AB,

I guess my pen-pal relationship had progressed fairly well. I had actually met her. Twice. She even took me to meet her parents (she later told me that, I was the first guy she's ever taken to meet her parents).

The attraction was strong (for both of us), but the fact that my D wasn't final even after we had been promised a firm court-date (which the court decided not to honor) was the straw that broke the camel's back. The other thing that weighed heavily on her was the magnitude of the sacrifice that moving forward in a relationship with me would necessarily mean. She would have to leave everything she knew and move half-a-world away. Those two things cooled her feet too much. I guess that's the double edged sword. We parted as dear friends (and I guess there is the possibility that she could change her mind once I finally am single... I don't know for sure, but I shouldn't hope too much). It hurt so much because there was nothing really wrong between us in our relationship.

Yes, the constant communication fueled what I believe to be a very deep connection, and our attraction did only seem to increase after we had actually met. I know I loved (love) her, and if I were free to do so, I would have moved to be with her long ago. However, moving never really was an option for me because it would mean giving up my girls, so it was a burden only she really had to face.

Perhaps one of the biggest problems is... she was SUCH a perfect personality match for me... She's very smart, and VERY "cheeky" (her word - she learned British English, but it's a word that fits her perfectly). Also, her religious traditions, and even her father's background prepared her to deal with and love someone with my particular training and inclinations. Oh, yes, there is the fact that she was an ABSOLUTE knock-out... Sexy beyond compare, on a purely physical level, and since she had a brain and personality, that sealed the deal as far as I was concerned. She really did spoil me. I have a hard time looking at any woman now because she raised my expectations so high. Obviously, there's much more about her that I loved, but... yeah, I did fall for her.

Okay... Like I said, even when it ends well, it hurts.

WBF

it is hard to let go when you meet and spend time with someone who has most, if not every, quality you would want in a person.

that is why i am fighting so hard for my ldr. this man has most of everything i could ever want in a man. we are so closely matched in so many ways. we are both family oriented, love spending time with our children, have fought very hard to have as much time as we can with our kids, both very spiritual and into church activities, both love to read and can just spend a day together not even saying a word but just sitting near eachother reading, very sexually compatible, both like to eat healthy and exercise. looks wise i am very attracted to how he looks and dresses. i could go on and on.

if not for all of the above i would say i would just let it go. but how often do you find that in another person?

i completely understand what you are going through.

mlhb

the mathematical probabilities at this age are between 2 and 6 %, so that for every hundred new people that you meet, about 4 will be compatible opposite sex matches. . . the trick is going through about 500 people to get a good selection. . .

that's the point of going out to have fun and meet people. . . and not overly dramaticizing the first of 30 that you meet. . .

wiftty

what's nice about this site is that if you study people and patterns long enough, you get to see them repeat over and over, just in slightly different settings. then after awhile, you begin to see the patterns repeat in your own life, and you should go, "Well, now that is interesting!" i am no different than the others. . .

that's the fun part of psychology, understanding personal motivations, and realizing that everyone's motivations are personal, and seldom the same as yours. . ..

projection is a big part of psychology, and many use it to validate their feelings and behaviors. . . in the end though, everyone has certain needs, most emotional, most inherited, and the child of an abuser is born with the same genetics, which gives the propensity to follow the same patterns. . . so after awhile, its just repetition by everyone to individually learn the lessons on here in person. . . unless they intellectually challenge themselves to really learn without making hte same mistakes. . . and then try it in practice

hey, i even made one of the on line mistakes in the beginning. . . jumping to fast, no marriage in mind, just getting too excited over a relationship, and realizing that i wasn't ready. .. . its very easy to do. . . long distance makes it easier to avoid the person until you are truely healed. . . foretunately, it was a one weekend deal. .

which is long after the ink is dry for most people. . .

wiftty

though i will say, that i have often told my long distance relationship, that if she finds someone better and local, go for it, because the future is uncertain. . . especially in a long distance relationship. . .

and if she did, i would be happy for her, because i have healed to the point of knowing that i take all relationships faithfully, with the knowledge that it someday, will end. . . i just don't know which day, and that if i enjoy every day as it comes, then i will be satisfied that i gave myself and had the best time and to be thankful for that. . .

possessive, i am not. . . differentiated i am. . . as an individual, and so is she. . .

wiftty

Wiftty,

Do you realize you just "diss'd" anyone who doesn't particularly relish the prospect of "playing the field"?

