SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Have you seen that YouTube video by Tyler Perry as Madea, saying if someone wants to walk out of your life, you should let them? He makes a point that some people are only meant to be in your life for a season, not for forever, and we can create problems and heartbreak for ourselves when we try to get seasonal people to stick around as if they were forever people.

My WH crossed the line from friend to 'NOT just a friend" during a time when I was frightened and vulnerable. Before that time, I had spent almost 10 years building myself up from my abusive past. I had been strong, brave, independent, and smart. Nobody told me a thing was impossible. One former BF used to say, "Where the is a WP, there is a way."

At a certain point, my grief began to heal and I started being more like myself. I was ready to go back to school and get back to working on my dreams. I wanted to resume being that woman I had worked so hard to become.

I remember one very confusing and painful conversation with WH at that time, when he told me that he preferred me weak and vulnerable, so he could feel like he had something to protect. \(Not like he really protected me in the end.) He was not in favor of me working through my grief and returning to a place of strength.

I'm not sure if it was the same conversation or a different one, in which he also told me that I was no longer interesting to him because he already had me. According to him, "strange" (his word) is always preferable over a known person. And conquest is always preferable to being comfortable.

Looking back, that was the end of our season, right there. I needed someone to lean on at a certain time (although I am not defending or excusing the timing of when our "friendship" turned sexual. ) After my fiance passed, most of my friends split and I was pretty well alone. But when my need to recover and continue growing started to clash with his need to have me not recovering and growing, that was when the season should have ended. When he grew bored with me because I was no longer "strange," that should have been the end.

I don't rightly know why I kept it going. I just never let go when I should have. Instead, every time he pulled away, I followed. Over time, I became more and more afraid and needy, until I felt like I literally could not live without him, and that is when he started his A. The fact that I was starting to have some career success at the same time I became so bizarrely needy seems important.

I think deep down, I knew being successful would cost me my marriage and I was trying to find a way to hold on.

Over time, I became more and more afraid and needy, until I felt like I literally could not live without him, and that is when he started his A.

This. He felt your need and abused it.

You started having success and it was evident you wouldn't be so needy for much longer.

[This message edited by thatbpguy at 6:01 PM, April 6th (Tuesday)]

Codependents really struggle with seasonal relationships. We do not give up on people--ever. We pride ourselves on the "strength" we exhibit when we stick with it. "I never gave up!" we say. We see ourselves as tough.

Abandon people? Because it's not meant to last? "Quitters!" we think. It took me a lot (yeeaaarrrsss) of IC to see letting go of people as healthy, as a strength, as a source of pride and self-esteem. I learned to be proud of valuing my needs by demanding better. I am very, very proud of that now.

I read other codependents here complimenting themselves on their strength and perseverance in staying with difficult spouses, and I recognize those feelings. It takes a lot of work to see yourself as weak for hanging on instead of strong. I didn't want to see it. I thought I was right and everybody else was wrong for not rising up and loving me back, for not appreciating the way I didn't give up on them. But no, I was actually weak because I valued keeping people instead of valuing my own needs and boundaries and tossing them. That's weakness, not selfishness like I feared. That's need for them, for their approval. That's fear of that abandonment wound. That's hurt, hurt that I don't want to feel. That's self-hatred, keeping me miserable and treated badly. Now I know better and let people go. For myself. For my dignity. For my pride.

Man, it was hard to learn.

I do it with love though. That part of my codependency, my strongly empathic personality, will never change. "I love you and wish you well, but goodbye." They rage and rage and rage. "Ok, I understand. I wish you well." I let them go with the love in my heart for myself AND for them. And hope they figure their sh$t out.

[This message edited by OwningItNow at 8:14 PM, April 6th (Tuesday)]

I never heard the term seasonal people before this thread, but I can see how it applies.

It really sounds like you're regretting not ending the relationship sooner. I can understand the feeling.

I could probably fill a semi with wishes if I tried. But there's also nothing I can do about the past, either.

Hopefully the feeling fades.

Just here to say..

OwningItNow, that was a great post. Thank you for that.

Thanks for the post.

I have heard the saying that people come into your life, for a

REASON

SEASON

LESSON

LIFETIME

I haven’t given much thought to the Seasonal people but they sure came for a reason and have taught me a lesson that should last me a lifetime.

“When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.” Maya Angelou

That is a great way to look at people, to listen to them, to watch their actions.

Believe him when he wants the excitement of the other women. He has told you who he is.

@ OIW, awesome post, and so true!

@ NotTheVictim, yes, I regret it every day. The day he told me I should throw my pregnant self on the El tracks, I filed a police complaint and told the security staff in my building not to let him in any more. But of course he talked me into taking him back.

I was going to end it about 6 weeks after my son was born. but as I sat on the couch, contemplating how I was going to tell him, at that very moment, the phone rang. it was his Dad calling to tell us his mother had died suddenly.

I actually did not want to get married. I knew it was a horrible mistake, but I did it anyway because he told me if I did not marry him on Saturday, I would find all my stuff on the curb by Sunday. So I stood there in front of everyone I knew, and pledged my life and love to this man, and prayed to God it would work out.

And then I threw myself into trying to keep the commitment I made, no matter what.

@C2H, I don't know why I never believed him before. He has been telling me since before we were married that I would not be enough for him. I just never listened because I didn't want to hear it, I guess.

I have always had a problem letting people walk out of my life. And if you extend the concept of seasonal people to flings as well as relationships, I struggled with those too. I am always the one holding on for dear life, even if there’s literally nothing to hold on to.

Co-dependency is such a hard habit to kick, most of all because, as OIN said, we mistake it for something else for a big chunk of our life and turn ourselves into martyrs. But understanding the problem is the first step.

These days, whenever I fall into that old trap, I call myself out on it. It’s work in progress but I am getting better at it.

[This message edited by Karmafan at 9:39 AM, April 8th (Thursday)]