I don’t think having an affair is an option. It would be difficult for me to meet, hide, lie.. It would be the end of my relationship, and pretty soon end, I am sure.

I could meet her once, at my place but I know and I agree with what you wrote that “The implications might be bigger than you want them to be.” Even her being at my place would be crossing the line.

Tee,

Yes, I know, you’re right. I don’t want to do anything stupid.

I keep telling myself, besides the fact that my feelings are real and I really loved her it’s also..an obsessive thought. And texting her will probably not fix it.

Thank you for responding!

🙂

Tee,

Thank you for taking the time to understand. I appreciate it. I know it’s wrong that I think about it (wrong because of my current girlfriend) but I cannot help it. I cannot switch it off and stop so I choose to process it a little bit, think it through so again thank you for your time and effort.

“I see… so it could be that when her ex found out about you (and perhaps was jealous?), you felt as if you two were hurting her (“we hurt someone else”). And you felt guilty and perhaps believed you don’t deserve the “fairy tale” (was not longer a fairy tale). And you then sabotaged it by cheating on her. Could this be what happened?”

Yes. First when we met it was great. It was like we found each other. It was so instant. It was so obvious and normal that this is the one. She touched my hand at the cinema and I just knew. I know it sounds so..cliche and silly but those moments are so powerful.

Then I found out she just broke up with someone and there was some confusion, jealousy. I was also dating someone but I left this person because of HER. We both had someone who was hurt because of us, at that time. I know it sounds like very trivial and silly but it really wasn’t for me. I may have sabotaged it, I see it now. She was still jealous, suspicious, even though I told her I was single already. She tried to make me jealous, posted pictures with ex girlfriend, even though I knew she did not love her but it broke my heart seeing them because I knew they were still hanging out, I could not stand it. And I was too, hanging out with other people. Then her ex tried to hurt herself and they lived together again. I tried to text her, call her but she did not want to talk to me, said I was selfish. It got really hard to communicate. Too many things we did not talk about. I did not cheat until before our last meeting. It was someone I barely knew and did not care about. I think I wanted to stop loving her, that’s why I did it.

I thought she cheated on me too, but seeing her reaction and how hurt she looked.. I can assume she never cheated on me.

“Now that I understand it a bit better, I think you did love her, but it seems your guilt was bigger and you sort of sabotaged it.”

“You’re right, I think the time has come to process it now… process what happened back then, but have compassion for yourself. Don’t blame yourself. As you said, you had a lot of issues and trauma, so have compassion for the confused and wounded self that you were back then. You can even write an apology letter to her, and then burn it, i.e. never send it. That could be a good closure…”

Good idea. I wrote couple of words to her, did not send it. I sent it to myself on social media with a plan to send it to her, although I know I shouldn’t and probably won’t. But I really would like to do it, to talk to her, call her. I does not hurt to fantasize. Or maybe it does because it is on my mind too much. Maybe I will write some more and it will give me some closure. Writing some of it here helps me to organize my thoughts (although it seems like I am more guilty so it is not very comfortable to realize )

Hello Roberta,

Thank you for the advice. I will check out the Eckart Tolle.

I think I too, do not want to revisit this relationship. I think I am having an obsession, and she happens to be this obsession, for some reason.

“Also how hurt do you think your current girlfriend would be if she found out” – I have no idea, to be honest. Probably she would feel hurt. But as much as I care about her feelings and do not want to hurt her, this does not help me in any way… for me to stop obsessing, unfortunately. I wish it would work like that.

“mental infidelity often comes before the physical action)” – so does this mean it is very likely for me to cheat after “mental infidelity”?

“The word fraud means to deceive someone: to intentionally present yourself not as you are, so to deceive someone. Being afraid of being seen as boring… how is it connected to fraud?”

