New - HELP! Tried the 180/Last Resort & Failed

[25yearsmlc]

Thank you 25years and Sandi,

I really needed your encouragement and sympathetic words today.

Sandi, you hit the nail on the head when you said that I feel like a child forsaken by a parent. ... So its no wonder that we fell into a caretaker/dependency relationship.

Still, we had a great, loving, and happy partnership but then about 10 years ago, ex-partner suddenly stopped wanting to have 'physical relations' with me...He said he didn't know why but it made him feel 'guilty' or 'wrong' - ironic that he would feel guilty about it long after I became an adult. His lack of interest in sex bothered me now and then, ....

I bet it did. That's NOT typical of any man I know.

So, I didn't push him for more and I always thought he might be a bit depressed, etc., or just have a low libido. Plus, we had such a happy relationship otherwise:

so he was "depressed OR had a low libido...and you had "such a happy r otherwise."....honey, IMO, you were too young to know better.


Then around Valentine's day this year, the intimacy stalemate broke open. I initiated, he rejected me.......---and then two weeks later he dropped the IDLYAM bomb.

NICE...

So in a way, though it seems like he is in a raging MLC, I know the problems were deeper. .... He said his lack of interest in sex must be because he didn't love me enough.

Any man who says no that often doesn't have a "love" problem...they have an INNER problem of their own unless you are NOT attractive, which isn't possible since he found you attractive before!

[b] (I'm sure he has no problems being intimate with her - but how do I know?)[/b]

You don't know. You two had a decent sex life, albeit too little of it, for some time...then it wore off. How old is OW? Why would you think a situation so bizarre as his and hers, would be healthy in any way?

Guess I'm also saying, who cares? Seriously...you have no control over this and you are spinning again... It is a waste of time. I mean that.

This time should ONLY be spent on YOUR life and future.

I know you have tragic abandonment issues that are a big fat drag.

But all the more reason to look out for #1, which is you, btw.

Furthermore, there's no way w/your history that your p is...okay....he's not a normal guy...sorry...before the MLC, he was unusual, and when you finally realize how much worthier you are, how well deserving you are of a loving healthy r, you may want to thank him..Now, you are awake...

So, in our last conversation when he brought up "guilt" about our age difference and saying he "just shut down" it was more than the MLC speaking, it was something that has obviously been burdening and incapacitating him for years. THIS IS NOT NORMAL STUFF and none of it is YOURS...so you must let go b/c you have no control...NONE...but there ARE things you CAN do something about...a whole lot. Why not focus on those things?


I'd like to believe both you that some day he *might* want me back, but clearly he is convinced it could never 'work'

Why is this all about him? You do see the pattern? Please read "Co Dependent No More"...


Yet, at the same time, in the book "Men in Midlife Crisis" I read that during the first stages of a MLC men often completely lose interest in being intimate with their wives/partners and that these "latent" stages of MLC can last for years - but 10 years of 'latency' before hurdling themselves into "replay"!?!?!? If this is attributable to MLC, its been one very long, protracted MLC.

You know nothing about what his intentions/feelings/plans were/are.

Stop the mind reading. It's NOT productive. Heck, I doubt HE knows the answers to this.
As for MLC...

I'm just saying this once...

I believe a lot of "MLC" talk is bogus. I think LBSers look to name their spouses behavior with this b/c they believe that somehow it means there's a higher chance of reconciliation. There isn't much data to support that.

Worse, the false hope the label gives them, paralyzes people. There are people here who've waited for literally 7 years or more...even when their spouse MARRIED the OP!! The LBSer said they'd wait for the "MLC to end"...

Remember, The approach to MLC for the LBSer is the exact same as a WAS....

Which is to focus on YOUR LIFE & FUTURE...exclusively yours...NOT him/his.

so why not look at YOU and your choices for the future?


