I've noticed myself fading away from the forum. I check it mostly out habit, but I find myself not needing it. I think that's a good sign. I think that if I don't talk to all of you and I fade away, you've all been a great help to me during a difficult time in my life. The forum seems a lot like my relationship with my X, it was great, intense and wonderful at first, but then I found out that I don't need it. Everything I need is within myself. It feels really good to get to that point. It comes and goes, but the good days are better than the bad. :)
Fading away from the forum
(17 posts) (7 voices)-
Posted 6 months ago #
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BHG...Like you I am also feeling not needing to vent anymore. So this is a goodbye I am happy to say. Hopefully the lessons we learnt here are not lost. Wish us all find strength and happiness in life.
Posted 6 months ago # -
Me too ladies...I'm glad my venting/questioning phase is over. Maybe it occurs during a heightened sense of anxiety/pain. The next time I feel that out of control it better be over something or someone that's worth it.
I'll be around chiming in when need be.
Thanks to all of you as well!!Posted 6 months ago # -
My X finally gave me a clear answer and said the consequence of our relationship was too great. He said that I only see that he's let go, but he had been trying to hold. I guess nothing has really changed. The relationship was bittersweet and will remain so. I just need to take care of myself now and I don't need sex for happiness... finding it elsewhere. :)
Posted 6 months ago # -
I've faded too. It helped me when the EMA was discovered and I was in shock and needed some "hope."
Now that I realize the EMA is completely over, I feel less in common with people here and therefore less need to post. Most people here seem happy in their EMAs, utterly self-justified in having them and cheer each other on.
I don't want another EMA. I don't think they are a good and honorable thing and no, I don't think you can have one and truly be a "good person." I'm trying to be that good person now. TRYING. I only now post if I see some kindred spirit that needs a rational voice in hope to cope with an EMA that has gone horribly wrong or been discovered. but I cannot encourage people to do this. There won't be any "YOU GO, GIRL!" cheers out of me. I wouldn't want anyone to end up feeling the way I do or how a betrayed spouse feels when it's discovered. And they almost always are.
so my time here is pretty limited, although I've struck up an email friendship with several here who are in my boat. It certainly was a useful place. I wish all of you peace and happiness.
Torch
Posted 6 months ago # -
I'm with you. I don't want another EMA. I am becoming distant from my husband more-so, but I find that I'm happier alone. I loose sight of who I am when someone else is involved and I feel that I do have a lot that I can contribute to people that are worthy. I'd rather not waste it on having another affair that I have to play the ridiculous guessing games with. I have to say... it's completely ridiculous. I'm nearly to the point of ripping my X an new asshole and explaining his issues, because I don't care anymore and he's a complete inconsiderate, antisocial moron.
Posted 6 months ago # -
Nice to hear. Fading away from the forum because I have some sanity about my affair is a time to look forward to, though right now it feels like it will never come.
Posted 6 months ago # -
I'm also fading out. This forum has helped me so much during my nervous breakdowns, I met some nice people with whom I keep in touch by e-mail, and have learned a great deal with other's experiences and perspectives. But now, since I am not in a EMA anymore, I don't see a point in continuing very active here, unless like Torch said, I see my 2 cents can be worth it. I would like to leave my experience in this forum as an example for all the single people out there falling in love with MMs. I did not want to see, hear, read, believe in anything I was told when I started my journey. I really thought my story was different. I really thought we had a chance of being among that 0.0001% cases that work out. Apparently it did not, and I don't even know why. I still have love for him in my heart, although I am so deceived and disappointed. It is hard to let go. But not being around in this forum is also helping me get going with my life. This is representative of something that does not exist in my life anymore. It's gone. It's over.
Thank you very much to all of you who helped me telling what I need/wanted/didn't wanted to hear or see. I wish you all the best of luck in the crazy roller coaster ride, I now know an EMA is like. I have posted my e-mail address before, but here it goes again: dancing.star2@live.caIf ever someone feels like contacting me, feel free to do so.
