Are these just poly growing pains?

S

SJJ

New member
I am living with this situation in my head and have no one around me that can understand on a 'poly' level. So I am hoping that I can have a bit of a sounding board here. I apologize that this will be super long, but I have to get it out of my head somehow. What I am really looking to do is to calm my head to a place of relaxing a bit and seeing how things play out.

My background is that I have been in somewhat open or poly relationships for most of my romantic life. I married my first (passed away) husband when I was 19. We were monogamous for a bit, but then we opened up to occasional play partners. I have always known people that considered themselves poly, but didn't really think it would be me. Well, as I moved on, I decided that, at the very least, I had poly-leanings. I was coming to this just at the time he died.

I picked up a relationship with one of my playmates that had been running for nearly a year at that stage. I slipped into that relationship. I tried very hard at first to have the 'Look, I am poly' conversation, but he kept shutting it down, and saying we could talk about it later. Well, we didn't. A few years down the line, we got married. But he became emotionally abusive, to the extent where I had to leave him. So I did.

I decided this was now my time to really explore my own poly. A couple that I had known for a long time, and for whom I had feelings, asked me to move in with them as part of a triad. (I am bisexual.) I did. For a while, it felt really good, until the male turned out to be somebody that just could not play by the rules. We set very few rules when we started.
1) Everybody gets tested.
2) No fluid bonding outside of our circle.
3) Not one particular person who had been hurtful to many in the past.

He broke two of these, by having unprotected sex with that person in our bed while both the other woman and I were around. It was a betrayal. After a bit, I decided to leave.

I've spent the last year or so working, and living with my best friend. He and I will never be a couple. I would kill him. So that felt like a space to sort of find myself a bit.

Anyway, about two months into this year, I had a totally chance meeting with one of his friends. It was like the breath was taken out of me. We clicked instantly and in a way I really haven't felt before.

He was married. I have a no-married-guys rule. But the thing is, I was dumb, and even though he was wearing a ring, I honestly didn't see it. By the time I had mentally decided to 'go there' with him, I was already committed in my mind to doing it.

We did, and it was beautiful. He and I started up what has been a pretty intense but largely long-distance love affair. I really tried to shield myself from all the married men cliches, but it was just such an intense bonding. On one of our very first nights, he asked me to tell him about myself. This was at a stage after leaving my marriage where I was deciding to tell people outwardly that I am bi, poly, etc.

So, I did, and it was like a world opened up in his eyes, and he realized that he was likely poly too. I know many people whose path to poly started with cheating. Perhaps sad, but also true. It concerned me a bit from the start that he hadn't really researched poly much, but just knew that was what he was when he reviewed his life in his head. Being with me and me being okay with non-monogamy really enriched him and brought him to a place where he finally felt there was nothing wrong with him.

We spent about ten months seeing each other once or twice a month (we lived in separate parts of CA). Of course, he was still married, and I was feeling guilty about how much in love I was with a married man, while also trying to guard myself from being a cliche. At this stage, I trusted this man with almost every fiber of my being. I have such huge trust issues after the abuse, and then what happened in my triad, so this is a huge deal to me.

In the time when we were apart, we both knew there would be other sexual partners. Clearly he was still married. I also knew of one other lover of his, and he was always honest with me about meeting up with her. He knew that my best friend and I were friends with benefits at times, and there was a chance that we would have sex now and then. Heck, he and I even had a threeway with one of his FWBs that was/is herself poly, and I was okay with all of that.
 
Then, in July, when we went to a party, he saw this woman and he was blown away by her beauty-- instant lust. I could tell. I told him to go talk to her, but that if he decided he wanted to do something that night, then he should assume that I may find somebody for the night too. He went off and talked to her for a while. Then he came back to me on the dance floor.

In the weeks that followed, he kept telling me that he felt that getting together with her (for sex) was something he simply felt he had to do. It upset me a little, how intense he was being about it, but I also appreciated that he was telling me about it. I addition, I was trying to keep in mind that this was the first time he felt an attraction he wanted to act on and could do so honestly. Virgin territory for him, I guess.

