Where were you this time last year

As the new year starts...I am reminded of where I was this time last year....I was dreadfully sick with bronchitis (third year in a row) I was in a lawsuit with my ex (again, 3rd year in a row) and I was pining away for MW...missing her so much that I could not even function properly..and it was a little worse the year before...

So here I am..sitting here on a Friday night getting ready to go and have dinner with my beautiful love and getting better each day. I know all too well how it is to pine away for someone....but then with each day, you have to ask yourself, what did I do for ME today...

I am doing for me now...living for me....and wanting still to help as much as I can because I know all too well how fragile an affair makes us..that's why I come here to reach out...don't think I am just all better and I am smiling every day...I am not..many days I have to reconcile time I wasted away trying to get to my MW....I let so many things go...and now I am reconciling with God to help me straighten my life as I embark on a new journey.

I am very much now in love and I want to ensure that I stay focused, convicted, and right with God to help me make each day count for something. And in doing all those things, I am still very thankful for your support, your kindness, and your love...I know I can't do it all alone!

SD~

I am proud to know you and be able to say you are a friend. Things have been somewhat of a see saw for me over the last year. I too have to keep my focus on moving on with my life. I never knew how completely lost one can get in someone else. It is in reading the post here that assures me that I am ok and I can move on.

I have done well with keeping my distance from MM. He hasn't made efforts to contact me either. I have run into him on occassion while out and about. We do exchange greetings but then move on. I can't tell ya the last time we actually sat down and talked. I do miss my best friend. But I dove into work & keep myself busy. I went from parttime to full time at my second job. Now I work 60 - 80 hrs a week.

I am finally get back on my feet finacially now. I have been spending as much time as i can with my granddaughter. I even got all my paperwork together and started my photography business, on paper anyway. I still need to do some advertising and get appointments scheduled. I am hoping that by summer I will have my business in full swing. If all goes well by next winter I hope to quit my second job.

I'm gonna stay focused on getting the business on it's feet. As long as I stay focused on me I'll be ok. A year ago I didn't know if I could say that. We all have come a long way..

Happy New Year, May it bring us all peace, comfort & prosperity.
May

It's so good to hear you both doing so well. I'm afraid I really haven't moved on from this time last year; it is just getting harder, if anything - and I feel I am close to reaching my pain threshold. I know that I have lost myself in him, as you say, May, but I am still terrified of losing the person I have shared so much with over the last 5 years, and who has been the closest person to me in this world. I keep rocking the boat now, because the pain gets too much. It is so easy to start feeling let down, but I don't ever want to become bitter or feel that this has all been a waste. He has been the love of my life, and I think if I could have lived my life again I would have made the same mistakes. But it is getting to the point of trying to survive now, I am hoping to pick myself up and find a way forward, regain some of my own strength. I'm sorry I haven't had the energy to post here, and I hope you are all doing ok. It is so good just knowing that this forum is here. I am thinking of trying to take some time off work soon, and then booking a few hours with my old therapist, who was so good (and she and her husband had actually got together through an A, so she isn't judgemental about these things). Need to get a grip somehow, and see that there is a life beyond him, whether or not we go NC. Dulce - will reply soon! Love to you all, Veronica

Where was I last year? In a helluva lot of pain!

I am not out the woods yet. I did ask MM to stay away a while back, I believe I posted about that, and was too embarrassed to come back and say that it didn't stick.

BUT, it was a step.

Part of it was that I was under so much stress from the semester that I didn't have the energy to fight him off. Now that the holidays are over and I won't be around MM every day, I have a greater chance to put more distance between us.

My husband has been out of work since before Thanksgiving. He has been dragging his feet about finding a job. I keep putting my foot down and telling him to get an hourly or salary job. But he keeps coming up with these commission jobs.

There are days when I want to make our marriage work, and there are days when I have just had it. I see his chronic problems and want to give up.

MM fights me tooth and nail to stay in touch with me. But, I just can't do it anymore. I don't want to have to pull out the big guns, but I am going to have to do just that.

A year ago, me and MM were fighting like crazy. He didn't think I should give my husband any more chances. Regardless if that is true, that is MY choice, NOT HIS!

He still thinks that I shouldn't give my husband any more chances, and with the lousy job my husband has been as a provider this year, I don't blame him. But, I am not going to give up that easily. I will graduate in May and start looking for positions. I feel that I have to get a job and become somewhat stable before I think of divorcing.

Like SD, I do not want to break up MM's family. I know that he loves his wife. I know that he is greedy and just wants us both. I don't want to settle for less anymore.

In many ways I have come so much farther. I don't feel as sick or upset when I cannot see MM. I know that once I stop seeing him that it won't be easy, but it sure isn't easy now!

I'll keep ya posted. I want to make some serious progress!

hugs and love,
Mandy

Mandy a year ago I didn't think I'd ever be where I am today. It took a LONG time for me to get past the tears and heartache of MM. I still have days I feel like I need to see him. But I know that is only my own fear. He is a comfort zone for me & when things get unsettled I want him to be there to tell me that I am ok. It has taken me almost two and a half years to realize that it isn't him that I need it's the acceptance that he stands for.

Ya know it was SD and Toledio that helped me most. It was reading how very much they cared for the women that they loved, that made me realize that there really are good men out there that would love and appreciate someone like me.

The day will come that you too will be able to say enough and take back control of your life. Until then we are here for you to support you and let you know you are worth every thing you want in life and more.

You know, it's always going to be a struggle... a struggle to forget or wipe out what we had built up so intensely in our minds....

I know for me, I had built up this person for years and years and years...and I remember that HIGH when we first started...but because I journaled everything, I re-read my entries....everything was always associated with pain....

