I am engulfed with guilt and shame for my actions (in short ? an emotional affair that got physical twice ? backstory
) and I expect that I will always feel this way. I?ve ruined my life and trashed my wedding vows and we will never recover from it.
Sorry for using this place to vent. It has been a safe place for me to do that in the past and people have given me so much to think about previously and helped me to order my thinking (as well as some deserved b***ings).
Recognising the damage that I?ve done and the pain I have caused and continue to cause haunts me. I?ve spent a lot of time trying to redirect my energy and pouring my attention into my family life. Things have improved to a point I didn?t think we could get back to. Having come this far I can see that the relationship is salvageable and that is what I must do for everyone. This is a step forward from the brink I was on where I was definitive about wanting out and wanting to be on my own. If we can make it work it will be so much better for DD (3).
So, to the present. I cannot bring myself to be intimate with DH. I can see that he is attractive and I want to be able to be intimate because I can see that it will help to heal things and without that intimacy, the relationship will surely never survive. We are now into years plural rather than months since. I have quite a physical reaction to any suggestion of it (aversion) which I try and suppress. I don?t know why but I suspect it is linked to the guilt and the shame I feel. However hard I try to overcome it, I hit a brick wall.
And there is a pervasive sadness and sense of loss in my life now. I miss the OM although I do not want him in my life. We have extremely little contact now, working towards none at all. I cannot shake a sense of responsibility for him and what has happened to his life in the last 2 years. We have met up twioce in the last 9 months and each time was painful in the sense of sharing an understanding of the awfulness of our actions. These were not meetings to regress to what had happened but to try and make sense of it. He expressed anger at himself, at me at our mutual stupidity and selfishness. He talked about the impact of his actions on his family and how disgusted he is with himself. How he feels unable to get over the fact that he crossed such a moral line. How much he believes in marriage and how he cannot believe how he could be capable of messing with two marriages. He talked of completely losing it with someone who was attached who he (maybe mistakenly) felt was coming onto him. Verbally assaulted her in rage at the prospect of it. We both have struggled with previously thinking of ourselves as good people and not feeling like we have any solid ground under our feet any longer. If we were capable of adultery, what hope is there. I?ve sat and cried with him. Sad, stupid, selfish fools in crisis finding solace together. He says that he does not know what he can be to me. Best to withdraw altogether but we have both found it difficult to make the definitive and final push away. We both know that there is no future of any kind for us and nor do we deserve one but it is hard to push away somebody altogether that you feel understands you so well. We can?t be friends to each other and we certainly can?t be ?more? but for all that I pray to find the strength to never ever see him again in any capacity. He is clear that he would never ever cross any line with me. There is no sense in it. I miss him more for his friendship and advice and guidance, wit and sharp thinking than for any of the other stuff. I know I have to leave it be but it is very difficult when it feels like the best friend you?ve ever had who can read you and see right into you is so toxic to you. Meeting him ruined my life but the disgust I feel at my actions cannot bring me to hate him or even dislike him.
So many lies and damage done. The shame I feel is like a burning sensation in my chest. It wakes me up in the night and makes me want to throw up when I catch sight of DH or DD on certain days.
I?ve tried to tell DH but I?m too much of a coward to force the rest of the truth on him. To admit that I fell deeply in love with somebody else. That the pain of not seeing him has caused me to question my sanity at times. That I became a bad person as a result of it.
I?ve made progress with my DD in the last year, I?ve found a better balance with work and home. I feel a better mum for it although I still loathe myself for what has happened.
I know that the guilt and the shame are part of the punishment and I know I don?t deserve anything different but I want to heal things, I want a better future and more stable home for my DD and I want to try and repair some of the damage I?ve done.