They also lived in different parts of the state. So, while I knew they were talking, I also knew they had yet to hook up. All the while, he is trying to assure me "Nobody is trying to take your place. She knows she has to respect that or we can't be anything." So, whilst I did ask a few times to be clued in about the nature of their relationship, and never really got fully straight answers, I let it slide, even though it was bugging me a bit. Part of what bugs me is that she isn't poly. She isn't even really an open-relationship type person. Also, she was an ex-hookup of my best friend. (We are in the BBW community. It is a small world when it comes to those things.) I knew from him that she is the type to fall hard.

Then in September, some big changes came in my life. I was recruited for a job that brought me to live in LA, which is where he is based. He had previously been trying to find a job closer to where I had been living, but mine happened first, and frankly, pretty suddenly.

I had about two weeks to quit my other job, find an apartment in Los Angeles and move. He was amazing with helping me with all that. Taking my breath away, he nearly instantly asked his wife for a divorce and moved in with me. In fact, he technically lived in my apartment before I did.
 
The first few weeks everything is heaven. Then, I started to get a niggling feeling about him and this girl. There was just something that wasn't sitting right with me. He was being too "This has to happen." We had just moved in together. after so many months of trying to get to that place.

One day, he was texting her in the wide open, not really trying to hide anything, and I saw a picture come up of the two of them. Where they met was at a BBW event that takes place in a hotel. When I asked him about the picture he said it was in her room. (There are often massive room parties that are basically drinking places.) They had just taken a quick photo lying down on the bed, and then he had come back to me. I honestly believed that to be true. But for some reason, it set my trust alerts off a bit, because I guess I figured I should have been told he had been back to her room, even if nothing had happened.

Now, here is where I think I messed up big time. I have a low-level anxiety disorder that throws anxiety attacks at me a couple times a year. Change is one of my triggers. All that change at once, and then that dent in what I thought was perfect trust, well, it sent me into a spin of nearly two weeks of straight-out anxiety attacks.

I was in a new job, with no health care or access to medication to calm them. I was trying to hide them, but they started to overtake me.

I began to get a little bitchy with my responses when the other woman was mentioned. One night, he brought her up in a way that I found disrespectful to me.

I had met him through my best friend. They do music together. There was a need for him to go up to my friend's studio to help master an album they were working on. His funds were low at that moment, so I said, "Sure, let's rent a car on me and go up."

He replied, "Well, I could always ask [name] for help getting up there, and then you wouldn't have to pay." She lives about an hour from my best friend. I knew that would be the time they hooked up. I just thought it was a slap in my face, when I was offering something to help our friendship trio, and he was seeing it as a way of sleeping with somebody else.
 
When I got home from work, I tried not to look to pissed off about it, but at night he brought it up again. I snapped. I told him that for right now I really would prefer a period of monogamy for a little bit, as we got used to being a proper couple. Well, that lit a match I really didn't expect. He is a very gentle man who rarely shows emotion, but we had our first real fight. It resulted in him crying and saying that he just can't be with just one woman sexually for the rest of his life, and there must be something wrong with him.

Right there, I felt so horrible. I never ever want him to think the desire/need for more than one sexual partner means there is something wrong with him. I've been made to feel like that before. I am sure a lot of us here have too. From that moment, it was like I was watching a man slip into depression. I didn't blame him at all for it.

He'd just broken up a 14-year marriage. He has two kids, and even though he sees them most days, and they are only 20 minutes away, not being with them was really starting to hit him. Previously, he had sworn he would be okay with it, but I knew that it would bother him. That is why I worked on moving to LA vs him moving up towards me and away from them.

Then I threw something into the works that sort of shattered his blissful picture of us together in a happy and healthy poly relationship.

I was partly pissed off at him for the way he was handling things with this other woman, and partly mad at myself for having let my anxiety attacks take me to that place.

So, the next day, I called in many favors. I managed to find a doctor who would give me some pills to calm my physical symptoms of anxiety, so that the cycle of them would stop. My bf didn't appear to understand what those attacks could do to me, and it scared him.

He changed with me for a bit. He said he needed some time to see if he was going to be talked to like that again. Seriously, this was just a state of the relationship talk. You'd think that in his 14 years of marriage he'd had one of those before, but he said not. Maybe when you are cheating vs trying to honest, there isn't much to talk about.

