How can I have been so stupid

[Fuzzywig1]

I am in a terrible terrible mess and it is all my own fault.

This is long sorry.

Before I post please can I say that anything nasty or mean you say to me I have said to myself and it is not why I am here

I have been married for 21 years to a kind and gentle but emotionally distant man. I know he loves me but he does not find it easy to be vulnerable and show it in some ways. I am very warm and physically affectionate and he is not or not consistently meaning I often would feel lonely. Sex was also always on his terms and less than I wanted.

30 years ago I had an 18 month relationship with who I thought was ‘the one’ . Yes I was very young 22 and he was even younger (19). Anyway after a very very passionate relationship he went off to drama school and decided to leave me. I was heartbroken and never forgot him and never trusted that sort of passion again.

2 years ago and out of the blue an email arrived saying he had seen me at my sons football training. We started emailing agreed to meet ( I told my husband about this first meeting) blah blah yes we started an affair.

From the beginning he told me he always loved me but buried the feelings deep he wants us to be together we are twin souls. He left his wife and now lives on his own.

I did not ask him to do this by the way

I feel somehow enchanted by him and that I lose my reason ....

I have told my husband I want to get divorced but he cannot believe it and says we have always had a lovely and sweet relationship

Eventually he found out and now I am in an awful impasse.

The om said he does not want to put pressure on me but his moving out made its own guilt and pressure. His constant emailing showering of love and gifts etc have made me stupid.

My husband seems to just want to carry on as if nothing has happened and that I’m the end I will ‘cone Back to him’.

Over and over every day I change my mind about what to do. What will cause the least harm.

I have two lovely children aged 13 and 9 and I cannot bear the thought of hurting them. I have already hurt them by being distant from their father and sleeping separately from him.

I think I have now got to the point of knowing that I cannot do this. It is wrong, I have been deluded Abd stupid.

But I am now scared to tell the om who has changed his life for me and will be devastated

This email sounds so stupid.

I don’t think people would believe this of me.

She might reconsider herself if she knew he'd been cheating on her for two years!

Block the OM from all devices. Have your friend post the keys or mail them. Don't go near OM's house. He needs to be dead to you.

Set up counseling. It may be beneficial for you and DH to have a few separate sessions with the counselor before you begin joint sessions. There may be things each of you needs to deal with on your own before you start to work together. Don't be afraid to change counselors if the one you start with isn't right for BOTH of you. DH and I went through 2 before we hit lucky with the 3rd one.

Op from someone whom has been in a very similar position as you I think you have done the right thing. You are lucky your husband is prepared to try and fix things. Sadly my now ex partner and couldn't do that. He wasn't able to forgive me for my EA with my first love who reappeared after thirty years. He the OM withdrew and ghosted me after I came clean and told my partner everything. Then contacted me weeks later and every few weeks for a while then just disappeared again. No contact nothing. I too was so stupid. I've lost the love and care of a truly wonderful man because of my own choices. I still struggle to understand how I could have been drawn into all of it. However I own it my own fault. I will hopefully get to a better place one day with myself but I suspect I will regret the choice I made to engage with the OM for the rest of my life I wish i could turn back the clock and trust my first instincts to send the OM packing. Good luck to you I do understand how you feel and your struggle to understand how you could have behaved like this. I to always felt I was a good and moral person however now I'm not really sure?Be strong and don't be tempted to contact the OM. Believe me it's for the best. Again good luck your husband sounds like a good man to me.

OP It's time to block all contact with OM if you have any chance of regaining your husband's trust and reconciling with him.

This man seems as though he is not going to take no for an answer and you need to tell him not to contact you again.

I did tell him not to contact me for a month.

He sent me a song

I resisted but then I sent him an email saying I can’t do this it is over goodbye

And then he replied telling me he was a ‘broken man’.

I know he is not my responsibility but I feel awful

I know it was his choice he set up a campaign to get me

As soon as he saw me he decided he wanted me and he set up a parallel plan to leave his wife

He left his wife and two boys 11 months after seeing me

I told him not to

The fact he could without anything like the anguish I have suffered tells me all I need to know

When he left me the first time he called me and said ‘it’s beyond my control’ this being a reference to les liaisons dangereuse that we had seen together in Paris 3 months before.

2 months before he had sent me roses at work.

