I’m younger than you by half, Zap, but I’ve been through this several times. It sucks hard each time. Irish has some very good points from his first post. Some feelings never die at all. It’s part of the human condition, no matter how you wish it weren’t.
I’ve never met a therapist that couldn’t be thoroughly thrashed by a good close friend’s listening ability. Sometimes you just have to talk it out with someone you trust completely, and talk it out several times…it’s a burden your good friends will bear gladly. They’ll also smack you in the face when you need it.
Avoidance is the absolute. Do not under any circumstance go where you think she’s going to be (ie-lakehouse). Keeping yourself from having the opportunity to do something stupid in the first place is key. Don’t crack the door open.
To others: you get these kind of questions and thoughts when something blindsides you (“25% done with my workout, surely I can make it to 50%”). It’s not particularly good, and it’s not rational, but this is also a part of the “human condition” as Irish put it.
Writing your thoughts down is a good idea. Burning them is also a good idea, not to keep others from reading them, but as a way of basically saying “this is the past, and this is over. I’m releasing these thoughts and moving on with my life”.
My suggestion though, is to take some time off from lifting, (or do simple beach work, something fun and new and not too hard) and take some time with your wife. Rediscover the reasons you love her so much. Do some of the things that drew you close in the first place. Recommit yourself.
It isn’t gonna do you any good in the long run to repress the feelings, because sooner or later when you least expect it you’ll run into her again and it’ll all start over again. Finish it now. Good advice from other people here too.
And cowboy the %&*# up man. Trust your instincts–you made a damn fine choice by your own admission.
[quote]Houshin Akai wrote:
I’ll say it one last time though - forget the other person exists.
Dont hear about what’s happened to her, dont know if shes married, pregnant, single, whatever. Cause honestly, you dont need to think about that stuff.
FightinIrish26 makes some great points. If all else fails, re-evaluate your life. Get this stuff out of the way FAST, it will build up on you.
Best of luck.[/quote]
Good post. I mentioned this has happened to me a few different times. Look, to paraphrase Einstein “if you do the same thing repeatedly and expect a different result, you’re a fool” Repressing didn’t work, so try something different.
Put your wife on the back of your bike and take a road trip man. Spend some time without any distractions, have an adventure, whatever, just don’t do the same thing you did before.
Houshin Akai you have to be one of the best posters I have seen anywhere on the internet, or in life for that matter.
We all are in love with a memory of something we once had. And being human we love the tragic. The love that got away, the great man who died young. If the story wasn’t sad, if there was no big amount of pain, it just wouldn’t be interesting.
Well, as men, we have to realize the difference between the pain and tragic that compells us, and the reality of our situation. I sincerely believe that you love your family, and your life, and what you have now, and that you need to separate your past and what could have been, from what is.
Zap you silly bastard that is a perfectly normal reaction.
The only thing that makes it easier to get over is to remember all the things about her that used to piss you off. I’m sure there is plenty.
I’m fond of my old flames but crikey I wouldn’t want to spend more than a few hours with them they’d drive me up the wall. I certainly wouldn’t want to spend a week with them even though in decades past I would have married them. THANK GOD I DID NOT. They were wonderful ladies but there just were things about them+me that grated on each others’ nerves.
I don’t know if this is helping but that really, really is the key: instead of looking back and remembering the good times you gotta look back and remember the bad times. (only regarding past loves, and helping to “move on”, don’t do this with life in general).
I can’t even put my finger on what the hell it was that split me with my last girlfriend before I met my wife. I loved her dearly and vice versa, but maybe we were kind of opposites, I don’t know. Whatever the hell it was, it just wasn’t fun anymore.
I guess my point is, if you split up, then there must be something about the relationship that you can remember and use to jolt your brain into the “oh heck I forgot how bad it was” mode instead of feeling hung up/jealous/what if scenarios. People who don’t do that, suffer.
I’m sorry to hear you are going through this phase. And I would assume it is a phase that will go away.
