Oh, no I don't feel "attacked" at all, LL. I value your opinions.
I have made several other posts about my opinions on OM's integrity so I'll refer you to my prior posts on that point, rather than re-hash.
It's not that I find the term "open M" offensive... it's just that it sort of invalidates the pain H and I are going through... people in true open M's do not have pain over their situation... they are fine with it. H and I DID consider Open M as a "way out" of this sitch of me being so attached to OM. We desperately considered all sorts of solutions to our problem, such as me being "friends" with OM and so forth. We rejected open M not because we found it offensive, but mostly because we value a simple lifestyle and multiple partners is a complex way to live. H and I are also both kind of "romantic" I guess, in the notion that one person can and should (with some work on the R) IDEALLY be able to fully meet the spouses needs, and we felt like open M would be (for us) "selling out" on that ideal.
And, I guess we will just have agree to disagree on what an "open M" IS! By your definition, almost everyone on this forum would currently be involved in an "open M" just because they do not immediately D when spouse is having an A. I see a huge difference between a couple that's in agreement about extramarital involvements being fine (open M) and a couple where one spouse is "tolerating" another spouses A under distress! I DO see your point that the same behavior may be going on in both situations, but R's are not just about behavior but about attitudes about what is going on, right? I know my H would not like to be thought of as the "same" as a man in an open M who thinks his wife kissing and having feelings for another man is just fine and dandy, and part of his chosen lifestyle.
Yes, I agree that my comments about OM's W are biased, as all comments are. For example SINJIN is often pointing out how my comments about my own H are biased! And I agree, they may be! So of course my comments about OM's W would be also.
QUOTE: "you have no real idea of how she is in the r or who she is as a person."
TRUE...and like I just implied, often people cannot even make this claim about their own spouses!.. that they know who they are as a person... But I can see that at least I do have first hand info about H!... and not about OM's W... so if it makes you feel better, if I make other comment about W (which I doubt I will, as it was the only one I ever made!) I will preface it with "according to OM" or "OM feels" or "I get the impression from OM" ... I just thought most people would assume that I am not chummy with W, and that impressions would come from conversations w/OM.
not sure if it's just your writing style or not but I get the sense you are more aggrivated with my comments than you are directly letting on ie the extra use of ! and over explanations of things.
Frankly I do think that we (those that are at least temporarily accepting of their spouses a)are all living in open marriages whether we like it or not...but that's me.
re comments about om's w. I personally don't care if you refer to her here or elswhere as the wicked witch of the east. My point was not that you shouldn't talk poorly of her my point was that your thoughts and opinions of her are biased and the things you hold true in your conceptions of her (thus the ability to think or make the statement that she will never be able to fully satisfy her h)
More importantly it seems you may have missed a post. You claimed to be tired of trying to figure out oms and h's motives...I say forget trying to figure them out and spend some more time trying to figure out your own.
LL, yes, I did see the post you made on motivations. I do spend an awful lot of time already, trying to figure out my motivations. I tend to be introspective to a fault, and being a psychology student makes me even more so. I agree, it's basically a good thing, because it has yielded a lot of self-insight, and gotten me in touch with "whys" of my conflict. I do know my motives... When I said "I barely know my own motives" what I meant is that my own motives are sometimes tricky enough to figure out, without also trying to do the same with H and OM!
My H said something interesting today, he said that people often have such trouble making decisions because they view them as "permanent," as if their fate will be sealed by whatever they decide to do next. He reminded me that decisions can always be reversed or at least revised. I told him I rarely think of life in those terms, and maybe trying to do that will help me get out of limbo. He said I either need to get OUT of limbo or get a lot more comfortable IN it. Yep, those are the only two sane choices.
I just realized I have not posted on my own thread in a long awhile. An update, then... for those who have been losing sleep over Annalise's situation.
"Minor Progress" sums things up, I think.