Also, "this age" what age? Where did you develop your statistics? I am truly curious. Mlhb bothered to list characteristics of the person she cares about and implicitly asserted that finding the blend of characteristics that were to her liking was improbable. Did your statistics take into account that some people are picky and may, in fact, be looking for a particular set of characteristics?

I do not know, but I suspect that your "2 to 6%" statistic hails from some text book and refers to generic people and generic couplings. Perhaps being generic appeals to you, but personally, I find the idea that I'm fungible to be revolting. My kids don't think I'm interchangeable with anyone else on the planet.

Nevertheless, do you have statistical data to prove that playing the field (i.e. "going through about 500 people to get a good selection. . .") is inherently better than carefully selecting your potential mates and only considering a small handful of potential mates? How about arranged marriages? If the match-rate is only 2 to 6 percent, wouldn't arranged marriages necessarily result in an amazingly high divorce rate?

I see that you're an INTP. I don't fault you for enjoying the intellectual exercise of analyzing relationships. I suggest that your model is so overly simplified as to be either or both flawed and offensive to some.

That's my 2-cents.

WBF

(BTW, years ago, when I was suffering from undiagnosed depression, I came up as an INTP, too... Now I score as an ENTP... Yes, I also enjoy the mental exercise of analysis, and engage in it even when it's not all that enjoyable or profitable. However, humans are just too complex for simple models, and searching to understand them ought to start with humility and awe... IMHO)

reality sux, doesn't it?

its a generalization and its a probability. . . one difficulty with human intelligence is that it has a hard time dealing with probabilities. . it much prefers certainty over uncertainty, and cetainty is a binary concept. . .

dealing with uncertainty sux, doesn't it?

wiftty

wiftty,

You're assuming the truth of your assertion without support. You equated your "generalization" and "probability" with "reality" and on that basis belittled gigantic swaths of humanity.

How about you try some stark truth, which is to say that YOU believe what you've read/heard/deduced/whatever about probabilities.

Human intelligence has difficulty with many things, but that's not the issue. The problems here is your rudeness. Is it your belief that it is your mission in life to steam-roll over everyone who doesn't already hold your opinions? Fine, but, so that you know, in MB parlance, that's called "Disrespectful Judgments" and is likely to be an issue in your future relationships.

As for difficulty with dealing with uncertainty, yes, uncertainty is by its nature... uncertain. "Playing the field" therefore is an attempt to control your destiny. Nevertheless, let us contemplate this for a few moments... Because you want to deal in probabilities and uncertainty, we can stay in this realm for a moment. In your fungible universe, "compatible" people come up 2 to 6 percent of the time... Presumably some people within the "compatible" category are more precisely matched. Now, with your approach of running the numbers, you don't deal with the fact that the VERY FIRST person you meet could be the best possible match for you in 100 billion attempts. Your approach says "get a large sample!" But one thing I suspect is that potential matches don't *like* being treated like experiments. If you pass on #1, you may never get another shot with the best match for you.

If you, instead, take each interaction with another human as a unique experience, it may be that you will find that the first person you meet really is a precious person, or maybe it's the second... or maybe it's the forty-second. The point being that if you treat each person as an individual, you don't take away from the stochastic nature of the universe, but you do run the distinct risk of getting to know a person who is worth getting to know.

I ask you this... is hiding behind "generalities" and "probabilities" a truly more mature method for dealing with uncertainty than valuing the humans in question? It seems to me that based on your apparent need to belittle humanity to feel validated, perhaps it is you who has the greater difficulty dealing with both reality and uncertainty.

Finally, I take issue with your sig line... "Learning from your own mistakes creates experience, learning from books creates knowledge, combining the two together creates wisdom." Learning from whatever source creates knowledge. Perhaps you see "wisdom" as knowledge that is useful as a predictor. I do not believe that's correct. Wisdom is deeper. Scripture indicates that "knowledge puffs up, but love builds up." I subscribe to the belief (note how I'm owning my opinions and beliefs) that knowledge plus love matures into wisdom.

