Mid-life crisis

I'm actually not being harsh on Freedomelf - take a look at my posts. I'm talking about the behaviour of an asshOle, not her. Okay, I think she's deluding herself, but hey, I give her a couple-three more months and she'll be kicking him to the curb. Why? Because I have absolute faith in people who have been WRONGED.

Free is just fooling herself and we all need to give her TIME to figure that out... and I say that after reading all the daily, weekly updates - proves my point, actually.

But everyone has to find out for themselves - I'm just saying it upfront because that's who I am.

Noddy, if I saw someone beating on you anywhichway, I'd be in the middle of that like a dirty shirt...

And Tino! You are a hero - good for you for finally seeing what is in front of you. I wasn't going to say it, it was for you to figure out... you are getting smart.

Abuse is abuse is abuse, no matter what the form... if what you do causes others pain, take a good long look. Period. Mr. Free is a self-indulgent male who no longer deserves the love of Free, so she should throw throse rose-tinted glasses away and look clearly at the situation. She can do it, she's half-way there.

I had a feeling you were being awfully quiet, Tino. I'm sorry to hear what's happening in your relationship. She was hurt, she reacted. You've done some things, she's said some things. Now you're both reacting. You both need to step back, assess, and look forward (perhaps as a separation, perhaps with counseling). If you can't see a way of getting past the reactions then it won't happen.

Freedomelf, keep your chin up. You have done absolutely nothing wrong. You have nothing to apologize for, feel guilty about, or otherwise be down on yourself about.


As an aside.... a couple years after our 'episode' a close friend announced she was separating from her husband of 12 years. Her husband had informed her he wasn't sure he was still in love with her. He was confused, he was in a rut, he was blah, blah, blah, he had a 'friend'. <uh oh, I'd heard all of this before>. HE HAD INFORMED HER THAT HE WASN'T SURE HE WAS STILL IN LOVE WITH HER. She marched off to a divorce lawyer, and filed separation papers. Eighteen months later (they were still in the process of divorce) he told her he'd never wanted a divorce (duh) he just wanted to be able to talk to her about what was going on in his life. After 18 months she was still furious, he was still confused. They completed the divorce process. Four years later she is still furious, at both his indiscretion and his indecisiveness, he still doesn't know what hit him. They are both very nice people who weren't able to see what impact their actions were having on their partner.

Tino, your partner has no reason to take her anger out on your kids. You are both adults, responsible for every action you make. If you relationship can't survive your infatuation without destroying your relationship with your kids, then it isn't worth it.

This made me almost as mad as it did when I heard it 8 years ago. I'll save you my tirade.

Mame, I thought about sending this in a PM, but I thought I might as well put it here:

I think all of us share your anger at Mr. F and probably fear the worst in terms of what is going to happen next. That is, I don't think you're saying anything particularly new. What is different is that you're comfortable taking out your frustration on FreedomElf; I'm not. I can think of situations in which I would be, but she has shown remarkable self-awareness and clear-headedness throughout, and I don't think that kind of "tough love" actually helps anything.

One of two things will happen. One is that the marriage is permanently trashed, and unsavable. If that's the case, SHE will figure that out. We can't make her.

Two is that the marriage is not permanently trashed, and it can be saved. J_B -- one of the smartest, savviest, strongest women I know -- is testament to the fact that marriages can recover from this crushing blow.

Taking out our frustrations on FreedomElf only adds hurt to a hurtful time.

Osso and Soz, thank you both very much.

Mame, Tino isn't a hero and FreedomElf isn't a fool. They're both normal people, trying to figure out what life has thrown at them.

Mr B is one of the most caring, loving, sensitive people I have ever met. Our relationship today is deeper than it was ten years ago. We've been together for nineteen years, married for seventeen, all but a couple of them blissful. Some things are worth it.

I have my own opinion, thank you, so you don't need to tell who's who or what I think... Keep yourself busy.

There's a lot of weak people out there who don't even realize it. Huh.

Mame--

I appreciate your passion. You want to save Freedomelf some grief, but she's the one who has to sort out Husband and Bathwater.

I appreciate your offer of backing me up in a mugging--and I realize that there are many varieties of mugging.


Tino--

J_B said it very well:



I agree, counseling seems necessary. Bathwater is a complicated entity.

Ain't it, though.

(Sigh.)

