My newish boyfriend is also my friend of twenty years.
He split with his wife at the end of May last year and in my opinion went about it terribly and spinelessly; he randomly messaged me one day to say he had something to tell me but it would mess up his entire life and wanted to meet with me to discuss it; I wasn't able to meet with him so a week or so later, he messaged to say he had split up with his wife and was moving to my town, to stay with a friend!
A couple of weeks after the split, was their wedding anniversary. He messaged me to explain they had an overnight stay at a zoo booked, asking if he should go.
Obviously I advised him not to go if he was adamant he wanted to finish with his wife as it would give her false hope. He went anyway and messaged me a few times throughout the day saying how awkward it all was and how he wished he had taken my advice.
Over the next couple of months, we developed feelings for each other and ended up getting together. Too soon, but at the time neither of us cared about that as we were being selfish and stupid.
He started divorce proceedings and over the summer went to mediation. He kept the fact he was seeing me a secret from his wife as he didn't want to rock the boat, or delay the divorce proceedings in any way.
His wife took the split quite badly, threatening suicide, saying she couldn't take care of their cats, blaming him for her health issues and blackmailing him to go over and help her. He duly turned up each time, sitting with her when she said she had overdosed until the ambulance turned up to take her to hospital, cutting the grass as she couldn't, decorating the house ready to sell, etc.
Then she started texting and phoning me, begging me to speak to him and tell him to go back to her. Each time she contacted me, I asked his advice on what to do and he told me to ignore her, so I did, thinking he was dealing with it and I shouldn't rock the boat.
All of this was taking its toll on me and I felt so insecure, upset he wouldn't tell his wife about me, didn't feel like I could meet his friends or family as the divorce was getting more and more messy (mediation was happening but it took weeks to agree on anything) and I kept swinging from thinking it would all be okay, to wondering what the heck I was doing and wanting to end the relationship. Obviously this upset my boyfriend and he felt insecure with me as well.
Eventually he decided to go no contact with his wife as she kept sending messages begging him to try again, so he decided to only communicate through solicitors, but only after I'd found out he had been replying to all her begging messages - he showed me his phone to try and prove there were no messaged leading her on, but the fact he relied to almost every message she sent, including one the night he first stayed at mine overnight when she asked him to message when he got home and he replied in the morning (just after he left my house) saying he was fine - why even bother replying to that?! I told him it was giving her false hope to reply to her so much and he agreed.
Earlier this year, his wife rang me again. By this point he had told me she knew about us, so I answered her call.
She told me that a few weeks prior, she had given him a lift to mediation and he had been telling her all about our issues, how worried he was that I was still friends with my ex and how it was like we "were in a relationship, but without sexual contact" and that he was trying to end things with me but didn't know how :(
A few days after he'd had this conversation with his wife, he messaged me to say he was thinking of ending things with me as I was too friendly with my ex. This felt a bit of a bolt out of the blue but I immediately cut contact with my ex out of respect to my boyfriend and our relationship. Obviously I didn't know about him speaking to his wife about it at that time.
She also accused him of being controlling, nasty and blaming when things don't go well and just generally not a nice person who she stayed with out of loyalty as she thought he was mentally ill.
I spoke to my boyfriend about all this after the phonecall and he basically said she was making it all up.
He admitted they he'd spoken to her about me and my ex and regretted doing that, but that his 'anxiety' about my friendship with my ex made him feel insecure and unwanted - I'd always been upfront with him about my friendship, never hidden it at all and he said he accepted it, although wasnt best pleased and would rather I wasn't still friends with my ex.
A few months down the line and he is now saying that I've been causing his erection issues (he can't stay hard) because I've been so up and down with the relationship that he feels like he's walking on eggshells and the anxiety and depression that causes him, is giving him erection difficulties.
Admittedly, I have been swinging on an almost weekly basis from thinking I can cope with all the stress of him still not having his house sold, still not being divorced, all the lies and half truths it feels like he's told and the accusations from his wife that he's controlling, to thinking that it just isn't worth the hassle and finishing with him.
This obviously isn't good for him, but he seems to think I'm being deliberately "nasty" and has accused me of grinding him down and being the cause of his anxiety (and now erection problems).
He doesn't seem to be able to take responsibility for any of the things I've mentioned in this post, always just makes an excuse ("I split with my wife as she had been grinding me down for years, I had provided a home, kept her fed and looked after and she was so unappreciative", "I married her because I thought it would improve our relationship which had been going downhill, also she gave me an ultimatum saying if I didn't marry her she would finish with me", "the relationship with my wife started going downhill when my cat and then my father died in close proximity") so I genuinely think he's playing the victim and blaming me for his shortfalls, as he seems to have done in the past with his wife.
So, reading this back it's a shit show but I do love him and genuinely can't work out whether I'm right to think we've both done stupid things through the relationship but he can't take responsibility for his part in our issues, or whether he's right and I'm unreasonable and have been grinding him down for the last year...? And his wife ground him down for ten years before that?!