butterflycardinal Posted June 6, 2011 Posted June 6, 2011 Unhappily married for many years I entered an EA over three years ago. At the height of the emotions and newness of it my husband made a major decision without discussing it with me to relocate. I decided to stay behind. I live alone for some time and filed for divorce. My love has already divorced once and was engaged when we started our affair. He married her anyway and claims he is as miserable as I am after 26 years of marriage. At the beginning he said this is just an affair. He will not fall in love with me and if I fall in love with him, it is over. Well I did fall in love and he didn't end it. A few months later he admitted he loved me, too, but couldn't leave his wife due to financial reasons. I figured I was just caught up in the excitement of it and decided to call off my divorce. I moved across the country and have been living with my husband for 10 months now. We are still miserable but my MM now says he can't live without me and doesn't want this to end. We talk nearly every day and I have returned home nearly every month for one excuse or another to see him. He says his marriage will end. He just doesn't know when. I feel terrible living this way. I feel that if he really wanted to be with me, he would have figured it out by now. It has been over three years since it started and ten months since I left. I feel like I can't move forward because I am waiting for him. We are so compatible in so many ways. I feel that he has tried to be as honest with me as possible under the circumstances and tries very hard not to hurt my feelings. We have talked so much that I feel he is a part of me. I feel that if all this was about was sex, he would have just moved on when I left the state. I am feeling very stressed about the situation. I hate living apart from him and yet that is not under my control. I would like to say goodbye but can't imagine him not in my life. I wish I could be friends and not desire anything from him but I can't. How do you dig yourself out of all these feelings? Has anyone left their signicant other without hating him and having a falling out? Can you gracefully say goodbye? Is it possible to still be friends? When will I stop hoping when the phone rings that it is him? I guess I feel the need to end this for my own sanity but fear the ending is the very thing that will make me insane.
whichwayisup Posted June 6, 2011 Posted June 6, 2011 I think you need to go through with the divorce since you aren't in love with your husband and HE deserves a woman who will love only him and not cheat on him. Does he know of your cheating? As for your MM, well, until he D's and has proof, then he is still very married reguardless of what he tells you. So what if he misses you and loves you! He has a wife and a life built with someone else. He can say 100 times that he wants to be with you, it means nothing unless he actually puts a plan into action and serves his wife with divorce papers! Tell him goodbye and to contact you when he's sorted out his life, divorced and been on his own for a while and then maybe you'd consider dating him and getting to know him outside of the affair dynamic. Stay with him and you'll be the OW for a very long time and be second fiddle in his life.
MissBee Posted June 6, 2011 Posted June 6, 2011 I don't think you should stay with your husband if you're unhappy...I don't really get your reason for stopping your divorce. Are you trying to make things work (it doesn't seem that way) and if not then what reason do you have? I've learned: things may not be easy, but they are simple. If your MM was unhappy while engaged, I have no idea what sense it makes to get married He had a choice, a simple one at that. He could have jumped ship before it was anchored, so to speak. The whole mess just seems...messy. Just people fumbling about, making nonsensical decisions on obscure premises and then ending up being unhappy. I assume much of it is fear of the unknown and looking for guarantees and not wanting to make a decision that is final without looking back, so you both are dangling on the fence or in some strange gray area that causes frustration...which is the crux of most affairs. You can't have it both ways....you have to make a choice. YOU. Essentially you can't force his choice or wait for his choice, but make the choice for yourself of where you want your marriage to go or not go, where you want this affair to go or not and then actually take steps towards it. But wallowing in inaction is what is going to drive you crazy.... Letting go of someone you're attached to is one of the most difficult things; however, it's not insurmountable and we all have had an experience of "loving and losing" and it hurting but we move forward from such feelings, life goes back to normal and we love again. You deserve happiness, so does your husband, so does the MM and so does his wife.
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