This is what SL has gifted me with

nt

Stormy, I can feel the pain and power you put into that. It's really touching. And I think that, in the large sense, you're demonstrating how SL parallels life -- in some ways it can even be larger than Life. You showed real strength in risking the exposure of such personal feelings here. I admire that courage.

I loved this line, though. Even in your situation, you haven't lost your sense of humor. That's the most important part of all

I need a love that's meant.
I need the heart that's heavy.
I need to be his world.
I need a word that rhymes with heavy

Cindy

I agree with Cindy - I love that line


Take heart, I had a man like that once. Karma always has the last laugh.

Ain't it the truth. My ex is fat, drunk, unhappy and wasting away. I couldn't be happier

Cindy

lol.... But ya know, as "he" carries on to waste his life away, I will always ask what so wrong with me that he'd choose said wasteful life over being loved.

And the exposure doesn't matter to me anymore either. In the end, we're all ultimately "anonymous," and those that would have a problem with what I express here aren't worth worrying about either. It's people who "get it" that I care about sharing it with.

There are just some things we will never understand about other people's thought processes (especially ~cough~ men). A very close friend of mine recently went through one of the nastiest divorces since Henry VIII, and after surviving the severe emotional fallout she's now rediscovered a relationship with her old high school sweetheart - two decades later. It's one of those "getoutahere, Oprah!" kind of stories we hear about but can't believe it's true. She told me that she felt like one door had closed but that had opened up another door for her. I've never seen her this happy

I guess what I'm saying is that we can't know if we ever made the right decision, or if a relationship's failure is a good thing or a bad one. We can't know that until we can see into the future. Until then, it's more a matter of mattering to ourselves enough that when another chance happens, we have our feet on the ground and so increase our chances of success.

I don't know you, Stormy, but just from the few posts I've read, you're anything but 'stupid' or a victim. You matter whether Mr. Dipstick thought so or not. Your real worth is completely independent of his opinion. Right?

Cindy

You touch my heart also, Stormy.

Surprised me, too. I had no idea SL relationships could cut that deep. Unless of course there were RL meetings too, in which case the surprise is gone.

I am afraid the problem you raise is very deep and fundamental. In my opinion the only way through is for each sex to accept, once and for all and deep down, that the differences between the sexes are so deep that no male will ever, ever love you exactly the way you want. Particularly if you define that by looking into your own heart to see how love should be, using your own capabilities as a model. I don't think its possible anyway, but even more so in view of the expectations the modern world raises. Both in terms of what we expect others to be able to give and what we judge we are entitled to receive.

Remember that evolution is so slow that we are 21st century intelligences, operating in bodies, and with instinctive emotional apparatus, that have not had time to evolve one whit from the stone age environment for which they were designed.

This causes horrible clashes and discordances which give us all sorts of difficulties, including being the rock-bottom cause of what you have suffered.

I remember reading a well-respected behavioural ecologist and geneticist, who said that if we ignored the central fact that we can actually breed with each other, men and women satisfied many of the criteria to be regarded as different species.

The selective pressure on the two genders is different in many ways, and they have sufficient unshared genetic material (the sex chromosomes) for significant aspects of their evolution to develop separately, in addition to the more obvious commonalities of destiny.

I think the most helpful approach for people who want to be partners is to try really to accept the differences in how you each feel, and are even capable of feeling. To discuss these differences, to joke about them, maybe to read serious stuff about how and why they may have arisen over the dozens of millenia.

You don't expect him to have the same physical feelings as you when he f*cks you. It would be silly, anyone can see how different his body is.

You can't expect him to have feelings the same as yours when he loves and cares for you. You can't see it perhaps, but his mind is just as different from yours as your two bodies are.

Just say "Vive La Difference".

Once he realises, deep down, that you truly and irrevocably accept what he CAN feel about you, that it is enough, then he'll be able to give it to you more generously, and the relationship could start to climb back up, provided of course he can accept you in the same way.

Not talking about this one particular lost love, of course. In general. Maybe the next try.

Good luck, anyway. Perhaps this viewpoint might help a tiny, tiny bit. Like looking up at the stars, to see the wider picture.

Could you marry someone when they're telling you marriage is silly, they don't take that committment seriously, and it's just to get around customs? I imagine there might be some people out there willing to accept being in that place. I love deep and thoroughly, and deserve much better than that kind of offering.... I don't care what his biological differences are. To me, there was no question what had to be done.

I understand what you are talking about though. I know men and women love completely differently. But, this thing he had... it was not love, even by a typical man's definition. He'll call it love when things are good. He'll say it's nothing but a word when push comes to shove. There are men out there that devote themselves to women much better than that. Don't you think?

If its that clearcut - don't touch him with a barge-pole.
The only biology you need is to find his ass. For a broom handle.

