Anyone willing to share their thoughts, joys or fears about their new relationship?

Is anyone getting ready to tie the knot again?

Thanks,
Llama

Ohhhh, you want to know about our relationships, I was going to tell you about my WW's new relationship, LOL

I'm trying keep my sense of humor. I understand it is important.

Tony

<small>[ August 05, 2004, 10:50 PM: Message edited by: laura_lee ]</small>

<small>[ August 05, 2004, 10:51 PM: Message edited by: laura_lee ]</small>

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by laura_lee:
<strong>Well, I don't go to Christian singles groups anymore - because, it's such a sad dilemma lol!, all the guys wanted to date me. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

I went to talk with a Christian psychologist about my... dilemma... and he, too, was... enthralled. He told me I'm a Ferrarri! (sp?)... and I have so much feminine SHINE... I am just WAY... attractive... to the male species.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Heh. That sounds like the woman I'm interested in. She attracts everyone and has had trouble with guys getting the wrong signals because she is so friendly. When she talks to you, she looks you in the eye, and you just know that she cares about you. People are starved for that kind of attention and it is little wonder that guys would see that and think "I want that for myself." What they may not realize is that she will always be that way with everyone, so that whoever ends up marrying her had better not be the jealous type...

With that kind of overwhelming attention, it's little wonder that she has dealt with the problem by just making a blanket rule for herself not to date at all.

It's kind of funny for me to be interested in her, because my ex-wife is the exact opposite. My ex-wife is very introverted, and although everyone who gets to know her loves her and thinks she's really sweet (or at least, that's the way it used to be), she doesn't make it easy to approach her. In fact, until I came along, no guy had ever dared ask her on a date - despite some who apparently were interested (according to her watchful brothers).

I guess I'm just the type of guy who is only attracted to unavailable women. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="images/icons/shocked.gif" />

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"><strong>I went out with a guy for 1-1/2 years. I kept trying to "break it off"... and he kept wanting to try. But I didn't want to marry him - so, to me, it didn't make sense to date. He wanted to marry me. I really love and respect him. Awesome guy.

I don't agree to go out with every guy that asks me out. Once a guy asked me to go for coffee. "No, sorry, because I don't believe it will lead anywhere." He wanted me to try. He got really frustrated... and wanted to know how I would know if I didn't even go to coffee???!!!???</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Heh again. I can relate to these guys, except that (a) I completely agree that it makes no sense to date unless you think marriage is a possibility, and (b) I don't see that going to coffee has much chance of making a difference.

Heck, I've been to coffee with the woman I've "fallen in love" with. That was the time we had our little talk in which she told me very directly that she could not foresee ever marrying me. Nice "date", huh? <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" /> (Actually, I was very appreciative of her directness, and I told her that I didn't want her to "date" me unless she were willing to consider the possibility of marriage somewhere down the line.)

The fact is, I value her friendship wherever it does or doesn't lead, and as far as I am concerned, she is giving me every chance I could possibly want - because as friends she is giving me the opportunity to show her who I am, without the distortion of a romantic haze, and she is giving me the opportunity to demonstrate that I respect her and her boundaries. If that isn't enough to put me in the running once she starts thinking about dating again, then nothing will ever be enough, and it simply isn't meant to be.

In the meantime, I value our friendship for what it is, and if she can find a better match for herself than me...well, I wouldn't want to stand in her way.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"><strong>Am I "dating"? I dunno. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" /> </strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Heh heh. I guess I don't know if I'm dating either. I've had dinner or "drinks" a few times with women - sometimes just one woman at a time - but on none of those occasions did any/either of us approach the situation as a "date".

I would date, if the circumstances seemed right, but...I'm not interested in dating for the sake of dating, and I'm awfully hung up on this one woman...

<small>[ August 05, 2004, 10:52 PM: Message edited by: laura_lee ]</small>

<small>[ August 05, 2004, 10:53 PM: Message edited by: laura_lee ]</small>

Is the title of this thread correct or is that a typo?

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"> Topic: Poll - who is not D and dating/in a new R? </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Is that supposed to be "now"?

