My LDR Story.
I'm sitting here, all prepared to lay my story out for anyone who cares to read and I have decided that I don't even know where to start. This might be a super long one, so if you're planning on reading this get comfy. I'll start fromthe beginning...
It was around March of last year when my long term relationship went down the toilet, my live in boyfriend of three years had just come clean to me about sleeping with another woman, a girl who lived down the street from us, who I thought (stupidly obviously) was just a friend of his. Looking back on it now, I can't believe how incredibly blind I was to it all. He had spent many hours out of the day with this girl under what I guess was the guise of helping her out with stuff around her house, fixing things for her etc. I shouldn't have stood for it but I trusted him implicitly, he had never given me a reason not to, so why wouldn't I? We had been inseparable. So, to cut to the chase about that, I was incredibly hurt and he just left, as if nothing we had shared together in the past three years mattered. I spent the remainder of my days for an entire month inconsolable. Everything was upside down. He was the one I never expected it from and if he could do this to me, I definitely could never trust another person again. I stopped taking proper care of myself, putting all of my energy into my kids and trying to make ends meet,exhausted all day, starving myself because I just couldn't stomach the thought of food. One day while my daughter was in school and my son was down for a nap I went outside for some air and wound up passing out on the porch, hit my head and was unconscious for fifteen minutes. I decided that I couldn't do this on my own, at least not at the time, and I decided to move back in with my parents for awhile. About a month in, I'm sitting on my computer, and decide to hop into a new lounge on a site that I used to frequent often.
I go into the lounge and begin chatting with people, and me and this guy get to talking. Pretty soon we're bantering back and forth and getting a great dynamic going on, the whole chat room is joining in. He was hilarious, and I found myself really enjoying everything we're doing. I get kind of excited to be talking to actual human beings again and I decide to hop on cam. He immediately hit me up in private after that. He had the most unusual profile name, and though I won't share it here, I will regale you all with the gist of what went down due to said name, a simultaneously important and unimportant aspect of our relationship:
Me: Soo...why do you call yourself "[]"
Him: Well considering I have no legs, I thought it was pretty fitting.
And that's when I found out that he had no legs. Now,dear readers,when a lot of people hear that another person has no legs, they kind of automatically assume certain things. When I was perusing his pictures, and when I saw him on cam myself, I made some as well, like any arrogant girl would (haha) He was well defined, with big, VERY well muscled arms, chest and broad shoulders. He had an adorable face but one that was quite stern (in pictures) even though he's quite good humored and goofy and hilarious. My assumption from this and the whole no leg bit was this: "Oh, well he must have been in the military and lost them in battle." When I ask him this he laughs and says no, he was not former military, although it was always a dream of his before he was told he could never be when he was younger, and that he was born without them. Straight from the hips down, there was nothing. It was all he had ever known, had never known life with legs, so it was something he was used to. I asked him how he gets around, if he had a chair, and he says he moves around on his arms (explains those delicious muscles huh?) and that he couldn't stand using wheelchairs. I was really nervous about asking him these questions, didn't want to be offensive but he was so open, so easy going about talking about it, that it seemed he wasn't bothered at all by it. He wasn't. It's one of the many things I admire and love about him today. Moving on... Pretty soon we exchange Skype contact details. Our conversation was decidedly fantastic and we continue on this dynamic for about a week or so before he asks me if I would like to give him a call on the phone (didn't have a mic for Skype at the time). I say yes, of course. Now I know this might sound ridiculous (maybe not I don't know) but there is a sort of unusual nervous anticipation before you hear someone's voice you've been chatting with for some time for the first time. In this light, there's also somewhat of a fear of that awkwardness that comes with being on the phone with someone you've never been on the phone with before. There was none of that. We hit it off vocally in the same way we did in text, only WAY better. During our conversation, he asks me about the ring I was wearing when he saw me on cam that one night, I was confused, completely forgotten that I was still wearing the engagement ring I had from my previous relationship (still a sore subject that I hadn't even really talked with him about yet). I finally admit to just having gotten out of a relationship that ended terribly for me and he asks me what I'm looking for right now, I tell him I don't want the hassle of having to trust another person, so no relationships for me ever again (says the silly heartbroken, jaded girl). He says that he understands that, and then we start talking from a very different perspective. Now I'm going to put this out there right now, so there's no confusion about it later on: I am a very sexual person and I LOVE sex. That being said, I am a demisexual, which means that I'm one of those people who can't just have no strings attached relations with another person and the intensity of my feelings for whoever I'm having a sexual relationship will determine the intensity of sex itself. Despite this, we begin a sort of friends with benefits long distance thing, as we're both very open and very sexual and I figure what the hell? I mean, it's not as if he'll develop feelings for me anyway and I would make sure as hell to prevent my own growth of feelings for him at whatever cost possible. Our sessions were. Simply. Fantastic. I had never felt as good during an act with any other man in actual sex as I felt when I was doing those things with him. That right there was a red flag and I began to distance myself from him, my own personal self defense mechanism in action. When we were finished one night (about two months into this 'relationship') he asked me if I would stay and 'cuddle' and talk to him. I get defensive, and I say no, I have to go, choking up in the process. He could tell immediately that I was upset. I had done this for the third night in a row and he says, "I'm sorry....I just...really like talking and spending time with you. If I said something to upset you, I am sincerely sorry....just...please don't go yet..." The tone of his voice was heartbreaking and I felt the armor beginning to crack with every word. I broke down on him, telling him that I just couldn't continue on like this, the intimacy that was growing was too much and I figured that he'd just go, decide I was completely nuts and stop talking to me altogether. I had expected that, counted on it, because then I could effectively distance myself from him and break the ties that were forming before they could harden and eventually break my heart in the end, again.