And to all my e-mail friends from here: I'm sorry I've been taking long to reply.. I have just been trying to get back to living, rather than only breathing. Things like waking up, getting out of bed, and eating, are slowly entering my routine again. It has been 16 days since contact was abruptly interrupted with no explanation whatsoever. I lost over 10 pounds, missed work deadlines, and am now racing against time not to let this BS have an even greater impact on my life.
All the best! xox
Posted 6 months ago # -
Glad to hear you're doing better dancing.star. I, like you, also thought I was an exception to EMA's not working out. I was wrong. What I've discovered is that most people tend to find this forum when their EMA is fading away. In the midst of it, there's no need to talk about it. I don't check the forum much, but I do comment here and there when I feel that I have useful advice.
What I hope the most for you and for everyone else is that you can find happiness within yourself and not with someone else.
Posted 6 months ago # -
Actually, I found this forum when my EMA started, because I could not believe I was getting into it. I spent a lot of time here defending my cause to be in it, only to realize later that I probably should have listened to my gut feeling from the get go. Well, I don't regret a second of it. Learned big lessons the hard way. This forum was amazing throughout my experience. And still feels good to have a place to come to when it hits me. I just wish people could learn a bit from my experience, although I know that when you're in the high of it, you can't relate to the downside of other's experience.
Posted 6 months ago # -
Most people here think that their story is different and that they and their secret lovers are eternal. That they have all the justification they need to have done it, mostly based on what their spouse is or isn't doing.
The reality? We are all 100% responsible for everything we do.
The chances of an EMA really working out in the way most envision? Like taking a 40 foot dive into a tub of water. It happens. Sometimes. But rarely. EMA's probably have the lowest rate of long-term success than almost any other romantic liaison.
I too hope that now I can help others here that are hurting and need perspective. but I have come full circle from the total ecstasy of being completely in love with someone else to seeing the self-indulgent, narcissism of what I was engaged in and the potential devastation I could've caused others in my life.
I'm mad at myself for allowing it to happen and I'm working hard to explore the reasons why it happened and either strengthen/rebuild my marriage or begin to take steps to get out. But not for someone else, but because if I can't love her the way she deserves, then I should set her free.
Peace all
Once, Jmark wrote this - and I could've written it.
"Dancing.Star, you are not alone. As I posted before my OW has decided that we are done as well. She had been 1/2 caught a year ago, and now for a year I have been open and honest, caring and soft, available and there for her. I have traveled to see her and held her hand while she cried.
Now, after the holidays, she is asking me to back off completely and to be done with not only the affair, but the emotional attachement. This is, in fact, the hardest thing I have ever had to do.
I can not shake the pain of losing her. She is not "In Love" with him, but she feels committed. I understand that just as you understand yours, but it in no way shields us from the pain and loss of our best friend, our lover and for me my soul mate (I hate that term, but for the first time in my life I understand it....and agree with it).
I spent my weekend reading and writing, going back and working through my thoughts. It was so hard and so complicated, and I'm nowhere near done. But I am starting to understand what it was that made it so good and trying to believe that I will find that again, and more.
I just ran to the store and bought Vitamin water - guess I knew that little tidbit already. I am hitting the "replay" button - and I am sad. I need to acknowledge that I wasn't chosen, that I never will be, and that it is ok. It was the best experience of my life and I will treasure it always. "
In the end I wasn't chose. Dancing wasn't chosen. Jmark wasn't chosen. Even Fallen's OW realizes that she's not going to keep a flame going on the slim shot that Fallen gets divorce and stays with her in the who-knows-when future. SHE was not chosen. Others here too.
Yet all of us had EMA promise us that we WERE the chosen ones. Yet when push comes to shove, the reality of the situations overwhelmed our own self-indulgent fantasies. We had partners who chose the easier course, the safer course, the honorable course. They chose to NOT follow their hearts. Some will, most won't.