Oops, nevermind <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" /> :
Topic: Disregard previous post - should read NOW D not NOT D - post here

<small>[ May 13, 2004, 07:15 PM: Message edited by: AFS ]</small>

Laura Lee...girl you just rock. You just need to come on over to my house and i'll pour ya a glass of vino...we can let both our lights shine shine shine. I Divorced my husband March of 01, but he wanted to come home the day it was final..I let him and well...he never learned how to keep his trouser trout in his pants. So I guess I started dating in Jan of 02 after I finally got the ex to get his stuff and carry on. Well My light had been snuffed out but it didnt take long for my mojo to resurface. I was 36...I had a few ponies in my stable, a few cocks trying to get into my hen house and a few planes in the hangar...Gosh it was kinda overwhelming but It was nice to have the attention. I have never really been into the bar scene and I am a busy sales person with a 4 state territory. I have met the coolest neatest people via match.com! Anyway, I have a wonderful wonderful feller in my life over a year and we have just started cohabitating....with talks of marriage (not gonna rush into that anytime soon). We both know that marriage takes work and we are not afraid to put our hearts out on a limb. The bigger the risk the bigger the reward. I used this acronym in another post but FEAR: False Evidence Appearing Real. Have no fear...there is life after divorce. GNOME..As far as the term "dating"...I referred to it as Dangling...its kinda a date..but more like hanging out. I think of dating when ya have been going out to dinner and movie...hm..uh..ok 5...yeah five times constitutes dating. Good prime number. But they have to be in consecutive weekends...otherwise you have to refer to it as dangling. ;)lol
Have fun out there...it does get better. And for any gals who are in the throws of divorce..may I suggest a great read. I think its by Abegail..darn i forgot and i've lent it out. "Why women who divorce do so well" is the title. Good good empowering read!!! Be well all.

I remain,
Ruby

to answer the topic question: oh...for me...I didnt have any desire to date during our separation/thru the divorce. It was too painful and I was a wreck.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by laura_lee:
<strong>That's so cool... you know someone like me... and understand. I just truly love people... and I'm all full of light and energy and enthusiasm... and can, quite effortlessly, connect and reach out and touch those used to be "corralled" in emotional withdrawal.

Their defenses melt in my presence and they feel warmed up. It truly is love. I'm not really "flirting"... I'm just loving people.

Dr. Harley says that when people feel their defenses melt... and feel greater capacity to give and receive love... they think, sometimes, "that person" is what they need to feel love.

Well, some of us are just more adept at reaching hearts... but we all have the capacity, ourselves, to be free.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I hear you, Laura.

I always thought of my ex-wife like the moonlight. I love the moonlight, with its soft illumination and the mystery it imparts to everything around. But I love sunlight too, and from the day I met my new lady friend - long before I had any romantic thoughts regarding her - I saw her as sunshine.

The downside of being the way you are - the way my lady friend is - is that your light not only holds a particular pull for those who are emotionally desperate, but because you do naturally love people, it makes it harder for you to reject them. You want to help them, and make them happy. But you can't, because happiness and freedom can only come from within themselves, and to give in to their hunger would be to surrender to enmeshment rather than love. For my lady friend, I think that drawing back from any romantic relationship was the only way for her to protect herself from being absorbed while she solidifies her own identity.

I'm a little afraid for her, because I believe that left to herself she could easily make (another?) mistake and be drawn into an unhealthy relationship. But I'm only a little afraid, because she deeply loves Jesus, and as long as she continues to seek His will for her life, I know she cannot go seriously wrong.

I'm actually having a great time watching her grow, in part because it's such a contrast to watching my ex-wife self-destruct. If there is any greater pain than watching someone you love self-destruct, I haven't yet discovered it. But conversely, if there is any greater joy than watching someone you love grow, I haven't yet discovered that either.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"><strong>So you're hung up on her, huh?

Well, I like nice guys. And I bet she does too.

