redpoppy Posted December 15, 2005 Posted December 15, 2005 Hi to you all visiting this site. I've been reading your wise words of help and support to each other and you're helping me a lot to understand myself and my situation. However, everyone's situation is very individual and personal to them and there is not one that is identical because of our very natures. I'm hoping someone may remember my story as i've posted here before but in case not, i will condense it and fly over it and hope that someone can spare the time to come back to me. Husband and i extremely happily married for 30 years, he worshipped me and never gave me any grounds for worry or concern. However i needed out but didn't know why 3 years ago and as i was extremely depressed at the time i found all kinds of reasons why i should leave. I know how much i hurt him and he has hurt me too of late when he turned the tables around and left me 18 months ago to be with another woman, who he had turned to after i left him. We stayed in each other's lives for the first 18 months including sex and cooking and dating but then it all changed when he went off with a woman he knew fancied him and was available after i had been flippant to him. He broke it off with her and came back to me but because my problems were all too many and still undisclosed even to me we still werent communicating and it went downhill until he told me we should get a divorce 18 months ago. It was at this point that i had the nervous breakdown which i had been heading for and it was also at this point that it was discovered that as well as being sexually abused in my childhood i had also been suffering with ocd - contamination ocd which i had tried all my life to hide from everyone but not always succeeded. Anyhow the present situation is that we were to divorce last year in November but it still hasn't happened. We went back to seeing our grandchildren on a saturday afternoon together as my husband said we should do it for the children and we've also been sharing all the family (both sides) with birthday presents and christmas presents. We split it right down the middle with me usually buying it and wrapping it and my husband paying his half. He visits my parents once every 10 days as i do his mother. He always texts me mid week, usually just making conversation. His relationship with the other woman as far as i know is kept very quiet. He sees her several times a week and went on holiday with her this year. She is about to go to America but not with my husband. His daughter and him recently had a big row as he had changed seeming always to be putting the other woman in front of his daughter and her family and in that conversation it came out that the other woman wouldnt move in with him unless he was divorced (shame she couldnt have those principles while we were still in a relationship) i intercepted many texts from her when they had first finished telling him she was always available for him. I've come to terms with my ocd and my past csa with lots of therapy and hard work. I don't feel any anger any more, having suppressed it for many years and now let it out. I know i can't go back, we can't go back but i still love him deeply and feel heartbroken that all this has happened. I've told him several times that i want him back, to put this all behind us but he never makes any comment. I've moved house, i've made new friends, i've got a new job and i go out now and again but i still love him and i don't want another relationship only friendship with other men. I've told it briefly and with no holds barred and if anyone can make a comment i would be more than happy to read it and i thank you for reading this as i know it got long even when i tried to condense it. With many thank yous and a big thank you for your time. A deeply confused and hurting Poppy.
riobikini Posted December 16, 2005 Posted December 16, 2005 Poppy....you have lived in emotional pain for years and have gone great lengths to appear 'normal' to others, including your husband. It sounds like you stuffed so much inside over the years that you really didn't need all this pain of breaking apart on top of everything. You got help for your emotional problems and still, it made no difference in his decision. Could it be that he is happy that you have now received help that you had been needing all along and felt 'safe' in leaving the relationship, now? It is clear that, he does still care about you in ways that credit him with the decency of having been your husband for so long, but he has, perhaps, only been waiting to know that you are getting help so that he could leave you without the full onslaught of guilt. Poppy...life is all about YOU, now. It's not about how you lived before, -it's all about how much better you can become. By all means continue your treatment & therapy. You do need people to listen to you aside from the professional help you are getting. Include a few close friends in on what has happened in your life and make a few new ones, too. This man will probably not be coming back. But inside, you already know that. He will remain close to you because of the family ties with the children and the grandchildren and this will probably cause your pain to heal less fast than if he'd just died or something because you will continue to have to hear about him, or see him from time to time. Change your focus. Stop worrying about his life and focus on your own. It's easier said than done...but you can do it. You are a valuable human being and you have lots of love and experience to offer someone....someone who values YOU and loves YOU, in return. Take a deep breath. Let him go. And start your new life by loving YOURSELF first. You can do it. Keep us posted. -Rio
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