I thought I knew everything...

[Mikess1978]

I feel like running away from everything. But I cannot. It will not be fair to the few people I have left in my life. I won't deny, I thought about it, actually, I think about it all the time but somehow, I don't have the courage to run away.

 

Most nights, I cry. Then I cry a bit more till I cannot think of anything else to cry about. I have been sleeping less than two hours a day at least three nights a week but I am happy to be alive because every night, I hope that a miracle will happen and I will fade away in the history.

 

It never happens.

 

I read some poetry long time ago - All these arguments are there till we are alive, no one dies for you when you die.

 

I really don't think people care. For few days, everyone will be bit said but then, life goes on...

[Mikess1978]

This is all my fault. I do not even know where to start.

 

Things got really bad in last couple of days. I am having anxiety attacks and it seems I am suffering from depression. Doc says I should go on the medicine but I really cannot afford to do that. Antidepressants would make me lose my job and a lot of other things.

 

So, here I am, expressing myself to calm down things.

[Mikess1978]

I really don't know where it all started.

 

My wife left me in last September. I think, it was all my fault. I did not see it coming. After being in marriage for 12 years, one day she said, she wants to separate. I did not see it coming. I thought we were happy, I thought we were in love. To be honest, now I don't really know what love is and I just turned 39.

 

How do you define love? What the hell it really is? I don't think I can figure it out now. Perhaps, it is too late for me now.

 

When someone wants to leave you, there is absolutely nothing you can do. You might be able to delay their decision but at the end of day, you are just delaying it, it is inevitable. I had no option but to accept everything she wanted.

 

The reality is that I still love her so much. I hoped that during the one year separation period, she might change her decision and come back to me. But it does not seem that case.

 

I still try to understand what really happened between us.

[Mikess1978]

This is when I met Sara.

 

Sara is 11 years younger than me. She is smart, comes from a well reputed uni and has everything going for her. We met, talking to her was great. I hate when I lose interest in people the moment they open their mouth. She was super smart, she knew about anything and everything and we always enjoyed our conversation.

 

Sara wanted me as a friend with benefit or rather needed me as friend with benefit. I still cannot understand whether she wants me or she needs me. I am more inclined towards "need" than "want". Why would a 28-year-old gorgeous, smart and attractive girl "want" a 39-year-old who got nothing going for me. Luckily, I am good at my job and there is one thing I have more than I need - money. She needed money and I needed company.

 

Now, I think, if I could erase Sara from my life, that would be good. But I don't think, I can survive without her.

 

We have been seeing each other for only five months and I am having anxiety attacks. My Doc says I am suicidal and he wants to put me on antidepressants. It seems I am suffering from depression. I don't want to go to work and even if I go, I am always home early. I cry everyday, thinking about my daughter we lost last summer and thinking about how I have nothing left in my life. It got so worse that now, I have to turn on all of my lights if I am home alone. I feel like running out of my home and I am sleeping very little. I cannot go on antidepressants as this would create a lot of trouble for me, at work and financially.

[Mikess1978]

We met at a coffee shop in a mall.

 

She was wearing this very cute dress, but it was not expensive. She had great taste in her clothing and shoes but she was very smart on getting good deals for them. She is 28 but she has a very cute face which makes her look even younger. She is pretty hot and has an amazing body. We chatted for about half an hour and agreed to meet again. She was nice, warm and I felt like she was genuine. She has this quality in her, you have to trust everything she says. She was extremely polite and I liked that about her. We talked about our education and work. She passed out from a good university and it seems that she travelled the world. I do travel a lot for my work as well so that was a connection. She asked me if I could help her financially and she will pay me back later. She was kind of hesitant about it and very polite as well. I agreed as money was the only thing I had going for me.

 

We agreed to meet again.

[Mikess1978]

I don't feel good.

 

I am claustrophobic however, now, I cannot even sit alone in my home. I feel anxiety and I feel like running away in the fresh air.