I am just writing this to remind myself why I need him out of my life.

He is all about grand gestures not about substance

I was with another friend last night who was not helpful. She kept saying ‘ you need to decide what to do’ I said I have repeatedly but she said well it’s only been a day. She also told me I had been unhappy and complained about h lack of attention repeatedly. Which is true

And said don’t contact him for a month but then see how you feel

This is not helpful

If I think ‘it’s a month’ it keeps him alive in my mind

It is hard to be strong because it is like an addiction

And also I am very very empathetic and when he tells me he is broken and sobbing when his back is turned from his boys I feel hideous

oh fuck him and his broken and sobbing

Just a thought: you might like to have a look at SLAA if you feel you're addicted to him.

For the love of God, do NOT contact him again! Your email was contact ffs

I know someone who was in this position. She left her lovely husband for a man she had a brief relationship with 30 years before. She left her husband, her children were mortified. Three months later the OM returned to his old partner and she was left alone. Her husband quite rightly didnt take her back as he was completely devastated and would never trust her again. She had ruined her relationship with her children. I don't like the OM's methods either. Try and work on your relationship with your husband first - the risk is this OM may move on again like he did before. He's turned your head but could you trust him if these are his methods?

No I can’t trust him. Not really really though I wanted to.

My brain is telling me abd has throughout that this is not good

Unfortunately the chemicals produced by this intense relationship are similar to addiction

I have blocked his number so he cannot call me

I am going to send all his emails to junk

I was doing ok at not contacting him until he sent me that song

And no doubt he knew he it would have that effect

Although he told himself he couldn’t help it and apologised for having sent it

He had also apparently called me the night before but luckily I was asleep and phone on silent

Yes my email was contact

I told myself I hadn’t ended it properly

How on earth can I know all this and be still foolish

You only live once. You gave dh over 20 years and he doesn't give you what you want physically or emotionally. You will always wonder what if. You have to leave for your sake AND his. He doesn't deserve the fact that it's causing you this much stress when deciding if you even want to be with him. Let him find someone who wants him.

Hi Cocopop

I do not think you are right. My h in the past was able to give me what i wanted. He was very caring and we were happy.

There have been some issues with sex (not always).

He has taken me for granted.

The fact it is causing me stress is not really to do with my feelings for him. It is to do with the way i have been manipulated by OM and the addictive 'love bombing'

Having read a lot about it i truly do think he has a lot of narcissistic traits but this can be very damaging to an empathetic person whilst something still feels 'off' about it you also feel very charmed by this person.

I KNOW that if i got together with OM he would eventually either leave me or be unfaithful and i would not be happy but i need to FEEL that knowledge.

I may wonder 'what if' if I allow myself to but i will get to a point where i see it as a lucky escape. That point had started to happen and was what caused my OP

he tells me he is broken and sobbing when his back is turned from his boys I feel hideous

When he left me the first time he called me and said ‘it’s beyond my control’

Oh wow what a nasty manipulative man. Hard to imagine anything likeable about him. He is painting himself as some dramatic victim of his emotions.
He left you first time because it was beyond his control. What a joke.
Now he is upset about his boys. Presumably all that situation was beyond his control too?
I really hope his wife finds a new and lovely man soon who can make up for all the years she wasted on this awful, self centred and manipulative man. His poor boys though.

he wasnt saying he was upset about his boys he was saying he wsa sobbing about me behind his boys back.

he does say he feels bad about that. But also says things to me like 'what choice did i have' and ' it isnt our fault how we feel'.

But have always said we do have a choice and it is our fault what we do .

i have diverted all his messages to junk now and his number is blocked on my phone.

I really wish my family was back. Although it has probably been good for me to be on my own to think.

I am seeing my closest friend for lunch which will help.

The awful thing is that whilst in one way it is helpful to see his true colours it is also very difficult because you do not want to admit that you have come so close to ruining your life and have betrayed your h with somebody who was not worth it

You have answered your own questions there in that one sentence

“You have come so close to ruining your life”

Thank goodness you have realised before it is too late and can now put your heart and mind back into your H and ds, you are a very lucky lady you have this chance, maybe if you had carried on with your plans and realised he was a narcissistic nightmare all would have been lost for good.

Take care

I haven't RTWT but something you wrote about your husband jumped out at me: I do think he has problems showing his vulnerability.