My biggest regret in my whole experience and how I handled it, even though the outcome was good,


is that I spent so much time reading about MLC (and my h fit it to a T, wanting to live in Alaska, and "make millions" and "breathe the brisk air"....yeah it's brisk, it's -50'F....anyhow)

I obsessed, I read, I polled people, I told everyone I met what h was doing and asked for their opinions about what H was doing/thinking/planning and I'd ask WHY? WHY? WHY?....

Thank God, one day I remembered a little girl I met at a children's cancer camp.

She was 11 and told me she used to wonder why she had cancer. She said "I used to ask God, 'why me? Why? Why? Why?...and then I thought, I just do...and it's important to have fun while I can..."

and she did have a great summer, and it was her last...THAT memory triggered a change in me. I began to snap out of the whole "what's up with H??" cycle I had repeated so often...like a loop I could not get out of...

Finally I began working on ME and MY LIFE and being there for my kids. When I truly detached from h, ironically, I became both freer, happier, more productive and then

more attractive to h...

there were other things going on with him over which I had no control

but I was getting to be "just fine, thanks"...and boy did he notice....more than I realized at the time.



Look, let's look at what you actually know...

He's gone now. That's what you KNOW.

You need to get a job, a place to live, and a plan. Later, you can discuss your own issues with a T or C...and he can do whatever the... he!! he does...


So now you've heard about the one issue it's a biggie, even if it is the "only issue"...

that wasn't good between us and which seemed to precipitate this whole thing. How do I possibly address an issue this deep that wasn't mine to begin with?

YOU DON'T.

PART II:

In regard to both of your comments about his relationship with OW... .....

Looking back on it, it makes me think that something casual online might have been going on.

So....this helps you know what? That he deceived you longer? Okay...it's likely.

He even said something about not liking the idea of being a 'swinging monkey' in a relationship: 'not able to able to let go of one vine before securely grabbing on to another.'

But he is a swinging monkey.
>90% of men leave R/Ms with OW waiting...it's rare that they leave without a back up woman. Sorry.

His relationship with OW also got so SERIOUS so FAST,

That is weird even if he met her online a year ago...he didn't know she had a kid!! Who does that??? Come on...

SO WHO KNOWS?!
WHO THE HECK KNOWS!?!
Sandi and 25years, given this new information, do you have any fresh insights for me?


See my above comments^^^^^... You have a sister nearby? Good. Embrace that R and do what you need to do.


All I can do is survive right now, and its so hard to deal with the hurt of him not loving me anymore


Stop that tape in your head. You don't KNOW what he feels. HE doesn't know. His behavior hurts like heck, I know...I was devastated to think h would choose a JOB ANYWHERE, over me and the kids...like how low on the totem pole was I?

He tells you what he tells you. That doesn't make it true. I said and wrote things in 2005 that I thought were true at the time I wrote them. They weren't or if they were, they aren't now.

But this makes NO difference. Why? B/C [u]he thinks AND acts as if he doesn't love you and he's acting like a man with another woman...which he is....if it comforts you to believe he still loves you, fine. That's good. It's likely. But it makes no difference in YOUR work. Make sense?[/u]



..it certainly would be easier if I could believe that his lack of love for me was the *result* of him being infatuated by another woman rather than the *cause* of him becoming infatuated by another woman. Does that make any sense?

Yes it makes sense from an ego point of view. And your ego has taken a big hit over the years, more so lately obviously. I get that and I ache for you.


But the questions you ask, remind me of all my wasted time/efforts...please learn from my experience...


He certainly always seemed to be in love with me (though shy about s-e-x) - I even have little love notes he wrote just after Christmas and hid around the house. How did it change so fast?

He has big time problems not of your making. Not problems you can solve either. And therefore....what do YOU do?

You take care of your life/future. No one else is going to do that for you.
And you truly do have to let go of him. This isn't your problem to solve.

But it is now your journey...

Be the author of your life. If your life were a novel, would you let HIM write it?

B/c he's written the last few chapters, and how have they gone for you?

It's time for YOU to write the rest of it.

How do you want the rest of your novel/life to go?

Let's begin with you making things in your life go the way YOU want them to.