 

I don't even know why should I write this. My Doc says that I should write a journal but what is the use of it.

 

I cannot stop thinking about Sara and when I think about her, it makes me sad. I just want to end everything. I still see her as a friend and we talk.

 

I cannot stop thinking about her, I cannot take my mind off her. It is affecting everything in my life, I cannot focus on work, I cannot focus on my life. I even hired a personal trainer so that I can get some positive energy.

 

I do want to live but all I can think is about her. It is like I am going in circles.

[Mikess1978]

The good – She is SUPER SMART. I don’t think I have met anyone as smart as her. I believe, this is my weakness. I always like people who are smarter than me. She is a blonde, not that matter, very fit and is super crazy about her fitness. She has this cute face which makes her look even younger. She went to a really prestigious business school in UK and was always an A student.

 

I am a Canadian with Indian background and we both live in a different country than our home countries. I have been here bit longer than her but boy, does she know everything about this place. I am amazed at her knowledge of local stuff. You can talk to her about anything from Brexit to which brunch to go to next weekend and she can have a great conversation with you with same level of confidence on any of the subjects.

 

Her dress sense is amazing, she knows exactly what to wear and the best part is she is not a follower. She is a leader. She goes for new trends and can make very simple stuff look great on her. She is kind of a snob when it comes to fashion but I think, that is a good thing. Knowing is always a good thing. She can look at a shoe and even tell you who was the original designer or who is making that same design of shoe for less.

 

I love her eyes, they are big and blue with huge eyelashes. Initially I thought, they were fake. Her body is perfect and I just love the touch of her skin. I don’t think, she takes good care of her skin or body (other than the gym) but I guess she is blessed and got good genes.

 

Talking to her is always a treat. I love it, conversations just flow and there is no dearth of things to talk about. What else do you need from a good company.

 

She is extremely easy going, sometimes it makes life difficult. She can enjoy McDonalds with the same excitement as a fancy restaurant.

 

She is the best in bed, she knows what to do and when to do it. She is very much open to any idea and I think, she must have tried everything out there. She gave me a new meaning of sex.

 

The bad – This is something I need to think about. I will update it when I can.

[RainyCoast]

We met at a coffee shop in a mall.

 

She was wearing this very cute dress, but it was not expensive. She had great taste in her clothing and shoes but she was very smart on getting good deals for them. She is 28 but she has a very cute face which makes her look even younger. She is pretty hot and has an amazing body. We chatted for about half an hour and agreed to meet again. She was nice, warm and I felt like she was genuine. She has this quality in her, you have to trust everything she says. She was extremely polite and I liked that about her. We talked about our education and work. She passed out from a good university and it seems that she travelled the world. I do travel a lot for my work as well so that was a connection. She asked me if I could help her financially and she will pay me back later. She was kind of hesitant about it and very polite as well. I agreed as money was the only thing I had going for me.

 

We agreed to meet again.

 

so. first thing when you met her, she asked to borrow money?

 

how would you lose your job over antidepressants?

[Mikess1978]

so. first thing when you met her, she asked to borrow money?

 

how would you lose your job over antidepressants?

 

Hey RainyCoast,

 

Yeah, she asked me for the money in our first meeting. Actually, I knew beforehand that she did not have a job and she was in need of financial help. She asked for about a thousand dollar which I gave her. I was going through rough time and at that time, I believed that money is the only thing I had. I strongly believed that we came in this world empty handed and we will go empty handed as well so if I can help someone, it is fine.

 

She always said that it is a loan which she will pay when she gets money from her last employer. She was clear about it but then I guess I made things bit murky.

 

I am at very high level position at my work and things can get messy very easily. I am sorry, I cannot elaborate more on it.

[Mikess1978]

I met Sara on Sept 9th, 2016 first time and after having coffee with Sara few times, we decided that we should make the next move.