I swallowed my pride over the guilt of making him think, even for one second, that there was something wrong with him being who he is, especially in a time when he is just starting to walk that path.
 
I told him I would be okay with him going to see her, but asked him to do it fairly quickly so that it wasn't something just hanging over us.
Well, about week after our talk/fight, he had to go to Texas for a family wedding. So, I was there in our apartment really thinking he was weighing up if he wanted to leave or not. It was confusing the hell out of me, since up til then we'd had a near perfect relationship for nearly a year, as far as depth of feeling and communication.

He kind of cold-shouldered me through his trip to Texas, checking in enough to let me know he hadn't forgotten about me, but certainly not the loving messages and talks we normally would've had.

When he got back from Texas he told me "The other trip is at the end of the month." I knew what that meant. I swallowed my feelings a bit and thanked him for telling me and asked if he could he let me know the dates. He did. I called my best friend and asked him to come down to be with me that weekend so I didn't spiral into anxiety attacks, which he did.

The day before his trip (which she must have paid for which made me feel odd, because in my head it takes a certain level of relationship for somebody to pay your airfare), I asked him for his flight times and he flipped. He he said I was trying to keep tabs on him. Wow, he'd never reacted like that to me, ever. I said, "No, I was just doing what any couple would do and ask flight details on the chance something happened." On top of which, I discovered that day that the trip was actually a day longer than the initial dates he had told me. I admit I did question why he hadn't told me that.

So, now he was feeling pressured from what I think are just straightforward questions that poly or open couples would share with each other when going to meet a play partner. He gives me a set of flight times and I don't know... something wasn't right in my head about them.

When I got home, I accidentally bumped the computer table and it turned the monitor on and there was his itinerary with totally different times. To my knowledge, that was the first time he'd ever straight-out lied to me. It really hurt. I tried not to mention it, to just let him do whatever it is he needed to do, but I couldn't. I asked him if he would lie to me when he was mad. He paused for a bit. I asked, "Then what are your real flight times?

He hung his head in shame and told me. I asked why he would lie to me and his answer was that it felt like I was trying to control him. It's like whatever state he was in after our talk was making it difficult for him to not slip back into cheating behavior, something never needed with me ever, rather than just be honest. I took the answer and let it slide from there.
 
He returned from his weekend break with her and he saw that I was not in his face freaking out about it. He started to relax a bit and be more like the man I deeply love. But he did drop in that he is still dealing with that talk we had (at that stage, now nearly a month ago) and he still had to get over that. I said, "Okay, we will get there together."

A week and a bit went by after his visit with her and he hadn't even mentioned her name, which I wasn't sure how to take. Had he gotten what he wanted and now wasn't so anxious that he had to mention it so much? I didn't know. But he was slowly being much better with me.

We talk a lot throughout the day via text while I am at work. One day last week he hit me up and said out of nowhere that he was starting to believe that I really was okay with being poly/open, where there are occasional other partners. I said that yes, that had always been the case. but that it does need to be occasional. and I need to be shown honesty and respect. and I could not deal with being straight-out lied to again. He agreed to that and said that he was starting to believe that the real person he loved had returned (which really kind of annoys me but I let him say it, because really, I'd had anxiety attacks. I was the same person, just ill.)

He made some comment that he still thought I might "wig out" down the line when he asks to do something again "Even if it isn't on a special day like a birthday or holiday," which felt like an odd thing to say. But I reconfirmed that as long as there is honesty and respect I will be okay.


Days go by. He starts telling me I am the best friend/partner/mate anybody could have, and I think it is all settling back down.

Then, two days ago, we were working on a group project together on our computers. He opened up a Facebook message from somebody to show me. I could see the list of previous conversations on the side. I am never somebody to snoop. I won't even get something out of a bag for him when he says it is okay; I will bring him the bag to get it himself. But I could see her there from a few days previously and her last line was "I know, I love you too. :)" Well, he had never told me they had exchanged the L-word. It just sat with me in my head all night.