WBF

LOL!

as a pure atheist. . .

first, there is no truth, there are only opinions and perceptions. . . so its my opinion, whether you like it or believe it or not. . .

Rudeness in answering a question, i doubt it. . . differing beliefs yes, rudeness, overly dramaticized. . .

everyone has assumptions underlying their beliefs, otherwise they are just observations. as one leading aetheistic psychological author wrote, one of the universal truths, everything has no meaning at all, until humans assign it some.

you can take whatever issue you want. . . with whatever i type or post. . . however, as an individual i am entitled to my opinion, like it or not. . .

reality sux, doesn't it?


wiftty

You and I can have differing views on lots of things. For example, I simply don't have enough faith to buy atheism. Nevertheless, atheism is not a license to be rude, despite what many college professors seem to believe.


I invite you to disbelieve the perception of the sharp bend in the highway and see if "truth" in the form of objective reality invades your opinion.


For someone who has been on the MB forum for so long, you clearly have no comprehension of what a disrespectful judgment is... or you feel no compulsion to avoid dishing them out to people with whom you are not romantically inclined. In any event, it's a matter of character [or lack thereof].


Assumptions underlying beliefs... Okay. I'm still not seeing a license to be rude. Honest and respectful people can have honest and respectful disagreements about all sorts of things without resorting to belittling the other.

You really like "argument from authority" don't you? It's a form of intellectual bullying. Not terribly effective in my case, but, okay. Am I supposed to bow down and say, "Geepers, if a leading aetheistic [sic] psychological author wrote it, well, by golly, it must be true!"? Perhaps I would be inclined to say that if you could find a similarly persuasive unattributed quote from another leading aetheistic [sic] psychological author which would indicate that all things written by leading aetheistic [sic] psychological author(s) are, indeed, universal truths. Do you, Mr. INTP begin to grasp how weak your line of argumentation is?

Here, though... If you want a good quote, try this one (I'll even give you the citation to it)... It's from one of the leading "theistic" authors -

"Meaningless! Meaningless!"
says the Teacher.
"Utterly meaningless!
Everything is meaningless."

What does man gain from all his labor
at which he toils under the sun?

Generations come and generations go,
but the earth remains forever.

The sun rises and the sun sets,
and hurries back to where it rises.

The wind blows to the south
and turns to the north;
round and round it goes,
ever returning on its course.

All streams flow into the sea,
yet the sea is never full.
To the place the streams come from,
there they return again.

King Solomon (Ecclesiastes 1:2-7)

I highly recommend the entire document of which Ecclesiastes is a small part.

Wiftty, you're obviously not a dumb fellow... so you don't need to use intellectual bullying tactics. If you think something is "true," then tell me so and tell me why. You can even honestly resort to "it seems manifestly obvious to me that..." without tossing a disrespectful judgment at the person with whom you disagree (me, for example).


Thank you. I will. See... isn't that nice. You're OWNING your opinion rather than presenting it as gospel truth! The flip side of that is that I get to disagree with you, and such disagreement does not make me a lesser intellect or human, generally, than you.


Case in point... you had to throw in a little dig, to make yourself feel superior. Well, to the extent that you concede that reality exists... right back atcha, good buddy.

WBF

I hate to interrupt, well, okay, actually I really want to interrupt this battle of wits.

WBF, Wiftty's tone can sometimes be annoying, and I often disagree with his philosphy. However, he has some excellent points and I don't think he's been disrespectful of you or vast amounts of people. He hasnt' said you were stupid, ignornant, deluded, lazy, scum or anything else, nor has he implied it.

"Playing the field" has a connotation of playing with people, which isn't very nice. But, you can still take some time and meet a bunch of people before making a choice. This is especially true if you use any type of dating service. Many, many of the first dates won't go beyond that. Plus, no matter how you look for a mate, coming out of a divorce we are suffering from not having our emotional needs met in a very long time. For many, it's been years of misery from zero lovebank balance and the pain of LBs or infidelity. So, when we go out there, ANYONE who meets our needs even a tiny bit looks immensely attractive, and we ignore red flags and obstacles. In your case, you ignored or dramatically underestimated the obstacle of being half way around the globe. And we tend to ignore the hard lesson we learned: Love does not conquor all.

