What I Wouldn't Give....
to have someone to share my deepest darkest secrets......hopes ... dreams....fears...joys.. Someone who is not afraid to open up, realizing that the deepest pain can be a bit more bearable and overcome with someone to help you through it...... Or that a simple joy can be magnified beyond belief with another to share it with.
I was taught early on to be polite, well behaved, don't bother others with "my" problems and be sure to convince everyone my family was a happy, typical one. Over the years, I would discover why things were the way they were, not just for our "family", but for so many others (for just as many different reasons)
I feel like I discovered the magic key to unlock the door leading from chaos and dysfunction to a healthier , happier life. I think this is why I crave this so much. I have come full circle....from a very quiet, lonely little girl who would learn to shut down and feel nothing for years....To a grown woman who has recently (for the 85th time ......really, I exaggerate just a tad) learned it is no life if you try to get by simply going through the motions...shutting down,feeling nothing.
I long for the day when I could find a warm,caring man who is not afraid of opening up and sharing everything with me and will allow me to with him as well.... to smile when he simply entered the room, get goosebumps at the mere touch of his hands (anticipating what is to come)....to help him through hard times or grief.....celebrate happy times .....and share passion...from a gentle caress to roaming hands and lips exploring each other til our hearts raced and hot sweaty bodies did need to recover lying in each others arms.
Yes, I know, i am a true romantic.....and a fool.
(At least I still have my dreams....and that is it)
PS I do know I am still married...but I can't share very much as i have to weigh my words or anticipate responses from him. I also have another man who wants to be there who knows what I am currently going through....but , with him as well...he says he wants to share good and bad, but there are also things I guard from him as well because i am afraid.
Ultimately, I am alone and probably always will be.
Replies
Hells bells, VQ. I wish I could empathize more with the being quiet and shutting down, but I'm just the opposite. I don't think I've ever left a confrontation thinking to myself that I should have said this or that. I ALWAYS leave thinking to myself that I didn't necessarily have to say that last thing or two.
As for wishing for a man you can truly love and who will love you back while still being trapped in your current marriage, I was probably to harsh in my last response. Everyone wants to feel loved and wanted. It's a basic human need we all have and that doesn't go away because we're stuck in a marriage that isn't what we want. I believe that you have finally mentally found some closure and your current circumstance does not permit you to be where you want to be physically. It sucks that you can't readily reconcile those two things right now. I have a feeling this will all work out in the end. You are on the path to true happiness, I can feel it in my bones!
@Gutted..... thank you.....(From your lips to God's ears, but I'm not holding my breath.)
I have always reverted back to shutting up and not stirring things up in the past. (Anger and confrontation usually sent me the other way)
This past year or so things have changed. Unexpectedly, I would come to find so much of what I needed from a very kind stranger a zillion miles away. He would give me encouragement, hope, confidence , allow me to open up and be myself (accepting me just as I am), help me past some hang-ups I would struggle with all my life and.....share with me what a healthy relationship should be. He was the one who did flip the switch.....bringing me back to life and all these emotions flooding back.
With this new found confidence, I got braver, bolder and finally started to speak up . My quietness has grown to chattiness....even speaking my mind now, although I am often (like yesterday) bullied back to silence (especially by hubby) or else completely discounted. (Believe it or not, like you, I do have moments too where I finish and think....did I really need to say that? haha Mine are still more conversations then confrontations though.)
Thanks for your kind words. I am glad you did find your perfect match and I can easily believe he was (and is) a true gentleman . I am also in the US and my very special friend is also across the pond (a zillion miles away) I have told him many times that English Mums do a much better job raising caring, polite, respectful sons than we seem to be producing here in the US. lol
Glad that you found a special friend. How odd that your friend is British as well. It just goes to show what a small world we all share. Also congrads on coming out of your shell a little. It's an unfortunate truth that we have to stand up for ourselves in this world, cause the minute we start relying upon someone else to, it makes us weak. Hubbie stands up for me but I do my fair share of standing up for him as well, so I suppose it all balances out. I hope you find some peace in your home or end up somewhere better. We allowed unpleasant relatives to live with us once, and boy oh boy, we tried to stay gone all the hours under the sun from out own house. Glad that's behind us. I kind of know how not being happy in your home can feel.
It sounds like we grew up a similar way. Be a lady and be quiet..... Even when I was an adult, I have a tendency to act like someone I am not. I guard my feelings but burn or get upset inside. So frustrating!!!
