I want my Monkey and Sheep Back

[beepee]

Thanks so much for your input Miska, I really, really appreciate it.

I agree and disagree with some of what you are saying, only because I truly believe that no one knows exactly what goes on in a relationship except the 2 people in it.

H should have been emotionally better equipped for the R than you by sheer experience.

agreed but considering his past relationships, he wasn't.

Oh, he was prepared allright......to control you!

I disagree here, he was a bit more controlling in the beginning of our relationship but once he cheated on me and admitted it, I became the controlling one. I did spiral downwards into a deep depression and I became very, very controlling. Not in the sense that I was actively saying, YOU CAN'T DO THIS, YOU CAN'T DO THAT, but instead it was more of a silent control. When he wanted to do something that I didn't want him to do, he wouldn't do it because he feared me getting angry. And he didn't like the way I got angry. I would sit in complete darkness and cry. I wouldn't sleep. I would call him names. I would say negative things about myself and say that he doesn't love me, I would sometimes hurt myself. He feared that the most. And he didn't know how to handle it. He always felt he couldn't leave me alone whenever he wanted to go out and do something on his own. I was very attached to him and would get very sad if he left me to go anywhere (due to my insecurities after him cheating on me). So he always felt stuck, and I understand it so much more now, how suffocating I was to him. He did try to make it up to me after he cheated, he was remorseful. He apologized profusely, did everything for me, I never had to lift a finger for months and months after he admitted to cheating. I got so used to it that any deviation from what I considered the "norm" would make me feel sad, depressed, lonely, unloved, abandoned because I felt like he was giving up trying to make me feel better and no longer wanted to help me get over his infidelity.

I hate to say it Beep, but it seems a lot like you were played by him.

I understand your concern, but I deep down do not believe this is true. Yes, he cheated, and yes, he's not willing to change, and yes, there is a huge age difference between us, but I don't think that amounts to being played. I don't think he would have styed with me for as long as he did if he was playing me. I don't think he would have married me, or stayed to care for me and wait on me hand and foot if he played me, he wouldn't have continuously begged me to go to MC with him if he played me. Do you know what I mean? We both had our flaws. But the difference is that I am more aware of my flaws and am more willing to change myself for the better. He doesn't want to change, because he's confusing changing negative behaviors with changing who he is as a person. That's what I was never able to get through to him. And I don't know if he will ever admit to his flaws or if he will ever even realize that he has flaws, but I sure hope he does, because he is a good person, and I do want him to be in a happy relationship. I just don't think he will get that if he doesn't change. UNLESS he finds someone just like him!

One of the huge problems we've always had was miscommunication, mainly due to cultural differences. American v Irish. The way we communicated, our type of humor, our reactions to certain things, were completely different. I didn't understand him a lot of the times, he didn't understand me a lot of the times. We got to this point because of our failure to try and understand each other and understand that we both grew up in different countries and had very, VERY different families and upbringings. He claimed to be very open-minded and accepting, when he met my family, that all went out the window. I claimed to be open-minded and very accepting. I accepted his family and never said a bad word about them despite my feelings towards them and some of their feelings towards me, but I did not accept my H for who he was and where he came from. In the beginning, I embraced everything about him, everything that annoys me now about him, I used to love and adore. But the cheating changed all of that.

I have to admit that I was not the nicest person in this relationship towards the end. I was in the beginning but not in the end and I should have been more accepting, more understanding, more loving. Despite all the things he has done to me, ignoring me when we're talking in groups, not taking my opinions seriously, and so many others, there are all of his amazing qualities as well, love letters that he would write to me, calls from work to say hi EVERY SINGLE DAY he was working on a movie set, doing every single chore for me so that I could do what I wanted, making me coffee and tea every single day, even when I was furious with him, giving up what he wanted to do and doing whatever I wanted to try and keep me happy, never going a day without telling me he loved me, even when we were fighting, always telling me how beautiful I was whenever I dressed up, and even when I looked like sh*t in the morning. So he's not all bad, but he does have his flaws just like anyone else, its just that he is not aware of them.. OR he is aware but doesnt think they're flaws and won't change, which makes me really, really sad.