Afterall....This IS my Life III

[heatherg]

The start to the negotiation is when both parties agree that there is something to negotiate. It is clear that your old relationship could not continue as is.

Do you think it's clear to H as well? I feel like H's behavior has indicated that he would like to continue a relationship with me, he has yet to specifically acknowledge that we need to start over. So, like you said, the start to the negotiation is when both parties agree that there is something to negotiate. I don't feel like H and I have necessarily reached that mutual conclusion. I was thinking of sending this email:

I can't quite describe how surprised and elated I am at the way we've connected since you came home from Seattle. I absolutely knew we could do it, but still, your willingness to reach out to me has touched my heart in a way that I feel so...grateful for. Your behavior toward me has indicated that you still want a relationship with me and I am so relieved by that...absolutely, glowingly happy to know that we both still see one another in our futures. When you told me you still loved me, there were no words that could have expressed my emotions...making love to you was literally a need at that moment.
I don't want to misunderstand you though, I need to hear you say that you would like to start over too. I'm so happy with the way we've communicated the past few days and I hope that you see this as something that we can continue, not as something that we've gotten out of the way so that we can get back to normal. I fear the latter because I can't go back to our old 'normal'.

We have a lot of history together and I think we've both recognized that our feelings about the past and the issues that have been created don't just go away. In your last email, you said you hadn't even touched on a tenth of what you wanted to say. I want to hear everything you have to say, everything. I'd really like to continue our emails when we discuss our past because I think it's been a great, non-confrontational way to lay out our perspectives.

I'm really happy you're home.....that YOU are home.

Heather