I'm an old member of MB. When going through D I came here like so many others and completely immersed myself in this site.
That was almost six years ago. Thanks to this site and counseling I long ago became very comfortable being on my own and raising my kids.
I have not dated and easily passed up a lot of opportunities to date (they just build up over that many years) until about 4 months ago. I met a woman who just had something about her that clicked with me and I agreed to go out with her.
So since then I have fallen completely,intensely in "love" with this woman. Thankfully I know what's going on (again because of MB). I guess I just want to know that these feelings fall within the normal range. I don't completely remember how it felt when I had a crush in high school, but I'm pretty confident it wasn't like this. I mean I can't sleep, can't quit thinking about her. I know this is what happens, but it's the amazing intensity that is throwing me. It's so awesome but almost too overwhelming at times. I wonder if there's something wrong with me, it's that intense.

There's nothing wrong with you, you just have something good going on that you haven't had in a long, long time if ever. Just make sure you keep your reasoning engaged so that as things go on, you're evaluating your relationship with the heart and the head. Easier said than done though, right?

Travis

I agree with what tccoastguard said. Remember, the first two to six months you have hormones going on that make you feel incredibly wonderful. That's all well and good but it can tend to make you not think and see clearly. Christian Carter talks about, in his dating and relationship CDs and books, stepping back and looking with the "observing eye". Just don't make any commitments or do anything until that period of time has passed. After the first phase has passed, what is left is more even-keeled but is more for the long haul kind of stuff.

Good luck in your relationship and I wish you the best!

Thank you both. I do remember how things were at first with my XW and it was not like this. I never had the intensity that I'm experiencing now.
I am going to start asking more probing questions, I realize I don't really know her yet. Is it too early to ask her opinion on being friends with X's while in a relationship? I think the answer to that question says a lot about a person.
One of the aspects that makes this so enjoyable is discovering how much I've grown. As amazing as this is, if she said goodbye tomorrow I would miss her for a while but I would be okay. I never realized how much my own feelings of self worth hinged on how the person I was with felt about me. I didn't know I was like that and I didn't know that I had outgrown it until this started. Nice!

At four months, I would imagine you'd be able to ask her pretty much anything within reason including that question. I too agree that a person's answer to that is really telling regarding their boundaries. My STBXW is friends with all her old ex's and it has bothered me throughout the entire marriage. She wants to be "friends" with me after the divorce as well... lol. Go figure.

Glad you're having fun and keeping it real starman!

Travis

I'd say about 6 months to a year... If after that you still think she's great, then you're on to something good .

AGG

thanks again tccoastguard.
I'm going to dig into this with her a little deeper tonight. I'm sure there are people who can be friends with X's and it really is no big deal. Personally the people who I've come across who do this are keeping them around as a kind of fall back. That's just what they do. I've even seen them get upset when it causes trouble with one of the X's current BF/GF. They get angry because, you know, they knew them first!
To me it's a sign of insecurity and/or ignorance. I mean it's not a difficult concept to understand is it?

Well I don't think so.... lol

I think the issue of being friends with exes is varied and individual. First you have to define what you mean by friendship. Do you mean you carry on a civil conversation when you run into each other or do you mean you share holidays and family events? There's a big difference. My kids' dad and I get along well and talk to each other on occasion but we have strong boundaries we adhere to also and do not cross them. We send Christmas cards to each other and get along at our kids' important events. We are still friendly with each other's family, although we don't see them on the holidays (we were married 23 years and had a good rapport with in-laws. I do not call his house, his wife would consider that an intrusion, but he does call at mine when my kids are visiting because their cell phones don't work at my house. But I know other people who carry this a lot further, they all get together at Christmas, etc. I'm not sure I'd want to do that.

Why limit the question to ex's? Seems to me that you'd also be interested to know if she thinks that it's ok to have male friends, no?

kaycstamper,
The R you have with your X sounds healthy to me. If my X and I could get along like that I would probably have a similar sort of R with her.
What I was really talking about were people who are friends with XBF/XGF, people who they have been intimate with in the past and continue to want to keep them around while they are supposed to be serious with someone else. My experience in the dating world (I haven't participated in it directly but have observed a lot of friends who do) is that these people may say they want to be in a committed R but don't want to do what it takes to make one work. Do you think I'm making too big a deal out of this? I'm asking because I was burned by this sort of behavior with my XW and definitely have a bias!

Kerala,
You know, that's a good point. What would be considered healthy boundaries for opposite sex friends who have never been intimate?
I don't think I would like anyone I was in a serious R with spending too much time with someone like that either. Again, maybe I'm too biased by my own life experiences. It just seems disrespectful and wrong to me.

I think there are extremes to both sides. One one hand there is no way I would want to date someone who spends time alone with opposite sex friend even if proclaimed innocent. One the other hand having someone from the opposite sex as a friend to talk to can be helpful. I made a grave mistake in last marriage in talking too much and confiding too much with first wife. It was innocent but rightfully perceived as much more. I couldn't recover and lost her. It was a painful life lesson.