 

I picked her up from her place and drove to my place. We sat in the living room and I offered her if she wanted to drink something. I gave her few suggestions and she said a gin and tonic would be great. We both started drinking though I believe it was around noon and a Monday. Monday is the busiest day for me as It is always full of conference calls. We have few GnT and the conversation was going so smooth.

 

I asked her if I can kiss her and she said that she was waiting for it for the longest time. We did it. It was amazing, probably one of the best sex I ever had.

 

I was bit tipsy for my conference calls that day but I was kind of happy. I was bit happy after a very long time.

[RainyCoast]

oh wow. sorry to hear that. and she never payed it back? didn't that make you see her differently, the opportunism?

[Mikess1978]

So, we kept meeting, had tons of coffees, breakfasts, sex once a week and sometimes thrice a week. I really enjoyed it as it was helping me keeping my mind away from the real problem of my life.

 

Most of the times we met, Sara asked for some money. Sometimes it was for food, sometimes for visa run and sometimes for the gym. I did not mind it and kept giving her whatever she wanted. To be honest, she always said that she would pay me back when she gets money from her last employer which never happened but even if she wanted to pay, I would have not accepted it. I had money and she did not. Also, we talked about everything as friends and things were good. I am not really sure if it was friends with benefit kind of relationship or something else.

 

Sometimes, she would send me these pics which were very revealing and those pics made me wonder what is really happening. Who Sara really is? I wanted to ask her about a lot of things - is she sleeping with anyone else? How does she survive in a foreign country without a job? I kept thinking about them but never had the courage to ask her about these things. Whatever she told me about her life in UK was true, so I believed her on everything she said about her life in Dubai as well.

 

At times, we want to see what we want to see. Reality does not really matter and I did not want to lose Sara at any cost as that was the only good thing left in my life.

[Mikess1978]

oh wow. sorry to hear that. and she never payed it back? didn't that make you see her differently, the opportunism?

 

Honestly, now I feel bad sometimes but it is not because of the money, it would be for very different reasons. For example, she would ask money to go out clubbing with her friends or for a brunch which I think is not really a "need" when you are unemployed but a "want". I still don't care much.

 

Between sept and now, I think I gave her about 30K in cash, investment for her garment business, mall gift cards etc. There have been good and bad reasons from food to gym membership to private trainer sessions to Jimmy Choo shoes. But honestly, money is not really the issue.

 

The more we spend, the more we earn.

 

I never expected her to pay back. If she does, I would be very surprised.

[Mikess1978]

Sara left for UK a bit early for Christmas and I stayed back in Dubai as I had some important work to take care of before flying back to Canada for Christmas.

 

Before this, she used to send me a lot of messages everyday and I used to send her less messages. But now it changed. I was sending her more messages. Before, she used to ask me if we can have fun today, now I was thinking about the fun.

 

This is where it changed, I needed her more now than she needed me.

 

I wanted to go out on a vacation in January and when I asked Sara few times if she can go with me, she said, she would and I booked a vacation with her to an African country for the middle of January. Honestly, I had very little hope that she would go on vacation with me since after going back to UK, her messages dried up. We were rarely chatting. I spent my Christmas in Canada. Though, she promised me that she will send a lot of pics from UK, she sent two or three in her three weeks stay.

 

I was not sure what is happening but then, I had no control over the situation.

 

When I returned back to Dubai, I got few messages from Sara asking for some money for her business. It was a big amount but I did the bank transfer.

 

Within two days, I received another message saying that I need to transfer more money and I cannot ask questions about it. She will tell me when she returns to Dubai. I did that transfer too.

[Mikess1978]

When Sara returned back to Dubai, we met again. We talked about the holidays and other stuff. She later sent me a pic of a hand with drip. She said, how she got pregnant and she was seeing only me. She had to do the abortion and she needed money to go to private clinic as NHS had some waiting time and she did not had time. That was the reason she asked me to send money to UK.

