I am going to get a good amount of criticism after I write this and post. That's ok, and it's partly why I am doing it. I DEPERATELY NEED A SI BITCH SLAPPING. Here we go friends:
I somehow have become the OW in what was a strictly friendship based relationship with a married man.
Background:
Me: Betrayed by WH
He had a 2 year LTA with a woman he cheated on me with 10 years earlier when we were dating. I tried for 3 years to forgive, move past the devastation. I became fed up this year in May, mostly because he continued to have inappropriate female friends, continued to do drugs, continued to gamble and watch porn...the only vice he gave up was his OW.
He moved out as requested on June 1.
How I became an OW:
June 2: I logged on to my facebook page and saw that I had an inbox message. It was my 7th grade bf (typical, right?) telling me how great I look and can we be friends?
At that point, yes, I could use a friend. So I accepted and told him it was great that he found me, however, I am in the beginning stages of a divorce. I think he heard the dinner bell?! The "vulnerable woman" alert must have tuned him in to my neediness frequency because he knew how to draw me in....Compliments, nostalgia, and stories went back and forth in a few phone calls. He told me he had just gotten caught in a two year LTA. This interested me. For some reason I had the idea that I could get answers out of him that I could never get from XWH. I was immediately intrigued because he was willing to be very candid and open with my questions. I basically gave him the 3rd degree. What's weird is I think he like the confessional-type of friendship that started to develop. We didn't talk trivialities. We got on the phone and the infidelity-driven conversation took us deep into our fears and frustrations with our spouses. I was now unattached, but He was still very married, and I knew somewhere in the back of my mind this could get tricky.
Wasn't this the "just friend" bullshit that we always hear about? Was I dangerously becoming a diversion for him, and myself?
Let me be honest, with you guys and myself. I KNEW IT WAS NOT A GOOD THING I WAS DOING. It felt selfish. I would tell him so. But then, we were just talking on the phone. Until...we decided to meet for lunch. Wtf was I thinking?
I wasn't. I was angry. At my Xwh, and at him for betraying his wife. I curiously found it easy to demoralize myself because I found my feelings were numb to everyone. I started to realize, my God, this is how my XWH must have felt. No one matters but you and your selfish desires. This is how it starts. Lightbulbs...
In my lifetime, I was never a cheat. I am loyal, true to my integrity, and my high moral standard always kept me feeling good about myself. Now, I feel awful. I don't recognize myself. This abyss is degrading and hollow. Why would anyone WANT to be the OW?
So if I am confessing, let me do it right.
The fact is I definitely felt a strong and immediate attraction to someone else's husband. This was not ok. Beyond that, in a moment of pure adrenaline, I regrettably kissed him...just like I did in 7th grade. I then felt like a 7th grader...with no regard for the consequence of my actions, just having some fun.
Wait a Freaking Second here! I know all about predator married guys who find lonely, single women with low self-esteem. That is NOT me!
I am now involved. It did not "just happen". I consciously knew what I was doing. I calculated every thought and emotion I was allowing to enter my mind. Every word I said to him brought us closer to a unspoken precarious ledge over which we pretended we wouldn't fall... This is how an affair starts...Many of the questions I wondered about XWH have been answered by this experience and, all the while I realize there is a wife out there, whom I don't know and have no right to hurt, I am destroying. I didn't give her much thought...because I am her.
My dilemma now, I need to be out of this so-called friendship with a married man. It disgusts me. Yet I still find myself taking his calls, answering his text, looking forward to knowing more about him...every part of that is wrong and I argue with myself daily.
My recourse is to put it here. For SI to give me the perspective I am not giving myself.
WHY WON'T I STOP?
WHO AM I KIDDING, I KNOW THIS ENDS BAD?
HOW AM I STILL ABLE TO LOOK IN THE MIRROR?
WHAT TWISTED EMOTIONAL NEED IS DRIVING THIS INCREDIBLY BAD BEHAVIOR?
Please don't hold back...I deserve whatever you have to say, and I welcome it...
[This message edited by blindsidedbyhim at 5:14 PM, September 29th (Sunday)]