Can't get over an ancient mistake.

[likestodraw]

I'm going to be told to just get over it, but I'd really like some practical ideas about how. This is ruining my life.

When I was 18 I met someone who I quickly became very close to. We spent all our time together. We went travelling together. We occasionally slept together and regularly told each other we were in love.
I then got a boyfriend but we stayed close, we still sometimes slept together. He had a couple of girlfriends. The other relationships never changed how close we were. We both assumed that we would end up together, but we were really young still and not ready for 'forever' yet. We were trying to have our cake and eat it. We were shits to the other people involved and I'm sorry for that now, but everyone was young and nothing was serious.

A few years went by, we were in our early-mid 20s, he got a girlfriend, initially nothing changed between us, but she loathed me and their relationship became serious. I got a serious boyfriend a year or so later.

They got married. We got married. We had kids, they had kids.

20 years has gone by since we met now. I have a lovely husband who is a wonderful father and a great friend, but we're like flat mates. I have never got over that first love. I keep it under control, just, and sometimes the sadness fades to almost nothing. But then every so often it engulfs me like a wave and I am completely overwhelmed.

I always thought there'd be a point when we were together, always thought there'd be another chance, but then life just took over. I moved in with my now husband for practicality's sake, got pregnant unexpectedly, then got married. He asked his wife to marry him shortly after I told him I was pregnant.

I just can't bear the thought of this going on forever. We're still regularly in touch, my husband is friends with him, his wife accepts I exist.

It's so crappy and I just want to remove the part of my brain that remembers him. I just can't seem to move past the mistake I made in thinking there'd always be another chance.

You need to tell him how you feel and leave your marriages for each other or cut contact completely. How will you get over him when you are still in contact?

@Candyfloss99
I think you're right but I just don't know how. At this point cutting contact would cause almost as much drama within our friends as me leaving my husband. Old entangled group of friends.

But maybe I need to upset that applecart so that I don't end up ducking up my marriage.

Would you consider telling him how you feel?

It sounds like you didn't want to get pregnant and married? So many years on lnever mind this guy who was a bit of a fantasy) it's no wonder that you feel regret at your life.

I too wonder if some therapy might be good to explore all of this.

@coffeecow
He's probably the only person I could tell. And I'm thinking now about telling him by way of explaining why I don't want to have any contact again.

The problem with cutting contact is that it's admitting there's emotions there. At the moment it's all hidden away, we're close friends that all.

It just seems such a mean thing to do, to tell him all this. He is a good person and doesn't deserve me putting this on him.

I have exact experience of this and what happened next but I'm not prepared to share it on here

@Oxyiz I love my kids and I love being a mum and I always wanted to have kids 'some day'... but yes it all happened about ten years sooner than I'd planned.

Once we'd had DD1 it took a while for me to concede to having DD2, but I didn't want an only child, and I didn't want to be a young mum AND an older mum so just though let's get on with it.

My husband is lovely and a truly good man. I just feel that life has happened to me rather than me being in control.

Counselling . You are grieving for your youth as well as this fantasy man.

Maybe CBT would help as well, for your compulsive thoughts.

No more one to one conversations with him by any method. Minimal social contact in groups.

It don’t believe you when you say that doing this would cause trouble in your group. Do you all monitor each other’s email and texts ?

@ISAD0RA
No, you are absolutely right. I could stop all one to one communications and just see him when we run into each other.

Mutual friends always ask after him when they see me and haven't seem him for a while. That year when I did but contact there were a few awkward times when I had to say I didn't know what he was up to... but that's momentary awkwardness, totally possible to deal with.

It would be massively weird if I tried to stop seeing him ever again, but cutting out one to one contact is totally possible. Ridiculous I hadn't thought of that.

That would at least wean me off the intimacy.

No, don't tell him anything - that's just hinting to start an affair.

How do you find a counsellor??
I know nothing about this stuff. Come from a family of people that just bottle everything up.

This sounds a lot like you miss who you were rather than who he is OP. It wasn't your desire to be free at a young age it was something instinctive that said 'not this one'. Maybe if you'd met him for the first time at 25 you might have a different story.
Ultimately though it sounds as if the secure base you've built for your family is starting to feel a bit constrictive - time to start thinking about how you would like your own life to look.

God I want to have a massive gin and a good bawl... but I have to supervise bloody music practice now.

I always thought I'd stop FEELING so much by the time I was this age. I thought I'd be so grown up and over everything. Doesn't work like that though does it.

This is all very relatable and very human OP. I'm sure a good counsellor would get it.

My instinct is that you need to properly grieve that "idyllic" alternative life (which you logically know would've just become ordinary). Try not to push the emotions down. I hope you can have a good cry soon, and perhaps a shout/scream if necessary. Then pour all your energy into making your own life more exciting

Its ridiculous to be honest, like a childish crush. If he had been the love of your life and the other way round you would have been together not with other people.
I think you are just bored with your life and this fantasy helps you to escape for a while.

@madcatladyforever it is indeed bloody ridiculous.

Finish with your husband as it's not as you'd want a relationship to be anyway. Find your own place.

Make your ex aware you're single- don't proposition him or anything but mention it in passing.

It's up to him then what he does. He may not be as happy with his wife/family life as you think.

Don't do anything with him until you're both single- affairs are just a recipe for messing with your own head as you can't be with him when you want to be, plus it's immoral.

Is this the sequel to "Normal People"?

Interesting to say that you don't feel in control of your life. When you had this man in your life you kept him at arm's length. He wanted more and you didn't. That must have been empowering. Maybe it's that feeling you miss. Being able to choose life's options.
If you take sex out of the equation, you can do most of the things you enjoyed with him. Hang out, talk about big subjects. Somehow you have to transform him in your mind to being a great, lifelong platonic friend. Someone who 'gets' you. That's not to be dismissed or thrown away lightly just for sex.
Counselling would be helpful I think. Are you fulfilled in your career?

@NoMoreDickheads I don't want to break up my family. I wouldn't dream of an affair, I wouldn't ever do that to my kids.

I just want to get over this sadness that I've been trying and failing to get over for about 15 years. I'm exhausted by it.

@loldie99 ha! sadly we were never as beautiful, nor did we have such aesthetically pleasing sex as them!

Not half as clever either.

@DianaT1969 I am. I wasn't and I retrained a few years ago and I thought that might be the answer to everything. It was for a while, but then it wasn't anymore.

Lockdown for sure hasn't helped.

We both used to work in a similar area, he moved on to something far more 'grown up'. Years went by, I've retrained, now he's dabbling in a similar area to my new work alongside his proper job.

I’m a counsellor and I’d take you seriously. Look on the BACP website to find a counsellor in your area.
This is not uncommon, you need to process this. There’s a lot of unresolved ‘stuff’ without ending. A counsellor can help you process it, make meaning of it and deal with it. Sounds like it would be money well spent.
It’s probably fulfilling an unmet need in your current relationship so agree with all the posters that have said work on your current relationship. Dealing with both issues will help as they’re likely entangled.
Good luck OP