Given the pattern of back and forth with the fireman, my therapist suggested that I have a response prepared for if he reaches out again. His pattern has been to pull away.. I end things and then he comes back and wants to talk it out where he then assures me that he is the person he was in the beginning..only to pull away again a couple weeks later. My pattern has been to let him go but then readily accept him back when he professes his adoration for me and wants another chance. He and I are both equally a hot mess. 

So here is what I will say if he tries one more time:

I’m sorry, I just can’t. We both know how much I liked you and upon further reflection I don’t think I was treated in a way that I deserved from someone who claimed to like me.

When we first met I was truly and whole heartedly myself. I am fun and funny, honest and “cheeky” as you called it. I dont take myself too seriously and I like to have fun and joke around and be playful. That is who I am. That is who I was when we met and for the first few weeks but because of the way you treated me..I began to change and I don’t like who I became. She wasn’t me. 

When I realized that you were judging the things I was saying and using them as reasons to pull away from me without even talking to me and clarifying with me, I began to be more thoughtful in what I was saying and doing. I was trying to not be too affectionate because I learned you were not really as affectionate when sober as you claimed to be when drunk. I began to joke around less as I became nervous that you were judging me and finding me failing. I curbed my sarcasm so as not to hurt your feelings. I just wasn’t free to be myself as I was so focused on showing you that it was okay for you to be who you actually were. It’s pretty ironic that in my pursuit of showing you that I accepted who you are, I lost myself.

So no, I don’t want to have another talk or another “restart”. We tried enough and I was left hurt and feeling uncared for. I do not intend to be that girl again

The Fireman…

The man who inspired the last post on heartbreak was a fun and energetic  Fireman. Or so I thought.

Well…he definitely was a Fireman…but it turned out he wasn’t as fun and energetic as he initially portrayed. 

In our early conversations we talked about the various things we wanted to do together, hiking, mountain biking, adventure races…but as time went on he admitted to me that many times he prefers to just sit in his garage and drink. Or sit on his couch and drink. Or get together with his family and drink. I’m sure we can all see the pattern here. 

The drinking wasn’t really much of a problem for me although I am not much of a drinker myself. It was more the fact that in the early weeks of our dating that he presented himself to be someone that he is not. I believe he was presenting himself as someone he would like to be and perhaps someone he thought I would want him to be but I don’t think he was intending to be so misleading.

I’m an active person and I like to do things to challenge myself, although I love a lazy day on the couch as much as the next person.  I enjoy being affectionate, spending time with a guy I am interested in and I like some level of daily contact to at least touch base and show interest…especially in the early days. The Fireman also portrayed himself in the same way and fed into my desires with daily contact…random “thinking about you” texts and through a lot of physical affection during our dates. 

My marriage was still considered “open” at that point and he told me repeatedly that he was okay with the situation and respected where I was at. But apparently this wasn’t the case.

Over the next couple of months he would begin to demonstrate some pursuing/fleeing behavior. He initially pulled away (fleeing) indicating that he was thinking of reuniting with an ex..only to change his mind and want me back. He then admitted that he wasn’t as okay with my open marriage as he thought he was and when we reunited it was after he found out that the marriage status wss chafing to “separated”.  

He pursued again for two weeks but then started to pull away again only to later disclose that he felt we were too different because I like to be active and busy where as he likes to lounge on his couch and in his garage etc. I talked about how balance is good and he began to pursue again, telling me that I would be good for his motivation to get out and do things. 

And then he pulled away again as he felt our differences in our sex drive and my desire for affection were too great. I am a touchy/feely person, and although he claimed in the beginning to be this way as well.. it turned out he wasn’t. He likes to climb into a shell and sit and think and when this is happening he doesn’t want to have to think of being affectionate towards someone else. When I asked for affection this caused him to pull away which in turn made me want to chase harder. What I was chasing was the man he claimed to be in the early weeks…but he was not truly that man. He acknowledged to me, as we ended things for the final time last week, that as strong as he started off with attention and affection, that it was just too much for him to maintain and he did not want to be expected to maintain that level of behavior. I understood but felt rejected at the same time. 

I really just wish people could be consistent in how they behave and present themselves. 

All in all I am doing okay as my infatuation with him starts to fade. I realize now that over the past few months I was changing myself to fit his needs and that is never a good sign. I like me…and if he chooses to let me go well then he never deserved me in the first place.

Changes…

So much has been going on since my last post. 

After this recent heart ache I realized that as much as my open marriage was helping to meet my sexual needs while keeping my family intact.. it wasn’t what I truly want.

I had to be completely honest with myself, and my husband, in that I wanted more. 

I want a full, loving, real relationship with a healthy sexual and emotional connection. In the open marriage I was finding some good sexual connections outside of my marriage but not able to realistically find an emotional connection. 

I told my husband of my revelation…that I now knew that one day I would leave him. I didn’t know when or for whom, but I didn’t want to keep this knowledge to myself or surprise him with it when it would eventually happen. I told him that while I do love him as a best friend, we couldn’t live like this forever, and we both deserved more from life. 

Being the amazing and caring man he is, combined with the fact that he knows me so well, he was able to understand how I was feeling and allowed me to take time to think about what I was suggesting.  While his preference was to keep going in our “open marriage” situation, he didn’t get angry when I uttered the worse “I want a formal separation”. 

So the past few months have been just that, us working towards an amicable separation. We have told our families, our close friends and co-workers and we explained things as best we could to the kids.

And here is where things get kind of weird…or weirder…we are going to continue sharing the house.

At this point we have realized that we have been living together as roommates so well why change what is working?? My bedroom has moved downstairs..its my own space and “our room” is now “his room”.  We continue to co-parent the kids and are flexible with each other’s dating schedules. I prefer to not bring any dates to my home..but I really don’t mind if his new girlfriend comes to the house after the kids are in bed on nights I am out. I am relieved that she seems to be a really nice woman. 

So that is where we are at. The kids seem to be adjusting well as their world has not really changed. They know mom and dad are best friends but are not in a marriage any longer. They are aware that amongst their friends their home home situation is likely the weirdest….but they really don’t seem to mind.  We all mess up our kids in some way or another…this at least gives them something to talk to their future therapists about.