I mean, I can't speak to all women but I can say that the whole thing started with him being a "Friend". He had nothign to lose because of the distance he was from us, he only had things to gain (favors, sexting, companionship). I asked her the multitudes of "Why" and it really came down to this, she thought of her and me as simply just HER, and that MY opinion and will would mirror her own. When I told her "this isn't the way things are" regarding a situation or even regarding the guy, she didn't believe it because she didn't believe or trust herself regarding any shortcomings of the guy.
My wifes 1st visit to a therapist was last week, and it went okay I think. I still think that she worries about peoples perception of her and played down a couple points in her rendition of events to this lady. I told her, take notes because she is forgetful as fuck, especially when stressed out. One of the things she glossed over was my wifes obsessive personality, that trait plus her always wanting to please / be viewed favorably by people leads to some situations where people can easily manipulate her. This combo stems from being used (Not Sexually) and shoved aside early and often in life. This combo is part of the reason why I didn't lead with moving out and a divorce lawyer. The obsession part can't be taken as simple obsession either, it basically drives every aspect of her personality.
Her therapist is a lady in her 50's and while she's religious, she doesn't push religion as the solution to problems and instead focuses more on the behaviours that are troubling. She is pretty good at her job but doesn't understand the effect of the internet on whats going on, she is applying most of her therapy as if the guy was local, which, in my mind, is a bonus because it brings all this from being far off to more personal.
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Said this before but none of this is an attempt to JUSTIFY behaviour, I want to understand the situation and most of this is likely a biased / slightly biased perception of events.
being that said..
Since I've been using this thread as a Pseudo-Therapist of sorts, why stop now. I find it helpful to rant here (sorry). Some more information that has popped up in the last month of on and off discussion.
This wasn't the 2nd time she had done this, it was the 3rd. The 1st time wasn't with the guy I THOUGHT it was with but when I read her messages and saw the line "a french person I knew showed me this book" (or something similar) I knew who it was immediately. She told me just how far that went, online only. Supposedly the guy even asked her to stop dating me and he would stop dating the lady he was going after and they would take their relationship to the next level. The shitty part, to me, is that I maintained a relationship with 1st and 3rd DURING their bullshit and AFTER their bullshit with 1st only because I didn't know about it. I even met up with the dude after they "Broke it off" because my wife (Dating at the time) refused to break off her relationship with me (per her words). Honestly it just makes me feel angry thinking about it. These peopel are people I consider more than just online acquaintances, these are people that I enjoyed spending time with and in each case they do whatever they want behind my back and when they are done using my wife (girlfriend in some cases) they just continue on like it was nothing.
Seems that the common trend is that these are people that I hang out with on a regular basis and USUALLY the relationship forms after a friend of hers bails on her in a hard way.
1st guy (French Guy) was preceeded by a pretty good couple we knew and played with in WoW bailing on us after I got salty on a "Casual Guild" leader because she was fucking some dude on the side and giving him a ton of gear. They bailed on us and left my wife with a statement of, "If you stay with GuardianX you will never have any friends". Such amazing people, they were mad that I brought dirty laundry to light because they just made officer status in that casual guild about 2-3 weeks prior.
2nd guy was about 2-3 years later and was preceeded by a gay friend of hers bailing when he told her that she was "Way too needy". He played a druid and my wife played a druid! When the gay friend stopped playing with her, the druid friend picked up that slack. She likely thought that he would bail on her and started sexting him. I found out about this relationship during the relationship, we were still dating (Yeah I know we dated a while).
3rd (Druggie guy) guy came after the crazy mother / daughter combo ghosted her, likely her perceived role in the destruction of daughter and druggie guy's relationship (that was ALL them...). Prior to him being a cornerstone to their gaming experience, she was grouping with the Mother / daughter combo. Once that dissolved she was attached to him through shared drama and then she didn't want to lose that "friend" either so she started simply enough with just sharing too much little by little. I kinda noticed all this and I noticed her putting on blinders for this guy and I told her look, this guy has a "Guy Face" and a "Public Face" around you he puts on the "Public Face" something that's presentable and likable, essentially he's on "good behaviour" around you. Her response to that, havign 0 common sense was:
Because she wanted to be treated like one of the guys. Everyone here would take that as a green-light.
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When I think about my wife, it's 10 years of marriage and like 8 more years of knowing her before that. I understand her more than I think she understands herself in some cases but it didn't stop this shit from happening 3 times. I know she has TERRIBLE common sense, this is a girl who has chopped off part of her finger because she cuts TOWARDS herself and STILL pushes a knife towards her palm when she cuts things. I know she has dependency issues that cause her to react extremely when she feels like she is losing friends. I just figured that she would take a more active role in keeping me informed regarding her emotions because she has done so in the past.
Now for the part I know I'll get shit for, her therapist suggested that she should write a letter to the guy and not send it. Therapist suggested cutting guy out 100%, well the obsessive part of my wife needs closure (I've already told her that she needs to discuss the DEPTH of her obsession with the therapist and not leave it as a passing comment). I asked her what she would need to be CONTENT with the situation so there wouldn't be any lingering emotions one way or another. She said that having a last conversation where she basically sent the letter that her therapist had her write would help, irony of irony the dude never responded to her and ghosted her. You all can guess how this ended, if you guessed "MORE OBSESSION!" you are correct. I have suggested that she ask the lady for WEEKLY sessions for the foreseeable future. As I type this out, I may suggest that she keep a daily journal so that she can remember the intensity of her thoughts and bring them up during her meetings with her therapist. This last week has been pretty trying for me because I have to deal with an emotional woman that is lamenting the loss of (when you really break it down) her lover TO her husband. In her mind she is depressed that she just lost a friend group and a "Decent friend" because of her, self admitted, stupid actions. I don't want to close the door on her as she actually tells me everything BUT to say it's anything short of emotionally and physically draining is an understatement. I feel it is ultimately better for her that he ghosted her but for the time-being she is depressed / angry / obsessive about the situation and it's like trying to wrestle a jungle anaconda.
I'm working hard on not letting any of this impact my kids at all, I'm still the same level or MORE attentive to them. We don't yell at each other when discussing these things so there isn't any additional burden on them that I am aware but these are emotional conversations and my wife sometimes cries so I know our eldest notices. I am wholly committed to see my solution play out and I know, in order to do that, I need to do all the motivational poster slogans. Like I said, it's tiring and I'm exhausted a lot but, so far, it seems to be going about as well as I expected it to go.
GuardianX