 

I was heartbroken. I was so angry with myself and with the whole situation. I believe, she took the right decision and I believe that it was her right. There was no way of thinking anything else in this particular situation. I was so sad, I just lost my first child before even she was born and now this happend.

 

I did not really know what to make out of it but I felt very sad and connected to Sara now.

[Mikess1978]

I was married to the love of my life for 12 years before she decided that she wants to try out what is there and find out who she really is and what does she want from life. She was the only woman I dated before getting married.

 

Imagine being married to someone for such a long and one day, she comes to you with legal separation documents and you can do nothing but sign them because you want them to be happy.

 

I did it. She had her reasons. She suffered enough.

 

I am 39 now and I think, I don’t really know how the entire love thing works, how do relationships work or why we should be even in a relationship.

 

I think, love is sickness.

 

It just a crazy feeling when we just crave for a person just like we crave some food. When we cannot think about anything but just one person in this world. Love is when we cannot see flaws in the one we love. Love is when the entire world seems to be perfect to us. Love is when we blindly trust everyone and anyone. Love is when we want to do anything for the one we love.

 

It sounds more like craziness to me.

 

This is what happened when Sara and I spent three nights at an all-inclusive resort in Africa.

[Silverbirch]

Hey Mike, I hope you are doing ok today.

 

If that is love, I'm glad I don't have it in my life. I am alone, but I gave become happy being alone. It sounds to me that you felt Sara was able to give you comfort from all the ancient and sadness you felt because of your marriage breakup.

 

There are some mess you could take fir a while which should not interfere with your ability to work.

[Mikess1978]

Hey Mike, I hope you are doing ok today.

 

If that is love, I'm glad I don't have it in my life. I am alone, but I gave become happy being alone. It sounds to me that you felt Sara was able to give you comfort from all the ancient and sadness you felt because of your marriage breakup.

 

There are some mess you could take fir a while which should not interfere with your ability to work.

 

Hey Silverbirch,

 

I wish I knew what is love. I kind of feel that it is a sickness.

 

I feel like I wasted 39 years of my life and I have nothing to show for it. You are right, Sara helped me getting through my break up but then my relationship with her became even bigger mess.

[Mikess1978]

I picked Sara up from her place around 4:00 am as we had an early morning flight. The flight timing was great, we were reaching at the resort around 4:00 PM so that we can enjoy for few hours on that day as well.

 

I always felt that Sara was (bit) embarrassed of being with me. But at this resort I felt it more. She always used to walk little bit ahead of me like she does not want to be seen with me. I think, it was natural since we have huge age gap, I am 11 years and 6 days older than her. We had tons of drinks that night and talked about anything and everything.

 

I think, my favorite thing to do with Sara is talk. It is painful too as Sara has all kind of experiences in life. The more you know about her, the more you like her and the more it hurts because she is a freebird, she can never be yours.

 

We had great sex at the resort, many times and sex is just fun with Sara. I always thought that it cannot get any better and guess what, next time is always better than the last time. I don't even have words to express it.

 

We stated at the resort for three nights, it was good vacation and we both had lots of fun. There were times when Sara spent time alone and I thought, maybe, she does not want to be seen with me. But it was all okay, we are not in any relationship, we are just two friends who are enjoying life and helping each other.

 

Something strange happened during our stay. We had this ocean facing room at the resort and sea was so close to our room that it was sometimes hard to sleep since the strong waves used to make lots of noise. We were having sex and we both were enjoying it a lot. It was early in the morning and she suggested to have sex before we went for the breakfast. I guess man never say no to sex, at least I never do. Well, most of the times. We were doing it and in the heat of the moment, I said I love you to her. I don't think I meant anything because it is kind of a natural habit when you are living with a partner for over 12 years. I love you is just a default sentence in your life. She kind of ignored it and did not say anything but we kept making love.

 

As I said before, she is super smart and know how to handle any situation and she handled it well as well.

