I don’t know what I want anymore

[YoursTrue]

That is some good insight into my situation. Yes, I do want to get married again, but only if I can find the right man.
No, I do not want what other men want but I would be willing to compromise and engage in some of the activities that a man likes doing and maybe I would even come to enjoy them. However, I am not going to compromise on the cats or my religion. A man does not have to be a Baha'i but he would have to have similar values, especially regarding sex before marriage, and a belief in God. Even though I have two MA degrees I would not expect a man to have a similar education and I would marry a high school graduate in a heartbeat if he had good values and was kind, caring and considerate.

I already thought of that. I would like to find a man who would appreciate my resources, and is willing to live in my house with all of my cats, but I don't know how I would find such a man. Mind you, it is not a good idea to advertise my wealth on a dating site since there are so many con men on those sites. Ideally I could find a Baha'i man who was widowed or divorced and is not attached to where he lives, and he might not even own a home or have financial security. I met a Baha'i man on a Baha'i dating site who had that situation but he lived in New Zealand is was not willing to relocate to the US.

Initially, I thought Mike could be 'the one' since he has hardly anything by way of financially assets or income, and I have a lot to offer and would be willing to share it with him, even leaving him my pension and social security if I die first, but he is what I consider ungrateful because he doesn't even think of what I could offer him. All he can think of is his MCS and his nutrition! He really has a bad case of OCD.

It sounds to me like you are feeling very sorry for yourself.

 

[Trailblazer]

It's usually more subtle... like they want you to do something different but they never quite define it.
Ignore me, I'm just grumpy about women tonight.

That's okay, I understand....
I defined what I wanted my late husband to do but he never did it. I still have the notes I made and affixed to the calendar with dates on them. It's so sad really and I try not to think about it unless I see something that reminds me. I have all of his things covered up or put away so I won't see them but once in a while I catch a glimpse.

My counselor said that we all handle grief differently so whatever I do to manage it is okay.

 

[Trailblazer]

It sounds to me like you are feeling very sorry for yourself.

You could not be more wrong. I am only happy that I finally came to the conclusion that this man is not for me and the good people of this forum have helped me a lot in that regard .
Since I always tend to blame myself and think things are my fault, they have helped me to see that I am doing nothing wrong by cutting it off with him.

 

[Trailblazer]

Good he was up front about it. A lot of times people pretend to be something else just to get your approval.
You can't really expect a person to change who they are for your benefit, mostly because they can't.

You got to like the person as they are, not as who you want them to be.

Perhaps you thought you could compromise to make the relationship work but that is only temporary and if you don't actually like the person as they are you are not going to be happy in the relationship anyway.

Maybe I did not make myself clear enough in the OP. It is not that I don't accept him for who he is as a person, but I cannot be married to a man who is emotionally disturbed. The man is bonkers for lack of a better word. He has a serious case of OCD so there is no way I can even meet him in person unless I am willing to fly from Seattle to Utah and stay in his car where he has parked it in the desert, since he thinks that is the only place he can live owing to his MCS. He won't even stay in a motel for a few days because he is convinced that all motel rooms have the residue of tobacco smoke. I asked him if he ever heard of a non-smoking room but he said there is no such thing. He is living in the dark ages, when people smoked everywhere. Those days ended 50 years ago.

It is not me who was unwilling to come up with a solution so we could at least meet each other, but what would be the point of meeting him, since he cannot live where I live, since he has convinced himself it is too polluted? I live way out in the country, not near a metro area, but he says that the winds blow the pollution from Seattle, which is 60 miles away and not really a polluted city.

First he said he could never come here in the winter because people burn wood and propane but maybe he could come for a visit in the summer. Then he said he could not come in the summer because people use lawnmowers in the summer which release fumes. In one conversation about two weeks ago he said that maybe he could live over on the Washington coast since it looked like low pollution on his map, but when I talked to him a couple of days ago he said he could not live anywhere in the Pacific Northwest because there are so many evergreen trees that emit a chemical! The man is bonkers. Why it took me this long to figure it out is anyone's best guess.

