I'm torn...
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I'm torn...
| Wed, 01-14-2004 - 11:43am |
I've been married for 7 years and have a 4 year old and another child on the way. I know I will appear to be the villian in what I describe and I understand that. But in the last 6 weeks I have fallen for an online friend I've known for 3 years. She is an honest, caring person and neither of us intended for this to happen. My marriage isn't a violent or even a terribly angry one, but I haven't been happy for years. My wife has been nonresponsive and detached for a long time and unfortunately we never did anything to resolve this. My dilemma now is the other woman and I are in love (believe me, I'm not an impetuous person who just falls in love) and want to be together. I've told my wife about the affair (I don't even like calling it that) and while she was devastated, she wants to try to make it work. I still love my wife, but not in the way I need to. Part of me wants to give her what I feel she deserves and that is an honest effort. And on top of that, I love my son with all my heart and have difficulty imagining living without him everyday. On the other side, I see in this other person the potential for the kind of long-lasting, fulfilling relationship I feel I deserve. I know some of you may say I should give my marriage a chance and if it is meant to be with the other woman, it will be. But I don't believe in meant to be. And I guess I don't want to stay in my marriage out of fear and guilt, which is what I think I would be doing. And I'm also scared I may resent my wife for causing me to miss out on the opportunity to be with the other person. I know I sound completely selfish but I'm seriously on the verge of leaving my wife. The other woman and I can't be together full time right now (although she's not married, she does live some distance away). I would really like to just try separating with my wife but she isn't willing to do this. It is all or nothing for her and I guess that is her right. Any and all advice would be appreciated.

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Your OW is not going anywhere that you have to hurry and make this haste decision. I feel that she is very selfish to expect you to leave your wife at this stage of pregnancy. Somebody here rightly suggested that many times we think we have fallen in love with a person and think of them as our soulmate but in online cases there is the chance the impression that we have of them is what our mind has created and it may not be exactly them. In any case, do think of your unborn child and the resentment he/she would have when he/she grows up and finds out that his/her dad deserted him/her. I don't suggest that you stay together with your wife if you have not been happy for so long but don't leave at this stage. Think really hard from all angles and NEVER make haste decisions. One other thing...I believe in karma and in the fact that when you hurt others.... at one or other stage of your life you are going to be hurt too. So whatever you do, don't hurt anybody....do everything gently...give your marriage a chance because that is the priority and make sound (not hasty) decisions.
so you've decided to stay and work on your M, GOOD FOR YOU, your W and your child(ren)! even if the M eventually ends, you've done "the right thing" by staying while your W is pregnant and being there for the birth and afterward so that life gets settled down. counseling CAN help bring issues to the fore that both you and your W need to recognize and work on. and now that your W understands she was "this close" to losing you, she may change and be more responsive to your needs. but in turn, you MUST be more open to making the M work. yes, pine for the "what ifs" with the OW, but after 6-8 weeks and one visit, you cannot possibly know if she's the one for you, to end your marriage, and the two of you cannot even be together right now. i feel you were swept up in the surge of the A and not thinking too straight. but you did listen and make your decision, for which i applaude you!
as for the future, you might lose everything OR gain everything! none of us can predict the future, but it is what you make it, omaha! work on making your M better, for all of you. you've chosen well!
best of luck to all of you,
gurl
You're right, I have worked through a lot in the last couple of weeks. I believe I have made the right choice for now and I do think as I move forward with counseling there is a possibility that I could form a good and healthy relationship with my wife. And please don't think I was deluding myself to the point where I believed I would live happily ever after with the OW. It was more a case of realizing there may be more out there than what I had settled for with my W. So regardless, this has been an eye-opening experience for me. I do cry when I think about the OW but as you said, there are other circumstances keeping us apart for now so that makes it a little easier. I have talked to her once and she and I are dealing with this separately and living our lives the best we can. I will never really be able to make anyone understand how I could fall in love in such a short time because the sum of the parts don't add up to the whole. But suffice it to say she knows me better than anyone on this planet and I know her better than anyone also. She's in my heart and always will be. But I do love her enough also to accept that she may not end up with me. As long as she is happy, I'll be okay. All that said though, I'm also not giving up hope that possibly someday down the road she and I may get another shot. As you said, no one can foresee the future so I'm just living my life day by day and doing the best I can each day. Thank you all for your advice and comments. Obviously I made this decision myself but it does help to hear other viewpoints.