I decided to go spend two days at a best girlfriend's house for a change of scene and to gain some perspective. It truly helped me feel better and re-join the land of the living a bit more. I am eating and sleeping better, and obsessing less about my sitch, and less upset about it. My friendship with H is still very solid.
I am beginning to realize that this is not just an M crisis, or an OM crisis, but actually more like a mini-identity crisis. I have yet to find my niche in my work life, and I have been procrastinating in some areas of self improvement. And on examining my R patterns over my life, I can now see I have never allowed myself to be without an emotional connection to a man... to be self reliant, emotionally. I am not a huge fan of total self reliance, but I want the option of that, and I want the prospect of it to feel more comfortable. So, I am making a plan to work on all this, and I feel like as I do that, decisions will come more easily and be more valid.
I am still, at this moment, totally ambivalent about my M... about whether or not to reconcile, and H says he is ambivalent as well. Part of me would like to try to get back together, to "save" the thing, and really see what we can make of it now, that is appealing to me, but though I love him, I do not feel "in love" enough or attracted enough to him physically, and those are barriers. Yes, I know those barriers can be worked on, but I'm not sure I want to, in light of our M problems over the years, which do not outweigh the good times, but almost.
I am really wondering if my feelings for H were ever strong enough... he says he does not think they were, and he says he does not think his were for me, either... that we were definitely in love and committed, but that all our contention prevented a truly deep emotional rapport and connection from taking hold. When he said that, I said YES, I feel exactly that same way. So..???... I do not want to live without that kind of connection anymore, so our question is, do we want to "work" on that with eachother, or see if it comes more naturally with someone else one day...not an easy decision for either of us.
H has lost interest in his cyber AOW (almost other woman). He says he is having more fun kinda "playing the field" in cyber space, and got bored with AOW. He almost had another AOW, but he says she got bored with him.
I am still in "e-mail only" contact with OM, and it is a bit less frequent. I feel good about the fact that I am saying the difficult things I wanted him to know before I break contact. I know that will almost certainly not "make any difference" but it will at least make no contact with him a LOT easier, knowing that I have not left anything unsaid this time, as I did years ago with him. He has been sharing some thoughts and feelings with me as well, but he does not share nearly as much as I do, which is our usual pattern. He is not trying to pull me back, at all. He knows we are at an impasse, since he won't consider D, and I won't continue any kind of R with him, otherwise.
It's incredibly hard to write the very last of what I want to say to him, and have all contact be over with. But I know I will manage to do that and very soon... I am highly motivated because I re-start school in a few weeks, and a new job. I am excited about those things, and I want to let OM go before then, so I will be able to focus.
I am not worried about staying away from OM, I know I will... what I am worried about is how to fall out of love with OM. That does not feel really possible, and it bothers me that if I don't DO that it will sabotage my future R, either with H, or anyone else! Even though OM will NOT come charging back into my life, I want to feel that at some point, if he DID it would not automatically bust up whatever R I am in! I guess I will get a book on how to get over someone, or try to use rational-emotive self-talk, or just WAIT, or what? I would like some comments on how people have "gotten over" someone they were still completely in love with when they broke up. How is that done? Enlighten me.
Oh... a very unexpected twist. The LAST thing I ever wanted or imagined as even remotely "possible" would be some AOOM (almost other OTHER man) complicating my already complicated sitch. And, for the past 14 months that I have been S, I have not even had to "try" to avoid that... I have easily avoided it, because I have been all tied up emotionally with OM, and therefore completely unavailable. Not that men have been beating my door down, with me moping around and pining away for OM.
Long story short, I found myself getting into a flirtatious conversation with an out-of-state stranger, on the phone. This was not like me at all. A single guy, my age. We were clicking, and before I knew it, he asked if he could call me some time. I declined, saying I was S, but still lived with my H.