He has no job and no house, just a car, a 1989 Chevy Suburban. He moves his vehicle from place to place every two weeks or so, somewhere in the southwest corner of Utah, and he parks it on BLM land, depending upon the weather forecast. He eats, sleeps and cooks out of his vehicle and I'd rather not talk about his personal hygiene habits. Suffice to say there are no showers or toilets on BLM land, just land.

I have a full time job and three houses I own in Washington State, two of which are rentals. Here is what he expected me to do if we ever met and got married: Retire from my job and sell all my houses and move to the southwest corner of Utah. Does this sound reasonable to you? Does this sound like a man who wants to compromise? At one point I told him I could easily afford to pay for a rental for him to live in far, far away from the city, up close to Mt. Rainier, but he had a reason why that would not work.

Finally, towards the end of the last conversation we came to an impasse. The only way for me to talk to him is on his cell phone but I cannot call him since he does not leave it on since it would run the battery down, so last we talked he told me to call and leave a message if I wanted him to call me. I told him he can call me if he wants to since I felt sorry for him, but if I talk to him again I will tell him I am sorry but it is obvious that we can never have a relationship since we cannot even meet let alone live in the same location.

All this is aside from the fact that he has OCD about what he eats, talks about how badly everyone eats, so if I married him he would be telling me what I can and cannot eat. He already told me I should not be taking vitamins since I should get all my nutrition in my food. I am sure he would have something to say about my eating pizza, which I do only once a week. There is no way a man is going to tell me what to eat and not eat, I am an adult. Food is one of the last remaining pleasures I have and I eat healthy enough. He also does not like the idea of my having eight cats because he sees them as competition for my affection.

 

[Sgt. Pepper]

You could not be more wrong. I am only happy that I finally came to the conclusion that this man is not for me and the good people of this forum have helped me a lot in that regard .
Since I always tend to blame myself and think things are my fault, they have helped me to see that I did nothing wrong.

I was thinking that maybe talking to the psychic medium would make you feel better about your ordeal, especially if the medium gave you a message from your late husband or if you used a spirit box to speak with him directly. I personally gave a special message to a widow the night I assisted my Christian friend with her séance. Her husband had passed a few weeks before, and she expressed her struggle to move on with her life. I shared quite a few special messages that night with the other guests, but I was especially touched by her message and story. It was the night after Halloween, and it is believed that the veil between the spirit world and the physical world is the thinnest, so the spirits of the dead can better communicate with the living and can even be seen and heard by people who aren't psychic mediums. It can be a very busy time for mediums. Anyway, I thought of her story as I was reading your thread.

 

[YoursTrue]

You could not be more wrong. I am only happy that I finally came to the conclusion that this man is not for me and the good people of this forum have helped me a lot in that regard .
Since I always tend to blame myself and think things are my fault, they have helped me to see that I am doing nothing wrong by cutting it off with him.

Ok.

 

[Trailblazer]

I was thinking that maybe talking to the psychic medium would make you feel better about your ordeal, especially if the medium gave you a message from your late husband or if you used a spirit box to speak with him directly.

I still plan to contact that psychic medium and communicate with him but I have to be in the right head space. Now that I have made a decision about this man my head is clearing but I still have to wait a while. I have over four weeks of vacation time coming up in February and March so I will probably wait till then. I know I am not going to have any closure till I do this but admittedly I have anxiety about what he might say, so I need to be really stable when I do the communication.

 

[Sgt. Pepper]

I still plan to contact that psychic medium and communicate with him but I have to be in the right head space. Now that I have made a decision about this man my head is clearing but I still have to wait a while. I have over four weeks of vacation time coming up in February and March so I will probably wait till then. I know I am not going to have any closure till I do this but admittedly I have anxiety about what he might say, so I need to be really stable when I do the communication.

Maybe it's better for your emotional health if you wait until the medium communicates with your husband and you get validation and closure before looking for a new relationship. That's my advice to you as your friend and as a medium. I wish I could help you more.

