Awake and pondering the end of my long marriage

[dontknowhow2feela]

I'm awake again. Sleeping is not easy anyway but it's been worse since he told me it's over. We'd been together since the cusp of becoming adults. I care for him and know although we functioned well together it wasn't a full relationship of recent years. I was grateful when he stopped hugging me at night as it was just a distraction from whatever I was reading. My immediate response was relief when he told me. I know this is right but untangling our lives still hurts.

He is really trying to do this the 'right way' and end with me before he starts his new relationship but his new relationship has already started. He's been developing feelings for her over long Zoom chats through lockdown and met her a year ago for coffee without telling me. He tried to deny his feelings by talking about our future. Telling me he wanted to work on our relationship and reintroduce sex as we'd not been intimate for some years. I was initially excited when he said this. I'd always done the heavy lifting in the relationship but stopped 5 years ago or so when I said I'd match his input and if he wanted things to change he needed to step up. He did try a little of recent months and I felt awful that even though he was trying to instigate some intimacy I still wasn't really on board. I now know the reality is he didn't really want to work on it with me at all and it was a half hearted attempt. It makes sense I still wasn't getting any real connection from him as he was hugging his secret meeting and his burgeoning feelings to himself. His emotions were fully entangled with her.

He went on his 'first date' at the weekend and before he went I started divorce proceedings. He looked shellshocked. Apparently they discussed it afterwards and she was surprised it was so quick. Maybe she doesn't realise he has left me for her. Possibly they are both in a shared fantasy that the ending of this relationship has nothing to do with them being together. From my perspective when your DH tells you he is obsessed with a woman who has made major life decisions as a result of the strength of her feelings for him, it feels a bit late for HRT and relationship counselling! I care for him but I don't care enough about our relationship right now to fight for it.

I'm concerned for our young adult kids, one isn't taking it too well which is a real worry. but I grieve and mourn and am excited and relieved in equal measure. I know I will be ok and I know our relationship will be better as a result of this, whether we are apart for the rest of our lives or if our shared history and companionship brings us together at some unnamed point in the future...but right now it's hard and I wish I could get some sleep!

@dontknowhow2feela

I am protecting myself enough not to want to dissect our relationship together so he gets tips for his new one. He can do the work himself!

Very good OP. Its absolutely not your job to make it easier for him in his new relationship(s). Especially as he was looking after number one (and that wasn't you) whilst he was deciding on his next steps. As pointed out by daisychain01. Your focus should definitely be you and your future. 🌹

I had a full 6 hours last night so not bad at all in the end

I'm feeling much calmer this morning. He's gone out and didn't tell me where and that's right and proper. We were distant with each other and I'm determined to do more of that. It would be humiliating to carry on seeking connection with him still and it seems we are both moving past that now. I'm not proud of the digs I keep making but I am kind to myself. It's not even been a month yet! I keep striving to rise above and be better. Although I said I don't want to dissect our relationship with a counsellor, I've definitely done too much of it in the home. I'm going to try and practice more grey rock from now on and I can see he is too.

Billy in your response to Missed it you said he is taking action now when all is almost lost but I am doing the same. Many things I haven't dealt with because life was just plodding on, I've suddenly found the will to deal with them. I've joined the gym, sorted out my eating, started to go out. It feels like I've been in a holding pattern for a very long time. We were stuck in such a rut and I don't think our marriage was serving any of us well (I include our children in that).

Looking back I've really not done anything for quite some months. I've been binge eating, binge watching box sets and had investigations for intense pain without any obvious cause. I now assume it's been preparation for this. Maybe I've done my grieving and gathered my strength ready for what was to come. It may be why it feels like I'm holding it together relatively well now. I love that a part of me ticks away in the background, guiding me even when I'm not aware.

If we can manage one more month in the house it will benefit us both but we are going to look at our finances again soon. Maybe we should bite the bullet and edge the date closer.