If you are happy with your life (wife, kids and everything), you’ll start dealing with the grief and recover - but it will help a lot not trying to be Vulcan, but being more human: I’m 35 (just to qualify here) and have had my share of relationship terror - including the ones I fucked up with similar shit.
I mostly agree with Irish (as often), just a few more points I’t like to make: Loss hurts, and will keep on hurting; if you have trouble handling it, keep your distance (as not to foster it) and start thinking about why this particular thing hurts so much. This, only you can answer. Are we talking missed out chances, an alternate life you could have led?
Sometimes people need help, and there’s no shame in seeking proper counseling if you have the feeling over a longer term, that you can’t deal - there’s no shame in it. And it’s better to deal with it early, and pull out the ugly stuff quickly, than keeping on suffering in silence forever. It’s your life, and you have choices - not all of them are appealing, and you can fuck up badly. Bottling up limits your choices, and will hurt you more in the long term.
I’s personally be a bit careful with writing stuff up, if you don’t want to be prepared to discuss it, for example with your wife once she finds the notes. But, here comes the main point: Don’t suffer in silence - you have a partner who cares about you. You might need help in how to address the topic with her, but you might find out it’s not going to be necessarily about your old girlfriend, but about the image you have developed about how you’re supposed to be. Maybe that doesn’t completely fit anymore, and it’s time to make a (perhaps very small) change (midlife-crisis anyone?).
I wish you all the best and hope you’ll get over this - not hide it from yourself so that it bites you in the proverbial a few years down the line.
When my old gf got married I was torn up for a bit. For a long time I considered her the ‘one who got away’. Now I don’t give a rat’s ass about her. If I had the chance to see her I wouldn’t even bother to get off my couch.
Hi Zap.
I’m slowly approaching the thirties and I’m not married.
When emotional issues go wild I’m also the “stomach” type.
[quote]Zap Branigan wrote:
I had physical pain in my stomach for 2 weeks until Monday when I opened up to one of her bridesmaids who is a mutual friend.[/quote]
While I believe that mankind is not genetically made up for monogamy, man is.
It’s perfectly natural to have strong feelings for more then one person. That is just how we tick.
How to deal with it is what makes us true men.
A person who I respect a lot told me: When facing difficult choices, most of the time we already made a decision. But we falter to act consequential, we hope someone else will take responsibility or something will happen which will relieve us from the burden.
You know you won’t leave your wife and your kids. You already made your decision. Deal with it.
And take the sleep issue seriously. Drink till you drop or use some pills.
You’re a man and I know you will do the right thing and move on.
There is a reason you’re not together anymore - rediscover that.
I suspect - and I am just guessing - that part of your emotion is competitiveness and not just ‘old love’. I think it is completely normal to see an old GF get married and not say ‘ahhh, I am so happy for her - she finally found love!’. At least that is my experience - it stung my sense of competitiveness that some other guy had filled my old role. I had no interest in her anymore, but my hackles got up because I realized that she really wasn’t going to be grow old into a spinster believing that no one could ever fill my awesome shoes - dumb on my part, but that is the way competitive males work sometimes.
Maybe that is what is going on with you? Regardless, take the energy and use it to go lift harder. You’ll get better sleep as well.
Zap, I think it’s normal to have feelings for more than one woman. You broke up with your ex for whatever reason. You’ve been with your wife for 10 years and have two daughters. You’ve got to ask yourself which woman you love more, and answer that question immediately. Then act on it. This is coming from a 27-year-old who just got back together with a girlfriend after spending an entire summer being a selfish idiot.
[quote]deanosumo wrote:
When my old gf got married I was torn up for a bit. For a long time I considered her the ‘one who got away’. Now I don’t give a rat’s ass about her. If I had the chance to see her I wouldn’t even bother to get off my couch.[/quote]
I’m with Deano and Irish,I’ve been married 24 yrs.,and have run into a few old girlfriend’s here and there that acted like they wanted to take up from yrs. ago,they have had a few marriage’s apiece and it seemed like they were bothered that mine lasted and their’s did’nt.