[Someday_Soon]

Question,

 

You said she is very smart and attended a prestigious university school. You also said she did not have a good job and therefore is constantly asking you for money. Rather large sums of money at that. Purely for my own curiosity, have you wondered at all how to rectify her level of intelligence and formal education with the fact she is unwilling to apply those skills towards an equivalent career?

[Mikess1978]

Question,

 

You said she is very smart and attended a prestigious university school. You also said she did not have a good job and therefore is constantly asking you for money. Rather large sums of money at that. Purely for my own curiosity, have you wondered at all how to rectify her level of intelligence and formal education with the fact she is unwilling to apply those skills towards an equivalent career?

 

This is a pretty good question Someday, I wondered about it for a long time. I think, I know the answer or maybe, I don't. My thinking is kind of clouded when it comes to Sara. So perhaps I don't want to accept the truth.

 

I want to ask her a lot of questions but I cannot because if she leaves me now, it would be a huge mess for me. It will leave a huge void in my life.

 

She went to one of the best business schools and did internship after that and I believe she worked for a very large investment firm for three years in London before coming to Dubai.

 

You know, sometimes smart people find these ways to have an easy life. Maybe that is her but I hope it is not true. But it is possible. I thought about it. Financial sector is not doing great in London or even in Dubai right now. She came to Dubai last summer and my thinking is that she came here with good intentions but then kind of get used to easy life.

 

Initially, when she asked me for money, it was always small amount for day to day needs and she always said that she would pay me back. She never paid me back and I don't expect it as well.

 

Later, the request became bigger and they were not "need" related request but more of "want" kind of requests, like I want to buy a nice dress, or gym membership or personal training sessions or some shoes or the funniest one was starting a business of importing fake fur jackets from China and selling them in UK. You would not expect it from someone from a business background but maybe, it was a great idea.

 

To be fair to Sara, she was always very polite about asking for money and she never took more than she "needed". I would tell her to take money from my wallet or use my credit card as I rarely have cash. She always id it responsibly.

 

Weird things were asking for large amount to go out for clubbing. I don't think, one should be spending money on clubbing especially if they don't have a job.

 

Another weird thing was her knowing everything about online money transfers, online gift cards etc. I hate to think this but maybe, she is having more than one FWB stuff going. I hope it is not true.

 

The short answer is - if you can get easy money, why would you work? She says she is working now though I am not sure about it.

[Someday_Soon]

I can understand that. I have felt the desire to enjoy life without the inconvenience of a tedious career, many times. If I could, I probably would. But it would be if I won the lottery, not by someone giving me money. It wouldn't feel....moral. But maybe if I was a female and not a male, I'd view that dynamic a little differently.

 

At any rate, if I were you, I might consider the possibility that 1) she maybe never attended the university in the UK and 2) she does not have a garment business.

 

I don't necessarily fault you for being with her and enjoying her company. She needs something and you need something and you're both grown adults.

[Mikess1978]

When you like someone or you love someone, you accept everything they say because you are kind of a blind person who sees only goodness.

There are so many things about Sara that raises some red flags and at times, makes me sad too.

 

She said in September that she would be getting money from last employer in UK soon and then she would be okay financially. We are in February and those funds never came. Maybe, they did and Sara never told me.

 

She says that she is working now. But she is in the gym during work hours, she is at home or with me sometimes. She says her work timing is flexible. I am not really sure what it is.

 

How come a person who is new in a city would know all the great restaurants, night clubs and other places especially when they don’t have money to enjoy these places? Sara has been to all of these places. She has huge friend circle and almost every evening she is out.

 

She admitted that she had friends with benefit relationship in the past also. When I asked her if she had this in Dubai, she said, no, it was in UK. She said it was thrice, twice with guy and once with a woman. I don’t know what to read into this. For me, it is not a big deal.

