take the opportunity to be 'mad' at me whenever I stepped out of line somehow. So he wouldn't contact me for days. I thought he was cheating. He wouldn't come see me, always had something or otehr to do, or was working. I even hired a private investigator at one point because I just wanted proof and he turned up with nothing. I was relieved yet extremely frustrated.
In April, i ended it again. I just couldn't handle not seeing him and wondering what i was doing wrong. He kept saying he was busy and to not take things so personally...that we are ok..not to worry, etc etc.
Still, i felt starved for affection. we were hardly having sex and I was constantly an anxious mess. The times we woudl see each other was an Event. Keep in mind that he lives a short 5 minute drive away from me. This was ridiculous.
Anyhow, again, we were broken up for about a month. Thsi time I was very good in keeping no contact with him. Which is why he kept in contact with me...to keep me at arm's length. It was sickening. But I missed him. We got back together again about a month ago. I've seen him all of 4 or 5 times since then. We have had sex once.
WHAT THE HELL AM I DOING!??????
ps. he's 8 years younger than I
Let me just describe myself a little here. I'm a good looking woman, very successful, very independant. I come from an amazing italian family, I'm well spoken, intelligent and generally a good person. I feel the need to say all this because I don't understand how someone like me could stay addicted to someone like him.
We met online last June after I had been single about a year. I'm very weary of men in general, because of my son. His father is NOT present, at least not in the way or nearly as much as he should be. He does not provide any financial support for him. Which is why I wasn't actively looking for a relationship but I was curious to see what was out there. So I met M (my current bf) on a dating site and we hit it off instantly. The fact that he and I share the same culture and literally live 5 minutes apart was a huge bonus because I have neer been with anyone who spoke my mother tongue (Italian). I thought he would speak the same language, literally and otherwise. And we did at first. It took a month for us to actually meet. We only chatted on line and texted for a good 4 weeks, which was fine. I got to know alot about him. But I noticed from the get-go that he wasn't very curious about my life, my career, my family, etc. Yet he was very forthcoming about his. Maybe that was the first red flag, who knows...but I still don't understand it to this day.
Anywhow, when we finally met, it was explosive and it remained that way for about 2 months. We saw each other every day, and mostly at night after my son would be in bed. At first I was very adament about him not meeting my son as I wanted to be sure he was worthy of it. But then as time went on, I tried to make it happen, and M would subtly steer away from it until one day he told me he wasn't ready for him yet. He said he needed more time. I didn't think much of it at the time.
About 2 months into our relationship, something happened and I had a slight suspicion that he was being unfaithful. To thsi day I'm not even sure it was realistic, I never had proof. I confronted him and he was hurt and offended. I insisted. He denied. I broke it off.
We were apart for about a month but he kept contacting me, and so did I. At thsi point, it was clear I was completely addicted to him.
We reunited but this time it was different. We hardly spent any time together. We fought alot and there was alot of silent treatment. He would take the opportunity to be 'mad' at me whenever I stepped out of line somehow. So he wouldn't contact me for days. I thought he was cheating. He wouldn't come see me, always had something or otehr to do, or was working. I even hired a private investigator at one point because I just wanted proof and he turned up with nothing. I was relieved yet extremely frustrated.
In April, i ended it again. I just couldn't handle not seeing him and wondering what i was doing wrong. He kept saying he was busy and to not take things so personally...that we are ok..not to worry, etc etc.
Still, i felt starved for affection. we were hardly having sex and I was constantly an anxious mess. The times we woudl see each other was an Event. Keep in mind that he lives a short 5 minute drive away from me. This was ridiculous.
Anyhow, again, we were broken up for about a month. Thsi time I was very good in keeping no contact with him. Which is why he kept in contact with me...to keep me at arm's length. It was sickening. But I missed him. We got back together again about a month ago. I've seen him all of 4 or 5 times since then. We have had sex once.
WHAT THE HELL AM I DOING!??????
ps. he's 8 years younger than I
Am I willing to go no contact? What I've learned with M is that if I actually go through with it...change my number or whatever, this will just spike his interest. There's nothing he loves more than a challenge. He knows where I live, where I work, where my parents live. He'll 'bump' into me somewhere. Whatever...he'll do it.
This is something i will have to fight on my own.
You know what I hate more than anything? That I find myself trying to figure HIM out more than I try to figure myself out. That is so wrong on so many levels.
I have heard and read many times from N victims your sentiment- and I understand the perspective - my last one liked to keep in touch. Now having had both a Overt (my last one) and a covert (this one) the thing that WAS nice about having them "bug" you in a way, at least for me, and I can only speak for myself, was that it made it EASIER for me to be even more angry, and move forward. Whereas there is no real closure with the disappearing act. Hard to explain if you haven't been there. All I can say is I know I am not alone in how I feel from others that have also had my experience with it. The passive aggressiveness of the second kind vs the aggressiveness of the first kind if extremely challenging. Kind of like the difference of having a person disappear and not know if they are dead or alive.... and not having that closure vs finding the body. Kind of drags the grieving out a lot longer!
I have mixed feelings about all of this. The book, sites liek these, all these other types of self help mediums. To be honest, it pisses me off to the core that I'm giving that A-hole so much power when what he's probably doing right now is downing a pitcher of beer at a bar somewhere or who knows...maybe he's banging some skank and I'm the furthest thing from his mind.
I spend so much time and energy analyzing is every friggin move, I wanna barf.
I can't tell you how many times I have read his texts to me from the past few weeks.
I'm utterly disgusted with myself.
You mention having mixed feelings about the book, the site, self-help...
I would try to focus on this being about YOU and not about him. You invited him into your life and that's where the energy is going. Perhaps for now, you are re-reading texts and re-analyzing what he meant when he said this or this or that three weeks ago Thursday, AND that's okay too. It is part of your process.
This site, the books, therapy, seeking truth, all of it is a choice--entirely based on free will to serve you.
It is for clarity and support as well. These experiences are very confusing to people and recognizing yourself in a page of a book or here is not only liberating but an incredible salve.
I spent so much energy on myself after I left my abuser 3 years ago. I was in therapy for a while and it took a long time, loads of courage and so much determination to actually leave him and then to keep him out of my life despite being my son's father. I'm so angry at myself for falling right back into another self-destructive pattern with a selfish man. To make things worse, I did meet a really nice guy who was genuinely interested in me, who cared for me and my son. Who was good for me and I went and screwed that up. I was bored, he really didn't do it for me. WTF
You have a pattern going and you will absolutely relate to the stories you read. If you have read it, then keep going deeper with other books, articles, etc.
Even though you did work to move out and past your marriage (AND good for you, you are very strong to do this), you have not eliminated the pattern--even the 'ho hum' on the nice guy. Sometimes it's just chemistry and sometimes it is the fact that 'we' don't really dig the nice guys. Hence the pattern and the emotions and the energy.
Some of the stories did not reflect my life either--in fact, none of them did but the emotions and as I proceeded a deeper understanding of who I was in my past relationship (the one that made it glaring for me) DID make sense.
I get what you are saying--keep reading.
When I realized that I was in an emotionally abusive relationship about a year in to a two year union, I couldn't believe it--ARE YOU KIDDING ME? Me at 45??? What??? I had always been with very decent human beings. This time I needed to figure it ALL out.
I was overweight for much of my childhood and teenage years and I clearly remember daydreaming about wanting a boyfriend who thought I was beautiful. For the longest time, I really thought I would never be someone's gf or wife. I was bullied in school.
Today is day 5 of NC. It's getting to be painful. I can't believe he hasn't contacted me. MUST.STAY.STRONG