And we are the ones left in the dust with our own realities. Maybe that's a good thing? it was a wake up call to me.
Posted 6 months ago # -
Oh Torch! I remember when jmark wrote me this. It hurt as it was so true. In the end, we were not chosen. We were ready to go on and overcome whatever obstacles came our way to follow our hearts. And we tried to do it in the best possible manner.. but our counterparts were not so brave. The easier, the safer and the honorable course they chose for themselves caused the miserable course we had to accept. In the end, it's our responsibility for allowing it to happen. A major lesson for me indeed.
Posted 6 months ago # -
there is such wisdom in what you just wrote, DS. and Jmark hit it right on the head. I could've written it about myself.
She is not in love with him. But she decided to stay committed to him nevertheless. For better or for worse, she chose to follow not her heart but her head.
I too had the best times of my life with her. But I was not chosen. She made her choice and it was not me and the choice is irreversible to me.
If there is any difference, I am far more bitter than jmark. She could've been a bit more sensitive to me and my needs and not betrayed/broken every promise that she ever made to me (including how "not contact" was not even remotely a possibility to her. Ever).
but in the end, her actions spoke louder than her words. He didn't take her back. She left me.
Life goes on.
Posted 6 months ago # -
Um, the easier course? Honorable and safer, maybe. Easier, not so much.
Posted 6 months ago # -
I beg to differ. Staying within the confines of a marriage with a partner who desperately wants to keep you, despite your infidelity, and not having to go through a divorce when children, a home and finances are involved and bet your life on a married man who is not yet divorced himself?
I don't think I was played. I don't think she was a liar. I think she's just a coward. And weak. And he's clever and he used a real nice combination of enticement, punishment and guilt to keep her. I know because she told me what was going on before she broke it all off.
Oh she took the easier course. I didn't say "EASY" course. Just easier. Much easier. I think ultimately she will end up with the same problems that she had when she sought me out. His "new act" can't be sustained.
She told me that "he's trying to be you". How long do you think that will last?
Posted 6 months ago # -
Listen up everyone! All these sad tales - but think about the reality of "normal" relationships for many (most) people - it is NOT all roses around the door most of the time. Marriage can be very hard work, full of sacrifices, and does not necessarily fulfil emotional or other needs. But often people stay in them for practical reasons - children, finances, inertia. It takes a hell of a lot to exit a marriage into an uncertain future with someone who you have never had a "nuts and bolts" relationship with - eg: the daily grind of a domestic routine. I think a lot of people worry that it will be "out of the frying pan and into the fire". Also, once a person has exited the primary relationship, then some of the allure of the affair partner may be lost - people tend to value what they cannot have. When you know 100% that you have someone exactly where you want them (assuming that can ever be the case) I do think a little bit of the excitment factor of a relationship can go.
What am I trying to say? I think that, whatever the situation, married, separated, divorced, in an affair, coming out of an affair,, monogamous and all the other possibilities - all these things CAN bring pain and upset.
For myself, I find it easiest to have practically no expectations in terms of relationships apart from the basic courtesies. I know that my marriage will never fulfill every need, wish or desire and I am quite happy to accept its limitations. I will allow other people into my life if I think they are going to add something and hopefully I will to them as well.
I think the best thing is to try to be content in oneself and not look to other people to fulfil needs. If basic courtesies are not met, then I think people are not worth bothering with. I know that, for some people, that would mean fidelity! I suppose everyone has to decide what they are prepared to put up with.
Easier said than done, I know. Chins up!!
Posted 6 months ago # -
I hear ya, Penn-Penn, but I think to be honest there is MOSTLY sadness and heartache at the end of these things, yet ironically, it's out of these that we seem to expect the MOST. EMA's probably have the smallest chance of long-term success than any other type of romantic liaison.
Chins are firmly down because you have a lot of people who have had their hearts shattered here.
but of course we need SOMEONE to help cheer us up. I elect you!
Posted 6 months ago #
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