Affair, can't forget

waccoe_2

justme111 wrote: »

Ps. I wonder what your opinion would be of one of your kids was in a similar situation.

By the time they have reached my age I doubt I will be here to have an opinion, lol.

sammyjammy

If I were one of your children and I knew your relationship as my mum and dad I would feel so sad for both of you. Don't you want to be happy? You are ONLY 56, people find love a lot older than you are. I understand that you don't want to look (me neither and I am 41:o) but yoou never know what might find you.

There are many choices you can make, its not just bachelorhood or stay in an unhappy marriage.

Wishing you the best of luck with your life.

Odette

You need to change, you need to talk to her. I agree completely with poet123, You have hit rock bottom in your relationship doing what you have always been doing. Your wife did something bad but if you want to continue to live with her and raise your children you don't have a choice. You have a great opportunity to grow from this as well as a chance of saving your relationship.

swampduck

Waccoe! I feel for you I really do!! My now ex-husband had a fling with a work colleague and then told me about it! We had been going through a tense time, the children were young and he had had the fling because he thought I had done the same!! His idea was we would be equal and could then say well we have both had a fling so now that's done with lets get on with life!
He refused to leave when I asked him as he thought I wouldn't have him back when I'd had time to get my head round it. He stayed but wouldn't go for counselling and eleven years later I woke up to the fact that he was a control freak. Not so obvious so that other people noticed it but I knew that he didn't want to be alone and that was his issue. When we split up he was with someone else in a matter of days!!
The fact that neither your wife nor you want to be alone and you are using that as an excuse to stay together could in some respects be a base to work from but as others have said communication is what will get you through this. You have done the same as I did - anything for a quiet life. But what happens when the kids leave home?
Will you and your wife still have a life together? Will you still be talking? Will your wife have dealt with her issues? Will she still lay the blame for these issues at your feet? These are all questions and probably loads more that you should be asking yourself and you do need to talk. But personally I would say not to your wife - you need someone dispassionate and uninvolved.
My family were aghast with shock when I suddenly upped and left and thought I had gone insane! But I had never discussed it with anyone in the family and very few friends knew about it either.
But you must not let this turn you into a bitter man - you admit to not revealing how you feel generally and this could have huge repercussions in the future regarding your state of mind and even your health. Staying together for companionship might be good idea now but what if you meet someone else who could do so much more for you than your wife does now?
It could take days, weeks, months or years before you find the answers but in the meantime you still have a life to live here and now! A friend said to me when I left my ex-husband - People who live in the past have no future!
You have to look to your future because it remains in your hands as to whether you live a happy life or not.

Swampy

swampduck

waccoe wrote: »

What will she do when the children have all left home ? - does she have a job ?
She will find plenty to do and there are 2 children who live locally, 1 still at home and soon 2 at uni.
My wife has never worked but she has had a full time job of bringing 5 children up.

I guess she is now mid - late 40's with daughters (?) who are in their late teens / early 20's ?
She is 60 but looks 45/50.

I can't help thinking your wife has been a spoilt brat - you were obviously able to keep her in a fashion to which she has become accustomed to. The shock of having to get a job and fend for herself might be the impetus she needs to start treating you with the respect that her husband deserves. She is on a cushy number and she knows it!!

Sorry for the rant but I just suddenly saw red!!:mad:

Swampy

justme111

Waccoe , you know the question meant "in a hypothetical case", you avoided answeri.g it. Is it because you are doing something contrary to what you would advised to your son to do ?
Yes not rocking the boat and fear of the unknown are understandable.
I guess sometimes there are no appealing options and its the choice between bad and bad..

waccoe_2

[QUOTE=
Sorry for the rant but I just suddenly saw red [/QUOTE]
Swampy, you talk a lot of sense but this was my favourite bit, it made me smile, thanks.

waccoe_2

justme111 wrote: »

Waccoe , you know the question meant "in a hypothetical case", you avoided answeri.g it. Is it because you are doing something contrary to what you would advised to your son to do ?
Yes not rocking the boat and fear of the unknown are understandable.
I guess sometimes there are no appealing options and its the choice between bad and bad..

Yes justme, I was avoiding answering and making light of it. Because we both know the answer and that hit a nerve.

justme111

Although there is another option - staying put and changing whatever you dont Luke about yourself , ie becoming a better person. Then you would see situation in a different light and relationships dynamic would change

victory

waccoe wrote: »

All your comments are spot on. Just to answer a couple.
June Cambridge "How do you feel now about her affair now? Have you managed to come to terms with it? Does she still compare you with him?"
I will never get over the fact she had an affair, I try to forget but I just can't forgive. Yes, I think she does compare me with him. If you look back at one of my previous postings, when I wrote that her cousin (her best friend) told her "****(me) will never be ****(him)". This kills me every time I think about that statement.
In reply to you , marisco, "Forgive me for saying this if you consider it to be out of turn, but I cant help but feel that you are bravely trying to forgive, ignore and overlook, hoping things will improve, while trying to stave off the effects of your wife's hostility and treatment of you,"
Yes to all this but I am 56 years old, never looked at another woman and have no interest in doing so. We have 5 children together, 2 live in their own houses totally independant but we like to help them out, next one still lives at home, good lad, no trouble, low wage, help him as well, next 2 at uni who need a lot of helping out. As our family is the most important thing in me and my wife's lives we would never do anything to upset the very comfortable position we have found ourselves in.
I know our children should be standing on their own feet but it gives us great joy and my wife came from a very tough up bringing up so we want our children to have everything she didn't.
I am starting to ramble now, so will stop now, lol.

I have read your entire thread from when it started and have posted little, until now, thought best to keep out of it because all I have is a very similar story to share and you could read the story and think' well that's fine but this is my life' but this story is about a life.

My friend, let's call her Ann was married for 27 years and knew her husband 8 years before that, 35 years in total, three kids and 2 little beautiful grandkids.

Year 27 her husband told her he had an affair.

She used to come into work, looking haunted, blank , sobbed , screamed, yelled, stopped going out, never wore any make up, could barely find the strength to brush her hair.....

She would question everything 'why her?' 'could she have prevented it?' She was angry and bitter, unsettled and distraught, her mind would go into overdrive constantly.

Lots of talking later, they both decided even though the kids had left home they would stay together in the same house and move forward the best they could.

For a while it seemed the solution, not ideal but workable until Ann started not to be able to sleep, she would have dreams that her OH had had another affair, that she could not find him and began questioning 'what if he had another affair and brought her home?'
'what if he just left and did not tell her?' She couldn't relax, she was stressed, unhappy and would sob so much....

One day, she left, she moved into a tiny little place and sobbed some more, thinking she had made a mistake, that there was no life left, that her kids would be so unhappy... but her friends and family knocked her door and took her out, slowly, very slowly Ann went to bingo, out for a walk, on an outing, over to a family for sunday lunch, they carried her through it and slowly they put her back together and allowed her to have her own wings.

Ann found what she was looking for- peace of mind.

Boy did she go through it, she sobbed so hard at times she said to me ' I thought my head was going to fall off'

She is now 66. Ann tells me she has met 'a friend' who 'she is fond of'.

Ann says that life is an adventure, maybe your lovely kids could take their dad on a little adventure the next time they go on one and help you find your own 'peace of mind'?