When he went to sleep I did something I truly hate myself for-- I clicked on that message to read it. I did not scroll up to read anything beyond what was on the screen. The majority of the conversation was from RIGHT before he went to see her and it was all about how much he was lusting after her, and how she was his "siren," etc. There was stuff that made it sound like he was stoking her up over me a bit. She made some comment about, "Well, she tried to change the rules," and he did defend me a bit in there.

But really, it was mostly about how much they were lusting after each other. (Meanwhile we have sex every night, so his lust for me felt just fine.) She did make some comment about not being jealous of me, but not wanting to hear about other women. Which sort of makes me think/hope he was still telling her that I was who he would be with as a primary. Then the last response in the chat was after a gap of many days, over a week since they had their "dates," and was just an exchange of "I love you." I closed it and decided not to go up and read any more. I was ashamed enough of having read anything.
 
On the other hand, I escaped an abusive married nearly two years ago and there are some things I can't fully let go. So, I woke him up. I will admit to having given him some BS reason. I said that I had a dream and it upset me. (I do have a lot of nightmares that tend to point to truths.) I asked him outright if he had ever told her he loved her. He said yes. (It is weird how when confronted he will answer.) I said I thought he should have told me that before, but okay.

Then he threw in, "But that was before I saw her," which really confused me. But he does not do well with being asked question after question. He thinks it means he isn't being "heard." So I didn't ask what that meant. But part of me read that as "I told her what I needed to, to get her to fly me up there and have sex." He was mad at me at the time for some of those comments. I could let that go if he was really just being a jerk and stoking her up because of whatever was going on in his head.

Then I asked him about her feelings for him. After all, she is not poly. How does this play out for her? He said that she is into him and has asked when they can see each other again. But she was being thoughtful and asking for dates that were special to us as a couple (birthdays, anniversaries, holidays), so it didn't clash with any of those. He said told her that there are a lot of events in December (my birthday and the holidays). Then in January I have a business trip he is coming along with me on. Then Feb is Valentine's Day and his birthday. So, it likely wouldn't be until the end of Feb or March before he has free time.

From that, I took two things - firstly, if he wanted to see her so badly again, he would make it happen before March. He traveled up and down the state of California to see me every other weekend until we got to live together. Secondly, I now knew where his statement about how I might "wig out' about meetups, even if they weren't on special days came from. So, obviously they are communicating other than on FB, or they had that conversation in person and he just took that long to relay it.

I asked him where he wanted to be. He got a little huffy and said he clearly wanted to be with me or he would not be living with me. He then also said that should he and I break up, she would not be his first choice for where to go next, I guess his way of saying chill out.

So, I am mad at there having been things kept from me. But I am trying to cut him some slack, as this is his first attempt at doing anything poly/open that wasn't cheating, and frankly, he handled it badly. Other times since our talk, he has asked me about meeting up with one woman he used to see in the past. He asked properly and with respect, and I said it would be okay if it happened. So, he is trying to learn (I hope).

I tried to be the poly grown up and said that perhaps it was time for him to sort of introduce us, and the three of us have a chat and clear the air. He said he would ask her (I sort of doubt he will) but that in the past when he suggested her talking to me she said it made her feel uncomfortable and that like it was a slap in my face. I pointed out calmly that it felt like more of a slap in the face to carry on with me in the dark about the nature of their relationship and that I felt I had been disrespected. He really hates being asked things more than once. So, I left it.
 
The problem is that now my trust is really dented. I am trying very hard not to be the type of person that goes back and reads the whole of their conversations to make sure I am not being played in any way. It is really hard not to shake the feeling that I have a right to know. I mean, maybe if I did, I would see that that level of talk was a blip and was indeed right around when he was mad/hurt, and then I will just store it in my head and try to forgive. On the other hand, I could see things that might ruin any chance at me just letting this go.

I don't want to give up on this man so soon. I really believe him to be a soulmate of mine and possibly the love of my life. On the other hand, I want the cuddly, lovey-dovey man back too. I feel like he was maybe slowly coming back to us being 'us' after his trip and I am hoping that asking those questions about her (where I have previously not mentioned her since the trip) hasn't set us back. I do think though, I have a right to be hurt, and I feel like I have nowhere to express that without damaging things further. We fought hard for nearly a year to get to be with each other. I don't want to give up on the first real hurdle.