 

[Trailblazer]

Maybe it's better for your emotional health if you wait until the medium communicates with your husband and you get validation and closure before looking for a new relationship. That's my advice to you as your friend and as a medium. I wish I could help you more.

That is what I was thinking too. I certainly don't want to meet a man and get involved until after that communication takes place so I am laying low on all the dating sites for now. I might not even feel comfortable doing this communication of I did not have your support because it is kind of frightening what I could discover. However, I know I need to do it anyway so thanks for encouraging me.

 

[Sgt. Pepper]

That is what I was thinking too. I certainly don't want to meet a man and get involved until after that communication takes place so I am laying low on all the dating sites for now. I might not even feel comfortable doing this communication of I did not have your support because it is kind of frightening what I could discover. However, I know I need to do it anyway so thanks for encouraging me.

You're welcome. I'm here for you.

 

[Truthseeker]

This is a continuation of two previous threads I posted:

I just want a normal boyfriend

I don’t really want a boyfriend

I don’t know what I want anymore, but I know what I don’t want, so I think that is a step in the right direction. I do not want a boyfriend unless it is going to lead to marriage, and I don’t want a man to have sex with unless we are married, since I would never have sex outside of wedlock. So why then do I want a man? If I get married again it will be for love, companionship, and emotional support, and to have someone who can help with the practical matters of everyday living, including caring for the house and the cats. I would also want a spiritual help-mate, such that we could grow together spiritually

However, I am not sure I want to get married, not unless I meet a man who I love who I am compatible with. It does not help me that I am attractive, healthy, own three houses, and am debt free and financially secure for life. Given my lifestyle and interests, it would be very unusual for me to find someone I am compatible with. That happened once in my lifetime, 37 years ago, but that does not mean it will ever happen again. It will only happen if that is what God wills for me, which would be my fate, not by my ardent searching for a man on various dating sites.

It has taken me a few months but I have finally reached this conclusion and I am fine with it. That doesn’t mean I am not going to make any effort to meet someone, because if I do nothing, then nothing will happen. God is not going to drop a man down my chimney. It just means that my attitude has changed so I no longer feel desperate about getting married again.

If I do not marry again, I might rent out space on my property so a man who is handy can live in a trailer on my property and I would rent it dirt cheap in exchange for work I might need done on the house and yard, since I don’t need the money. I have about an acre and there is a perfect place where a man could park a trailer and be very secluded.

Now back to the man called Mike. I have pretty much given up on Mike now, after our conversation last Saturday, and that is what I will tell him if he calls again. I feel good about my decision and I have a sense of freedom, thinking of no further involvement with him. I hope I do not change my mind, and I cannot see how that would be possible given what I now know about him, as noted below. I kind of feel sorry for him but I am not going to let that influence my decision, as I have needs too.

What I initially liked about Mike has now been far outweighed by what I don’t like and could not tolerate. I liked that he believed in God and seemed to have similar beliefs about God as I do, and I liked that he has morals, particularly with regards to sex. What I don’t like is that he really does not like the idea of cats even if he would be willing to tolerate them. I like that he is considerate and polite but I have now realized that he does not have much compassion, he is more in his head rather than his feelings.

What I have discovered through continued phone conversations is that he has no real ability of compromise and meet me halfway. All in all, I don’t think he understands what it means to sacrifice his needs for the needs of another person, and that cannot ever work in a marriage. I would not exactly say he is selfish, only that I think he has no idea how to have a relationship with a woman. That makes sense since he has only had one relationship with a woman 43 years ago, when he was married for two years. Since then, he has had no relationships with women. By contrast, I was married for 37 years to the same man.

To put this in context, I think the main problem he has is that he has OCD and I don’t think it is treatable by any kind of counseling, since he does not even know he has a problem! He says he has MCS (multiple chemical sensitivity) and he had that diagnosis by a physician, but he is obsessed about it. I simply cannot believe that he cannot live anywhere except in the desert as it makes no logical sense. I think his problem is mor psychological than physical. He is not only obsessed about the MCS, he is obsessed about nutrition and health. I could never live with a man who has these obsessions.

