noodle~

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"> If you look at what was posted, what I actually said ..was that I do not go to preg/OC..it gives me the creeps, it makes me angry.
</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Actually you said, you "get angry with all parties involved". That's what got to me. Now though, after you've expounded on what you exactly meant by the comment, I totally hear what you're saying. It's not ALL parties you're angry with, but rather WS who continue to behave like a WS, and BS's who let them, (I know it's deeper, but that's the jist, right?).

I wish you didn't post blanket statements in what I see as a hit and run fashion. You are a very good and intelligent poster, when you are asked to explain your POV. I appreciate that, just wish you would take the time in your intitial post on a topic that you do in your follow up posts. But, that's just me and definitely my own opinion or "pet peeve" if you will <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> .
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"> AD is remarkably fortunate in her circumstances..largely because OM was willing to disappear into the ether and cease to be a factor in the equation.</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">There is a lot of truth in this statement. However, I think we would've found a way to make it work if he wasn't willing to disappear. My H based his decision of forgiveness and acceptance before we were certain he'd stay away. By state laws alone, we're not completely out of the woods as to him staking any claims on the baby. I wholeheartedly agree though, it has made recovery much easier to NOT have x-om around and wanting a role in OC's life.
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"> I am appalled by what I have found just lurking there, and would never..ever post. I'd like to, 'cause I certainly have my share of sincere questions..that would sincerely be nothing short of taking a gas can and a match to the forum, so they will go unanswered.
</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I am glad you know your tolerance level, and I respect you for recognizing it. Since you think my situation is the exception, I probably can't help you with your questions, but if you ever want to ask some of those sincere questions, I'd sure try to answer. Just let me know...anytime. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"> Now, if AD doesn't mind me using her as a reference [I'll edit if you do..just let me know]..her situation is favorable, but not common.

Not too many parents are willing to never have any contact with their children. To give up their rights completely. Particularly Mothers. It really is a fortunate situation [that I have to admit leads me to suspect that OP does not know about OC..if OP does in ADs sitch..then I'd say it certainly isn't a common experience] in which the family can plausably close that door and integrate OC if the BS can stand to look it in the face.
</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I don't mind being a reference at all. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

However, I did tell x-om about the P, and that baby was likely his. He had no problem walking away. Some would say that was awful of him, and maybe it is, but I'm glad for his *awfulness*. It has made things way less complicated for us. As far as I know, he never knew the outcome of my P. For all I know, it's possible he didn't believe I was P, so has never given it a second thought he may have a bio child walking this earth. I still worry though, (but a little less each day), that he'll show up to see if I had the baby, etc.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"> Though the child is innocent..genetics will inevitably play their role. The child WILL resemble it's parents..and I personally am admitting that I could not guarantee that when it did, I wouldn't have antipathy for it as well.

I have said before, I'd rather walk away than be a monster myself. A lot of people make declarations of goodwill..but ignorantly. Not all, but some. I always wonder, let's see how you feel when that childs mannerisms mirror OPs..when it's voice inflections, and attitudes, and habbits are in your face reminders of a person with whom your spouse betrayed you.
</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Ahhh, but noodle this is where my situation is different than most as well. My H, (probably in his wisdom and self protection, and to aid in keeping OC separate from A/x-om~~as JL once pointed out to me), chose to never know who x-om is, (and no, he isn't someone in my H's life like a friend or something). He doesn't know his name, doesn't know where he lives, and doesn't know what he looks like. He only knows he's a SG, his age, and that I told him of the P. So, he doesn't know if the baby resembles the x-om in any manner at all. Pluse, we've not even done DNA, remember?...
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"> It's a lose/lose situation. Lots of variables that can not be foreseen. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I just flat out differ with this opinion. It's a lose/lose situation only if we choose to do the things that cause it to be a lose/lose situation. We will deal with the unforseen when we see them, and hopefully our choices will continue to cause our situation to be a win/win, or is that lose/win? I'm not sure what one should call it.

~ad

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"> The biochemistry of affairs (the part that acts like an addiction in our brains) is not open ended...it DOESN't last forever (thank God! ...If it did, most of us could not stand it!) and certainly not for the entire life of a child. It peaks at around 6 months and lasts for appoximately eighteen months to two years...so just because a recovered WS may have to see an OP from time to time (hopefully not much at all...or only with his spouse being present)...it is not like getting a dose of cocaine forever *whew*.
</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">star,

That's how I perceive it too.

If it lasted *forever* then it would be impossible for divorced parents to co-parent without fear from the new spouse that it would "take up" again. It would have to wane over time.

That's why I think it is possible for them to co-parent...even if accountability is required...and the spouse is involved in ALL aspects.

Hope I was clear in my explanation.

committed

Hey Atumnday!
I just checked in! I dutifully acknowledge your “Thank you!” <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" />

This is an interesting thread by the way.

I believe the love, and the feeling of love very often grows out of us acting in a loving way. When we give, our love is strengthened. I think this is so with our S, and it is the same way with an OC. The child will very soon change status from OC to DC (dear child) when the BS starts nursing. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> This is perhaps in conflict with the love bank theory, but I still think it is so.

<small>[ March 15, 2005, 01:51 PM: Message edited by: Frank57 ]</small>

Hey Atumnday!
I just checked in! I dutifully acknowledge your “Thank you!” <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" />

This is an interesting thread by the way.

