Am I at that point?
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Am I at that point?
| Mon, 02-26-2007 - 3:13pm |
I'm looking for advice from those who have been there done that. my husband and i have had a wonderful relationship for the last 7 years but things changed last year and haven't been the same since. years ago i couldn't imagine being with another man and i knew in my heart that my husband and i were a wonderful couple and would be together for ever. we had a few things happen last year, all of which were his doing and he'd tell you the same thing. And since then, i can't look at him the same way anymore, i'm not attracted to him, i'm disgusted by him. he's trying so hard to make this marriage work and i believe that if i wanted it to work, it could. he's a great man, really he is, but we are more like best friends than lovers. then about a month ago i started having an affair. i'm by no means in love with this other man, he's just fun and entertaining for now, he's keeping me busy as my marriage falls apart. i want to seperate at least from my husband now, but he doesn't want to. he wants to keep trying. in my mind the relationship is dead. but i'm terrified to make a huge mistake. what if it really could work? what if my feelings for him change someday? and now that i've taken it to this new level of cheating, does that mean the relationship is dead for good? were any of you to this point when you decided to get divorced or does it sound like i should stick around and make it work. we have two kids, we're not very well off financially so divorce is going to be very hard. still, i don't want to stay in an unhappy relationship....
Edited 2/28/2007 5:42 pm ET by babydollcd
Edited 2/28/2007 5:42 pm ET by babydollcd

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The worst part is that I have absolutely no family support- they have said that if I do this they will write me off and that my dilusions of wanting more out of a marriage are childish and unrealistic... I am in a bad place lately and really am at a loss of what to do...
So I feel your pain- this is the worst place to be in because its such a gray area and no one understands.
I don't have alot of time and I don't know any of the details of your situation so my response may be overly simplistic, but *work on your marriage.* Affairs do not provide clarity; they just confuse your heart, mind and soul. Marriage counseling and/or individual counseling can help. Marriage is a commitment; you should work really hard before foregoing that commitment.
Now you may have done so and you don't say what happened a year ago. Without that info I may not really be responding in a relevant manner. Some marriages need to end for the mental, emotional and physical well-being of the people involved, but many marriages end because the partner(s) weren't willing to work at it.
I hope you can find your way to your answer.
M
I stayed in my marriage until I exhausted every possible chance to make it work. I made sure my step daughters graduated high school, and even wrote my ex-wife phd dissertation to make sure she graduated with her degree in BioEngineering. I had many chances to stray, but I resisted the urge. That's just me.
In your case, it sounds like you have been testing the waters of divorce or an affair for a while. It sounds a little like you had decided not-to-decide and waited until some event drove you to a situation that your husband would never forgive or want ot work on. This is unfair to him.
First, you need to end this affair. It has no where to go but disaster. Stop worrying if you made a mistake or not. The affair is fact. It was a mistake. Now come the consequences.
Second, you need to decide if you want marriage or divorce, and follow it through until it happens. Quite frankly, it sounds like you want divorce. So if its divorce you want, talk to a lawyer and get the facts of how much it costs, who gets what, etc. And since you cheated, you can expect a very bad reaction from your husband, and he'll probably fight you (out of anger).
Lastly -- this is a major life decision, and yet you are very passive about it. You need to understand this (with counceling, books, groups, what ever works for you). This is a big red flag that you need to work on so it does not happen again (even if you stay married).
Good luck.
Some may argue this point but it seems that there are many emotions that you have kept from your husband and he is tredding water desparately to make some sense of what is keeping you from totally letting go and allowing yourself to explore every aspect of what could be good in this relationship.
If you are going to attempt to establish relationship on solid ground, he deserves to know what he is working with.
Peace,
Di
***If you cannot define yourself, your circumstances will.***
Have to add my 2 cents here. People have affairs because they are either lacking something inside themselves, or there IS something lacking in their relationship. It's hard to figure out what your motives are, and this is where therapy is a GREAT option. It is possible that something in the marriage is leaving a need unmet in babydoll. Before you give up on your M completely, bdoll, find someone competant and qualified to talk to about what is REALLY going on in your head. I know from experience. I thought I had a great M, until I had an affair. The whole thing got to be so painful, they always do, that I sought help from a great therapist to figure out just what was happening. After some individual therapy, my H and I are now in MC. Somethings I never expected have come up in marriage counseling, and I am just starting to see what the problems actually are- I started this process 6 months ago! The crazy thing is my H, who has seen me cry and struggle with this marriage for a long time now, is actually starting to acknowledge that we DO have problems- namely in the way we communicate. He's been cut off from his feelings for a long time now, and it's created a huge distance between us...it happened so slowly, I didn't even see it. Or, rather, I chose to look at the overall friendship we had and thought "this is ok", instead of allowing myself to know that our marriage was failing. I still don't know what we are going to do, I'm going to stay with a friend for awhile later this month.
Babydoll, end the affair while it is still easy to do. it will get harder if you keep it up. First figure out what REALLY happened to your marriage. Then you might feel the freedom to leave without regret, or stay if that seems to be the best thing FOR YOU.
just read your post and had to add my opinion. i am in almost the same position as you, although, my husband and i haven't had such a great marriage since about 6 months before we got married. yeah, i know, shouldn't have gone through with it, but for whatever the reasons, it is done. i gave absolutely everything into this marriage because i wanted it to work, even if i had to deal with the odd things he was doing, which i didn't realize were going to cause major problems down the road. well, it turns out, after 5 years of marriage counselling and about the same amount of time with him seeing his own psychologist, that it is never going to work. for many reasons that are too much to write. but the thing is, after i gave up wanting to try to work on the marriage, he all the sudden wanted to. but at that point i had no feelings for him beyond resentment. absolutely none. then i got pregnant. we now have two children. i am questioning myself as to wether i again try to work on it, regardless of my lack of feelings for him (or negative ones that i have most of the time if i have any), for the two kids, or do i go through the unpleasntness and hard times and be happier in the end. my husband is also emotionally abusive towards me, and just the other day he started on my two year old. that right there is telling me that i should leave him, but i am so scared of taking the kids away from their dad. but if he is going to do to them the things he does to me, it would be worse in the end.
i am also in an affair, but like you, it is just something to amuse me, and can be ended at any time. there is no way in the world that this other man would ever become a permanent fixture in my life - he's too immature. so i don't know what to tell you, other than you aren't alone in it. i personally wouldn't stay if there were no feelings...that you and he had a good first couple of years should make the divorce easier and less nasty and maybe even amicable. i wouldn't tell him about the affair though...would just muddy things. my opinion, nothing more. it's hard.
Your still on the fence about marriage.
If ending your affair is easy to do, do it now. Not tomorrow, now.
I agree with the other general opinions of other posters -- personal counceling of some kind would be a very good option for you. In order to get to where you are now, a very long chain of events has taken place. It will take time to understand what has happened and why. What's missing? What's not working? Why are you so iffy about marriage?
Get your head straight before you make any big decisions.
If you tell your spouse about the affair, be prepared for a whirl-wind. It will be unpleasant and ugly.
In my experience, when the Cheater gets to admit to the affair, they do so to feel better and/or avoid a nagging sense of giult. I have yet to know anyone who cheated and confessed to do so for the betterment of their marriage. I suppose its possible, but I have not met anyone who has done this. In my observation, the confession was masked as "being completely hosest", but the net effect is the same. The Cheater gets to feel better, the betrayed feels much worse.
If you confess your sins, how much penance are you willing to do?
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