Going dark feels like pressure

[Bat]

Good Morning B

The last couple of years have certainly had some stressful situations for you and H. Plenty of events to stir unrealized and buried hurts from the past.

H is displaying quite a bit of confusion. He bounces from idea to idea, with a general gravitation towards his fantasy. It’s near impossible to compete with a fantasy.

Do you mean short term? I mean could he be right that a woman from .. is what he needs?

And it had to be a woman from a specific part of the world, that was his dream.

Bat, the OW is just a symptom. I’ve never seen a more proof filled statement of that than the above. Such objectification. Just a women from a particular part of the world. Not “her”.

The other person is a symptom. A band-aid. An attempt for the person in crisis to feel better about their life and self.

Yes I think this is true. Sometimes he says “her” but mainly “an .. woman”. He goes as far as believing it’s the same as being gay, that it’s an urge he needs to pursue.

Long story short we agreed with help from MC that he would sleep with her. By then she had booked a ticket to meet him.

Odd advice, in my humble opinion.

That being said, having this out in the open may prove to be the best. H was otherwise likely to just take it underground. We really cannot stop someone’s crisis.

Yes I am glad it’s out in the open, lies probably hurt even more.

In oct they met and did have sex. I supported him because even during those 5 days he said this is it after this I’ll end it and make everything up to you.

You gave him the opportunity. The benefit of the agreement from MC. And he did not make it all up to you.

The MC did not really agree. I agreed because I understood he needed the experience.

So now I’m planning to stop asking questions. Let the A run its course and hope for the best. In the meantime I do wonder should I keep the connection between us by talking to him but without R talk? Or should I put pressure on him by going more dark and stop talking? It feels like pushing and manipulation and not giving him the space to let the A run its course.

Yes, stop asking questions to H. The affair has to run its course. Any influence from you, as well meaning as it may be, will at best be neutral, it most likely will delay things or even stall them out completely. You really cannot speed this up, though you can certainly slow it down.

How does my influence slow it down?

Give plenty of time and space. And definitely no R talks.

Going dark is a mechanism for you to heal and regain your balance. It is not a strategy for getting H through his turmoil, or influencing him, or some such. Going dark is not punishment either.

Thank you for this. It does feel a bit like a strategy or punishment.