Emotionally Drained

[dizzylizzy]

Over the weekend my boyfriend and I (together for two years) go up to the mountains for a picnic and some quality alone time. During the picnic we drink a bottle of wine and decide we would like to make a night of it so we get a room with a wonderful jacuzzi and fireplace. We go out to dinner and share another bottle of wine. During dinner he proposes and I say yes, we proceed to the room etc etc and to make a long story short the evening ended with us in bed and him crying because he didn't try hard enough in his first marriage that ended 30 years ago. Initially I tried very hard to be understanding but when the crying continued I blew up. He says he isn't holding on to the first marriage just the fact that he failed it. At some point don't you have to move past your failures and let them go. And am I wrong in being hurt by his timing of all this. I understand there was a lot of alcohol but jeezs isn't 30 years long enough to get over it? And you would have thought that his mind would have been on happier things. I am so disappointed and discouraged yet I am sitting here beating myself up because I blew up at the situation.

[brahman]

maybe he just see's it as this competition and loosing just wasnt an option, but he lost anyways. he might see himself as less of a man becuase he couldnt win.

 

and he is drunk, and emottional, and well, @#!$ happens.

 

if he was so drunk, how do you know the proposal was real?

 

and yeah, i would be a little ticked off to, but like i said, @#$$ happens, you cant control ur emootions.

[DN]

Intense emotions fueled by alcohol will often bring up intense emotions from the past. Also, alcohol releases inhibitions and that outpouring of emotion may be exactly the thing he needed to help him.

 

I can see why it hurt you but it may have been the best thing that could have happened in the long term. It may have been cathartic for him and now he can truly let go.

[dizzylizzy]

From about 2 months into our relationship he has wanted to marry me but I had not been able to say "I do" due to trust issues (I've caught him in some lies etc). He also had a 25 year marriage between his first marriage and our relationship. We have talked in the past about his first marriage and his regrets over not trying harder. Something he had apparently expressed a few too many times with his second wife because after discussing it with me the first time he said that his second wife didn't appreciate his regrets about his first divorce because she also felt like he was sorry he had married her. We have had so many trust issues that this hasn't helped me to trust in the relationship.

[DN]

What is it exactly hat you don't trust? That he loves you? Or that he will try to go back to his first wife?

 

Where the lies about her?

[dizzylizzy]

Because so much has happened in the past two years I am going to abbreviate things as much as possible to keep it short. The first feelings of no trust started when he felt the need to tell me about every girl that came on to him, basically he had to tell every conversation with every girl he came in contact with, how all the girls at the local coffee shop knew him, how the young girl with a boob job asked him out but he specified to me that he didn't want a hottie (that made me feel real good), how he got this favor from this girl and that favor from that girl when I finally said enough was enough he slowed it down. After 6 months of his divorce going no where I started to have some uncomfortable feelings so I watched his online chatting and he while he was bragging about all he had and all he was losing in the divorce he state that "he thought that he wasn't fighting the divorce becaue he thought that he still 'LOVED' her". He says that he didn't mean what he said and that he just wanted the people online to know that he had a heart. The people online did not like him. After this happened (it was a lounge where people play cards) he told me that he quit the card league and would not go on the site again. Three months later while he is out of town I go into the same chat room and he has rejoined the league; however, of course he wasn't lying because he did quit the league he just failed to tell me that he rejoined a couple of weeks later. This is a league that he admits to being addicted to which concerned me in the first place. And then he works from home and I caught him lying about being at home working when he really wasn't. Don't really care about what he was doing as he was visiting his son but I do care that he lied about it.

[DN]

Why do you think he lied about him seeing his son?

[dizzylizzy]

Because his son has had a hard time accepting our relationship and he pretty much knows that the only way he can have a relationship with his son is if it doesn't include me so he avoided telling me the truth.

[DN]

Have you given him a hard time over that?

[dizzylizzy]

Probably. It is like he has two different lives, one that includes me, him and my kids and one that is him and his kids, both over 18. I have extended myself on many occasions to his son, daughter in-law and grandaughter and for the most part the daughter in-law won't have anything do do with either one of us. At first the son said the his wife had issues then when my B/F pushed it and wanted to talk to her about it (so we could maybe come to some kind of resolve) then the son said that he had issues but wouldn't tell my B/F what the issues are and refused to to discuss it. It is very strange though because one week the son will call his dad every day then all of sudden he doesn't call at all. Doesn't share in anything that is going on in his life yet he had no problem accepting $15K from his dad for the house he bought less than a year ago. Just been a struggle all the way around.

[DN]

I think it is best to just stay out of that side of his life. If they don't accept you then there is nothing you can do except add even more pressure on his life and make him choose between you. Best not to do that. Just ask him to make sure he doesn't neglect you and to tell you th truth about when he sees them

 

Don't compete with his kids for his attention. It is much better to be polite etc if you meet them but don't engage in anything else. As they get older they may well change.

 

As to everything else - he has been through an emotional maelstrom and that will take awhile for things to calm down. But he wants to marry you and that could well be the calming effect that he needs.

 

But if you feel that being with him is likely to cause you more unhappiness than happiness then you should reconsider the relationship.