This is my DP to a tee. In fact, how you describe your DH is exactly how I'd describe my DP. Very early on in our relationship he admitted he really struggled with showing affection (it broke up his previous long term relationship) and that he felt physically awkward with it at times, and that while he might not tell me out loud that he loved me, I should know that he did. I decided to view it as not settling for being unloved but rather knowing what I was up against! At first it was frustrating, but I soon realised he was, in his own way, showing me love all the time in unspoken (and often mundane) ways and that stopped me feeling rejected. He's also the most decent, kind, funny and loyal man I know who is adored by his family and friends and, over the years, possibly because I've been understanding about it, has become much more openly affectionate and now tells me and our DC that he loves us, which I know is a huge deal for him.

My point is, some people are just more reserved when it comes to being demonstrative. Taking OM out of the equation for a moment, what you have to decide now is whether you want to cope being married to someone like that for the rest of your life. I'm sorry to say, based on what you've said, I don't think you can, because you clearly need to feel wanted. The problem is never going to go away because of who your DH fundamentally is.

Good luck with the future, whatever you decide. It sounds like it's been torturous and I hope you find some peace soon.

PS: The fact that OM is ignoring your requests to leave you alone and not contact you speaks volumes. Classic narcissist.

My h does and can say he loves me

Just not all that often and sometimes when i say it to him he would not say it back which he said is because it is better not to say it by rote. But if my kids say 'i love you Mummy' i would always say 'i love you too'.

I have blocked OM now.

I hope we can rebuild a better relationship.

He feels we can. I hope we can but whether we can or not OM is not the answer.

He said he is so glad he hung on in there and thank god we have the kids as they meant we had to continue relating to one another via them

One thing the counsellor said to me did ring true but i did not want to listen - he said that throughout our session we had looked at each other all the time which showed there was love there though perhaps not in the right form

I think you have picked the right course of action. Block the OM and then look at your relationship and decide whether it can or it is worth saving.

But don’t do it at the expense of yourself this has highlighted you are unhappy in your relationship and things do need to change

Interesting comment from the counsellor. I wonder what he thinks is the "right form". Because love evolves, especially after years of marriage and children, and just because it's not the knicker-ripping kind doesn't mean it's not as valid. There's a lot to be said for deep, enduring and even comfortable love. But if it's a sibling kind of love you're feeling when you look at your DH, then you have your answer.

I think he meant that we had lost sight of what we initially had had with each other not about bodice ripping.

No it is not sibling.

@Fuzzywig1

Unfortunately the chemicals produced by this intense relationship are similar to addiction

Yep.
http://brainworldmagazine.com/flame-addiction-neuroscience-infidelity/

..when you realise the chemicals are responsible and that Timmy really isn't the 'one' or your 'soulmate', it's like finding out that the Magician didn't really saw the lady in half and the Tooth Fairy was really your parent.

"He feels I am vulnerable to the OM because he broke my heart"

And I think he may me right.

There have been some issues with sex (not always).

Isn't there always?!

Intimacy (in to me you see) always wanes... It's going to right? When you have grievances and emotional separation you don't want to share or leave yourself vulnerable.

Sex Educator and Author, Dr Emily Nagoski:

I am not sure there are 'always' sexual issues ? Are there?

Though they do seem very common i admit.

I am feeling better again

I have spoken to my friend and she is keeping me strong.

I need to get rid of all the 'gifts' he gave me. I dont know why i did not see it at the time but you dont give people gifts so they can 'be with you' - most of the gifts were wearable things including a locket with a picture of us in it. Which i didnt really like ie i found it a bit possessive but ignored this. Some incredibly expensive shoes etc

FrancinePefko do you have any links to articles on the theory of higher earning women and divorce. I'm genuinely interested as I have at times been the higher earner.

All I can echo op is go totally no contact with this man. Not wishing to insult all people in showbiz but my Mother was on stage and is self obsessed and overly dramatic in everything. I'm sure some actors or showbiz professionals are lovely but you must have a need for attention and a bit of an ego. She needed her ego fed constantly and it got worse as she got older. I'm the product of an affair gone horribly wrong. She destroyed my Father completely, she pursued him and he thought of her for forty years until he died. I knew one of my half sisters Fathers well, he was a lovely man he ended up just the same as my Father. They were broken by her. She did this to several men.