In other news, a small mental victory. I've not been near a full length mirror for the last few days had been imagining my body and thinking no one would possibly fancy me and I will likely never have a physical relationship again.

Now I'm home and back with a full length mirror, I saw my body this morning and felt it was actually ok. It's overweight, saggy and shows signs of repeated weight loss and weight gain but it's perfectly serviceable and I felt good when I looked at myself. That is a REALLY good sign that I really am doing ok

Oh I can completely understand in a long term relationship that things get ignored between adults.

I really do.

But I do think that is quite different IMO to one parent totally avoiding family life.

Working supposedly long hours because their job is so demanding, ignoring their children and wife and leaving the overwhelming hard job of raising the family to your spouse.

To then be found out to have found the time to have an affair but to suddenly be remorseful of the enormous neglect of your family when you have been found out?

Raising children with a largely absent husband who is overwhelmed with work is a difficult load to carry, to know you were doing it whilst he had an affair and neglected his children is a whole different ball game.

I would be so furious on behalf of my children not to mind myself.

I would never trust a man like that again.
Some levels of selfishness are too hard to swallow.

We are all different of course and I accept some are more forgiving than others.

The core character of someone who behaves like this for so long, is
someone to take proclamations of shame and regret very lightly from

I fully agree with @billy1966 here

This scenario plays out so often with stupid, selfish men. The ltm comes into problems with resentment from neglect and seeing the one sidedness of the marriage.

Then if you're unlucky the right time and place occurs with them meeting someone receptable to their misery of having to face their deficiencies, insted of facing up to their selfishness, they are convinced the ow they meet is conformation they did nothing wrong in their marriage.

Unfortunately their selfishness is not addressed and usually ruins the following relationships.

Then what you are left with is a man constantly shaking his head thinking wtf happened and they have no possible way or means of rectifying the damage done.

Whether you stay together or part, the union breaks.

I don't think women as they get older can put up with stupid.

@dontknowhow2feela

I hope your confidence continues to grow.

I found it quite strange after my long marriage how I began to feel and have feelings like I did when I was a teenager.

You forget the old you,
your opinions
your outlook
your hope
even your sexuality

Saying hello to your younger self can be quite intersesting. 🤗

I've just been considering he's a good man who decided to end the relationship before properly starting another. It's one of the reasons why I felt he is very committed to not being with me but being with her. Then realised we have 'find my phone' and they don't work together anymore. We also share all finances. He wouldn't have been able to see her without it being very obvious indeed that something odd was going on.

Maybe not such an honourable man after all...

@dontknowhow2feela, things are rarely black and white. No one is a paragon of virtue. I feel sure there are shades of other motives and impulses behind his decision, but I think one could say that for almost any life decision. I wouldn’t regard him as unduly good, but I also wouldn’t artificially stoke my anger against him unless it’s useful for you psychologically eg. to start to feel fully separate.

I’m another who finds your writing relatable and thoughtful. I’m also interested to see a nuanced, relatively compassionate account of the (probable) end of a marriage, and which pays attention to the complexities and compromises of longterm relationships.

Very best wishes, @dontknowhow2feela.

Hi Table, thanks for your comments. I don't feel angry about it, it changes nothing, but I do actually feel better.

I wondered why do other husbands at least try and retain what they have but mine threw it away. I told myself it's because he's single minded and would say he doesn't find deceit easy but I know he can lie to me. He has done so at times over the years.

It actually helps to realise he probably would have had an affair if it had have been an easier prospect. He did say he would likely have done that if it hadn't have been for lockdown so he was definitely not adverse to the idea. If he could have had a chance of keeping it all, he probably would have done. I can take some strange comfort in that.

I did have a flash of anger yesterday when I realised he had 4 years of me matching him emotionally and then looked elsewhere after just 2.5. That's been my reality for the entire relationship.

Then I remembered, I needed his lack of emotion for many years. I craved the connection but actually needed the distance as I struggled to regulate my own feelings. He needed my heightened empathy as he didn't know how to feel and how to ask but I knew anyway, he never needed to articulate his needs.

