Skip,
Please don't play with her emotions to get even. Every time she reaches out to you, you lash out at her and your own comfort level with the situation seems to improve. That is the "push/pull". She feels you bully her to get your way. When that doesn't work, she feels you abandon to get your way.
There has been no push/pull from me. I asked her for NC nearly 10 weeks ago. She decided to break that on 3 separate occasions. Each time pulling away again after having a conversation. I didn't invite the contact and on each occasion it launched me into emotional crisis. I don't abandon her to get my way, I do it because she gives me ST following every reconnection. I have spent years trying to be reasonable, as much as my own personality will allow me to. It is intensely painful dealing with her behaviour. It's not about getting my way, it is about trying to protect myself.
A lot of people are being seriously abused in this "affair". I know that is a bit in your face, but I intend it with kindness. You can't dress it up any other way or say that the innocent spouses deserve it. And, as you have said on a number of occasions, your attraction to he is mostly physical / sexual.
Her husband is bisexual and from what she told me he has met other women too. She tells me he is not interested in her from any other standpoint than financial. She has been clear about that over many years. It is always possible she is minimising and justifying but they do not have a close r/s as far as I know. Which is why I have always been confused about his control over her. My wife is not being hurt in this affair because she doesn't know about it. Whereas if I tell her that I am leaving her because we are not having sex then she will be heartbroken probably. So which is more hurtful do you think?
You have also referred to it as "unconditional love" but none of the interfaces with her over the last month have been loving... .nor are you descriptions or her or situations.
Well it is certainly not unconditional love from her point of view. Please keep in mind that she spent a year abusing me via texts. One time from Hyde Park where she was at a concert with another man. Yet you see me as the aggressor here. I have been open and very honest about my actions on here, but I can tell you this, my behaviour does not come from a place of bullying her, whatever she says. It comes from a place of anguish and love. I did have unconditional love for her. When she was in rehab, I invited her out to something I was involved in, which was high risk to me because she met some of my friends (at her own request) and then I drove her back to rehab. That wasn't about sex. I also helped her through the initial stages of AA when she wanted to drink again. I have been her confidante and shoulder to lean on for years. That wasn't just about sex. So, yes, it has also been about love - for me anyway.
I was with my ex and she suddenly sat in the corner and started crying and whimpering. We had just been having sex so it was very disconcerting. That night we walked across Chelsea bridge and I took a photo of her and asked her if she liked the view, she said not really as she was considering throwing herself off the bridge. This was a weekend that I had been looking forward to for ages.
Read what your wrote her. She was having an emotional crisis... .rather than attend to her, you felt "cheated". If a women is in an affair and crying after sex and thinking of throwing herself off of a bridge, that is a pretty clear sign that the guilt and self loathing over the affair was overwhelming. If you loved her, you would have connected to that. Again, no criticism intended, just trying to keep give you perspective on what is going on.
Did I say I felt cheated? No, I didn't. I was giving that as an anecdote about BPD behaviour to Harley Quinn. To take it out of context is rather unfair on me, don't you think? What I didn't say was how I held her in my arms after she was crying and reassured her. When she said she felt like jumping off the bridge, we were already back in the hotel and again, I reassured her. I asked her regularly if she felt guilty about her husband and she always said that she did not. Her crying on the floor was not out of guilt, it was out of mental illness. Of that, I am certain. She never felt guilt about her marriage as far as I am aware. I wasn't the first person she had an affair with. There is no doubt that I love her but you cannot see that because you are going solely on my posts. I think you should be questioning her commitment to love rather than mine. I never inflicted ST on her and never abandoned her until the point where I stopped trusting her.
The hard question here, all things considered, are there any reasons other than reasons of weakness and bad character to continue with this "affair"? She can't handle it and is caught up in it - but she is mentally ill. You're not. You're stronger and you can step back an see that this is leaving a wake of damage and it will eventually engulf you too.
So by your rationale, everybody who has an affair is a 'bad character?' That is a little black and white don't you think? I also find it judgemental. I don't consider 'weakness' has anything to do with this affair. It is emotional attachment. Unless you are saying that anybody who feels the emotions I do is weak? Odd interpretation to me. I honestly don't know whether she can handle it or whether her behaviour is just punishment for me allegedly abandoning her. I have asked her to talk to me about things being, 'Not good.' I have asked about her mental health and sobriety too. So far there has been no response. Had she ever said to me at any point that she couldn't handle this affair emotionally then I would have backed off. In fact, just before I walked away I asked if she still wanted me in her life. She emphatically said, 'Yes.' Then behaved as if I were her arch enemy. A few weeks before her final two disappearances she also said that she wanted to keep on seeing me. Unfortunately her behaviour suggested otherwise.
This r/s has already engulfed me. There is no getting away from it. I have tried to detach from her but she keeps pulling me back in. You seem to be holding me entirely responsible for her behaviour, overlooking how she has behaved towards me in this situation. In fact there seems to be little mention in your messages about BPD traits on her part. Had there been no ST and disappearances we wouldn't be in this current situation.
I am actually very worried about her which is why I have stopped short of blocking her on WhatsApp. I have a bad feeling that she has started drinking again and if this is the case, it will be because she feels abandoned. So I am damned whatever I do. I will be guilty if I try to get away from her and even more guilty, according to some people in this forum, about having an affair. Let me make something clear in case you missed it, I love this woman with my whole heart and it goes way beyond sex. So the fact I walked away, should give you an idea of how completely messed up I was by her behaviour towards me and how much pain I was experiencing.
Through these boards I have become aware that by challenging her I am triggering the ST. I think I knew this already
but interpreted it as belligerence and control rather than BPD. Even now, she is playing hide and seek with me. I have sent her several texts today telling her how much I am concerned for her. I am getting a wall of silence. That is ringing alarm bells with me and I think she is scared to tell me that she is drinking again. I hope I am wrong because it took her 2 years to get sober last time. She started drinking that time (after 10 years of sobriety) when her brother died. I stood by her every step of the way over those two years, to the detriment of my own mental health.
Very often when one cheated on spouse finds out, they contact the other spouse. Play out that scenario in your head. Your affair partner has had suicidal ideation. You have had suicidal ideation. If either of these partners find out, they will likely have suicidal ideation.
This is really a risky situation.
She has been threatening me with suicide on and off over 14 years. She has never tried to do it as far as I know. There is no way her husband will ever make contact with me or my wife. He knows who I am and roughly where I live. If he was ever going to do anything he would have done it long ago.
Over the past 10 weeks i have let go of the idea that we will ever be together. They are both too level headed or fearful to involve anybody else in this situation. I don't know what the truth of their situation is but she has told me a million times that all he cares about is his financial security as the house belongs to her through inheritance. That side of things has never interested me but I gather she has an income.
If you want my honest opinion, the person who is in the most danger in this situation is myself. She has been in constant crisis for as long as I have known her. I accept I could have made life easier by being less challenging about her behaviour, but I am not a doormat and I have to look after my own mental health. Being without her has actually made me feel terrible. However, I do not believe this will reconvene as a r/s, especially if she has started drinking again. If that is the case my only interest will be in getting her back into AA and healthy again.
