atsafixafine
Fewer than 3 Posts
 Offline
What is your sexual orientation: Straight
Who in your life has "personality" issues: Romantic partner
Posts: 1
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« on: December 03, 2015, 05:45:17 PM » |
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OK... .from what I've read, this is going to sound awfully familiar to many of you out there, but it's unique to me, and I am counting on that familiarity to help set, and keep, me on the right path, so here goes:
I am in my late 50s, divorced 18 years, and never remarried. About 8 months ago I became reacquainted with a woman with whom I had gone to grade school - The connection was immediate and the chemistry powerful - We fell instantly and madly in love, something I hadn't felt since I met my (ex)wife, 25 years ago. It was magical. She was funny and beautiful and sexy, but, for me, the most attractive thing about her was how she reacted to ME. Like a mantra, she kept telling me how she had never anything for a man the way she felt for me. That her 25 year marriage was an abusive sham. She claimed to have not had not dated much, and had never been intimate with any man, in the 12 years since her divorce because no man ever made her feel safe. But I was different. I made her feel safe. I made her feel protected. Although it took about a month of seeing each other 2 or 3 times a week, we eventually had sex, and it was amazing. She told me I had unlocked something inside of her she never knew she could feel: Love, intimacy, passion, and, most of all, security. All the while she was falling more and more in love with me and, in turn, I with her. As our relationship began to grow, the more she revealed herself to me: She had been neglected and abused by both parents as a child. Hearing impaired and dyslexic, she was misdiagnosed as mentally retarded and bused to a special school every day. Raped by a friend of her older brother when she was 14, became pregnant, and secretly aborted the child with the help of an understanding adult mentor. Sold into virtual slavery as a teenager by her dysfunctional alcoholic mother. Molested by family members and friends of family members. I mean, Charles Dickens couldn't have dreamed up a worse childhood for a person. As a compassionate, loving, open, supportive, caring, giving man, who respects women and womankind, this was the perfect grist for my mill. This waif and I were like the perfect storm. And the more she needed from me in the way of love and support, the more I had to offer. Even when the rages started, I did my research, and decided pretty quickly that she has BPD. I called upon my powers of compassion and understanding to not only endure the mood swings and rages, and tantrums, but to support her through them (not immediately, it took some time and practice and lots of error to figure out what was going on and how to approach and react to it). I became quite good at getting her (and myself) through them. As tough as it could be at times (and it was really tough), these episode were more than balanced (in my mind) by the love we shared, and the progress I felt was being made. And my inherent desire to make things better.
But then, the lies started (actually, they probably started from the beginning, but I just hadn't recognized them as lies). And then the secret phone calls. And then I noticed she began unplugging her phone whenever I was at her place (she never came to mine). When I asked her about this, instead of trying to make me feel better about it, she called me a "jealous, paranoid freak."
And then, while looking for some scratch paper in her desk, I found a card which amounted to a love letter, from a man, thanking her for letting him into her life, her home, and her heart. And for showing him a world he though only existed in fairy tales. What the heck? How could this be?
And then came this past Thanksgiving weekend: She told me she was having out of town guests, and it was going to be too overwhelming for her to see or talk to me, so she asked (no... .ORDERED) me to not call her or "come snooping around" the whole 4 day weekend. I didn't, of course, because it wasn't my right to (and I made her a promise), and I did not hear from her the entire 4 days except a quick, 30 second call every morning just to say hello as she was always on her way out to do more shopping, or something... .Of course, my imagination ran wild (still does), and I am CRUSHED.
Now that the weekend is past, she is back to being more focused on me, calling me and telling me she misses me, and has even invited me to come over this weekend.
But now everything has changed in my mind. I don't know what to do. I mean, I do know what to do: I can't stay in the relationship. Not with all the mistrust running through my veins, and certainly not if there is any chance that she has been (and will continue to be) unfaithful and duplicitous. So why do I feel so torn? I know better than to stay in a relationship where there is no trust, so why can't I just run away from it? Why am I struggling with what my common sense is telling me? I feel like a member of a cult who needs to be rescued and de-programmed. What can I do to extricate myself from this? Should I go to her place and get my personal belongings and then leave? What do I say? What do I do? I've turned into a tower of Jell-O and pain. Help! :-)
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