[working]. I understand completely. I am now exactly 3 weeks on from severing all contact. It had slowed down a lot before, and just before April I thought I was doing well, but I saw him, and it was just like he had this hold over me, like he could ask me to do anything, and I would just blindly follow. I became someone else, I acted in a way I never thought possible. I lied, not just to his wife and my husband (yes I was still married, we split in January, so by April I was single), but to myself. I truly believed he cared for me. Our story is quite different from yours, and yet so very much the same. I fell madly in love with him, and it was just as you describe, the first thing I think of in the morning, the last thing on my mind at night.
I believed we were each others 'true love', which is so pathetic, because I never believed in that twaddle, but with him, I believed it.
I had the old blah blah story about their relationship being on the rocks, but in truth, I should have told him right from the start to contact me when he was single, but I didn't, I hung on for any crumbs he would feed me, I was like his slave. He lives in a different country, made it even more intense. I know it was wrong.
It does get better. Somedays I 'realise' I haven't thought about him all day, those are very sucessfull days. Whilst I am not talking to him, having online chats with him, I can become stronger, and try to understand how on earth I let myself get into the position of being the OW. It is very confusing, I wouldn't like to be on the receiving end either, and still don't condone it, but boy do I understand it. It is one of the hardest things to describe to anyone. You know everything they are telling you is right, yes, he is a (insert own expletive here) and that you were wrong. But it doesn't change how you feel now, and your confusion. So hang in there.
We still have avenues of communication, and I haven't barred him from calling me, but he also, wants to come and visit me in the UK and bring his wife to see me, and after reading this post, I will deffinitely not see them together. For one it will be hell for me, which just shows how little he really appreciates the depth of my feeling and hurt, plus I will not lie to her if she asks me outright. She knows, as does your OM's girlfriend. In a way, I am relieved to no longer be in the middle, or involved. They need to sort their own problems out. She knows what he has done. She herself had an affair, for which he has forgiven her, so they are obviously a couple with problems. Trust me, she knows, no matter what the other bloggers tell you. The best you can do is to remove yourself as much as possible from the situation. It sounds like it will be harder for you than it was/is for me, because you have many common friends etc. But give yourself some breathing space. I must say, when I cut our online chat route off, it actually made me feel suprisingly free, like I had been loosed from some bind. But he wasn't hounding me.
If I saw him now, I know all resistance would crumble, and I can't explain it. He is not the reason I left my husband btw, he was my 'exit affair', (had never heard that term till I came on here), he was the one that gave me courage to leave a very bad marriage. I was the reason his wife decided to stop drinking and start paying attention and got therapy. The reason they have recommitted to their relationship (funny).
So, yes there are others here who know exactly what you are on about. I am sorry for the guilt some of the bloggers are trying to make you feel, that happened to me on another post, you don't need to explain yourself to them, all you need to do is look after yourself now. You have to learn to forgive yourself. My self esteem is still in the toilet, I have decided to give up on being in a relationship for a very long time. I need to love myself, and to feel valuable in my own right before I allow myself to be with someone else. But it is hard though, especially when I start to miss him, even though I know he is building a brand new family home for his family and moving forward with his life, and I was just the entertainment, the therapy even. You are not a bad person, yes, what we did was wrong, but that doesn't make us wrong people, just people who made the wrong choice. We actually suffer far more than people realise, we allowed ourselves to get into this position, and the same poor self esteem that got us here, now beats us up for being here, and obstructs our way from moving forward from here. But you can and you will, and you will be a better, more empathic person for it who has gained a great understanding of the human condition, that we too are not immune to weakness and temptation, no matter how good we try to be or how different it is from how we ever thought we would behave.
Best of luck to you