Post by ionysis on Jan 20, 2008 3:39:59 GMT -5
So. Update.
After my rage filled tantrum of earlier in the week I decided we needed to talk through everything because I wouldn’t be able to get everything straight in my head until we could do that. I needed to know everything that went on in the last two years, what was going through his head, and what he was feeling as well as exactly what happened. So I booked us a room at a hotel just outside of town and met him there at 9pm.
We had dinner and just talked and talked from 9pm until 4am. Then we woke up at 10.30am and talked once more until 4 in the afternoon when we had to check out. He told me every detail of what had happened when he first came out to Abu Dhabi without me, what he was thinking and feeling in the months leading up to that. He told me precisely who he’d seen, what they’d done, about the woman he met when he first arrived and how he’d just fallen head over heels into a massive crush. He told me how he fell apart in every possible way and how he felt he had to cut everyone out of his life because all he could do was hurt people and he couldn’t control himself in anything. He told me how lonely he became, how he talked to no one how he went out to bars and sat by himself and drank until he could barely walk. He told me how on three of those nights he was approached by women who he ended up taking home and paying to sleep with him and how each time he did that he loathed himself more and his self-esteem hit rock bottom.
He told me about how he had seen one of those girls again – the Chechen girl I thought he was in a relationship with – and that he had felt an affinity with her. That she was so damaged and broken and crazy that he’d finally found someone who was in a worse state than himself. He started looking after her, paying her a hundred dollars or so a week for food and living expenses so that she didn’t have to trawl the bars any more. Now he pays for her to go to kick boxing classes to try to manage her aggression and sees her a couple of times a week to watch TV and try to get her stable. He told me that he hasn’t been able to have sex since August which was the last time he took a girl home from the bars and the condom broke. He says that he simply switched off sexually from that point. He will have his last HIV test in March and only after then will he be able to consider sleeping with someone again. We went over all the things which had torn me apart because I didn’t know if I was crazy or if things were really wrong. We talked about the rumors I’d heard while we were no contact and he told me exactly what the truth was in each of them – sometimes worse, sometimes better than the rumor itself.
We talked about how our relationship started and the issues we’d had throughout it. We talked about how we’d dealt with them or failed to, we talked about what each of our flaws were, what difficulties each of us had with the other and tried to understand exactly what went wrong. We talked about how each of us thinks, the parts of our character which were driven by and influenced by the fact that we both have ADHD. We talked about how out of everyone we know there are only a handful who understand each other the way we do. We talked about how it could ever be possible to make a relationship between us work, what would need to change, what we’d each need to do, how we could ever have a future together after everything that has happened. We discussed each of our families and how our different backgrounds contributed to our problems, how our families would never be integrated and how if we’d got married we would have always had issues with that. We discussed what we wanted out of life, what were our dreams for the future, how we felt about life and what were non-negotiables, just everything. Absolutely everything.
And it was the best thing I could possibly have done. Every question that had tortured me, every lie, every misconception, every hurt was completely expurgated. I could never forget but I realized I could forgive. I realized that we know each other inside out, that nothing either one of us did to the other could ever surprise us again. That complete truthfulness and honesty is the only way a relationship can work. But I also think that after so much has happened it would be practically impossible for us to ever be together as husband and wife. That the irresolvable issue is not one we can work on but is the fact that our families and friends would be irretrievably hurt by us being together. As an only child I would deny my family a son-in-law they could love and connect them with a family they detest and I don’t want to be part of his family – or indeed ever see them again. We simply don’t fit into each others worlds – not after everything that happened and indeed not before. But I’m not completely closing the door. He needs to fix himself, he needs to continue the work that he has started. And so do I.
One thing I have realized is that the LDR that started at Christmas is never going to work. It isn’t fair on him to keep seeing him when I still love my ex and it is clear that I’m not ready for a relationship. Also it seems obvious to me now that I will never have the connection and understanding with him that I did / do with my ex – his mind doesn’t think in the same way as mine and I don’t think I could ever have a relationship now with someone who I didn’t have that complete and total understanding with.
So – where am I? Getting on with my life. Watching, talking, seeing each other a couple of times a week as friends and continuing being totally open with each other. I don’t know where this will end up but I do know that for the first time in such a long time I don’t feel hatred or anger in me BUT I also don’t feel that longing I did either. The truth has set me free in some ways and maybe finally I can make choices based on objective thought rather than fear or neediness. We’ll see.
