dustkitty,
Thanks. I think we all learn something here.
As I said, I've been labeled and judged variously (on different boards) cold, unfeeling, and as trying tok, or needing to, justify or elevate as "love" the OPs perspective on the affair.
None of these is strictly true. And while I do feel sorry that my post made someone relive past deep hurts, it is not the case that I don't give a rat's [censored] what someone else thinks. I do care. After all, I posted here and read the responses, yours included. And again, I am sorry for the pain you carry that was awakened by my post. I can own that. I probably should have not written certain things and cast others differently.
You know, I got flamed seriously on an OW board when I advanced the notion (borne out by my experience) that it did not MATTER whether the MM loved me (us? all us OWs? that projection thing again) or not. I wrote, "what a leaky boat that is, if it matters whether what he felt was love." Man, did I get flamed!!! Personally. Deeply. This struck a nerve with a person, someone who'd been kind to me before and turned on me like a rabid dog. She said I had a hard ugly edge...but in reality, it was just my truth, which is that the only love we really "need" is God's.
It helped me to come clean with the whole story, though. It was an accident that it was here on this thread. It's been in my head a long time--it only recently came fully together with a coherent ending. I thought it might help someone to see that *things can change drastically within a person*--due to God, mind you--whether they be an OP, a BS, or a WS. So that means, if you're broken, you can be healed. If you're lost, you can find the way. If, if, if...more things are possible than not.
As awful as all this is, all the train wreck relationships I've been in, I have a lot of hope and optimism for a lot of things now. I'm not cynical any more. I used to be.