So, I need to dig deep and see if I allow this all to be chalked up to badly handling a first attempt from him at being honest about having sex with a person other than the woman with which he lives.

We have several things coming up soon-- my big work Christmas party is tomorrow, and though he isn't keen on putting on a suit, he is going. We have a concert on Saturday that marks the anniversary of the first time we... well, you know. And then on the 20th we have my birthday. Is it wrong of me to want to see how he handles those events with me? What he is like towards me?

I really do not want to give up on what could be a beautiful poly/open relationship, but I also don't want to find out I am being played in the background.

Ugh... what to do?

Sorry about the length. I haven't see able to say any of that to anybody that has a clue about polyamory. I think I needed a mind dump.
 
This reads like a journal thread. Could ask a mod here to move it to the journal area if you intend it that way.

Am I reading this right? You started up having a cheating affair with him, and are now worried he's kinda cheating on you/breaking agreements with this woman? There's a lot of details in there. But is that the bottom line? :confused:

At the very least, you have communication and respect needs that are not being met here. You have been lied to, and this has broken trust. Is he full of hot air, or actually making changes to his behavior, to make amends and rebuild trust?

It is on you to discern if he's used up his "three strikes, you're out," if the effort being put in is the right amount or too little too late, and if you are still willing to receive this sort of treatment if things are not changing at all, or or not enough.

You have been the victim of abuse in the past. Be very careful with your mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health. Do not mistake what you wish it was for what actually is.

If he does not change his behavior, how will you conduct yourself in self-respecting ways? What natural consequences have you told him will happen?

I really do not want to give up on what could be a beautiful poly/open relationship, but I also don't want to find out I am being played.
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How are his behaviors demonstrating beautiful loving open/poly kindness toward you?

I am sorry you are hurting. I hope getting to write it out and vent at least helped some.

Galagirl
 
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Yes, I got involved with him when he was being unfaithful. It is not something I am proud of at all. He is only the second man in my life that I have had any involvement with who was cheating on anybody. The first was when I was much younger, and he broke my heart. I did not intend to start a relationship with him, but the 'click' was so loud I wasn't hearing anything else. I believe him to be the love of my life. But I suppose life isn't over, so who knows if that is true, or not just yet?

That behavior are not demonstrating those things, but I meant that until this, we'd been such a force for love together. This isn't the man I know. That is why I am trying to hang in there and be a couple that works through things rather than gives up.

People will mess up. But I feel like he has placed so much odd negative energy on the one moment where I suggested that we maybe needed to be monogamous for a period, that he is looking at me wondering if I am going to suddenly not be poly. I have been been living poly a lot longer than he has. Perhaps because of that, I am uncomfortable with the lack of proper communication about the nature of the relationship he was forming with this person. If he wants to have some sort of relationship with her, fine. Just don't lie to me about it.

I am really having to fight with my trust issues here. In the end, how that plays out is what will determine where I go from here. I can't not trust the people in my intimate life.
 
I am really having to fight with my trust issues here. In the end, how that plays out it what will determine where I go from here. I can't not trust the people in my intimate life.
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What's this mean? What's the plan of action at this point then?

Galagirl
 
Wow.

1st thought: you seem to have impulse/control issues. You have all these ideas of what you want and don`t want, but the minute a situation comes up, they all get put on the back burner for whatever you feel in the moment.

You attracted a guy who is the same. And married. And not to you.

Good luck with that.

Do you feel you have always had a problem sticking to your beliefs, or do you feel it might be something that started occurring once your 1st husband died? Do you still have a lot of pain from that?

Side note: why do people snoop, but restrict themselves part way into snooping? I never really understood that. It doesn't make you any better then the person who reads everything. lol. If you are going to be insecure and snoopy, just do it already, and own it. Don't cop-out halfway through, to try and look noble.

Sorry, I forgot to answer the title question. No, I do not think these are poly growing pains. This is the price paid for cheating. I don`t really judge people's reasons for cheating, but there really is always a price to pay for that behaviour. Many times the cheater is at a confused state of life, and the person loving them on the outside is the guinea pig.
 
