Threshold

It sounds SO romantic.

Last summer I read a book about how falling in love is a sort of insanity. It was a nonfiction book, it talked about hormones and chemicals and cultural case studies and all that.

This past week has been a total stressfest. Anxiety 401.

Thing is that we sometimes learn to recognize and manage our own mental issues but assume the people around us are healthier than they are.

So in Jan a friend introduced me to a friend who is going through a divorce (red flag #1 because most of us are not at our mental best in such a situation) she swore that he was not in the least interested in dating or relationships. (red flag#2 the first time we went out on a non date he told me about several dating incidents with people he'd met online in the past couple of months, he'd not been honest with her)

Well, he fell for me. I was in a long distance relationship and in the process of making it a live in relationship. He knew this. He said he was cool with being friends, understood it could be nothing more. Somehow I conveniently forgot everything I'd read in that book last summer and let myself believe that because he is a middle aged man, falling in love would not render him a bit mentally ill on top of the fact that he was in the midst of a divorce and not being honest with his friends. DUH!

Fast forward. I moved far far away with my boyfriend. This formerly very nice man is acting not so nice and contacting me many many times a day and professing undying love for me, anger at my boyfriend,resentment against women in general, self pity and self loathing and tells me he just bought a gun.

In hindsight I can see that as soon as I got the feeling that he was falling for me the non dates and FB chats should have stopped. Granted, by then it might have already been too late, but I should have stopped it then just the same.

It's been a real paranoia and anxiety producing week. I feel shame, guilt, and a certain amount of responsibility as well for bringing this drama into my life, my boyfriend's life, my daughter's life, and even this man's life.

And I am doing an 8th step so a lot of guilt, shame, regret and sorrow was already stirred up.

So, not much to say except I'm in a real uncomfortable place and I don't know yet if this is over. He was told to stop contacting me and I haven't heard from him in 36 hours, but I am not yet sure that he isn't driving cross country to show up at my door.

thank you for listening.

Hammer

Sometimes things are just crazy. Directed at [you/me/whomever].

What do you know for real? He is/was really married? Really Divorced? Or just stories on stories?

Lesson learned?

Stay aaawwwwaaaaayyyy from the Crazy Folks.

Threshold

Thanks hammer, I appreciate the feedback, because this has been a throbbing stresser, certainly these past few weeks, but actually for the past few months ever since this man came into my life.

He is married/separated. He is in the process of a divorce. The mutual friend who introduced us knows him and his estranged wife well for over a decade.

Staying away from crazy people is mighty hard, we're everywhere!

I keep telling myself that I should have seen it coming, I should have done this, or NOT done that etc etc. and now the mutual friend is blaming me for leading him on, for breaking his heart, saying I should be slapped around for my behavior. Meanwhile I am trying to rebuild a life with a new partner...

and it's just life. A highway pileup of feelings and situations and dreams and dramas, and people colliding head on when they are going in completely opposite directions.

I'm just hoping him and his gun don't take a 2000 mile detour on the way to divorce court.

Hammer

Thanks on that . . . Yes . . . . (egad) *we* are, aren't we?

Not everyone's . . . we both know that, don't we?


drama can be a killer.

You how to kill drama before it kills you, right?

arabhorseluvr

I haven't much to offer but hugs... that sounds like a really scary place to be.

Threshold

I don't bother trying to kill drama...just keeps me engaged with it. I'm more of a pull the plug on it sort of person, stop feeding it. Like any fire, take away the fuel, the heat or the O2 and it dies pretty quickly.

When I first got into recovery I made a little note that I have stuck to the dashboard of my care "This time lets try it without the drama!"

I have found that for me those are literally words to live by.