Quote: and that people who truly have their acts together don't screw other people's spouses, or cheat on their own.
very true. And don't beat yourself up about thinking that because of your behavior she went to op, she had a mouth, she could've sat you down and say "you knwo waht TL, you are alianating me by doing xyz and I'd like for us to xyz" then again, I did say that to my H before he left but he had already set his mind on the crazy train.
Quote: I've already won
Yes, we've all learned so much that we wont take things for granted anymore.
Be not afraid...I will repay you for the years the locusts have eaten Joel2
30something 2kids survivor of S, MLC, A, D I have peace in my heart, at last.
Alot of "experts" talk about how if one spouse becomes destructive of the M and stomps on the feelings of the other spouse, the other spouse will latch on to the first person who comes along who appears nice and meets their emotional needs, no matter who they are, even if they're already married, an alcoholic, etc.
Actually, that's a fallacy. There are a lot of factors that can create the conditions for an affair and even "good" marriages are not immune to them.
Even people in loving marriages can fall into affairs. (I think focusing on problems in the marriage only makes it easier to validate a person's decision or ability to "cross the line" and enter into an affair).
I'm not saying you didn't do things or behave in ways that was harmful to your marriage, but according to research I've read they can happen in good marriages too. From what I've read there's a variety of reasons why they occur; the main being an individual's difficulty with setting boundaries (and there can be various reasons for this... i.e. parent's relationships, peers, immaturity, etc...).
There is no arriving, ever. It is all a continual becoming.
Actually, that's a fallacy. There are a lot of factors that can create the conditions for an affair and even "good" marriages are not immune to them.
TL, running is absolutely correct. Last year, on this board, someone posted the following from Dr. Frank Pittman that really helped me try to understand this. Hopefully it will with you as well:
ROMANTIC INFIDELITY
Surely the craziest and most destructive form of infidelity is the temporary insanity of falling in love. You do this, not when you meet somebody wonderful (wonderful people don't screw around with married people) but when you are going through a crisis in your own life, can't continue living your life as it is, and aren't quite ready for suicide yet. An affair with someone grossly inappropriate--someone younger or decades older, someone dependent or dominating, someone with problems even bigger than your own--is so crazily stimulating that it's like a drug that can lift you out of your depression and enable you to feel things again. Of course, between moments of ecstasy, you are more depressed, increasingly alone and alienated in your life, and increasingly hooked on the affair partner. Ideal romance partners are damsels or "dumsels" in distress, people without a life but with a lot of problems, people with bad reality testing and little concern with understanding reality better.
Romantic affairs lead to a great many divorces, suicides, homicides, heart attacks, and strokes, but not to very many successful remarriages. No matter how many sacrifices you make to keep the love alive, no matter how many sacrifices your family and children make for this crazy relationship, it will gradually burn itself out when there is nothing more to sacrifice to it. Then you must face not only the wreckage of several lives, but the original depression from which the affair was an insane flight into escape.
People are most likely to get into these romantic affairs at the turning points of life: when their parents die or their children grow up; when they suffer health crises or are under pressure to give up an addiction; when they achieve an unexpected level of job success or job failure; or after a child is born--any situation in which they must face a lot of reality and grow up. The better the marriage, the saner and more sensible the spouse, the more alienated the romantic is likely to feel. Romantic affairs happen in good marriages even more often than in bad ones.
Both genders seem equally capable of falling into the temporary insanity of romantic affairs, though women are more likely to reframe anything they do as having been done for love. Women in love are far more aware of what they are doing and what the dangers might be. Men in love can be extraordinarily incautious and willing to give up everything. Men in love lose their heads--at least for a while.
Hey, I agree with y'all, but what I describe is exactly what happened in my sitch. Not saying that's the ONLY way...and there's surely more than one way to skin a possum
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. -- Inigo Montoya, 'The Princess Bride'