And then he dropped the bomb on me...
"Can I be honest with you?"
"O-okay...*sniffles and various mucus filled noises*" (how embarrassing...)
"From the very second I laid eyes on you in the lounge, I immediately felt something for you. I knew you were going to be important to me, somehow. You were and are, the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. I know that you could never feel the same for me, I get that, I understand why, but you've completely changed my life and how I view the world. I fell for you the moment I met you. I am, hopelessly in love with you, and I know that won't change how you feel, I know I don't deserve someone like you but I thought that you should know the truth."
I can imagine the look on my face even now. See...before all of this came out, he had acted as if he had no intentions of a relationship with me, no intent of seriousness and when I asked him about that he told me that he had wanted it from the start but said otherwise because he was afraid that I would run off and never speak to him again. I didn't say it back that night, and it wasn't said again for awhile after that, but we talked longer that night than we ever had, opening up to each other in a way I promised myself I never would again. We decided to officially label our relationship a week or so later and have been together ever since. We haven't met in person yet but our dynamic grows stronger everyday and I fall more and more in love with him with every moment I spend in his presence. The fact that he has no legs has never wavered my decision to be with him, never factored in at all. We've had some serious snags but we've always worked them out and 90 percent of the time they're due to my fear of getting hurt again, and almost always my fault. He's always patient, always loving, always caring. I've never gone for any period of time without being able to talk to him whenever, he's always there for me, says he always will be, and though I was skeptical of this for the longest, I'm learning to fully trust in what he says. Trust in him. The distance isn't as far as some LDRs I have seen, but it's hard just as much. Due to my job as a mother and my financial limits, I am unable to get out there to see him, and he has his own financial issues at the moment so we haven't been able to plan a meeting yet, although I am hoping fervently that will change soon. I'm simultaneously overjoyed and terrified for that time, when it comes.
It was around March of last year when my long term relationship went down the toilet, my live in boyfriend of three years had just come clean to me about sleeping with another woman, a girl who lived down the street from us, who I thought (stupidly obviously) was just a friend of his. Looking back on it now, I can't believe how incredibly blind I was to it all. He had spent many hours out of the day with this girl under what I guess was the guise of helping her out with stuff around her house, fixing things for her etc. I shouldn't have stood for it but I trusted him implicitly, he had never given me a reason not to, so why wouldn't I? We had been inseparable. So, to cut to the chase about that, I was incredibly hurt and he just left, as if nothing we had shared together in the past three years mattered. I spent the remainder of my days for an entire month inconsolable. Everything was upside down. He was the one I never expected it from and if he could do this to me, I definitely could never trust another person again. I stopped taking proper care of myself, putting all of my energy into my kids and trying to make ends meet,exhausted all day, starving myself because I just couldn't stomach the thought of food. One day while my daughter was in school and my son was down for a nap I went outside for some air and wound up passing out on the porch, hit my head and was unconscious for fifteen minutes. I decided that I couldn't do this on my own, at least not at the time, and I decided to move back in with my parents for awhile. About a month in, I'm sitting on my computer, and decide to hop into a new lounge on a site that I used to frequent often.
I go into the lounge and begin chatting with people, and me and this guy get to talking. Pretty soon we're bantering back and forth and getting a great dynamic going on, the whole chat room is joining in. He was hilarious, and I found myself really enjoying everything we're doing. I get kind of excited to be talking to actual human beings again and I decide to hop on cam. He immediately hit me up in private after that. He had the most unusual profile name, and though I won't share it here, I will regale you all with the gist of what went down due to said name, a simultaneously important and unimportant aspect of our relationship:
Me: Soo...why do you call yourself "[]"
Him: Well considering I have no legs, I thought it was pretty fitting.
