She says that she has been unhappy with our marriage because I smoke marijuana

MyGodINeverImagined

It has been one month as of yesterday since I found out.

In early May my wife told me she was having anxiety attacks and that she wanted to see a couselor about it. I asked her "is it about work?" "No" she says. Is it about this, is it about that, I continue. No she says. Is it about us? "I don't know" she says. Aha, I think. I'm onto something. Over the next few days, I gently prod until I finally get it out of her. She is unhappy. We talk, we each offer to move out. She tells me what she is unhappy with (more of that later), I agree to change it, and we agree to go to a counselor.

She says that she has been unhappy with our marriage because I, shamefully, have been smoking marijuana. Doing so, I am lazy, and we haven't been sharing activities together. For this I am sorry, and truthfully, was not happy with myself. I do not want to look back upon my life at the end of my days and just see myself sitting on a couch through a haze of marijuana smoke, so, regardless of what happens with our marriage, this is done.

We had seen a marriage counselor several months previous and this subject never came up. I had thought we were there to work on the way we disagreed about things. I tend to storm at people when I am upset, hammering them with comment after comment, making them feel small. I hate this about myself. She tends to shut down and not respond to anything.

However, I am affectionate, but our sex life stank, in both quality and quantity. I am loyal, yet I believe I left her feeling lonely, unwanted, unfulfilled. I feel horrible. I feel guilty about what follows, as though I am responsible, and I could of stopped it.


After this discussion I asked her if there was someone else, she said no. I asked and pointed out that maybe there was just someone else she was flirting with, but perhaps she hadn't consumated anything. Again, she said no. I was suspicious.

Every year she plans a trip w/ her college friends (all female). This year they are going to Cabo. I got into her email and discovered that she had invited a man. He said no, as it was too expensive. She asked him to reconsider, offering to let him stay in the room with them. (Our time share!!). She asked her friends if it was o.k., promising to "respect them and not carry on while they are in the room." I saw other emails between them, chat transcripts, etc.... The terms of endearments they used for each other haunt me. She says they have not had sex. I don't know whether to believe this or not, it is plausible, as he lives in another state and they only saw each other as they worked on a project in yet a third state.

What followed was pure torture. She said she would not talk to him unless absolutely necessary for business. She said she would delete him and block him from her chat client. I soon discovered they were making stupid excuses to talk to one another, and suspicious, I checked her client and noticed that she added him back on. I was devastated. I called her, at her project location, and she flew home. She arrived drunk. She said she needed "space" to figure out what she wanted. I told her she could have all the space she wanted, but what she didn't have was time. A couple days later I pushed her for an answer. Do you want to work on our marriage or not? No, she answered. I ranted. She changed her mind and so we work on it.

She says she is still tempted to speak w/ him. She says she feels/felt a strong connection. She says he is not going to Cabo w/ her anymore.

I need to speak out the pain that I feel. Everytime I do, she withdraws, feeling as though I am beating her up. She is not who I want to beat up. I can't concentrate at work, I can't think about anything else. I want the pain to end. The only way I can think of to end this hurt, is to hate her, to give up on the hope that we will work through this. I still look around her mail, hoping to find evidence of continued contact, that perhaps they slept together, so I can walk away, so I can give up. So I'll know.

I feel guilty, I feel responsible for this. I feel angry, enraged. I am hurt. I fear the future and fear a breakdown.

Dazed, your post has touched me deeply. Please give me your thoughts. Please tell me it has gotten better. Please somebody tell me the darkness will lift.