Rather than typing that all over again, I will copy and paste what I wrote to @JustGeorge and @Truthseeker in a private conversation.

Well, this whole thing with Mike came to a head today when I talked to him on the phone. It is a moot point if he would adjust to living in a house because he will never live in my house or anywhere else in Washington. I Even talked about Oregon and Idaho but he always has an excuse as to why he could not live everywhere I propose. But what's the point? If we cannot even agree on a place to meet in order to see if we are even compatible there is no point talking about where we would live if we got married.

Maybe he has MCS, but I think it is more psychological than physical, although I will never convince him of that! It is like trying to convince an atheist that God exists. I am worn out from talking to him and it leads nowhere.

No, showers are not important to him and neither are toilets! I am kind of glad that I spent so much time on the phone with him today because now I can see that this cannot work out. He is a complete fanatic about nutrition and air quality, and I think he has OCD. It does not matter that he might have similar beliefs about God and sex because people have to live in the real world. He even said that spending much time on the computer is dangerous because of the rays that come from the monitor. The only way he ever gets information is from printed books and articles, even printed maps!

He is completely out of touch with the modern world and other people. What does he think we would do all day if we were married? I now realize I have been entertaining a fantasy. I did not want to face that it cannot work because I did not want to give up hope, but I don't think it is beneficial for either of us to go on this way anymore. He is not going to change and neither am I.

When I told him if I came to where he is located just for a visit I could get a motel room outside of town to be away from the air pollution and he said he could not stay in a motel room because someone might have smoked in there. I told him there are smoke-free motel rooms these days and he argued with me. He suggested that I sleep in his car on the front seat! That is when I started to realize he is bonkers. I don't want to be hooked up with a man who argues and is not amenable to any reason. I did not think he was the controlling type but in a way he is. It is subtle manipulation when he refuses to meet me halfway.

Also, I can already see that our communication is not good. I asked if he wanted some photos of the cats and house and he seemed excited about them but now when I asked him to let me know what he thinks when he gets them he said there was no point since he cannot ever live here. I was planning to send him some Baha'i books and he sounded very interested but now I don't think I'll bother.

What you say here is complex. The bottom line is that now you are now not desperate to find a man to marry.

I remember when I was desparate to find a woman to marry, and it wasn't good. I never told you this before, but at Wright State University, I was running statistical programs with a female called Pat Vendt in the same room. I was about 24 years old, and I was immature for my age. Pat immediately was friendly to me, and I wasn't used to that from a woman. Later she left a note on her desk saying something like "God help me". I don't remember the rest. I didn't realize it was tongue in cheek, because that is what people on the autism spectrum do, they take things literally. I am a lot less like that now, I grew out of it over time. Over the weekend I had these romantic feelings because I was obsessing over the danger she was in. I felt like I was in love with her, but it was merely obsession. I won't say any more about this situation except to say it didn't end well for her or me.

A little later Ed Rousculp, who you relatively recently talked to on the phone, did Marilyn Hunsaker a favor by having me help her with her Math. Immediately when I walked into the door of her apartment she was courteous and friendly to me. Immedaitely I was infatuated with her. I mistook courteousness and friendliness for something more. It was not long before I was dropping over unannounced to where she lived. Once again I inflicted pain on her and me by being obsessed with her by persuing her no matter what.

In these two relationships I desperately wanted to marry them. I was young, it was not until I was 31 that I was ready to have a real relatively mature relationship, and God provided a mate for me. Even then, I was not ready in some ways, but I grew over time, and Sara stuck with me while I was getting more mature.

Now I know how to be close friends with you while it not interfering with my relation with Sara. It doesn't hurt that this close realationship happened long distance on the internet. This I now realize was serendipity, or rather God working in my life again, like when God created the circumstances for me to marry Sara. You know that story already.

This is a good talk to you. It benefits me to look back on my life and see the pattern of my life with women.

