I struggle with this also.
I have been no contact since March 28.
April 2 2pm AH sent a text Happy Birthday ...I ignored it. --hard
April 2 6pm AH called. I ignored it.--harder
May 8 AH sent text Happy Mothers day! I lost my phone, found my phone, got it 3 days later... successfully ignored it-----much harder
May 9 AH left message, " Hi honey. Um, I don't mean to bother you, and I won't do it again, but can I get my boat keys and my binoculars back? Uh, you can just throw them into the yard. Bye."---again same time as above lost phone and found it...was a good thing because when I did get the message, I really struggled with it.
It was an excuse for me to see him. So I examined the message. I took it apart piece by piece and then I went to several people and asked how to handle it.
The breakdown:
He says "honey": I knew right there he was playing me. He had this sad sounding voice, like he was truly sad and depressed.
Then he says "you can just throw it in the yard." sounding akin to throwing a dog scraps or a bone. This was a verbal attempt to make me feel sorry for him. He was manipulating in every word he said.
I didn't have the boat keys, but I looked up the cost to replace them and it is not very expensive at all. One guy said he lost his and replaced the whole ignition for $25. So, it was not the boat keys he really wanted.
Same with the binoculars, maybe $50.
Anyhow, I had the binoculars and I felt that if I saw him, I would cave and wind up spending time with him.
So I thought for several days why I needed to give them back. My girlfriend suggested I mail them and that was when I realized he had given me the excuse I wanted to be able to see him.
I recognized that is what I was doing.
I struggled to stop myself.
I finally gave into myself enough to tell myself that I would take the binoculars by during the day while he was at work and I would snoop a bit. That should satisfy my craving to do something with him without actually seeing him.
To my surprise, when I got within view of the house, this surge of anger overtook me.
It took everything I had to get out of the car and put the binoculars on his porch. I nearly threw the dam things. I was so angry. I don't even know where the rage came from, but it was clearly there.
I couldn't get away from there fast enough and thought just down the road I was over it. I was wrong
I struggled with that anger for days, but didn't recognize I was angry at him. It just felt like this well of fire in me that came out as "being too wound up".
I didn't even realize where it had stemmed from!
May 16 AH sent an email that said: I LOVE YOU!
Again it was a struggle that haunted me for weeks...I began to feel really sad that I was alone, that I could have had a great marriage, that, that , that...
I threw myself into my work, stressed myself out, got sick, all because some sad little man sent an email to me that said he loved me.
How pathetic.
I have to pull myself out of that wallerin hole by living in reality, remembering reality, and not putting on the rose colored glasses.
Even though, for a short time, life shure is perty with em on.
Take off your glasses. Reality wakes you up everytime.
