Weather for Saturday morning not good, and instructor not available in the afternoon, so flying will probably have to wait a week. I'll survive somehow, I'm sure.
I'm saying the above so I don't have to write the rest.
My intellectual friend is more than a friend, but less than something more. If I were still with my wife, I'd call what I was doing an EA. We now talk daily, for most of the evening after D is asleep. Text a bit at work and at lunch. "Good morning" is the high point of each other's day. Her hesitance about talking to someone who is still married is rapidly evaporating.
To make things even more complicated, DBing apparently works. Even when you don't want it to anymore. I spoke to W for an hour tonight. No yelling. No spewing. Just tears. Just apologies. Just regret. Just telling me she's noticed my changes. Just telling me she was happy she saw me smile today when she dropped D off after taking her to dinner, even if she was jealous it wasn't her making me smile. Just telling me to be happy and take care of myself.
Just telling me she loves me. Just telling me she misses me.
I'd have given anything for this Just a month ago.
I'm not asking for advice on this one. I just need to tell someone what a screwup I am.
You are not a screwup. You are a human being. You have to forgive yourself and believe me, forgiving oneself is the toughest thing to do.
The EA thing is not very smart, because you are in no place emotionally to be stroking the flame. I know you are lonely and that you are looking for confirmation and it is nice to be found attractive by females of the opposite sex. But you are not there yet. Your world has been shattered and you have to rebuild yourself first and trust me, you have a lot of rebuilding to do and only in hindsight will you be able to see how much you have grown...
I'd have given anything for this Just a month ago.
I get why you say you wouldnt want this. Im telling you that right now, you are still in such early days. Juts because you doint ant it today doesnt mean you wont want her back in a month or 6 months or whatever. I believe you are still in kind of a 'shock' phase where there are still tons of emotions rattling around.
My advice is to just take your time. Rushing into an unhealthy attachment to another woman isnt a solution. Rushing back into the arms of W isnt really either.
My advice is to pull back from OW and to stop having these drawn out conversations with W. Date yourself for a little bit. Explore who you are and whats important to you.
Then you can decide more about W. When youre in a good place.
Don't beat yourself up, but as with Vapo and Kaizen this probably isnt' the time to do an attachment. I'm sure it give you comfort, ego stroke, confidence, but still good to just thaw out.
You don't know where you will be in a month. You might be missing your W, you might not, but do you want to risk that right now with attachment?
Best of luck.
Me 42, Wife 39; Married 16; Together 17; Kids: D13, S10 Wife asks for Divorce: 03/19/13 Reconcile: 07/07/13 Round 2 Starts: 02/19/17 Apartment Life: 04/21/17 PA Confirmed: 05/23/17
I would have to agree with everyone. I just ended an EA/PA with a lovely W. I call it an A because technically I'm still M. I ended it because I realized that I'm no where near ready for anything serious and I still have a lot of work to do internally. I also didn't think it was fair to her for me to jump into something that I'm not ready for. Not saying that you're not, but I would just advise to take it really slow with this OW if you wish to pursue it. Either way, with or without your W, you don't want to repeat the same mistakes that lead you here.
In a lot of cases the WAS can jump into a R while the LBS is left behind healing first. That is because they use a R as a "band aid" without actually fixing any issues they have. Many of those rebound R's just end up the same way though and they remain unhappy.
Again, not saying this applies to you, but did it not feel good to hear your W say those things she said to you at all?
M: 37 W: 36 T: 16 M: 11 D2: 8,3 PA: 2015 WAW: 2016 W Filed: 2017 2/07/2017 W officially dating OM2
Agree with all here. It is really hard when you snap out of your funk, start to "GAL" and then, lo and behold, discover that there are other women out there who are interested in and/or attracted to you and are also interesting/attractive themselves. A bit of a head rush and you have to step back because YOU (and I) ARE NOT READY! Bad for you, potentially bad for your D-B-ing,and, just as importantly, not fair to these other women out there who deserve to be treated RIGHT and get the BEST you... not the "just emerging from the wreckage and not ready for a new R" you.
I "woke up" to this a couple of weeks back when I finally "let myself go" with some friends while out and decided to just mix, mingle, and have some fun. I concluded that I could do that, but I needed to be careful and PERHAPS tone it down to not give anyone the wrong impression. Trust me, I enjoyed the attention, and I had forgotten how intoxicating it can be to have someone of the opposite sex look and interact with you "with interest" (and this also gave me some additional insight into my own WW), but I am still committed to doing what I need to do... with hopes of resurrecting my own marriage. I am trying to become more "outcome neutral" in terms of my happiness, yes, BUT... trying to keep my love focused on my W, wayward though she is.
H53/W51, R-ing 4/'18
"Do not arouse or awaken love until it so desires"-Sg.of Sg 2:7
"So oftentimes it happens,that we live our lives in chains, & we never even know we have the key"-Eagles III 1:3
Talked about all of this with therapist. She suggested that this would be a positive for me. She further said that I should stop analyzing everything and just try to live for once. So I did.
