Married Man & Married Woman

Good, you acknowledge that these feelings have crossed your mind before this woman. Because, as you may be beginning to understand, a lot of people cling onto other possible mates/loves/sex partners as a way to distance themselves from their marriages when the reality is that they should be long gone from their marriages prior to even thinking about someone else.

Your inertia is not helping anything, but I can understand its attraction. Waiting it out (until what? Until someone dies?) is a lot easier, emotionally and financially, than dealing with a messy divorce, what with its arguments, bad karma and division of community property.

Yet deal with it you must or, at least, you should. If you care about your wife at all, even on a friends only level, surely you can see, once you get beyond the haze of your own issues, that hanging around is not doing her any favors. Y'see, and not to be overly blunt here, but unfortunately it's true, women lose status in the mate market for every year they are alive. It sucks, it's absurd, things should not be like that. But it's true. A 30 year old has far less chance of finding someone than a 20 year old. A 40 year old, even less so. A 50 year old, even less. Part of this is because of menopause, part of it is because of a lack of men after a while (particularly as the end of life comes nearer and nearer), and partly because many men (not necessarily all, but many) are hard-wired to want a young chippie. I say this as a 43 year old woman, by the way, and a happily married one at that. But I ain't kiddin' myself. I am well aware that someone who does not know me for my sparkling personality and the like () would be hard pressed to justify me as a mate when there are younger and more attractive gals around town.

So your inertia is not helping your wife for the future. And I know that's a tough thing to think about, what things would be like for her with you not around. But for people whose best interests we are concerned about, that kind of unselfishness can really happen.

My advice, essentially - and it's always my advice in these situations, and I really should just start copying and pasting it already - is to make up your mind. You want to be with this other woman? That's fine, just let your wife go so that she can pursue other interests - interests that may or may not include a second marriage. Don't jerk your wife around with your inertia. Or be with your wife. That's fine, too. But that means giving up your gal friend's hugs and hand-holding.

Oh, by the way, if your wife finds out about the hugs and the hand-holding, she will see it as adultery. Most would. She may or may not be forgiving, particularly considering as there have been no sex acts committed. But it will change things. So you need to see that you are playing with fire. What happens if you and your friend are hanging around in the stairwell, holding hands, and a coworker walks in on you? Will all of your coworkers keep quiet? Will they lie for you? I doubt that seriously. And one thing is a certainty in all of this. Divorce and the like stink. They are a raw deal all around. But at least if you come to your spouse on your own terms, and you split amicably, it doesn't suck anywhere near as much as it does if you were to get a divorce because you were found out for cheating or near-cheating. Consider that before you and your lady friend hold hands in the hallway, stairwell, cafeteria, conference room, parking lot or wherever.

PS You don't say whether kids are involved, either in your marriage or in hers, but their interests and needs have got to be paramount. A messy split will devastate them. Think about that. Inertia is attractive and fun. I am as lazy as the next person. But the pain of a divorce for fault is far worse than the escape velocity you need to get out of the inertial state.

Deep
Wow that was crazy deep. Thanks for the post, I dont know if its all sunk in yet, but I appreciate the time you put into it and I will definitally have to reread it a few times. A big part of what started all this is kinda weird/sad/bad/whatever but we JUST had a child, and ever since we found out she was pregnant, my heart kind of sunk, only because it created just that much more "attachment" to my wife with all these thoughts.

The other girl has a 3 year old, but we talk all the time because I would love to spend time with her boy and his dad spends no time with him, he is really lazy, treats her really bad, and effectivly ignores his son. It makes me angry, because I would love to be in that childs life. It makes it that much messier. Ive thought about the idea that "getting caught" would be much worse then just getting it over with, but it sucks because if I look at "getting it over with" that means I really should do counseling. Which could be a couple years of dragged out "make it better" talk.

Either way it sucks and I still am in a haze about everything. Any more information and comments are appreciated. I will reread your post again a few times, and again thank you for anything you can tell me.

Well, counseling doesn't have to be that way. It doesn't have to be a big push to save your marriage. Since you don't seem to want to save it, then counseling can be for the transitional period. And, even though I failed to mention it above, there's a third option, of course - leaving your wife and not ending up with that gal. That exists, too.

Also, since there are kids involved and because there is a push to get you involved in the life of your lady friend's son - consider the possibility that she's just looking for a better Dad for her son. Despite whatever she's told you, that might be the prime motivation there. Or not. I don't know her, I only know what you've said, but that might be what's going on there.

It's unfortunate if the child's own father won't spend time with him, and it sounds like that marriage is headed in only one direction. But that does not mean that yours needs to follow suit. What kind of a father are you to your own child? I am assuming this is still a baby. Do you feed, change, burp, wash, rock the baby? Or does your wife do it all? Recognize that your wife is busy and may not seem wonderfully attractive right now. That's kind of the way things go when a kid comes into the picture. It's a whirlwind of sleep deprivation and colic (I say this and I don't have any kids, but that doesn't mean I've never observed new parents). Plus there are rewards, of course. But it's not the same as being just a couple, just the two of you.

Oh, and one more thing, then I have to run - I find it interesting that there's barely one sentence about your child, whose sex and age you don't even reveal, yet there is a half a paragraph about this woman's 3-year-old son and his Dad. It's as if he is more important to you than your own child is. If you don't consider counseling for any other reason, you might want to think about it for that.