My_Part

    In an effort to show this story in the absolute truth, I do have a few things to explain about my attempt to play his games.
When Josh left here that April day, he swore to me as soon as the business got set, he would come back here to be with us. As his excuses got longer and he disappeared more often, I started to play some of his games.
    I had a software conflict with ICQ, anytime I printed anything or worked in WordPerfect, ICQ would send messages to everyone on my list. Through these one sided conversations, Josh started to show his jealousy often asking me what I was talking about. I thought if I could make him jealous, then certainly he would want to move back home and be with me. So to my advantage I hoped to use this defect. I would send messages to him that SOUNDED like I was talking to another guy. I did it simply to make him THINK I was seeing someone else. He had had one full blown relationship (unknown to me) before I started this. He was already trying to get 2 to move to Oregon and had moved in Paula, his best friend's wife nextdoor into his mother's house. ALL this was unknown to me. My game went on for about 4 months when I couldn't lie about it anymore. I told him in email and via ICQ what I had done and that none of it was true. I explained why I had done it but he was too busy with his women to listen, he basically just said, is that all you have to tell me. I apologized and promised I would not do that again. In truth, in 4 years I only went out with one other person and then I told him I was going out BEFORE I went. I mean, do you REALLY think he was home alone on New Year's night?????
    Josh also states over and over that we weren't even dating each other. Well, to date you have to be near each other....that is true. But at the same time, he is swearing to me he's not seeing anyone and that he loves me. I asked several times if he wanted the right to see someone else, and I'd do the same, but his answer was always no. Even when he was here, I told him that very thing and he was very pissed off about it. He also says we weren't "together" the whole time.....he knows that's not what he wanted me to believe, and it's not what I believed. He knew good and well I wasn't seeing anyone else and I wasn't expecting him too. But just 3 weeks after he got to Oregon, he was busy telling women how single he was and how badly he wanted someone to love him. Josh knows good and well I don't date frivolously and if I was seeing anyone other than him, I might fall in love with them instead and leave him.
    This is a pattern Josh has followed all his life, in every relationship. He was engaged to his high school girlfriend when he left for Germany. He had broken up her marriage out of spite. While in Germany, he met Melanie, his soon to be wife. He was still telling fiancé #1 he loved her, she didn't find out he was married until 2 months AFTER he married fiancé #2. She didn't even find out from him, but from a mutual friend. This is a story she told me and he later agreed was correct. When he met me, he had another girlfriend back in Oregon, Kim. He flew her down to La on our first Valentine's Day together. He took her on a trip we had talked about taking many times while I sat at home alone and miscarried his child. Before that there was a girl in Deridder, Angel was her handle, he even had the balls to call her from MY house late one night. Later there was the girl in North Caroline, Monique he sent flowers to. There were more, most listed on the other page. He says all that took place in his younger years and that he doesn't repeat his history, that is not true either. He repeats it with every woman he dates. He's repeating it now, he's dating and sleeping with more than one and I'd bet not one knows about the others.
    And what is his answer for all this? That he didn't trust me because I talked about my dead husband and an ex boyfriend who stalked me for years. Things that we talked about the first 6 months we dated and things I thought we had settled. When I entered my marriage, I swore I'd never be so hooked on a guy again that I let him do the things I'd let my ex bf do to me. So I kept myself hidden from him. After he died I realized what a mistake that had been not to love him 100% so I vowed never to let it happen again. When I met Josh not too long after that, I wanted him to know me inside and out. So I told him about me, about my hurts and my happiness. I wanted him so badly to understand me and he told me he wanted to know. I had no idea until much later, after the damage was done, he took me telling him about myself and my experiences, that he was not wanted in my life. He believed this at 6 months and never once stopped believing it, no matter how many times I told him I loved him or forgave him for lying to me. No matter what I did that would have proven his idea wrong, he says he still believed and that allowed him the right to cheat and lie to me. I'm sorry, that is nothing more than an excuse. If that were the truth, then he should have left me and gone on to find someone he felt was true. Instead he decided to use me over and over. He came here and I bought everything, movie tickets, meals, movies, alcohol, clothes, long distance