FR – Anger, the Ring, and Pulling the Ripcord

Unplugging

Upon unplugging last September, I was angry. I was angry at myself for being so ignorant of all the RP truths that had been staring me in the face for 30 years. I was angry at my wife for ILYBIANILWY. I was angry for my wife having had a 3 year affair in the late 90’s; and by the fact that she had the gall to tell me he was more of a father figure when I confronted her about it last August. I was enraged at the possibility that my daughter might not be my own (DNA in February showed she is mine). I was enraged in recognition of the weak sauce faggot that I had become; and in particular that I did not confront her about the affair at the time. Taking the rage out in the gym, reading, and improving largely removed the self-focused anger by January as it slowly transition to remorse and now to acceptance of the past. Although this was not something I dwelt on all the time, the anger towards my wife over the affair could still undo my frame whenever I would think about it.

During the same period I started spending time on dating websites. There were several objectives. First, just curiosity/exploratory having not thought about the subject matter for decades and living in a small town. Second, visualizing what my life would be like post-divorce, killing the oneitis, and developing abundance mentality. Third, anger-revenge-porn…not intentional; but in hindsight I was drawn to this activity during fits of anger over my wife’s affair. By December I was engaging in sparse online communication/flirting; but will no real intention of carrying through.

Ten

After my first MRP submission and upon digesting the feedback I developed a self-centered mission/vision and phase 2 of my MAP. Towards the end of January I put my wedding ring in a drawer, and just stopped wearing it all together. One action of my MAP was to fuck 10 women besides my wife by September this year.

There were a number of objectives for this action based on my view that marriage is a highly asymmetrical power structure in that “Men are the gatekeepers to commitment and women are the gatekeepers to sex”. The asymmetry of this dynamic in marriage with kids is appalling. IMO, this is equivalent to I have a hand grenade for which I can only pull the pin if the family sits in a circle around the grenade and she has a sniper rifle aimed at my chest. Now before I am accused of binary thinking, I understand there are degrees of commitment (i.e. dread levels 4 and 8); but ultimately I have a grenade and levels 4/8 are just showing it off. For sure, everyone will survive this grenade but no one that has been through a divorce can argue that there will be collateral damage, especially if children are involved. The converse of this asymmetry is for the majority of single women, and especially post-wall women, a man’s marriage and wedding ring is a giant red stop light. For a great many men (majority…maybe…I don’t know), a woman’s marriage and wedding ring is a greenlight to sex without commitment.

The conscious objectives were:

1. Develop start to finish abundance mentality.
2. Kill oneitis as there would be more than one.
3. Determine by comparative shopping, does my wife even suit me? Does marriage suit me? Can I do better? More importantly, in the words of WMP > if you think you can do better, prove it faggot. if you don't think you can do better, get better faggot.

In a nutshell, given the asymmetry of the relationship I did not feel compelled to figure out what I want after I pull the pin. I feel zero remorse in negating my commitment.

In hindsight my egos objectives were validation seeking and anger management.

Tinder

In February, stopped messing with other sites and setup a half-decent Tinder profile. Took adequate security measures, basically don’t Tinder with 100 miles of home, don’t have a paper electronic trail, and locked down phone. First date (on Valentine’s Day) was entertaining; but largely a fail because I had divulged already that I was married. Lesson 1 (proven thousands of times over); Tinder is not used by near/post-wall women for hookups or affairs…..not saying it is unavailable…it’s just not on Tinder. Tweaked the profile to be more opaque about my status; but still clear I was interested in FWB. Match rate jumped from couple a week to 20-30 per week. Flaking is huge so this translated to 2-3 per week resulting in more than just a few text exchanges.

Ultimately, I went on dates with six different women in the last three months. The first (29yo), one 23yo, and rest 30-40. Closed with three of which one was lame, 23 was tight but not right in the head at all, and the last one (Meredith, 37) really caught my attention and where I saw the real problems with this course of action. We went out twice, the last time being Monday night. I started thinking more about this woman than my MAP.

Pulling the Rip Cord

Driving home Monday night, listening to “A Guide to the Good Life” audio book, I could see the direction this was all heading, and it was heading to ruin. I was spending 1-2 hours, at least, a day fucking around with Tinderellas. This is one, of a few, time wasting causes for reading and career routinely showing up in my OYS not owning category. Dating sites, and Tinder in particular, are to a person with validation seeking problems like meth to crack addict. That little red dot in the upper right hand corner blinking……. Furthermore, it was an emotional crutch that I was using to avoid the heavy liftingleading of my wife. Not to mention the ever present risk for one of these woman to start stalking me; and go fatal attraction. Tuesday afternoon I closed my Tinder account, and on Wednesday gave Meredith the dear Jane text (others were ghosted immediately).

Relative to my original objectives, developing abundance mentality and killing oneitis were achieved. I confirmed, not to my surprise, that I am a LTR type of guy and spinning plates is unfulfilling to me and a pain in the ass. The only part I will really miss is driving to the date. The anticipation to me felt exactly like standing in the door of a plane getting ready to jump out. To the question, can I do better? Maybe, and maybe no. This trip as taken was a fool’s errand for answering the question for two reasons. First and foremost, the question really comes down to can I be a much better man to which any women will reflect back. Second, not being able to play “all in” has such a negative effect on sample selection as to not really be sampling top tier women and of course the quality cannot be judged at a distance or overnight. Lastly, maybe it is coincidence but my anger towards my wife over the affair has completely dissipated in the last month. Dissipated to the point, that now when the thought enters my brain it leads to “I would not mind if it happened again because this would allow me to pull the pin while wearing a bomb suit”. For the first time the bitterest part of the pill (IMO) “she is not yours, it is only your turn” no longer makes me want to vomit.

Reflecting on all this week, and how it distorted/weakened my MAP I have a lot of work to do. The weakest part of it is a continued failure to really, and proactively, lead my wife through operant conditioning and modelling the behaviors I want reflected back. This is where I go next. Since one of my primary goals is for to check back in, I will be putting the ring back on tomorrow when I get home.