VQ - I don't know how you would go about doing this but you need to make hubby understand your needs. You need to do this carefully so he doesn't feel like you are shaming him, but at the same time I think that you need to also make him understand that if the relationship is to continue that you need him to get in touch with himself and start trying to develop a relationship with you.
If he doesn't show signs of being mature enough to do that hard work on himself and work on learning to court you....I think you should tell him that! time to get his attention. Put him on the spot and let him know what type of man you are looking for.....and that you would like him to be that man, but its up to him.....or you cant continue the relationship.
Dan... I have tried. Started by hinting I wasn't happy...said I needed more. Once i mentioned divorce, we did actually talk . He asked me what and i did try to tell him. he actually listened and tried for a day or two. By day three he shrugged and said, "you know how I am" and no longer bothered
He puts little stock into therapy. He did tell his sister he would try it ,but given the amount of effort he puts forth, I think it was offered as a stall tactic (and I don't want to waste any more time)
And as far as him courting me and trying to be that man I so desperately want. if i tell him this, he will laugh in my face and tell me....."I don't have to court you, we are already married...and you knew who I was when you married me .."
Sadly, when i first mentioned not being happy and needing more. his response was more geared to making me fear being alone and struggling financially with one income (How I was going to inflict this on both of us...). I did wish he would have showed more interest instead in offering a solution for us .
Hi VG, sorry you're still on pause in your relationship, that the VCR machine has grabbed your tape and won't release it or play it. I will share that my ex used fear also with me when I told him I was unhappy and that things needed to change. Well, at first, he had no reaction. He didn't get a counselor as he had promised many times prior, then when I got a counselor for us both, didn't put real effort into it. He just dug his feet into the old patterns and wouldn't budge. Then when I did file, out came the fear tactics. That he would get full custody of the kids. That he would ruin me financially. That I would be living on the streets. That everyone would hate me for "ruining" the marriage. And on and on. He did get me pretty hard with the getting full custody one, not that there was any reason in the world that I would be deemed a bad mom, but just that my kids are the most important part of my life and that I would be devastated if he got full custody. It was a groundless fear but it got me nonetheless. Eventually, I realized that the fears he was spouting out were HIS OWN fears. And he turned those fears into reality, for himself, for the most part. It's his self-fulfilling, self-sabotaging ways. He tried to project those things onto me, but in the end, they didn't happen. Is this what your husband is like? Isn't he unemployed? Don't you make more money than he collects (disability, Medicare/aid or whatever income he has)? Wouldn't you be in a better financial position if you divorced, split assets, and just paid your own way?
I'm 6 months post-divorce and at peace. I just vaguely wish for someone else in my life, but at a similar age to you and not a lot of self confidence about my appeal to men, I don't know if it'll happen for me. That's ok for now. The peace is something I've been seeking for a long time. It is wonderful waking up every day without the dread of having to see, interact, or try to get him to see that we aren't working anymore. I cannot overstate how important peace in your life can be. Finally making the hard decision to divorce was the start of rebuilding a new me. I gave up on the old clunky broken VCR tape. It wasn't working.
@ jojored....yes, that damn VCR tape does have a death grip. lol He knows (as does his and my families) that guilt and fear can stop me dead in my tracks. The guilt not so much anymore....fear still can. You are right (as someone else also pointed out once before)...the fears he is projecting are more his....but they are a concern of mine as well.
Financially I could do ok on my own. It is the debt that concerns me. It continues to grow. On my own, in control of my own finances, I can make a deeper dent in this then I can with him. (He has a different mindset.....more lax and unworried. I want to try like hell to put debt behind me.) With doing a divorce all tell me it will be a long haul and an expensive one. This is what worries me most.
PS I have finally heard back from an inquire I did make. It seems the check I have been waiting for was issued a month ago but i never received it. So they have to reissue another. There is still light at the end of my tunnel, just hopefully no more roadblocks.
About the debt, I don't know if there is any real financial reason to wait. If your debt isn't shrinking now but growing (I think I remember you saying you were making efforts to get rid of it), then you'll never get out and find a new life if you're waiting for $0 debt. Especially if it's mostly his debt, or his new debt - is he accumulating more debt and trapping you with that, knowing you want to rid yourself of it before divorcing? If he's fully aware, then this could be just another mind game he's using to keep you where you are.