My UFO (unbelievably fabulous observations)

[hoosiermama]

Thank you, naej. I appreciate your willingness to share so very much.

One of the more difficult parts of this "thing" is that it's a long-distance relationship. Of course, if it were not, it would have flashed over and burned itself out very quickly. Initially clung to each other like the 2 drowning people we were and had we been closer we'd have sunk. Okay, I'm wearing out the cliches and metaphors here! But anyway, hopefully we've done a better job of keeping each other afloat this way. But it's difficult, and by its very nature the communication is a bit strange--most of it is written, and there's no nuancing or facial expression or tone of voice or body language--just the words. And while we're both quite articulate, we're both kind of intense and introspective; occasionally I have to remind myself he's not my personal journal and it's okay just to talk about "stuff" and not process all the time. Yes, we do talk every week or so, and we laugh a lot.

Oddly, it doesn't feel like a game. I keep looking for red flags, of course--being the second-guesser that I am--and the only ones I find are more related to each of us being wounded messes trying to heal and put our lives back together than anything else. While I think there may have been a very tiny element of "holding a torch" going on for him, I don't get the sense that I ever came up in their marriage. I think it's been a real struggle for him to let go of his wife--she's the classic WAW and he's the classic LBS who had trouble dropping the rope, although it sounds like she was rather uniquely and creatively emotionally abusive. I had met her several times in the early days of their marriage, and I have to say she didn't like me much and was very territorial--which I found strange--altho I don't get the sense that there was any of what you describe going on.

I'm not sure how he'd describe our relationship; in fact, we take great pains not to describe it, not to define it and just let it be. But in the very first conversations, we promised each other not to let go this time, to remain in each others' lives in some way. I don't know that that would be possible if we found other people to spend our lives with--I can't see SO's being comfortable with the level at which we communicate. But because we're both works-in-progress, there have been some rather rough patches over the past year, and we've managed to pull together and work them out in ways I've never experienced before. And that's been a learning experience. I've learned a lot about myself in that, and I like what I've learned. And that has been very healing; xH blames the affair and all the marital problems on me--and I can see now from a different perspective, not just intellectually, that that's not at all true. It's interesting not to be in a relationship with a narcissist--and I think that my romantic life has been disproportionately populated with those. I'm a much better person in relationship when I actually "count" in that relationship!

But the slowness, the tentativeness, the pullbacks--while probably pretty normal--are excruciating, and throw me easily into feeling abandoned. And while it's not fun, it's probably healthy for me to learn the difference between "feeling" abandoned and actually "being" abandoned. I long for some reassurance, some ability to look into the future and know that this relationship will not also blow up in my face and cause great pain--and of course, there are no guarantees of that for anyone.

Thanks for listening to my processing. Happy New Year, and blessings to you, too, naej!