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This was an interesting one for me to read, because I think most people who know me think I have pretty great impulse control and would never at all question my ability to stick to my beliefs.

However, I think there some aspects of what you have said that are applicable, if I look in the mirror. I broke my own rule. Okay, I had already fallen for him before my thick head registered he was married, but I could have stopped it there. A part of me hesitates to say just yet that I should have, because I really have not felt this depth of love and connection with a person since my first husband, and there have been times in this relationship where it has left me a bit scared with how close this feeling is to the one with him.

I've never cheated in my life, but I am very aware that helping somebody cheat is as bad, even if you are in love and he is coming into his poly own, so to speak. Yes, it was wrong.

Do I still have a lot of pain from my first husband's death? At times. (It has been 8 years. I got married at 19.) His death was very sudden and in front of me. That certainly gave me abandonment issues. It was indeed after his death that I started to have anxiety attacks now and then.

What I will say that lingers more with me is the abusive relationship. That was only two years in my past. I was silent throughout most of what was happening to me, so nobody knew until there was a particularly scary confrontation and I found a friend to confide in. Like a bad sweater, as soon as I told anybody, my life unraveled and I had to leave. So, yes, I do have a bit of abused wife syndrome floating around in my head. My abuse was emotional, but please don't take that as meaning low impact. The man I am with now was the first man to make me feel safe in a very very long time. Now, I am struggling to not lose that feeling totally.

Yes, I guess I did snoop, something, again, very against my character. But in front of my face was rather clear evidence that I was being lied to. I guess I didn't fight the urge to click hard enough. But once I did, I didn't want to go further up and read more, partly because I didn't want to have more words burned into my head, and partly because I felt guilty. Really, guilty.

I believe you may be right that this is a consequence for not having fought my feelings for a married man, even if he put leaving his wife into motion as soon as he figured out his feeling for me. No matter how it is said, it was wrong. The love, was, and I hope still is, real, though.

Maybe I deserve these feelings for now, and I should swallow them and see how it plays out. Certainly, if it plays out badly I am going to have to go back to listening to my own rules, no matter what. I just really do want my soulmate to return from his depressive jerk stage.
SourGirl said:
You seem to have impulse/control issues. You have all these ideas of what you want and don`t want, but the minute a situation comes up, they all get put on the back-burner for whatever you feel in a moment.You attracted a guy who is the same. And married. And not to you. Good luck with that.

Do you feel you have always had a problem sticking to your beliefs, or do you feel it might be something that started occurring once your 1st husband died? Do you still have a lot of pain from that? Why do people snoop, but restrict themselves part way into snooping ? I never really understood that. It doesn't make you any better then the person who reads everything. lol. Really ? ..If you are going to be insecure and snoopy, just do it already, and own it.
Don't cop-out half way through, to try and look noble.

I do not think these are poly growing pains. This is the price paid for cheating. I don`t really judge people's reasons for cheating, but there really is always a price to pay for that behaviour. Many times the cheater is at a confused state of life, and the person loving them on the outside, is the guinea pig.
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I feel worried for you when I read through your writings about the situation you are living with, especially with the difficult, traumatic events that you have coped with.

You talk about falling very quickly in love, of feeling secure with your boyfriend. My feeling on these sorts of very sudden feelings for strangers is that they say more about us than about the people. Maybe he reminds you of somebody who was lovable, who did give you security. His posture, way of moving, aftershave, dress sense... any of those could trick your brain into associating him with love and security. The problem is that our brains can be tricked like that. The reality of the new person may not match the reality of the person they are being associated with. So in your shoes, I'd be mistrustful of these feelings.

And then there are your boyfriend's habitual thought patterns. He has cheated (with more than just you?) on his wife. He likely has lots of stories in his mind that justify to himself why it's okay for him to behave in such a hurtful way toward somebody he loves. I suspect that these stories and thought patterns and the behaviours that go along with them are by now comfortable habits for him - things he will go back to regularly unless he recognises them as such, and deliberately takes action and works on stopping them.