When I am around my colleagues I pretend to be energetic and fun. The girl I work with, she is younger and very optimistic, she talks a lot.  I think I may seem boring and dull compared to her/them. Every time she calls me (we work in home office so the  only contact is chat or calls) I prepare myself to sound happy when in reality I am very calm. She even said to me “You do not talk much” when both of them do… Unfortunately I often do not have ideas on what to say.

One time I called the guy we work with and he also seemed very calm while not in a group of people. But he has interesting stories to tell, he has experience, travelled… She, on the other hand, played in a band, lives near mountains so she shows us beautiful pictures.

I worry they will see I do not have much to offer.

Anita, I wanted to say I was thinking a lot about our talks lately and that I am very grateful we have those here. Again thank you for this and for reaching out.

you don’t have to be very careful here: you can type your words for me without much care because I will not punish you for wrong wording.

That is very kind. Of course, I would never think you would be angry or disappointed with my bad wording, yet I do not want to seem like I miss any of your valuable thoughts.

hating yourself is not kind. Whenever you feel hate for yourself, turn to empathy.

I still fail to be kind to myself. I think about that you wrote and then I forget to use it in life. Still thinking about myself as a fraud. I think I need time.

I feel less passive in general, though, more grounded. Learning to have my opinion, to be critical.

How are you, Anita?

Tee,

thanks for explaining, good to know it happens here 🙂

You go to work every day, which is productive… don’t count that as nothing

You are right!

Thank you for responding, good to hear from you.

Take care 🙂

Anita,

Dear Caroline:

 When you encounter certain distressing real life circumstances, the old thinking will automatically return. You will have to repeat the new perspective and new thinking until these become your new habit.

Understood. I need to practice new way of thinking and responding. I already behaved in non-passive way several times, maybe it’s not a lot but I know something has changed in me. I want to be more brave.

Today my coworker told me that yesterday there was an argument and an outburst of anger of the abusive person in our team, the ex-friend of mine. The other girl who works here says it is becoming a problem and that “he would destroy everyone and he is a sociopath”. I know that on our next weekly meeting he will “perform” as usual (talk in specific way – like an actor, show off, laugh at people, curse – he would usually talk like that for 40minutes while we all listen) and it is becoming a problem indeed that we all passively listen and allow this – along with our manager (he is passive too).

I know I probably won’t win this… or maybe I should believe I will. Already a couple of people left this job because of his behavior. None of us have an option of a new job yet. I want to call him out and stop his “showing off”, do something, stop being passive – because passive means accepting.

 I know that you deserve kindness!

Thank you, Anita. It changed a lot since I allow myself to feel that I feel, to rest, even if that means watching low quality tv shows. I noticed since I do not pressure myself to do something creative, I have more pleasure spending the day whichever way I choose.

Tee,

Yes, it does help with grounding. The more grounded you are, the less chance that your nervous system will go automatically into dissociation. It’s like creating new neural pathways, which enable you to stay more present… Anyway, try it and let us know how it went…

I have not had a lot of time to spend in the nature this week but I am planning to do it tomorrow: to go to the park, take some pictures and rest.

Sometimes you’ll feel great about yourself, the next day you’ll feel like you’re back in the old patterns. Throughout it all, it’s important that you have compassion for yourself and are patient with yourself. If you haven’t succeeded to respond the way you wanted today, you can try again next time. Patience, self-compassion and taking small steps… I think those are key to progress.

Great point. I will remember that. Being kind to myself.

don’t be harsh on yourself if you sometimes end up binge watching on those TV shows… What you can do is you might limit the time you spend watching those shows, say instead of the entire afternoon and evening, you tell yourself that you’ll spend max 2 hours in front of the TV. So you make a compromise with yourself: a little bit of your favorite TV show, and a little bit of something else, which is a healthier/more nurturing type of relaxation. So no one loses and everyone wins

I am trying to put it into practice. Unfortunately I ended up not doing anything productive this week but I what I did is took a bike few times to go to the supermarket and thus spent some active quality time, so..  I am working on it.