There was the pain of the D-day..the pain of not getting to be with MW, the pain of waiting..always waiting...the pain of not being able to tell anyone in my life about MW....

With all that pain, you would have thought I could get over her quickly...the fact is/was, I could NOT get over her quickly...it took a lot of work every day....and I still think I am not out of the weeds yet....her thought crosses my mind and still I wonder what if's

But the rational part of me takes over now and tells me how things REALLY are...how they should be if I want to live a good life with love and passion all around me...

I can see the light now and it looks a whole lot better than the darkness that I surrounded myself with in the affair...

All i can say is that it's time to start living....start loving yourself, start enjoying life for everything it has to offer....and to stand tall and look around at the beauty of all the good people in my life....

And each day I get a little stronger....and it gets a little easier...much easier than this time last year!!!!

SD and Everyone -

Again it's been too long since I've been here......but I too have been in sort of a slow-down, on just about every level - physically and mentally. I never thought I'd be saying this, but I'm feeling better now. The deep pain has subsided -finally!- and I actually feel like my head is above the water level now I am happier in general and it has been consistent over the last 4 - 6 months.

This time last year, I hadn't seen MM for 6 months, and I buckled. I caved in and went back to work at his facility this month last year. I think what started me on a better healing was that I'd discovered MM was seeing someone else at the same time he was seeing me. Briefly, - and Toledo I know you advised me NOT to do this - I was able to talk to MM about this. He had no choice but to give me the information I asked for (who is R....?? etc.). He gave me the info, and then said he was flattered I was jealous of his wife, trying to take the focus away from the real issue. I told him as firmly as I could that it was not his wife I was jealous of - it was the other other woman, and I said this specifically to put things in bold perspective. He told me the truth, though. He had no wiggle room, and even though I was furious with him, we ended the conversation amicably, believe it or not. And I came away from this feeling as if I had rid myself of foolishness and demoralization - I felt better about both MM and myself.

Suprisingly, I think I'm probably more angry with his wife. I do fantasize about tipping her off (which I won't do) only because I feel that my silence (and everyone else's) only enabled her to languish in ignorant bliss. Now, as for me, the gig's up - this pain belongs to HER, she is the one who should bear with her husband's activities, and I frankly hope one day she gets the opportunity.

I don't mean to be harsh, but I think it's time for me to start thinking a little stronger, and for the first time I can, albeit clumsily.

I hope you all are doing well - it sounds like you are!!
Good to see you all!

Dulce

HI Everyone!
It's been a while.
What can I tell ya? I started a part time job caring for an elderly gentleman in Oct. I was caring for him up until last week, now it's uncertain wether or not he'll be put intoa nursing home. I got a transfer in my full time job and am doing twice the work I was for the same pay. I am happier at this new facility though. So we have to choose our battles, right?

As for the MM, I am not speaking to him right now. I am beginning to see that I was infatuated with whom I wanted him to be and not who he actually is.

My son, moved out of my house last yr and none of us needs to be reminded of how difficult 08' was financially. So I got a friend of twenty or more yrs that ironically his fiance was cheating on him with her sons guitar teacher and he was booted out of the house.

So I offered to let him rent my sons bedroom until he found him a place. What was suppose to be temporaray seems to have become long term. We have a platonic friendship, and make fairly good roomates. Ok, the problem is he is good friends with the MM. So, I just cannot seem to avoid the MM. He comes over, rides dirtbikes with my roommate and visits him. I don't stick around and conversate. MM, attempts to speak and I ignore him. Interstingly enough MM hasn't made any efforts outside of when he comes over to contact me. No e-mails, or phone calls, no lets hook up invitations. He may want to remain friends but hasn't actually said so either way.

I don't see he and I being friends.

SB~
Congratulations on making some great strides in getting to that better place. However, something tells me that you knew that your friend was friends with MM...that set things up to have MM in your fringe life. I was guilty of pulling that same thing many many months ago. While what I did was not the same thing you did, the result was exactly the same...keep MW in the fringe of my life..somehow control that she would be "in my life"

I have learned that relationships are about control..who has it, why do they have it, what can I do to get it....and you got control...that is a good thing..however you are getting control of the VERY thing that got you into this place in the first place....

The steps you MUST take in order to get healthy is to remove the MP from your life... remember the MP does NOT want to be your friend..they want to be able to f**k you while still being married to their spouse/ Harsh as it seems, that's the reality.

Once you remove the MP from your life with all contact, then you can begin healing. Once you get into the better place, you start attracting different people..people who will not condone an affair...people who want you to succeed, people who give of themselves to make this world a better place....and before you know it, you attract potential mates who are better suited for you.

I know this seems like a pie in the sky type of thing...seems easy, but it's not..it takes a lot of work. It takes dedication to keep your hands to yourself with regard to the MP, it takes self control to not want to call that MP again and relive those "happy" times....it's painful...

The pain you feel is the pain of getting healthy. And then you hit clarity...that place when you realize that you created the MP in your head and the MP did all the things you wanted them to do in your head...the reality is that the MP probably barely did anything...you got used to expecting less so you overcompensated by giving more!

Please be very cautious of the next few months as the weather gets warmer...that's usually a good time to start going to that unhealthy place....please take good care of yourself and know that you're always working to get to that healthy place...it is hard workl, but it's worth it..it is sooooooo worth it!

Thanks SD. You're right, I have alot of work to do to get back to an emotionally healthy place.

You make some valid points about situations changing as the seasons change. I will keep all your advice in mind.

...and yes, I did more, for less.

Take care all.....