He persisted, so I said "No, I'm flattered, but my situation is complex." He was still not discouraged, and so I said I was ALSO going through a rough breakup of sorts, with a married man. I was hoping the naked truth would make me sound like enough of a nightmare for him to to let it drop. Nope. And then, for some reason I opened my mouth to say "No" again, but different words came out: "Okay... how about I just give you my e-mail address?" When I hung up, I could not believe I agreed to any further contact with a man I don't even know and have never even seen... especially in my sitch.
The next morning, he sends me his full name and contact info and a note about how he enjoyed our conversation and is concerned about making a good impression.
I looked him up on the net. I discover he's kind of a big shot, in his field. We exchanged some e-mails, and he disclosed that his sitch is complicated too. He has a rocky long-distance R that is on again/off again... a GF, not a W. Serious or casual GF, I have no idea, and I did not ask. I like to wait till people volunteer things, because then the unvarnished truth is much more likely.
He is only one state away and wrote that he would like to visit me. Visit?! I was so alarmed by that idea that I made no comment at all. So he asked if he could at least call. We are still playing phone tag. He leaves phone messages in Italian, and e-mails daily. I guess we will exchange pictures at some point. I am half hoping his picture is a total turn-off to me, or mine to him, because it would be more than fine by me if whatever this little encounter IS fizzles out fast, all things considered.
Meanwhile, this flirtation is a bit of a distraction from my OM distress, which is nice... but I know myself well, and "flirtatious diversions" have never been my thing... I do not "do" light R's. They annoy me. So I KNOW one of two things will happen... I will either drop this pretty darn quick (assuming he doesn't drop it first) or else it will morph into a R. That seems like only a VERY remote possibility, but it is worrying me nonetheless, given my sitch. I have seriously considered saying "Hey I'm sorry, but I think this was probably a bad idea," but I find myself curious about this guy, and I find myself liking being pursued, despite myself.
What does that say about reconciliation with my H... I think it says that I am even more ambivalent about reconciling with him than I think. H sabotaged our potential reconciliation by returning to cybering right as I was fading from OM... and now, I am sabotaging reconciliation too, apparently.
Yes, of course I told my H I seem to have a new phone/email flirtation going on. He is flirting like crazy in cyber space these days, so he was not upset... he jokingly called me a little tramp. Today we talked about it more seriously, and he said "I think this means you are still attached to me emotionally, and you need some help making the break from me, and you are gearing up to let go of OM, so you need reinforcements... women do that all the time."
Wow. Possible. I don't LIKE that idea though... it strikes me as not the most ideal and centered way to move on from an OM or an M. On the same hand, I'm CURIOUS about NF (new friend). I know, curiosity killed the cat. Good thing cats have nine lives.
Strange thing... the day after I posted the last update, I began to get in touch with some very positive feelings about my H. Admitting to myself that my feelings for him have faded, and maybe never were quite as strong as they should have been... that has been hard to face, and maybe facing that reality made it possible for some stronger feelings for him to surface. Who knows, we may just pull through this after all.
It's hard not to dwell on the fact that a crisis is a such a difficult time, but I've been reminding myself that a crisis is also an exciting time!... when I think about the future... either a fresh start for my M, or a brand new life on my own... both of those futures are full of exciting possibility, and that's the beauty of a crisis, I think... that it clears the way for more wonderful things to happen.
I am feeling like one of the most important things for me to do now is to immerse myself in my daily life.
I'm taking a break from the forum, and from time on my lap top in general, so I wanted to thank all those who've commented on this thread. I looked back at my first post, and it's dated only five weeks ago. I can't believe that! Seems like I've been here for months. If my H and I do decide to reconcile, I may be back... this is a nice community, with so many smart people in it!
I've read your last couple of posts a few times and wanted to say something but wasn't sure what.
so instead of trying to make sense of the thoughts that occured to me as I read your current thoughts I'll just say that I wish you peace and happiness in whatever direction you choose.
I feel compelled to add that I think you should choose your marriage.