phone calls he placed, pay-per-view movies he wanted to see, and cigs that I don't even smoke. I even bought Christmas presents for him to give the boys because he'd spent all his money on gifts for Paula's kids and another girlfriend. He currently owes me over $300 for things he swore he'd pay me back for. I bought him expensive gifts and always paid for the gas round trip 300 miles. All that and he got laid too!!! Heck, he had his cake and his ice cream as well. In 4 years, he actually paid for one REAL meal and a movie we saw, that was in November when I was there. He bought me a necklace as an after thought for Christmas our first year and the book this year for my birthday, all which has been returned to him. Do you think he returned ANYTHING I ever gave him? Are you kidding? He even tried to give the Nurse the Magic Cards I bought him that he STILL hasn't paid me for. He did buy two ferrets, the gar, I paid for (yes, he still owes me for it) As you can see, I certainly didn't stay with him because he was generous, must have been because I cared.
        I felt like I needed to add my part in all of this. I'm not completely innocent as my admission to the lies I told and that was after 3 years, previous to that I had done NOTHING to give him any idea that I was doing anything I wasn't supposed to. We did break up for about 10 days in October and then again for about 2 weeks I mention on the first page. Other than that, Josh worked hard for me to believe that he was only seeing me and no one else and he didn't want me seeing anyone else either. Anyway you look at it, he lied and was wrong to do the things he's done.
            I've had a couple of people write to me and ask me if I'm angry, yes, I am. There was no reason for this person to use me the way he did. Four years is a VERY long time to remain committed to someone, to try every waking moment to fix a problem you didn't create to begin with. I won't say that I didn't know about his problems where comittment and communication is concerned, but we had talked about it so often, and I asked him SO many times and when you love someone, you HAVE to trust them, you have to believe what it is they say or you've got nothing. Do I think he loved me? I don't know.   I do know that he is so numb, so devoid of feeling that he has to have these women...and more to feel something. Have I tried to hurt him? Yes, I think I have, it is human nature to strike out when angry, when hurt. Josh has done to me exactly what was done to him over and over and over by the people who were supposed to care about him the most. Only I didn't see it coming, but it's had the same effect on me that it's had on him. Right now, I trust no one.   What I really have problems with is the HUGE deception he orchestrated. Am I afraid? Yes, first I'm afraid he will come back and second I'm afraid that I may have learned from him how not to trust or love again.
Even for the most abused, it is hard to let go of what you've convienced yourself is the truth, even when it's staring you in the face. And yes, I did use the word abuse. He did abuse me, he used my emotions and my trust against me to do nothing more than hurt me. He did admit to lying and cheating but he's also followed it up by saying it was MY fault. It was MY fault he lied and cheated and decieved me on purpose. For the life of me I can't figure out why it was my fault, and you know what, it wasn't. I gave him room when he asked for it, I supported him when he needed it and have been here for him. I am not to blame for his inability to tell the truth or to be faithful, that comes from his childhood. I believed I was in a monogomous relationship with someone who loved me and who wanted to and was working on his problems. He clearly wanted me to believe this, he knew that if I ever found out, I wouldn't be around anymore....and I'm not; if he had come clean when I asked, would things be different? I'm working on a counseling masters degree and I truly and whole heartedly believe that people CAN change, but they have to want to.......Josh doesn't believe that there is anything wrong with him and he doesn't believe he did anything wrong. He believes it's his right to lie and cheat and use people. He says that most of our relationship was bad, well, knowing what he knew and the women he saw, yes, I agree, it was bad, but from my side, it wasn't, being ignorant of the truth, we had a good relationship, yes there were some problems, but I believed WE were working on them, had I ever known........ No one should be allowed to decieve someone to this degree, no one.

You Were Right

You Would tell me
You didn't deserve to be loved
And I wondered many times
Why you would think that
I've come to find out
That you knew more than I
About secrets kept
Deeds done
And the true ways of your heart
And I'ved decided that you were right
Just this once
You don't deserve to be loved
Not with someone's whole heart
You shouldn't be trusted with someone's hopes
Someone's dreams
Because you can't care about anyone
Other than yourself
No real feelings do you have
You use people for what they can give you
A false sense of security you give
Lies and cheating
Hurting those who care about you
You were right,
You don't deserve to be loved