First love

I met my first love 37 years ago. We fell in love, admitted it to each other and agreed to do nothing about it as we were both married with young families. In his words, "I can't keep it light, can you?" I couldn't have either. Our parting was heartbreaking and for months/years I longed for him.
Four years later, I got divorced but didn't contact him, respecting his wishes. He would have known I was divorced anyway because he was my son's tutor at school. Three more years went by and I met and subsequently married, Mr Specki. I loved him but not in the same way, more like sibling love (with incest!).
Then I learned that my first love had committed suicide. Not one day has gone by in 37 years that I have not thought about him. And after he died I was plagued with the idea that if we had not been so noble, maybe he would still be here. Nothing can bring him back but he lives on in my heart and will do always.

Oh, specki, that is so poignant. We will never know what might have been, but that doesn't stop us from speculating, does it?

How sad specki.

Gosh..that is a touching tale . Hope you can have happy memories of him too

specki

I wrote an article about my first love and it was printed in a Uk magazine.
I never expected that. I decided I had better get in touch with him and thought that his brother who had a business might ease the way though the internet connection. This contact worked out well and I was able to email him and tell him about the magazine article.
He reacted so strongly that he insisted on coming to visit me with his second wife immediately, although we live now so far apart. The visit took place 5 years ago and it was awful! It was the end of my dreams. He was not fat or bald but he was an old man!

He got on well with my husband and they wanted us to carry on visiting. No way! I realised I just didn't want to live my life backwards. It was a very uspetting time as I found out that a lot of what he had told me years ago was not true.
There was one thing though. The younger generation began to see me in another light. DD2 complained that I no longer had time to listen to her troubles etc.You're so taken up with HIM! she said.
Well I was, but not after I had seen him again.

So sad Specki ....if only ?????
I met my first love when I was 13 (almost 14) and he was almost 17.
He was polite, gentle and didn't behave like a lots of boys of his age.

we got engaged when I was 18 and married when I was 21 (just after qualifying as a teacher)......and in August we will have been married 43 yrs.

There have been difficult times and sad times but we are so grateful for our 3 wonderful daughters and 5 fantastic grandchildren.

DH's very poor health brings new challenges and at times I could ''Run away'' ...but I would be back within the hour as I am his carer 24/7 and he needs me ..and we still love each other in a very different way.

I write in disguise and shame. It truly isn't worth the pain it causes. My first love got in touch with me through Friends Reunited 3 years ago. I was reluctant to renew the contact after 45 years but as he said he was married and had grandchildren AND he lived in Queensland I thought it was safe and OK. However he worked for a global firm and came regularly to London. I agreed to meet him for coffee!!!It was absolute fireworks immediately and on our third meeting we ended up in the Dorchester!I have visited him twice over the last two years in Oz and its still as electric as ever, but no more. My husband has found out, his wife has found out, consequently lots of sadness and soul searching but at the end of the day we are in our sixties have wonderful children and grandchildren, live the other side of the world and have to be realistic. Don't ever consider 'if only.......'

Mel has just summed up what I was going to say - you cannot go back. Reliving an old love is playing with fire when it comes to existing partner. The old love has an aura of a dream - of a flame burning - but you have not washed his socks or underpants, and he has not mopped up your sick - there is a tendency to have rose-tinted glasses when you look through the retrospectoscope. Beware polytunnel - you could be playing with fire!

specki - that is a sad tale. You have my sympathies.

It feels a bit like unfinished business to me ...I don't know if it is but I am willing to talk a while and goodness I am not the person he loved then and I am sure he is not the person I loved but it gives me butterflies...I have never been unfaithful to my hubby and do not intend to be but it is so lovely to know that someone remembers the feelings we shared even if they are not the same now...I will try not to wear my rose tinted glasses and accept it as a friendship as that may be all it will be...we had our time and I could not jeopardise what I have. If I was advising any of my friends I would say be realistic...and that is what I hope I can be...thanks for your stories....I think love when you are young is so intense and new and wonderful that the feeling remains but as you say it could be flamable...need to keep the battery in my smoke alarm working...

Thank you for you flowers and expressions of sympathy. Gransnet should be proud because that is the first time I have told my sad story. No-one knew except us and after he died, I couldn't speak about it to anyone close. I have found the sharing of it extremely cathartic. Thank you Gransnet

Oh Specki how touching, how sad.

And (((hugs)))

specki I've just caught up with GN after being away. Your story is so sad, you were very courageous and selfless. You have my sympathies.

In reply to Pollytunnel yes I still love my first (and what was my only) one.

We met at 15, courted for 5 years (do they still court today?), was married for 57 years when she died over 4 years ago, and I still love and miss her.

I wouldn't change it for anything but I suppose it is realy a matter of luck or good fortune, and I feel I was very lucky.

Viduo

Fun and joyous though it often was, I don't believe the first love is the one that matters – it's the the last and lasting one that really counts.

Sometimes that is one and the same thing absent Mr harri and I will have been married 45 years next month and we have been together 50 years next July.

Anno...lovely!

I met my first love when I was seventeen and we married eighteen months later, we had almost fifty seven years of happy and contented marriage before he died five years ago, I don't regret a minute of it and still miss him lots, not to say we didn't have arguments but we agreed to disagree on some subjects which seemed to work.

My first love was a university romance, quite short, we were star-crossed lovers, pulled together but ever apart (cue violins and music in a minor key). However the affair shook me to the core and recovery was slow.

A few years after we graduated I heard he was married and a while later I married my VDH, also a university friend. For the first few years I was haunted by the fear of my past romance coming back into my life unattached. Fortunately he was in one of those professions that had published membership lists always available at the local library so I knew where he lived and worked, and it was well away from where we lived.

One day I woke up and knew if I ever saw him again, the most I would feel was friendship. My DH, our children and the life we had made together made the past, just what it was, the past.

Once or twice recently I have googled my first love's name and profession but nothing has come up. I suspect if we met now we would probably have nothing in common. I am not sure I would want to make contact anyway. My Romeo and Juliet romance, without the deaths, lives on in my memory, tucked in its little box, smelling faintly of lavender. I would like to leave it that way. It might all crumble away if once exposed to the cruel light of day.

Met up again after 40 years through contact online. The feelings are still there ,as they always have been. Circumstances caused us to go in different directions and we both married others. I wasn't unhappy, but constantly aware of wishing we could have stayed together. I no longer have my husband,but he is ,I'm sure, still happily married. His wife is very nice and we get on well ,but, try as I might, I can't help feeling envious that I met him too early and she met him at the right time! Feel guilty about this and wish I could dislike him, but to no avail. Help,anyone?

Wise words Flickety - thank you.
Specki

Oh what stories we have to tell...........
My first love was called Billie Whitehead and I was five years old, he was six or possibly seven. We played catch-a-girl, kiss-a-girl in the playground and I always wanted to be caught by him. I moved to another school when I was seven, but fantasized about him until I was about thirteen and finally gave up my dream of meeting him again. I always believed that the experience gave me some very useful insights when I was teaching infants - about how deep some children's emotions go.