I believe the love, and the feeling of love very often grows out of us acting in a loving way. When we give, our love is strengthened. I think this is so with our S, and it is the same way with an OC. The child will very soon change status from OC to DC (dear child) when the BS starts nursing. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> This is perhaps in conflict with the love bank theory, but I still think it is so.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"> When I read, what I see are broken people. Not broken in a healthfull broken will sort of way..but a dysfunctional broken spirit sort of way. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Noodle....I see many people like this too <img border="0" alt="[Teary]" title="" src="graemlins/teary.gif" /> ...it's heartbreaking, because I worry about their ability to be whole or happy again. Oh I'm sure you don't believe I really care about you....but I just can't seem to help myself. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" /> You're one of the people I worry most about. You seem so stuck in these angry thoughts and posts....and I worry about how healthy that is for you. Lemonman is all about the "logic"...I don't worry about him so much. He gets angry when folks don't stand up for themselves or are mistreated. He gets mad...and that's really different from wanting to vomit. LOL

Words like "creature" "spawn" "disgusting" "sickening" etc....well, they are "hate speech"....and hate destroys the hater far more completely than the hated. You might say...I don't hate anyone...they just "digust" me or "make me sick"...but it's semantics....destructive for this board yes, but mostly for you.

There is an old Chinese proverb that says: "Those who seek revenge should dig two graves."

Martin Luther King said it even better in this passage from his book "Strength of Love":

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Probably no admonition of Jesus has been more difficult to follow than the command to love our enemies…Far from being the pious injunction of a Utopian dreamer, the command to love one’s enemy is an absolute necessity for our survival. Love even for our enemies is the key to the solution of the problems of our world…

Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend. We never get rid of an enemy by meeting hate with hate; we get rid of an enemy by getting rid of enmity. By its very nature, hate destroys and tears down; by its very nature, love creates and builds up. Love transforms with redemptive power.

Hate is just as injurious to the person who hates. Hate destroys a man's sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as beautiful, and to confuse the true with the false and the false with the true"</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Maybe it even causes them to describe strength as weakness and weakness as strength.

When a BS...any BS, get's "stuck" hating the people involved (or giving them enough power to feel sickened), rather than the evil acts they accomplished (and many do)...they get stuck in a place where forgiveness is not possible, healing is stalled, grief becomes entrenched, and dysfunction blooms. They become a bigger threat to their marriages (and their spirits) than the evil that was done to them IMO.

You're wrong that many many folks don't move out of that dark dysfunctional place....life goes on, people getting tired of feeling sick and fractured. I know at one point I finally said to myself...HOW LONG am I going to suffer for something I didn't do??? I was just SICK of feeling sick!! There is a whole legion of folks here who have come and gone (some have remained, like K and myself...others are just living their lives and have moved on...no longer needing MB), as well as those who have not....but you haven't, and maybe for that reason you doubt that it's possible as often as it is possible....just an idea.

There is no way to heal a broken spirit without getting rid of the hate (for the people...not the act!) and finding forgiveness. I wonder if this is a big part of why you just don't seem to be happy or moving forward so slowly with recovery....I don't know...I'm just asking. It may seem like a myth to you...because it hasn't happened to you yet (but I think it will <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" /> ) But not has long as you continue to harbor hate. Hating the act that created these children is something that any healthy person can identify with and almost every person on this site would agree with (we are all SICKENED and disgusted at the thought of our spouses entwined with someone else). It's easy to look on these children as a "symbol" of that disgusting act. It is for certain the embodiment of that act...but it is NOT the act itself. None of us have a say so in our own biological creation. We are the ones who really become the "creatures" when we hate.

Don't you ask "why?" these people make you sick or the existence of OC give you the heebie jeebies? You admit you can't explain it...and it's not important to explain it here...but I do hope you explore that on your own. You don't even know them...they represent nothing that has affected you personally, and my guess is if you actually did see or know these children..it would be much harder to feel the disgust you do while you looked into one of their beautiful faces. It's easier to be disgusted with what we don't know. The power to make you sick doesn't come from them noodle...it comes from you. I really hope you start to ask yourself why? Do you really want to continue to give those thoughts power?

Like JL, K, and many others here....I've seen great opportunity to rebuild marriages that are better than the ones some of us left behind in spite of the affairs....even in spite of children born from those affairs.

Last time I was affected by something you said that was kinda inflamatory....I was really stupid...I jumped all over you and made a mess of things...just throwing gasoline on the fire. Since that time, I've read many of your posts and realized what an exceptional person you are....how skilled you are with words...even angry words....and I have truly come to respect you and care about you. So please forgive me if I said anything you find offensive, but I promise you that I wrote this with caring intention and a sincere desire to help.

<img border="0" title="" alt="[Frown]" src="images/icons/frown.gif" /> <img border="0" title="" alt="[Frown]" src="images/icons/frown.gif" /> <img border="0" title="" alt="[Frown]" src="images/icons/frown.gif" />

Noodle, you are hurting posters.

You have stated you cannot post on P/OC because of your "creeps" on this topic, I suggest you do not post on the subject of OC here as well.

As you know posters who have never had infidelity in their lives differ very much in their "I would NEVER" proclamations from those who have.

It is the same with OC.

Take your discussion to the appropriate forum if you wish to continue.

Archuletan,

Of course I will comply as you wish. May I respectfully suggest though, that you take into consideration of your criticism..that I did not begin this discussion..I was called out. I have done nothing but try to answer others with as much respect and clarity as I am able.

If you find the topic offensive, I have no problem with dropping it.

If you find my position offensive, I have no problem with not discussing it.

Suggesting that I am hurting posters and not backing this assertion up, and furthermore suggesting that I am the author of this discussion with a cease and desist offends me .

I answered *here* because I was called out to answer *here*.

Noodle