we can always walk away -- from a M, a job, home projects, whatever. it's the staying and finishing them that is the hard part!
the OW will always be the warm loving memory, the what might have been, part of your brain. sometimes we just "connect" with someone and desperately want everything to work out the way we want it, but you and i both know, that just doesn't always happen. you and OW just have bad timing right now, your W's pregnancy AND a four-year-old are just too difficult to throw overboard and walk away from.
you are certainly entitled to be happy in this life. i just don't believe we should hurt everyone else in the process!! i'm right there with you -- but i just can't bring myself (nor can my MM) to hurt everyone in both our lives just because we feel we could have a better life together than apart. i'm too old and self-aware to be that selfish!!
good luck with the counseling and i sincerely hope your life works out the best way for YOU!!
gurl
Well I have agreed with much of what you have said but I disagree with a lot of this last post. First of all, I'm not talking about doing what is easy. No matter what I would have done, it was going to be extremely difficult. I don't like hurting anyone and I put myself in a situation where that was a definite.
Also, I would never be "leaving" my kids. I know divorce would be extremely difficult for them, but my wife and I have agreed on split custody because I am such an involved father. Their lives would be different, but that doesn't automatically make them worse. I know for a fact that my parents stayed together too long "for the kids" and it made our lives miserable because they were both miserable to be around. I will not get to that point I assure you.
If my marriage is salvagable, my wife and I will salvage it. If it isn't, I'm not going to stay and invest years in something that doesn't work. Too many people stay too long and life is too short in my opinion.
You're right that the timing was bad for me and the OW, but that doesn't mean I won't eventually reconnect with her or possibly find happiness with someone else if things don't work out in my marriage. My point is, I'm not looking for perfection, just something real and something better than what I've had. Hopefully I'll find that with my W, but if not then I now know I can and will work to find it elsewhere. And no, that relationship won't be perfect and will require a tremendous amount of work also. But that doesn't mean it won't be better than my current marriage either.
Ultimately I will be making a selfish decision, whether to stay or go. But that doesn't mean I don't consider the feelings of everyone involved. It just means that the decision I make has to make me happy or I'll never really be there for them anyway.
Thank you for your concern and continued support. I'm not disagreeing with you to be contradictory, but I didn't want anyone thinking I fully agreed with what you said either. I appreciate your viewpoints though.
good luck in your future endeavors. you'll need it, no matter what you decide!
gurl
I didn't mean to offend you. Maybe I misunderstood you and you misunderstood me. I don't know. All I know is no two situations are alike. You're right that I would be missing out on a lot of my kids' lives, but I also know that if I continue to stay and am unhappy then I'll miss out on even more because I'll never fully be there. I realize that at some point they may want to choose a place to live. And I can live with that. But that isn't fully their decision either.
In any event, I think we both agree I did the right thing. The only question is what the future holds. And I honestly have no idea. But no matter what, I'm going to do my best. That's pretty much all I can do.
i believe everyone should be happy with their life and life choices. and eventually we all do what we need to do! i totally get what you are saying. i left my marriage because if i didn't i would have had a nervous breakdown and ended up in the hospital, but sanity and reason prevailed and i took the necessary steps for myself and my emotional survival!
life is what you make it, omaha. so make it good sweetie!
gurl
Of course I'm still in agony over losing the OW. She was not just my soulmate, but also my best friend. If it were possible for me to do so, I'm afraid I would run to her now. I don't know how to let her go and part of that is I don't WANT to let her go. Is it wrong for me to want to hold onto those feelings? Can I honestly move forward when all I really want is to have her in my arms and to look into her eyes? I don't know if I can go on with the thought of never seeing her again.
I guess I'm still torn...
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