I have emotional connections with many other people. He had no one other than me. When I withdrew and he didn't know how to reach me, it's no wonder he needed to find something with someone else.

I don't regret pulling back and I know this is necessary. We've both come too far now to stay stuck together forever. We need to finish growing up into whole humans rather than parts of a whole and we can't do that while we are still attached.

I can't be angry as it's so right but it still hurts.

Dunes I remembered the other day how impulsive I was. How much of a thrill seeker. I had dreams of taking a year out to backpack but he refused to go so neither did I.

I was the kid in school that everyone thought would travel the world, a real free spirit. I did scare myself though, his security and sensibleness was so stabilising.

Somehow over the years he became the cool risk taker and I the boring fun sponge.

I think I may be strong enough to handle myself now

They are together now. My DC video called in distress and wanted to talk. We talked, they said they were expecting a call from their dad today. I told them he is out and I didn't know where he is. We agreed I would call again when I had finished talking with my friend as I had arranged to speak with her this evening.

I spoke with my lovely friend and felt wonderfully centred after the call.

I called my DC again. They'd checked where he was on 'find my phone' (I've removed him from mine) and saw he was with her so they didn't feel it was appropriate to call.

I feel...nothing. It's very odd. I would think I'd feel something but I'm struggling to come up with an emotion. There is a small amount of irritation that he's not available for DC but TBH, I had a call with my friend at that point so it would be hypocritical to be annoyed. I don't feel jealous as sex between us wasn't anything for me to get jealous about. Maybe her physiology is more suited to him than mine but even if it's better with her, I really don't care. I'm just remembering this weird little expression he used to do before he kissed me and how it was a turn-off and how I've had a lot more orgasms since he's been out of my bed this last few weeks than when he was in it!

I did after all feel relief when he told me and I chose not to acknowledge it was happening. I have been wondering if it wasn't because I couldn't bear it but actually because I didn't want to stop it.

OK everyone at the top of the thread who told me it was over and I wanted this, I think I might believe you now! At least for the next hour or so anyway...

I think you’re being very honest and very reasonable, @dontknowhow2feela. Lean on your friends, and recognise that full disentanglement will be a long process, after such a lot of shared history, though my theory is also that nature begins to remind us of the ex’s negatives quite quickly. It’s also no longer down to you to mediate between your adult children and their father. Or to explain his whereabouts.

You are describing my marriage so exactly - right down to him having no one but me, and envying my connections with my friends (which did not come easily - I had to force myself right out of my comfort zone to make, but he doesn’t see that). It’s like these not very emotionally literate men don’t know how to connect with people and default to the romantic/sexual because that’s all they know.

I’m still making the bitchy digs after 3 months - I had a moment of thinking I should try to be the better person, but realised scoring cheap points with words was hardly in the same league as fucking someone else…

Good morning, today I feel magnanimous and I feel like a coward.

I assume he didn't come home last night as and I assume they had sex. I've just pictured it going well and pictured it going badly. The images were fleeting and lasted only a second. I didn't have to chase them out of my brain, I put/them there to test how I feel but I really don't seem to care either way.

I feel like a coward because I didn't leave but then...I wanted a reinvention of our marriage, I've had several long term relationships over the last 33 years but they've all been with the same man. I was ready for another.

When he first told me he was leaving, I said our marriage wasn't worth fighting for but he was. I'm in that headspace now. I hope he still feels that way about me.

Hi Table, I think it might have read as if DC called because they wanted to speak to their dad but that's not the case. They called to speak to me but expressed surprise that he wasn't home and I just said I didn't know where he was.

Hi Missed it It's not quite the same. I haven't had to work hard for my connections with others, it's always happened quite naturally. In fact, that's why I had to shut down the sexual side of myself completely and refuse to flirt at all as it would be too easy to connect with someone else.