By taking some time, and allowing others to meet some of one's ENs, one isn't so desperate and needy. One can better evaluate the people and the relationship.

In addition, there is the sad truth that most first relationships after a divorce do not pan out. I think it's because said relationships are in reaction to the last relationship, the marriage/divorce. So, one tends to either chose someone like the ex or the opposite.

Of course, it still stinks when a relationship ends.

Does anyone else see the irony and dichotomy of that statement?

BINGO!

Even Dr. Harley says to date 30 people before you get married.

See:
Choosing the Right One to Marry

WBF, you arrived 7/07 and in my opinion having read Wiftty's postings for 7 years, he knows his stuff!

I'd take his "character" any day of the week. He doesn't break my ENFP heart when he posts his opinion on any subject, never has.

True friends don't always tell friends what they want to hear.

I'd slow up, probably dry up on dating anyone, you have a lot on your plate and haven't begun to heal.

Then go and date 30+ people! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" />

Stick around, you will learn many things from many people!

Ragamuffin,

No. If you had read my original post, I was on this board more than 2 years ago. I forgot my logg-in ID, however, and my stbxw likes to snoop on the internet to try to find out what I'm up to, so I thought it best to change IDs.

That said, having read wiftty's postings on this thread, I see a moderately arrogant individual who argues from authority (which he doesn't bother to cite) and belittles anyone who doesn't already agree with him. I have no doubt that he's intelligent, but I've seen a distinctly disrespectful attitude in how he presents his arguments.

If it were merely style, upon realizing that the manner of presentation was destroying any likelihood that his point would be persuasive, he could have chosen to, if he wanted to continue to stay engaged, be sensitive to how the hearer was perceiving him and re-phrase. But he didn't. He chose to dig his heels in and get even more rude. "reality sux, doesn't it."


Wiftty isn't a friend of mine. I don't know him from Adam. As a non-friend person, he started at neutral and was able to demote himself several times by his constant rudeness and arrogance. What wiftty knows or doesn't know is beside the point if he is unwilling to present it in a manner reasonably designed to be accepted by his intended audience. You like his character, fine. He's intentionally demonstrated callous and rudeness and arrogance to me, so I'm not particularly impressed. Indeed, from his initial posting in this thread I informed him that I perceived his approach as cold and harsh. His subsequent posts have only served to reinforce that impression.

This isn't about him "breaking my heart." It's about me not feeling inclined to accept arrogance disrespect and bullying from someone I don't even know. You see, it's one thing to see a wound and scrub it clean - incidentally causing pain. It's another to poke at it, and belittle the one who is wounded. In short, wiftty was a royal jerk to me, and I felt that neither his longevity on the boards, nor his "argument from (uncited) authority" should result in my kowtowing to him.

About the serial dating that so many push here... I get that many people value the 30+ ideal. That's nice. I don't. I'm not that sort of person and never was. I take nothing away from those of you who like to date lots of people. Personally, the idea turns my stomach. I have always viewed pre-marital dating as interviewing for a spouse. The idea of forming a casual-quasi-potentially-romantic relationship with someone just to do so and then moving on seems base to me. I wouldn't like myself if I were to view dating as such a trivial matter.

I'm not saying, however that I won't date 30+ women eventually... only that it's not my goal. If I date one woman and she turns out to be an excellent match, great. If not, then I'll date another. I'm not looking to guarantee that the next woman I date will become my wife, but I won't date someone whom I strongly suspect from the outset doesn't have a shot at the job.

For what it's worth, I have begun to heal... I've actually done a lot of healing. From my stbxw, I've healed substantially. Sure, she's able to cause me pain, but she has to go out of her way to do that... like filing false criminal charges to keep me from being employed. Even then, that doesn't "hurt" me on an emotional level - rather I'm injured almost exclusively on a professional and financial level. If you're speaking of the woman with whom I had the ldr and who's departure from my life brought me back to this forum, I guess you're right. That pain is much fresher. In fact... I think that was the essence of the title of my post.

WBF