After my rage filled tantrum of earlier in the week I decided we needed to talk through everything because I wouldn’t be able to get everything straight in my head until we could do that. I needed to know everything that went on in the last two years, what was going through his head, and what he was feeling as well as exactly what happened. So I booked us a room at a hotel just outside of town and met him there at 9pm.
We had dinner and just talked and talked from 9pm until 4am. Then we woke up at 10.30am and talked once more until 4 in the afternoon when we had to check out. He told me every detail of what had happened when he first came out to Abu Dhabi without me, what he was thinking and feeling in the months leading up to that. He told me precisely who he’d seen, what they’d done, about the woman he met when he first arrived and how he’d just fallen head over heels into a massive crush. He told me how he fell apart in every possible way and how he felt he had to cut everyone out of his life because all he could do was hurt people and he couldn’t control himself in anything. He told me how lonely he became, how he talked to no one how he went out to bars and sat by himself and drank until he could barely walk. He told me how on three of those nights he was approached by women who he ended up taking home and paying to sleep with him and how each time he did that he loathed himself more and his self-esteem hit rock bottom.
He told me about how he had seen one of those girls again – the Chechen girl I thought he was in a relationship with – and that he had felt an affinity with her. That she was so damaged and broken and crazy that he’d finally found someone who was in a worse state than himself. He started looking after her, paying her a hundred dollars or so a week for food and living expenses so that she didn’t have to trawl the bars any more. Now he pays for her to go to kick boxing classes to try to manage her aggression and sees her a couple of times a week to watch TV and try to get her stable. He told me that he hasn’t been able to have sex since August which was the last time he took a girl home from the bars and the condom broke. He says that he simply switched off sexually from that point. He will have his last HIV test in March and only after then will he be able to consider sleeping with someone again. We went over all the things which had torn me apart because I didn’t know if I was crazy or if things were really wrong. We talked about the rumors I’d heard while we were no contact and he told me exactly what the truth was in each of them – sometimes worse, sometimes better than the rumor itself.
We talked about how our relationship started and the issues we’d had throughout it. We talked about how we’d dealt with them or failed to, we talked about what each of our flaws were, what difficulties each of us had with the other and tried to understand exactly what went wrong. We talked about how each of us thinks, the parts of our character which were driven by and influenced by the fact that we both have ADHD. We talked about how out of everyone we know there are only a handful who understand each other the way we do. We talked about how it could ever be possible to make a relationship between us work, what would need to change, what we’d each need to do, how we could ever have a future together after everything that has happened. We discussed each of our families and how our different backgrounds contributed to our problems, how our families would never be integrated and how if we’d got married we would have always had issues with that. We discussed what we wanted out of life, what were our dreams for the future, how we felt about life and what were non-negotiables, just everything. Absolutely everything.
And it was the best thing I could possibly have done. Every question that had tortured me, every lie, every misconception, every hurt was completely expurgated. I could never forget but I realized I could forgive. I realized that we know each other inside out, that nothing either one of us did to the other could ever surprise us again. That complete truthfulness and honesty is the only way a relationship can work. But I also think that after so much has happened it would be practically impossible for us to ever be together as husband and wife. That the irresolvable issue is not one we can work on but is the fact that our families and friends would be irretrievably hurt by us being together. As an only child I would deny my family a son-in-law they could love and connect them with a family they detest and I don’t want to be part of his family – or indeed ever see them again. We simply don’t fit into each others worlds – not after everything that happened and indeed not before. But I’m not completely closing the door. He needs to fix himself, he needs to continue the work that he has started. And so do I.
One thing I have realized is that the LDR that started at Christmas is never going to work. It isn’t fair on him to keep seeing him when I still love my ex and it is clear that I’m not ready for a relationship. Also it seems obvious to me now that I will never have the connection and understanding with him that I did / do with my ex – his mind doesn’t think in the same way as mine and I don’t think I could ever have a relationship now with someone who I didn’t have that complete and total understanding with.
So – where am I? Getting on with my life. Watching, talking, seeing each other a couple of times a week as friends and continuing being totally open with each other. I don’t know where this will end up but I do know that for the first time in such a long time I don’t feel hatred or anger in me BUT I also don’t feel that longing I did either. The truth has set me free in some ways and maybe finally I can make choices based on objective thought rather than fear or neediness. We’ll see.