Feel so utterly worthless after this experience

[crazyafterall]

A lot of this post is just getting it off my chest I suppose as I feel it is eating away at me horribly so hopefully this will help.

I am a longstanding lurker and poster NC because I am totally ashamed.

DH and I are in a sexless marriage. After trying to get him to have sex without feeling like he was doing me a great big favour for 3 years, it has finally reached the point where I don't want him in that way either and we are left with DC and a warm friendship and mutual respect.
I have suffered from mild MH problems for a number of years which must have been v difficult for him to put up with. It has left me unable to work and I am on AD. Sometimes I feel since taking them I have been in a kind of dream...I am 34.
We are on what could be described as a "break" at the moment while I get my head together about what I want to do and what is for the best. DH still wants me and thinks we should stay strong and together for the DC.

The way I chose to deal with this crisis point is by having an affair/ fling with a younger man I met at a sports activity I do. For 7 weeks I became totally besotted with him, although we only saw each other once a week and he was always quite cold and distant, I felt a real emotional connection with him and over the weeks I became very attached. He was quite a selfish lover, but I absolutely loved the sex with him, it was so different and wild. He was so attractive to me and I really fell for him. Like a total fucking fool.

He ended it last week as he feels like it's all getting too much and "it has to come to an end sometime". I feel, like me, that he was developing feelings and it just wasn't part of the plan for us. I found myself sobbing on the phone like a teenager whilst he said there was nothing left to say. The final and worst humiliation was when I asked him could we please end it on a positive note and could he not thing of anything to say to make me feel better -via text- and he patronisingly listen off a reel of good things about me and how we had had great sex and a laugh.

A fucking laugh. Right. I think I was iin love with him.

I could just crawl up for a month under a blanket. I feel like that bob dylan song " a corkscrew to my heart". If this is what guys are like out there I can't be single again I will be eaten alive. I feel so blank.

What is so strange to me is that my friends tell me I am beautiful. I look in the mirror and I see I am tall, blonde v slim with even features but I don't feel worthy until a man gives me validation and lusts after me. I feel hideous and unlovable. Good to fuck but no more. Apart from DH who just sees the friend and companion.
I don't know what i am going to do.
Thanks for reading.

"an affair is not the fault of the betrayed party, the cheat always has a choice."

It's not a generalisation. It's a fact.

There was a thread about it not long ago.

No matter the reasons for someone to have an affair it's always their choice. Blaming the cheated party is just coping out and blame shifting.

OP, have you had counselling for yourself?

Your oh may well love you but why won't he consider counselling to try and fix the relationship? That doesn't feel like a loving supportive man.

I understand your need for sexual validation.

However, I suspect you actually need to be alone now for a while to sort yourself out. Your oh doesn't feel that healthy either.

Thank you everyone, especially Leavenheath. You really said it so well.

I am so confused at the moment and really don't see a way out for me. I feel like I am trapped between the chronic dissatisfaction of my sexless marriage, and the minefield of being single, over 30 with a young child and desperate for affection and a particular kind of sex with a particular type of man. My head is spinning and I'm trying to hold it together at Christmas, a time when the icon of the perfect family is everywhere.

I keep waking up in the night fearful of what will become of me and thinking about OM and picking it all apart, the signs I chose to misread and how he really didn't promise me anything at all. I somehow was unable to cope when he ended it because I wanted so much more from him. I feel like I would have left DH properly for him which is insane.

I am not blaming DH. But he has rejected me sexually for so long. He just doesn't need it at all . But I don't want sex from him now.
I don't think therapy will solve my problems really..it's too late I think

I don't think therapy will solve my problems really..it's too late I think

Please don't think like that. Any time is a good time, just as long as you want to.

You don't have to do anything at the moment, do you?

I'm not sure whether you and your husband are living separately at the moment or whether this 'break' is under the same roof, but I'd approach this from the perspective that it's never wise to make final decisions when your emotions are all over the place after the end of the other relationship.

In 3 months time, you might look back with astonishment that a 7-week relationship caused this much consternation, because I suspect all your feelings for this bloke amounted to were lust and excitement and you'll soon realise that all you actually miss is the enterprise itself and not the man as an individual.

Which means you're probably at significant risk of looking for a replacement enterprise which will end with similar results.

My strongest advice is to take your time, but try to balance that luxury with being fair to your husband too. If after you've come out of the 'loss' period (which will be quicker than you think I'd guess) you still think this marriage is never going to be more than friendship, it will be time to renegotiate.

What you say about your husband not needing sex at all leads me to think there's a lot you don't know about his true feelings, wants and needs. You might be surprised if he had the courage to open up to you about what he really wants. I'd presume you've been skirting around having too many in-depth conversations because of the secrets you've got but I do get the feeling there's a story you're not hearing from your husband and it could be illuminating to the decisions you've got to make as a couple. Very few people are completely asexual.

It might be that the best thing for you as a family eventually is to separate and for you personally to avoid sexual relationships until you've dealt with some of the issues from the past and how they are haunting your future. That would be a self-loving, protective measure and I'd give that advice to any survivor of sexual abuse who had come out of a relationship that made her feel worthless.

In the meantime, what have you got to lose by trying some therapy and initially getting yourself immersed in a project of finding the right counsellor?