He hasn't ever been envious of anything I do or say irrespective of who it is with. I've never felt he's cared enough to give a shit TBH.

"I’m still making the bitchy digs after 3 months - I had a moment of thinking I should try to be the better person, but realised scoring cheap points with words was hardly in the same league as fucking someone else…"

I love this BTW

OP, I think I am on a similar path to you, married for 24 years except we have been separated for the best part of 4 years. Like you we have adult children.

He only moved out six months ago and at that point I felt content. We had discussed divorce at some future point but no hurry to set the wheels in motion. Then two months ago he starts pushing for a divorce and announces he has a girlfriend and…I plunged into sadness and despair. Why? I did not want him. I was happy without him. I pushed for the separation initially because I knew our lack of sex was causing him resentment and unhappiness and I wasn’t able to give him what he wanted. I felt separating was the right thing, to let him go and find someone who could make him happy and that that would make life better for us both. But now it’s happened I find myself looking at him in a new light, seeing him as a desirable handsome man who someone else wants and I am suddenly jealous of what they have and yearning for what we once had. I have to constantly and actively remind myself of all the reasons why he used to irritate, repulse and upset me but I still feel in a state of turmoil. I know for absolute certain I will never be loved by or love another man and it crushes me as I thought I was ok with a relationship-free future like this. Turns out maybe I’m not which has really come as an unwelcome surprise, my conflicting emotions and intrusive thoughts are keeping me awake at night too!

PS: I am enjoying reading your posts, thanks for writing.

@dontknowhow2feela you sound very detached and calm - more so than the circumstances warrant I would have thought - are you ok? I had moments where I convinced myself I was ok with everything early on, but now realise I was sweeping it under the carpet, which provided short term ease, but would have been a disaster long term. I needed to get everything out there, examine it, make a logical narrative of it (which meant asking and getting the answers to lots of questions about the timeline - what happened when in relation to our relationship and other life events) and then feel the rage and pain and share it with him. I recognise our situations are different, but you sound so distant and detached - do you think it’s good for you ultimately?

Ha! That makes it sound like I’ve got everything sorted now - far from it!

Sweetcorn I feel your turmoil. wonder why you feel you will never love or be loved by another? People connect up at all ages for all reasons.

STBXH is more attractive now than when we were younger. I relate to the awareness of his attractiveness. Months ago, when I raised the fact that she'd texted him 'good morning' and said that wasn't a colleague relationship (which I then subsequently ignored) he took pains to tell me nothing was happening. He was older than her anyway and she wouldn't be interested in someone like him. I told him then he was a more attractive than he realised. Physically he stands more confidently, professionally and economically he is a very good prospect. He has been in a committed relationship for a long time which is attractive to someone who had a nasty divorce and floated in and out of relationships ever since. His maturity is also attractive. My attractiveness has diminished and I may not have another romantic relationship. I'm not sure how I feel about that yet, only time will tell, but I'll have to cross that bridge when I come to it.

It feels very self indulgent to keep posting. I've been lurking for years and recently have responded occasionally but this is the first thread I've started. There's been a lot of processing going on so I know I'm posting a lot but it's really helping. Thank you for saying you're enjoying reading.

Missed by I understand your concern. My RL friends have been waiting for the crash but more and more are now saying maybe this really is it. Maybe I really am that ok!

It may yet come and if it does I'll have to deal with it then but my past history doesn't really suggest something is brewing. I tend to deal with things early and head on. The fact I ignored what was happening is out of character so happened for a reason.

One of my DC is in a relationship that's not serving them well. They are desperate for connection with someone who is treating them in an offhand manner. This has been the case for some years now and the prior relationship was the same. I've been thinking about for a very long time and it's something I wish they felt secure enough to break free from. I'm conscious our relationship was modelling this for them but I was content enough and invested enough to not want to leave. I also felt if I left, my DC would never forgive me. STBXH would remain unblemished and I'd be the needy one that hurt him.