And that's when I found out that he had no legs. Now,dear readers,when a lot of people hear that another person has no legs, they kind of automatically assume certain things. When I was perusing his pictures, and when I saw him on cam myself, I made some as well, like any arrogant girl would (haha) He was well defined, with big, VERY well muscled arms, chest and broad shoulders. He had an adorable face but one that was quite stern (in pictures) even though he's quite good humored and goofy and hilarious. My assumption from this and the whole no leg bit was this: "Oh, well he must have been in the military and lost them in battle." When I ask him this he laughs and says no, he was not former military, although it was always a dream of his before he was told he could never be when he was younger, and that he was born without them. Straight from the hips down, there was nothing. It was all he had ever known, had never known life with legs, so it was something he was used to. I asked him how he gets around, if he had a chair, and he says he moves around on his arms (explains those delicious muscles huh?) and that he couldn't stand using wheelchairs. I was really nervous about asking him these questions, didn't want to be offensive but he was so open, so easy going about talking about it, that it seemed he wasn't bothered at all by it. He wasn't. It's one of the many things I admire and love about him today. Moving on... Pretty soon we exchange Skype contact details. Our conversation was decidedly fantastic and we continue on this dynamic for about a week or so before he asks me if I would like to give him a call on the phone (didn't have a mic for Skype at the time). I say yes, of course. Now I know this might sound ridiculous (maybe not I don't know) but there is a sort of unusual nervous anticipation before you hear someone's voice you've been chatting with for some time for the first time. In this light, there's also somewhat of a fear of that awkwardness that comes with being on the phone with someone you've never been on the phone with before. There was none of that. We hit it off vocally in the same way we did in text, only WAY better. During our conversation, he asks me about the ring I was wearing when he saw me on cam that one night, I was confused, completely forgotten that I was still wearing the engagement ring I had from my previous relationship (still a sore subject that I hadn't even really talked with him about yet). I finally admit to just having gotten out of a relationship that ended terribly for me and he asks me what I'm looking for right now, I tell him I don't want the hassle of having to trust another person, so no relationships for me ever again (says the silly heartbroken, jaded girl). He says that he understands that, and then we start talking from a very different perspective. Now I'm going to put this out there right now, so there's no confusion about it later on: I am a very sexual person and I LOVE sex. That being said, I am a demisexual, which means that I'm one of those people who can't just have no strings attached relations with another person and the intensity of my feelings for whoever I'm having a sexual relationship will determine the intensity of sex itself. Despite this, we begin a sort of friends with benefits long distance thing, as we're both very open and very sexual and I figure what the hell? I mean, it's not as if he'll develop feelings for me anyway and I would make sure as hell to prevent my own growth of feelings for him at whatever cost possible. Our sessions were. Simply. Fantastic. I had never felt as good during an act with any other man in actual sex as I felt when I was doing those things with him. That right there was a red flag and I began to distance myself from him, my own personal self defense mechanism in action. When we were finished one night (about two months into this 'relationship') he asked me if I would stay and 'cuddle' and talk to him. I get defensive, and I say no, I have to go, choking up in the process. He could tell immediately that I was upset. I had done this for the third night in a row and he says, "I'm sorry....I just...really like talking and spending time with you. If I said something to upset you, I am sincerely sorry....just...please don't go yet..." The tone of his voice was heartbreaking and I felt the armor beginning to crack with every word. I broke down on him, telling him that I just couldn't continue on like this, the intimacy that was growing was too much and I figured that he'd just go, decide I was completely nuts and stop talking to me altogether. I had expected that, counted on it, because then I could effectively distance myself from him and break the ties that were forming before they could harden and eventually break my heart in the end, again.
And then he dropped the bomb on me...
"Can I be honest with you?"
"O-okay...*sniffles and various mucus filled noises*" (how embarrassing...)
"From the very second I laid eyes on you in the lounge, I immediately felt something for you. I knew you were going to be important to me, somehow. You were and are, the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. I know that you could never feel the same for me, I get that, I understand why, but you've completely changed my life and how I view the world. I fell for you the moment I met you. I am, hopelessly in love with you, and I know that won't change how you feel, I know I don't deserve someone like you but I thought that you should know the truth."
I can imagine the look on my face even now. See...before all of this came out, he had acted as if he had no intentions of a relationship with me, no intent of seriousness and when I asked him about that he told me that he had wanted it from the start but said otherwise because he was afraid that I would run off and never speak to him again. I didn't say it back that night, and it wasn't said again for awhile after that, but we talked longer that night than we ever had, opening up to each other in a way I promised myself I never would again. We decided to officially label our relationship a week or so later and have been together ever since. We haven't met in person yet but our dynamic grows stronger everyday and I fall more and more in love with him with every moment I spend in his presence. The fact that he has no legs has never wavered my decision to be with him, never factored in at all. We've had some serious snags but we've always worked them out and 90 percent of the time they're due to my fear of getting hurt again, and almost always my fault. He's always patient, always loving, always caring. I've never gone for any period of time without being able to talk to him whenever, he's always there for me, says he always will be, and though I was skeptical of this for the longest, I'm learning to fully trust in what he says. Trust in him. The distance isn't as far as some LDRs I have seen, but it's hard just as much. Due to my job as a mother and my financial limits, I am unable to get out there to see him, and he has his own financial issues at the moment so we haven't been able to plan a meeting yet, although I am hoping fervently that will change soon. I'm simultaneously overjoyed and terrified for that time, when it comes.
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