That whole myth thing about not liking nice guys... I don't think it's true.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I've never believed that myth either. And it wouldn't matter if I did, because I refuse to pretend to be anything other than who I really am. I absolutely hate manipulation and emotional games, so I've violated all kinds of "dating wisdom" by being up-front with my lady friend about my feelings from the very beginning. And I haven't regretted it, either, because - despite a naturally reserved demeanor - this woman can read me so well it's uncanny. In fact, it would be downright frightening if I actually wanted to hide anything from her.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"><strong>Well, nice guys are awesome. But attraction really does matter.

You gotta exude sexuality. Not just niceness. That air of confidence, masculinity, and stuff that drives us wild.

That's why there's that myth that women like jerks. It's just that jerks exude a jerk's confidence, pseudo "masculinity", and so they fool women sometimes.

There's the REO song "She doesn't like the tough guys. She says she's heard enough lies. They think they're full of fire. She thinks they're full of ****. They've got brains all where they sit. She doesn't like the tough guys".. or something like that.

How 'bout you make it a goal to "retool" and add to your repetoire a change in your look, and you work on exuding masculinity (not being a jerk).

That guy I fell for... he just seemed so masculine. He drove me WILD.

See, we need to stop being "afraid" of exuding pharemones, here. We gotta create attraction and romance and stuff.

For that lady friend of yours, can you pay tons of attention to dressing and looking... GQ... and being masculine? Like out of your inner being? You're a man. You're masculine.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I think I'm ahead of you on this one. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> I totally agree that, like it or not, attraction matters. Here my age may work against me: I'm fifteen years older than she is (gasp!). But (at under 15% bodyfat) I'm in pretty good (and improving) shape, and I look (and act) about a decade younger than my biological age.

She knows that I've got taste (which seems to closely match her own) and at least some style <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> . She knows that I have wit which I'm not afraid to use. She knows that I can write decent poetry (athough she has asked me not to <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> ) and she knows that I'm talented and creative in other ways. She knows that I'm intelligent and educated and that I can hold down a good job. She knows that my efforts to learn to cook have been pretty successful <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> . She knows that I am emotionally open (and intense) but that I don't overreact.

And she knows that, while I may be nice, I am no milquetoast. We have worked together to set boundaries in our (non-)relationship which allow her to be (relatively) comfortable, and she knows that I am willing and (with one or two minor slip-ups) able to respect those boundaries. She knows that I respect and admire her professionally, and she knows that I am able to accept rebuke and instruction from her. She knows that I have her best interests at heart, and that I will "let go" of my hope for a deeper relationship with her if circumstances render that hope inappropriate, but she also knows that I'm not going to pretend that my attraction to her does not exist. She knows I'm strong enough to be friends despite that attraction.

In short, she knows that I have the confidence to be myself, and she knows that I make a pretty darn good all-around package.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"><strong>Can you please not try to just be her friend? Where's the sexuality, here? Come on!! Step out a little. There's nothing wrong with it.

Can you see if it works? And tell me?</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Like I said, she knows that I want a deeper relationship than our friendship. But she has made it clear that she does not want to date at this point in her life, and the boundaries she has set with me have evolved to "nip in the bud" things that could risk causing her to be attracted to me. So you see, there actually would be something wrong with "stepping out" across those lines, or even pushing against them.

I do not want to be responsible for interfering with her natural God-paced development. She's young, remember (well, I guess you can't remember what you didn't know. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> ) - she's just in her mid-twenties. I'm satisfied with waiting to see what develops - even if what develops is that I become interested in someone else entirely.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"><strong>Good luck with your lady friend. I hope that someday the pharemones fly!! And, if not, there really is someone else that God has for each of you.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Over the years, I have increasingly learned to trust my intuition. It did not take me long to become convinced that my lady friend is exactly the sort of partner that would best suit me, and for more than a year I have sought to convince myself otherwise, with completely opposite results. But that's not what makes my situation most frustrating. No, the bigger problem is that I have become increasingly convinced that - whether or not I am the someone God has selected for my lady friend - I am exactly the sort of someone that would best suit her.

It puts me perilously close to believing that I know what's best for her, and that makes me feel mighty uncomfortable.