 

All the information she gave me about her family is true. The hard thing is to find anything about Sara herself as she is not on any social media. It is weird, why would someone give you very true information about their family but would lie to you about themselves?

 

She has been to my place so many times but never invited me to her place. Even when I gave her hints, she kind of avoided it saying her flatmates would notice me. On one hand, she is so outgoing and on other hand, she is thinking about what her flatmates would think of me?

 

Sometimes, she would say how she is okay with money these days and things are great but after two hours, she should ask me for more money?

 

There are these times when she invites me for a coffee and I go there happily thinking she really wants to meet me but I feel hurt when at the end of our meet up, she would for money.

To be fair with Sara, she is hot, smart and too good in bed, she can have anyone she wants and Dubai is full of loaded guys so it makes me wonder why does she still want me in her life? Perhaps, I am one of few friends with benefit guys? I hope I am not.

 

There are good things about Sara so it makes the whole matter very confusing. For example, we have never used protection. I have had just one partner for the longest time. When we met first time, we just did it and when I asked her why we did not use condom, her reply was you are just a harmless guy and I don’t think, you are having sex with anyone else so I just trusted you.

 

At times, she says these things which hurt me the most. Like, she would say, she is not romantically attracted to me and she will never be. But she tells me that she even had better sex with the partners who she was in love with. It really does make me wonder how the sex could be because I don’t think, it can get any better but it always does.

 

She is always doing something but she would not do it with me. We were talking about going to see a movie and a brunch. She said, she would let me know and the next thing I know is that she saw that movie after she went to brunch with some friends.

 

She is very adventures in bed, I think she must have tried everything out there and have had a decent (I am being very conservative here) number of sex partners. I don’t have any issue with it. On the other hand, I have had seven in my life and I am pretty happy with that. There is a huge difference between our values, she takes sex very lightly and I don’t. she has told me several times that she is not a moral person, she has cheated on her partners in past and she does not feel bad about it. She even said that if and when I move on with my life, we can still have sex and maybe, a threesome. It is hard to gauge Sara. She is like one of those mysterious persons you want to know but at the same time, you know, the more you know, the more you would want her and you are only going to get hurt by two things – you cannot get her and the stuff you are going to learn about her will only make you sad.

[Mikess1978]

I can understand that. I have felt the desire to enjoy life without the inconvenience of a tedious career, many times. If I could, I probably would. But it would be if I won the lottery, not by someone giving me money. It wouldn't feel....moral. But maybe if I was a female and not a male, I'd view that dynamic a little differently.

 

At any rate, if I were you, I might consider the possibility that 1) she maybe never attended the university in the UK and 2) she does not have a garment business.

 

I don't necessarily fault you for being with her and enjoying her company. She needs something and you need something and you're both grown adults.

 

Hey, thank you for the reply. You made a really good point.

 

I thought about it as well. She did go to LSE as we have talked about it and there is no way she could know so much about the financial sector. Or she is a good conman or conwoman.

 

The garment business thing is bit shady but I have seen her business cards. The idea is not that great but sometimes we think that a stupid thing would work.

 

I still want to believe that she is not making all these things up because I like her but there is a possibility that she is, I just don't want to see it.

 

It is kind of a strange thing because I find man are not that emotionally intelligent and woman are way ahead of them. I think she might have few guys like me in her life to support her life style but sometimes, the things she does make me rethink that. It is hard to find out. She asks a lot of questions about my daily life (only daily life) but rarely replies to my questions now.

[Someday_Soon]

You know I have read on this forum that men were more emotionally grounded and women were generally more likely to make errors in the relationship. But I certainly think it works both ways. I believe it comes down to our individual situations in the moment that we make those decisions. I think both sexes are vulnerable at different points in their lives but women tend to be more open and talkative about them.

 

One other question- when she showed you the picture of the drip in her hand, could you clearly see her in a clinical setting or was it just the close up of the hand? Did you ever see any other evidence that she had the procedure?