It seemed like they were playing a game to get me to cheat on my wife and F’up my good thing.If this chick’s your age and nobody else has married her before now ,there must be a reason,consider yourself LUCKY!
Guys, thanks for the awesome advice and insight. I think you guys all made some really accurate observations.
Shut off the computer and went for a walk last night. I think I got some sleep between 2 and 4. I got up and jumped rope and a million pushups and pull ups and went for another walk.
My already skinny legs may be shrinking by the day but at least I am keeping fit.
I stared at my sleeping wife and kids for a while. They are the best things that ever happened to me and I will NOT mess that up.
Then it was a nice 40 minute motorcycle ride in to work in 43 degree weather. There is nothing like cold weather riding to push the demons out for a while.
I think if I could get a night or two of sleep I will wonder what all the fuss was about.
Guys like you make me damn glad to be a member of this awesome site.
[quote]DPH wrote:
you sir are suffering from a self induced mind-fuck…low levels of testosterone are compounding your suffering (let’s face it, you’re acting like a highschool girl that’s just been dumped)…
step one: drink/smoke until you pass out.
step two: (the next day) inject 3cc of enanthate. Drink a big mug of coffee.
step three: realize that if you had stayed with her she would have driven you bat-shit crazy with all the horridly annoying irrational crap she used to pull (I know this is true because all women are like this).
step four: be a man for christ’s sake…enough of this sniveling highschool drama shit.
step five: if you’re not better by this time you need to have one of your friends punch you in the head and knock some sense into you.[/quote]
[quote]Myllz wrote:
Are you sure the pain in your stomach isn’t from being a Buffalo Bills fan? I get stomach pain all the time, particularly on Sundays.[/quote]
I did feel better after they crushed Miami but it took a day to feel it.
Normally squishing the Fish puts me on top of the world!
ZAP! You’re perfectly normal. What you are experiencing is part of the ride. There are different forms of closure on relationships that you will feel throughout your lifetime. There is an initial closure and the ability to move on and be able to love again. But, if you have loved once, it doesn’t mean that it will ever go away. The fire burns down as each year passes and the candlelight gets a little dimmer until its almost out. These feelings… no matter the amount of time, just let you know how strong the love once was.
I went to my grandfather for advice when I let go of my first love and tried to explain to him that I would never get over her and this was going to kill me… but I still had to let her go anyway because it was the best thing to do at the time. He told me to suck it up and enjoy the ride because this feeling will never go away, it will just be locked away inside you and at certain times in your life it will erupt like a volcano inside you. He said, “if you think its bad now, wait til your my age and you almost have a heart attack… because you ran into your first love and met her children and grandchildren. Then your heart almost stops beating because you just felt the regret of the last sixty years of your life that you missed out on… could have been spent with her.”
These types of things he said are the purpose of life and let you know how much somethings worth to you. In order to get value out of something, you have to let it go… to fully understand how you truely felt about it. The greater the love, the greater the loss, and the greater the pain. The greater the duration of this will let you know just exactly how important this was to you.
He said you have to let her go, and the only way to do that was to release your feelings as much as you possibly can and as early as you can. Otherwise you will carry these feelings inside… over time they’re just building pressure, and will eventually explode like a volcano once the feelings are brought to the surface.
[quote]Go heavy fool wrote:
ZAP! You’re perfectly normal. …[/quote]
I have never been normal!
I think your volcano analogy is perfect. I think I have to find a way to vent the pressure so the next eruption won’t be quite so bad yet I have to make sure that whatever I use to vent doesn’t lead to me making a huge mistake.
[quote]Zap Branigan wrote:
Go heavy fool wrote:
ZAP! You’re perfectly normal. …
I have never been normal!
I think your volcano analogy is perfect. I think I have to find a way to vent the pressure so the next eruption won’t be quite so bad yet I have to make sure that whatever I use to vent doesn’t lead to me making a huge mistake.[/quote]