If you get into a new relationship, that has to take priority and strict boundaries adhered to. Have you read the Policy of Joint Agreement? How about the other marriagebuilders material?

kaycstamper,
Thanks. Yes I have really studied everything on this site over the years. I remember back in the early days how excited I was to try the things I had learned with someone new. I had long since stopped thinking about it because I have been very content with life by myself.

Now out of nowhere this woman has showed up and I'm a little thrown on how to proceed. I'm afraid if I just bring up some of these ideas that she will be agreeable to them because she sees that I am. I want to ask her some probing questions and get her honest answers without revealing what I think first. Is that wrong?

Just for information, she is very outgoing, which I like, but she does have a lot of friends. She asked me early on what I thought of "girls and guys nights out". She said her XH was very controlling and she never got to do anything with her friends and it was important to her.

Since I've been around she has done several things with her girlfriends and sisters, even inviting them to her house when she couldn't get a sitter. No male friends, at least not to this point.

If you want my opinion, I don't have a problem with the girls night out with the right friends. Going out to dinner/drinks with the ladies and having a good time is fine; going out to a bar, getting drunk and flirty is not. I think a lot has to do with the friends and the boundaries.

But I know a lot of people on here and MB as a program are against IB of any form including girls night out with good reason. That and past history with that sort of stuff can color an opinion as well. What do you think? Does it bother you?

Travis

I'm afraid I would take exception to anyone who tried to keep me from spending some time with my sisters or friends. A better thing to ask yourself is about her character. If she has good character, I wouldn't think you'd object to it. But then my world is not about bars and such, I get together with my sisters once a month for lunch and one weekend a year at the coast. None of us would do anything immoral.

Case in point, right KC? I have a co-worker of mine who seems to be incredibly unhappy with some of the things his wife does. She goes out with her girl friends to Marine bars, gets hammered and flirts with Marines all night long. She even has a few Marine "friends" who she texts on a relatively frequent basis. Then there's the strip clubs, don't even get me going on the strip clubs she frequents.

On the flip side, she will not let him go out at all with us except on incredibly rare occasions. In fact, we managed to win approval to take him out to dinner at a restaurant a few weeks ago but that was only because he was going out with other married men and not some of our single co-workers. Admittedly this is an extreme example but it's happening right before my very eyes. I would not want any spouse of mine hanging out with this type of person and I feel terrible for my co-worker/friend who is destined to discover she's having an affair someday due in part to her crappy boundaries in this area; heck, she's probably having one right now.

Travis

P.S. Starman, sorry for the thread-jack!

I don't think it matters whether you should or should not be okay with this, but rather whether you are or are not.

IMO, when a person gets into a committed relationship, friends should fall naturally to the side. Dating for a short while is not a committed relationship. If I had just started dating someone and said I had plans with my girls on Saturday and he balked, I would get rid of him. But if we'd been dating a year, it wouldn't even cross my mind to make plans with my girls becuase I'd be planning to be with my man. Make sense?

Friends should just naturally fall to the side?! Wow! I'd never date anyone who thought like that!

My son is 26 and hasn't dated...he's been busy serving his country, building a house, working, going to school. Meanwhile, his friends get married and he's dropped. It seems it ends when he is best man in their wedding. It hurts him and it's wrong. Naturally they wouldn't have as much time to spend together after one of them marries, but still they should make some time in their life for him. He was good enough to be there for them all those years, threw them a bachelor party at his expense, paid for plane tickets and rented tuxes to be in their weddings, bought them gifts, is there whenever they need something, but they should just dump him because they're now married? Understand, he doesn't drink, doesn't smoke, doesn't do drugs. He has high morals and a wide array of interests, hobbies, and activities. I think there's something really wrong with this kind of thinking. It's like using a person until you no longer have need of them and then they're discarded. I told him to stick around, in a few years they'd be getting divorced.

In my opinion, it's not if you spend time with friends, but if you spend enough time with each other and make each other priority. You can set aside priority time with each other as a couple and still make time for your friends at other times. It's a matter of balance.

Also, my son has one set of friends that is a married couple with three children. This year they lost their house to foreclosure. They bought the only thing they could afford, a 900 SF house that had rotten floors, faulty wiring and box, leaky shower/tub, etc. My son went in, gutted the house out, and spent his entire summer rebuilding the house with a better floor plan, beautiful floors, new sheetrock and paint, new tub/shower, new subflooring, rewired everything, looked for parts to fix the box so it wouldn't have to be replaced because inspectors don't come to our rural area very often, I mean he went all out, free of charge. He is a friend. And he's invited to their family events, camping, 4 wheeling, etc. He is friends with both of them and loves and spends time with their kids as well, esp. the little boy, who already knows more about mechanics than most men because of him and his dad taking the time to teach him.