From: horntho@eng.auburn.edu (Thomas J. Horn)
Newsgroups: alt.angst
Subject: Re: My turn?
Date: 23 Jan 93 19:28:06 GMT
Reply-To: horntho@eng.auburn.edu
Organization: Auburn University Engineering

In article 105@geovision.gvc.com, pt@geovision.gvc.com (Paul Tomblin) writes:

> [interesting account of the death of a marriage deleted]
> 
> In short order, I was involved in another relationship - with a co-worker,
> which is probably a big mistake when you consider what happens to the
> atmosphere at work if it breaks up.  In the unlikely event that any of my
> co-workers reading this _don't_ know who I'm talking about, I'll call her
> Kris (not her real name, of course).  My company sent me to England for 6
> months, which I thought was a good opportunity to take stock and make a
> clean break in my life.  It didn't quite work out like that - my wife and
> kids came to visit her mother (my company pays for your family to come with
> you if you're out of town for more than four months - I bent the rules a
> little).  Shani and I got to talking, and arguing, and the next thing I
> know, we were having sex again - better than any time since the first year
> of our marriage.  So we decide to try marriage counselling - which we start
> soon after I got back from England.  Of course, this news hurts Kris very
> much, and makes me feel pretty scummy - because my relationship with Kris
> was a lot more open and honest that it had been with Shani, so I'm honestly
> wondering to myself why I'm doing this.  I guess it's mostly that Shani and
> I have had a lot more history behind us, which is both a blessing and a
> curse - a blessing because we have a lot of happy memories, and a curse
> because we have a set pattern of behaviour to overcome.

You yourself say that you were involved with someone else "in short order"--
are you sure you weren't merely using "Kris" as a desperation move, a warm
body to take the place of your wife?  I'm not.  If you weren't, then you wouldn't
have been so quick to take back up with your wife, regardless of the 
circumstances.  And "a lot of history behind us" is an excuse that cuts zero
ice with 99.9% of the women in this world.  Of COURSE Kris was hurt.  You
used her as a doormat.

[DISCLAIMER: I am not trying to flame you.  I was in a relationship about three
 years ago with a wonderful lady, and I was a jerk and did the same thing to her.
 I've been there, and it still hurts to realize what an asshole I was.]

> Anyway - trying to make this incredibly long story short (ha!), the marriage
> counselling didn't work - we're both too stuck in our ways, I bended and
> didn't see _any_ change in behaviour in Shani, so on the counsellors advice
> we stopped it.  Meanwhile, all this time, Kris had been sending me cards and
> letters urging me to give our relationship another chance, or asking for
> ``right of first refusal'' if things didn't work out with Shani.  So
> naturally, I expected that I could pick things up with Kris - not
> immediately, or right back to where we left off - I expected there to be an
> element of mistrust, and I expected it to take time to reestablish a
> relationship that the first time proceeded so quickly.  And so it appeared,
> until a few months ago Kris told me that she didn't think it was working
> out, and it was time to LJBF.

She is probably protecting herself.  My guess is she doesn't want to be used as
someone who you are only seeing as a last resort because you can't work things
out with someone else. ("Well, I still love her, but you'll do...")

> A long time ago, I read of a word, I believe it was ``limerant'', although I
> can't find that word in my dictionary, that meant something like ``addicted
> to the feeling of being in love''.  I guess that would describe me - I fell
> in love with Shani very shortly after meeting her, and we married 6 months
> after meeting; and I fell in love with Kris very shortly after we started
> seeing each other as friends.

If you had loved her, you wouldn't have fucked around on her.  

> -- 
> Paul Tomblin, pt@compass.gvc.com (I don't make or state policy for this company)
> "Thanks to Hurricane Andrew, people found out what it was like to have no home,
> no car, and no possesions without actually having to go through a divorce"
>   - Royal Canadian Air Farce.


---Tom 
   unfortunately, "been there, done that."