Lindar, I've been involved in online communities for years (we won't talk about how many, k?). I've seen love, marriages, babies, hookups, love triangles, deceit and even suicide. All with me only meeting around 1% of the other people in that community in RL.

I once sysop'd for a psychiatrist and author who ran one of the old communities in Compuserve. He had a great deal of wisdom even before the internet became the visual instant gratification it is today. He kept reminding us that the cyberworld tends to run about ten times the speed of reality, that it burns ten times as hot and also burns out ten times faster ... all due to the speed of communications online. (And, I might add, the ingredient of our own imagination and the way we project our fantasies onto people we can't see). So, I can certainly understand and empathize with Stormy's feelings. SL in that respect isn't much different than the old IRC or Compuserve days. It has only added the element of visual representation. It can still be a used as a vehicle for the one single overriding imperative of human existence: to love and be loved.


LOL! VERY well said

Cindy

And Lindar, yes, we were together in RL. He was able to spend a max of 3 months at a time here in the US, and there were two visits, so we "lived together" a total of 6 months. He flew back home 2 weeks ago and we were fine when he left. 2 days later we were broken up for good over this issue and an email reply from customs.

Technical note:
Broom handles are well known to transmit much less contamination than barge-poles.

Oh hell yes, Stormy. Just reading your comments on this guy, I'd say you deserve much more. MUCH more.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to get over this jerk and move on to someone who knows how to treat you right. They're out there. How do I know? I'd tell you but he's MINE! All MINE!

Cindy

Seriously Stormy, I'm afraid maybe you should let this one go.
Be grateful he was not such a swine as to fool you by putting up a convincing pretence until his residence status was secure.

I know a European male who had this situation in reverse, with a Nigerian girl. He loved her so much. Then by accident, by meeting in England someone from her next village he learned she was in a full scale long term relationship with a local nigerian man, When faced out with it, after some initial lies, she laughed in his face, and said "but of course, and once I had my papers I would have ditched you, and brought my man to the UK. Just part of our long-term plan. Never mind, we'll find someone else easily enough".

He's still not over it. She seemed more loving to him than anyone before or since. I don't think there has been a since.

The poor fool still dreams even now that perhaps if he'd never been told he could have loved her enough to make her change her mind. Ah well. Thats life (and love) I'm afraid.

Wow, Stormy... I've never met you, but I feel for you... so sorry to hear this happened to you. There's nothing at all wrong with you; from what I've seen, you're an intelligent & amazingly talented person. You bring a lot of life & beauty to this little virtual world, though that may sound corny. It sounds like this guy had some serious problems and/or issues that he couldn't quite deal with.... maybe that just blinded him to all the wonderful things he had in you. You obviously saw something good and worthwhile in him, worth trying to save, and you reached out to him, but he just couldn't reach back, for whatever reason. That's no reflection on your value.

And you're right, there are men out there who love as deeply as women do, and who want a devoted partnership as much as women do. Don't give up on looking for one just because this guy burned you. :::hugs:::

nt

Two more thoughts here, if I may.

First, not every human being is gifted with empathy. Some people are completely unable to FEEL what other people feel, to anticipate the emotional consequences of their actions and mostly are also incapable of honesty. Especially when it might cost them a goal or even nothing else but the flattery of being loved.

If you put human nature on a sliding scale, I would place these people somewhere over close to the "sociopathic" end of the spectrum. They're not raving maniacs or criminals, but they inflict endless hurt on other people simply because they don't know how to feel.



And now for point 2. Honesty can be hard for some people. Don't ask me why, because it escapes me too. There are as many reasons for being dishonest as there are people, I suppose, but I've found that those of us (like you) who have been honest even if it caused some short term hurt do so because we have more maturity than those who can't bring themselves to do so.

Maturity is the process of realizing that there is more to this world than just "me". In both of the above examples, it seems to me that immaturity causes a great deal of the pain and sadness in human relationships.


And it feels good, doesn't it? I'm actually glad you posted all this. It's a big piece of online life and it's also a warning to those who perhaps thought that polygons and chat could never hurt anyone. Hey, there are people behind those polygons!

Cindy

I wish we had spellcheck. What is "jist," huh?

I am SO hearing you there Stormy, me thinks we are in the same boat Same thing just happened to me, 8mths down the swanny... OH WELL, hurts like hell, but you gotta think, are they worth having if they can put you through so much pain ,when they supposedly 'love' you? I feel like a fool, but meh, c'est la vie. I have wonderful friends and family in RL and SL that are there to help me through this, It's upsetting, and i've wanted to just sell up and go, but I don't think I could do that.

Great poem

Thanks Willow.... you can come over and we can build voodoo dolls and stickpins sometime.

OMG I am so gunna stalk you until we do that, then imma stick it SMACK in the middle of my sim

Voodoo dolls next, right after I finish killing my garden.

there is nothing sexier than women scorned

hehe

P.S. SL needs more dead follage. I have to use oak trees for dead bushes?