 

[Nakosis]

Maybe I did not make myself clear enough in the OP. It is not that I don't accept him for who he is as a person, but I cannot be married to a man who is emotionally disturbed. The man is bonkers for lack of a better word. He has a serious case of OCD so there is no way I can even meet him in person unless I am willing to fly from Seattle to Utah and stay in his car where he has parked it in the desert, since he thinks that is the only place he can live owing to his MCS. He won't even stay in a motel for a few days because he is convinced that all motel rooms have the residue of tobacco smoke. I asked him if he ever heard of a non-smoking room but he said there is no such thing. He is living in the dark ages, when people smoked everywhere. Those days ended 50 years ago.

It is not me who was unwilling to come up with a solution so we could at least meet each other, but what would be the point of meeting him, since he cannot live where I live, since he has convinced himself it is too polluted? I live way out in the country, not near a metro area, but he says that the winds blow the pollution from Seattle, which is 60 miles away and not really a polluted city.

First he said he could never come here in the winter because people burn wood and propane but maybe he could come for a visit in the summer. Then he said he could not come in the summer because people use lawnmowers in the summer which release fumes. In one conversation about two weeks ago he said that maybe he could live over on the Washington coast since it looked like low pollution on his map, but when I talked to him a couple of days ago he said he could not live anywhere in the Pacific Northwest because there are so many evergreen trees that emit a chemical! The man is bonkers. Why it took me this long to figure it out is anyone's best guess.

He has no job and no house, just a car, a 1989 Chevy Suburban. He moves his vehicle from place to place every two weeks or so, somewhere in the southwest corner of Utah, and he parks it on BLM land, depending upon the weather forecast. He eats, sleeps and cooks out of his vehicle and I'd rather not talk about his personal hygiene habits. Suffice to say there are no showers or toilets on BLM land, just land.

I have a full time job and three houses I own in Washington State, two of which are rentals. Here is what he expected me to do if we ever met and got married: Retire from my job and sell all my houses and move to the southwest corner of Utah. Does this sound reasonable to you? Does this sound like a man who wants to compromise? At one point I told him I could easily afford to pay for a rental for him to live in far, far away from the city, up close to Mt. Rainier, but he had a reason why that would not work.

Finally, towards the end of the last conversation we came to an impasse. The only way for me to talk to him is on his cell phone but I cannot call him since he does not leave it on since it would run the battery down, so last we talked he told me to call and leave a message if I wanted him to call me. I told him he can call me if he wants to since I felt sorry for him, but if I talk to him again I will tell him I am sorry but it is obvious that we can never have a relationship since we cannot even meet let alone live in the same location.

All this is aside from the fact that he has OCD about what he eats, talks about how badly everyone eats, so if I married him he would be telling me what I can and cannot eat. He already told me I should not be taking vitamins since I should get all my nutrition in my food. I am sure he would have something to say about my eating pizza, which I do only once a week. There is no way a man is going to tell me what to eat and not eat, I am an adult. Food is one of the last remaining pleasures I have and I eat healthy enough. He also does not like the idea of my having eight cats because he sees them as competition for my affection.

Ok, however my point wasn't that you weren't trying hard enough but that perhaps you had been trying too hard.

 

[Truthseeker]

Can I add

5. Must be a handyman

to that list?

Whoops! That leaves me out.

 

[Truthseeker]

It sounds to me like you are feeling very sorry for yourself.

I don't know very sorry, but @Trailblazer is sad about the situation. It's a matter of her trying to cope with the situation. She's making some progress. It's a long road, however.

 

[Truthseeker]

You could not be more wrong. I am only happy that I finally came to the conclusion that this man is not for me and the good people of this forum have helped me a lot in that regard .
Since I always tend to blame myself and think things are my fault, they have helped me to see that I am doing nothing wrong by cutting it off with him.

In this moment you are happy, but there is still a road ahead where where you are trying to cope, though you are making encouraging progress. I sound like a therapist.