And now there is the pair of you. Now he's living with you. You are in the role of his wife. You are the partner he can be open about being with, you are the one he comes home to the one he has to lie to. This coupled with the fact that he seems from your writing to have taken no action or ownership of his habitual cheating thoughts and behaviours makes me think that you can expect to be lied to and cheated on for as long as you are with him.

I doubt if you being happy with poly and clear with him that he is able to have sex and romance with other women will make any difference to the way he behaves. Having sex with others may not be cheating in the relationship you share with him but until they are addressed, he will still need an outlet for the habits he has created in his thoughts and actions around settled relationships.

I think that he will still need to hide things from his spouse, lie about things and refuse to discuss what he's up to (all of which he has already done to you). I would bet money that if you ever ask him for any kind of boundaries around sex and romance (going slow, avoiding certain sex acts for a time with other partners, periods of monogamy while you get sorted, etc.) he will break those and lie to you about it.

I know it's easy to say, because I don't love your boyfriend, and am not in your position, but I would be thinking very seriously about leaving/asking him to leave.

I don't think your heart is safe with him. I think that the very early deep feelings of love and safety you felt were projected onto him by your mind and body, but that he is not worthy of them.

I wish you luck and strength.
 
InfinitePossibility said:
You talk about falling very quickly in love, of feeling secure with your boyfriend. My feeling on these sorts of very sudden feelings for strangers is that they say more about us then about the people. Maybe he reminds you of somebody who was lovable an who did give you security. His posture, way of moving, aftershave, dress sense... any of those could trick your brain into associating him with love and security. The problem is that our brains can be tricked like that. The reality of the new person may not match the reality of the person they are being associate with.


Having sex with others may not be cheating in the relationship, but until they are addressed, he will still need an outlet for the habits he has created in his thoughts and actions around settled relationships.


I think that the very early, deep feelings of love and safety you felt were projected onto him by your mind and body, but he is not worthy of them.
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All very good points here.

SJJ, I don`t think you deserve bad things happening to you. In fact, that statement sounds like some residual thinking from the abusive relationship.

I totally understand that you would have lingering and on-going work with things that haunt you from the abusive relationship. It is great you are looking at yourself and your actions with an open mind. I do wonder, if you are attracting 'sad' situations, purely because that is your history for your last 2 loves. You lost the first one far too suddenly and soon, and there is great sadness and grief with that, and the 2nd one tried to destroy you, just by its very nature. That has its own sadness and grief. Sadness and grief can be very sneaky. It can slip on you like a comfortable blanket, and change your perception of what feels good around other people.
 
I thank everybody for their responses . I have been doing a lot of reflection on them. I don't want to give up on him, but I understand that it may be something I have to do to protect myself.

Last night, I forced a conversation about the lying. It is difficult for me, probably because of the abuse history, to force myself into conversations where I know there could be conflict, but you can all tell where it has taken my head. So, I decided to start it regardless of the outcome. I told him how hurt I was that he lied to me and pointed out that he had never fully apologized. At first, he was grumpy, for lack of a better word, over the conversation. But then we got down to some nitty gritty and he did apologize and swears there is nothing out there looming for me to find out. I asked him about his commitment to rebuilding trust with me. He said he was willing to work on it. Which, honestly, is more than I expected. I told him that I can deal with him having feelings for somebody else, but not with there being such secrecy and sleight of hand about it.

So, I'll see what happens. I'm not wearing blinders on the issues. He was told pretty firmly that if I do find out anything else has been kept from me (told him that omission is indeed lying) I would leave him. I don't want that to be the result, but I will do it.
 
Good for you for having that hard conversation and being clear about your limits of tolerance, even though it was hard for you. Hopefully he will step up to the plate, stop with lies of omission, and help create a trust-building environment with you in this relationship. You deserve good treatment. Whether he chooses on his end to step up or not, this is you stepping up to treat yourself like you matter. Way to go. :cool:
 
You wanted him, knowing he was a liar and cheater. You knew this because he lied to and cheated on his wife. I suspect a lot of other women, though, convince themselves that the wife is really the problem, that he's soooo wonderful, and because she (the other woman) is also sooo wonderful and loving and understands him, he'd never do that to her.