I've believed safety in a relationship is not necessarily the be all and end all for years now. When people exclaimed how wonderful it is that I've been married so long, I might respond it shows a lack of imagination. I'm not sure marriage longevity is something to be celebrated in itself.

The fact we are separating now shows how much we have both grown over the years and that is something to be proud of.

The fact he has called time has freed me and has ultimately been the best thing that could have happened for both our DC. This is obvious already. It's still hard but it is right...

Well that’s great if you are genuinely at peace with your situation. I wish I was able to be with mine.

I think the great value of threads like this for OP, posters and lurkers alike, is you get a great sense that feelings, emotions and pain don't remain the same.

As they are teased out you can read how people become more aware and often very positive to change.

I love to read updates when posters express amazement and delight at how far they have come and how positive they feel in their new reality.

Relationship breakdowns often go through the same grief stages as in death, and reading about the stages of grief can be very helpful as a guidance.

OP, I think you and other posters are teasing out well that processing grief and loss often doesn't happen in a straight like.

You can think you are moving forward and then feel you are stepping back into a place that you felt you were in months ago.

No set timeline. But accepting that there is no avoiding your feelings can be very helpful to avoid getting stuck.

I think you are doing great OP.
I'm so glad to read that his instigating this has made it easier for you with your children.

Such an honest and human thing to admit to.

He's just responded to the divorce application. I felt a cold shiver as it arrived I my inbox.

It felt strange that he didn't tell me before he did it but I know ultimately it's a good thing to stop discussing our every move.

I won't progress it though until I discuss with him as we're going to pay from joint funds.

Hopefully he'll be at home tonight so we can talk.

@dontknowhow2feela “I feel your turmoil. wonder why you feel you will never love or be loved by another? People connect up at all ages for all reasons”.
Because I no longer want to have sex - with anyone - ever again so it’s highly unlikely anyone is going to want a romantic but platonic relationship with a near 60 year old woman. If I still had an interest in sex it’s likely our marriage would have survived despite all his annoying ways and habits, but the one thing I couldn’t stick was the guilt and responsibility I felt for his lack of a sex-life, nor the brooding, sullen resentment that it caused in him.

Sweetcorn oh honey, you are deciding how your'e going to feel for the rest of your life and how all these nameless men will feel. I'm not sure I'd be comfortable doing that! TBF I'm not too sure how I'm going to feel from one hour to the next at the moment so the rest of my life seems more of a stretch than usual but nevertheless, things change. As you said, the recent shift has caused you to feel differently and I imagine that's perfectly normal. I can envisage I may get used to being without stbxh but if he then moves in with someone, gets married or has a child etc it will churn things up again. I guess that will only change over time if I become so content in my new life I'm not remotely interested in his. I know people who seem to have got there but it has taken a very long time. Four years and only six months moved out is no time at all.

Missed it I'm so sorry for your pain. I hope it doesn't sound as if I have no pain and sadness at all. I really do. Deconstructing our lives is painful and I'm feeling the loss of 'my person'.

However it's hard to feel it too keenly at the moment as he cooked me dinner, we ate together and are now sitting watching TV together. I had to note my next of kin the other day and wasn't sure who to put. He told me to put him and shared he had put me a few weeks ago when he needed to.

He apologised for staying out last night and I explained I realised I didn't care he was with her and am now back to being focussed on making sure we retain mutual respect and friendship. He also apologised for not telling me he was going to fill out the divorce information ahead of time and gave his reasons which were exactly what I predicted and made sense.

I understand your need to rage but I'm not there now. I've felt white hot anger at various points in our relationship and raged five years ago. I know enough of the timeline not to need to know any more. It wasn't about anything I did or didn't do in the last 18 months. This stems from way before then.

thanks Billy one of the first things I did was read about the stages of grief when I kept being told I will feel anger and it will come. I was delighted to read that apparently I might not. I'm not afraid of my emotions and am aware my feelings may change but at this precise moment, I think I'm doing great too😁