 

[Trailblazer]

In this moment you are happy, but there is still a road ahead where where you are trying to cope, though you are making encouraging progress. I sound like a therapist.

Yes Duane, you do sound like a therapist, but that's okay. I have a therapist but I can always use another therapist.
I have mood swings, a change in mood depending upon what is happening on any given day. It is not a diagnosed condition like manic-depression, I am just up and down.

Mike called at 9:30 tonight and he left a message asking if I want him to call him next Saturday. I did not answer the phone because I had turned the volume off, but I saw his phone number flash across the TV screen.. I was surprised because he never called at night before. I might talk to him Saturday just to be polite and explain that I don't think there is much more to say for the reasons I explained in the OP. We cannot have a relationship so I don't want to drag this out anymore.

 

[exchemist]

Yes, some of the men on dating sites are weird, but some of them are just ordinary men looking for a woman. The problem is differentiating the two.

I have considering finding ways to meet some ordinary men, I just have not decided how to go about it yet. Maybe the local senior center has some activities. I'd rather meet a man in person and cut all the crap that goes on on dating sites. I did meet a man on a dating site who lives nearby and he wants to meet me in person, after we talk on the phone, so that is a possibility.

Ay hobbies? Evening classes that might interest you? Sport or keep fit? Walking? Yoga? Cookery?

People that are physically or intellectually active are most likely to be good value as companions, I'd have thought. You won't want a couch potato. Not to mention that getting out of the house yourself, and away from the tyranny of the computer screen, is always good for you!

 

[Jainarayan]

If I do not marry again, I might rent out space on my property so a man who is handy can live in a trailer on my property and I would rent it dirt cheap in exchange for work I might need done on the house and yard, since I don’t need the money. I have about an acre and there is a perfect place where a man could park a trailer and be very secluded.

Honestly, I don’t think that’s such a bad idea. Of course you need to be very careful … check his background thoroughly, etc. Even starting as a platonic and practical relationship, “having a man around the house”, it could develop into something more. What that “more” is would be totally up to you two, and the fates. There are plenty of men looking for the same type of arrangement.

 

[Trailblazer]

Ay hobbies? Evening classes that might interest you? Sport or keep fit? Walking? Yoga? Cookery?

People that are physically or intellectually active are most likely to be good value as companions, I'd have thought. You won't want a couch potato. Not to mention that getting out of the house yourself, and away from the tyranny of the computer screen, is always good for you!

Cats are my hobby, I don't have much time for anything else....
I was already married to a couch potato so I don't want that again....
Yes, I do need to get out more but the weather here is cold and rainy this time of year...

I have a long vacation coming up in February and March. I have considered going on a seniors single cruise, since I can well afford it. The problem is leaving the cats. I can get a pet sitter but I'd have to be sure she was trustworthy.

 

[exchemist]

Cats are my hobby, I don't have much time for anything else....
I was already married to a couch potato so I don't want that again....
Yes, I do need to get out more but the weather here is cold and rainy this time of year...

I have a long vacation coming up in February and March. I have considered going on a seniors single cruise, since I can well afford it. The problem is leaving the cats. I can get a pet sitter but I'd have to be sure she was trustworthy.

Why not? The only thing is I'd slightly have my doubts about a specifically singles cruise - could be full of creeps looking to grab a granny for a shag . But a cruise, well why not? Once you have solved the cat sitter problem once, you have a solution for future similar excursions. That will give you another degree of freedom which will help a lot. In the UK, there are even commercial cat places where you take them and leave them, like kennels for dogs.

Hobbies are good, though. Just the cats isn't enough to keep your mind active. For years I used to row, but now that I have dodgy knees and a slightly dicky ticker, that's not feasible. But I do still sing, which gets me out, provides mental stimulation reading the score, is surprisingly physical and is also social. Plus the buzz of performance. I've been wondering about something else, maybe an evening class on botany. I go walking and would love to be able to identify all the trees and wild plants I pass. But I'm in London, where such things are fairly easily accessible. It's probably harder where you are.