Well... yes. He would. Because the truth is, cheaters cheat because that's what cheaters do. Not because the spouse is awful, not because the new person is so wonderful, but because cheaters have no impulse control, they take what they want when they want it, they feel entitled to do so, and lie to their spouse so the spouse doesn't cause any unpleasantness, because they found another woman who will put up with that, and ignore the way she sees him treating a woman he claims to love, and convince herself he won't do it to her. :( It's all about them and their desires.

So... you wanted him-- a liar and a cheater. You got a liar and a cheater.

What do you do now? Do you convince yourself he's something other than what he's shown himself to be by lying to and cheating on his wife for over a year with multiple women? If you do, you'll continue to be on forums asking these same questions and telling the same sad tale of how he's doing to you what he showed you, directly, he is willing and able to do to a woman he 'loves.'

I hope you will take my next words to heart, because you have many years left ahead of you, and your decisions today determine the quality of those years. As I read through (and eventually skimmed) your first 8 posts, I read a lot of me, me, me, my, my, my, I, I, I, a lot of: Yeah, yeah, cheating's bad, it's wrong, I feel bad about it... But day-um, he's so hot, we really clicked, and the sex was so good! What do you really mean? That cheating is wrong unless you really, really CLICK? :confused:

May I just say (and I'd say it in a kinder, gentler way if I knew how) that part of growing up and developing character is seeing and caring how our actions affect others. Honestly, I just shake my head in sorrow reading your post, and have no real sympathy for you, because you only care about his lying when it hurts you. Did you ever once think how his wife felt during that year he was cheating with you, and apparently others, too?

I'm sure she had her suspicions. I'm sure she caught him in lies. He no doubt played the same mind games with her that he's now playing with you. What is she doing now that he's dumped her? Did she have to move out of a home she loved or go back to work to support their children? Does she maybe see less of her children because she has to be at work more hours? Has she perhaps suffered anxiety attacks herself as a result of his lies and mind games to her? What kind of stress is she suffering now, what kind of health issues does she have as a result of the stress caused by his cheating and the divorce and single parenthood?

What about his children? When my (now ex) husband stayed out for hours after work to see another woman, he not only cheated on me, but on his children, who were home, waiting to see him, missing him, asking me every ten minutes where he was and when he'd be home, and I had no answer. I had only my fear that he was dead on the highway somewhere. My children suffered as a result of their father being absent and unaccounted for, and suffered a second time as a result of the stress, worry, fear, and anxiety his unexplained absences put on me. Did your boyfriend skip his children's important occasions to be with you? Did his unexplained absences harm them? How are they liking having their family ripped apart? How will his lies and actions affect them as adults? How will it impact their future relationship with him, or even with their future spouses? Are they developing abandonment issues, themselves, as a result of their father walking out on them?

If you're not sure, please look up one of the many forums for betrayed spouses and read up on the agony that they and their children are suffering. You took part in causing that. I do not mean to be unkind, but it is the truth. You will be happier when you face this head on and learn and grow from it.

And because water seeks its own level, when you do that, you'll also choose a more quality man next time, one who will have the same integrity and honor you have gained, and will thus treat you as every woman deserves to be treated.

Is this poly growing pains? No. It's the natural consequences of getting involved with a liar and cheater. :(
 
I'd like to say that you aren't right, but I know that you are. I did struggle a lot at first, but I guess the deeper in I got, the easier it was to not listen to that part of my brain.

I never thought it was her fault, more as a case, at least in how he presented it, of people who weren't actually in love sticking together for the kids. I am aware that that is a likely story. He has always made sure to say he thinks highly of her, but I know how that sounds, given everything that has been done.

She hasn't had to move out. She is still at her same job.

He is good with his kids. He still sees them pretty much every day. Whatever is in him to lie, etc., to people he loves, doesn't extend to his kids. Of course, cheating is hurting them down the line.

I believe they were going to break up anyway, but I am sure that me being there (whether that was that was because of love, or because of him having a place to go) helped to move things along, none of which makes it right.

Perhaps that is part of why I am so anxious to make this work, to somehow not have done something morally wrong for no real end result. I don't know.
 
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