Msolga, I appreciate the kind words very much. To be honest, I did go through a "mid-life crisis" of sorts, but it didn't involve infidelity. About 2 years ago, I told my husband that, at 45, this would be the last year that I would consider having another child. My health was not perfect, and my doctor said that he would worry if I considered it too much longer. In other words, it was now or never.

He knew how much I loved kids….I could have had a dozen and wouldn't have minded, so I guess I was feeling "broody." Anyway, he told me he hated the thought of having another child at that moment. He said he might consider it in a few years, but not then. I told him I didn't HAVE a few years. So he told me to forget it, and close that chapter of our lives.

I got depressed, and went through a period of about 4 months where I didn't want to do anything fun, or go out. I didn't try to make anyone else miserable….I put on a brave face. I just wasn't my normal, exuberant self. (Ironically, I look back now and think this was the time when hubby and I got a little distant with each other.) During this depression, we dropped making love from about 6 times a week to about twice a week. Hubby didn't seem to mind….at least he never told me he did, until recently.

I snapped out of it and was fine afterwards, but I don't think that hubby recovered totally from that period. He told me recently that he felt I blamed him for not wanting more kids. I wasn't, really, but I guess that's how he felt. I didn't realize that anything was wrong after I snapped out of it. I thought things had returned to normal. Apparently not.

Eva and Noddy, I agree that it is necessary for my conscience to do everything I can, and am grateful you understand that. And I hope that it works out. Last night hubby came home in a great mood and was very sweet to me all night (no, he didn't get in the bedroom.) And this morning I overslept, so he made his own fruit salad for breakfast, and then knocked to come in to kiss me goodbye when he left. I'm hoping things will be okay. I look forward to our session tonight.

Osso, I also agree that it will never be the same again. I'm not sure I want it to after all the deception that I found out about. But I'm hoping for JB's miracle, and do remember all the good things that my husband once was, and hopefully can be again.

Tino, I'm really sorry that your partner is treating your kids that way…..that is a relationship buster, that's for sure. Forgiveness is the key. It is SO HARD to forgive having your ego torn out of your heart and thrown on the ground and kicked. If she can't get there, though, the relationship won't survive. I hope that she can, and that it will work out for you.

My husband was very resentful, a few years back, when he was the only one bringing in money while my older son, who is now 26, was living with us. After High School Quentin spent a year or two "finding himself" while we were supporting him, before going into college. He lived at home while he was attending college, so hubby was supporting him for about 6 years after High School, all together. Quentin finally graduated, got a good job and moved out about a year ago. However, Hubby is saying now that supporting Quentin caused resentment to build in him, and by the time Quent moved out, it was really, really getting to him. He NEVER told me this until recently…..it's a revelation to find out all these things, that he hid so well. I'm kind of in shock at how much I am learning that I never realized.

At any rate, I hope she can find the forgiveness, and the love. You sound like a terrific man, and I hope she realizes that before it is too late.

Sozobe, that play brought chills up my spine, because I, too, could see hubby in it. I think I may check out the New Yorker myself. Thanks…..and thanks for the support and ego boosting, too. I appreciate it.

JB, thanks. You have inspired me, and even if it doesn't work out, I am grateful for the hope that I feel when I read your posts.

Mame, I am glad you are with your first true love. My husband is my first true love. I think that if your husband came to you right now and told you he believed he was in love with someone else, you might think differently. Of course, I don't know……it's just that you seem very angry. I appreciate if your anger is for me, but I am not sure if it is. Perhaps I may feel more anger in the future, but right now, I can't. I'm just trying to focus on getting through this and seeing what to salvage and what not.

In a way, I am in the same mode that I was in when my father died. I took over, planned things, worked out the issues and was there to support my grandmother, who wasn't taking her son's death too well. (He was only 58 at the time). It wasn't until much, much later that I "fell apart" and grieved. I think this is what is happening here, at least partially. I've got to figure out where we stand and what we are going to do, for the kids' sake.

The kids are doing OK I guess, but I worry about my 12 year old because he is getting used to having daddy back….so I'm afraid he will be torn apart again if dad leaves. He DID tell me to be careful, in case dad "becomes a jerk again" (his words), but I don't think he is taking his own advice. He went up to dad last night to say good night and kiss him on the cheek…..something he hasn't done since this happened. It was almost as if he "forgot" his anger, and realized it afterwards because he seemed embarrassed after he did it. I just hope he doesn't get hurt again. My older one is so happy to have dad back, and he says he forgives him everything. He seems to think that I should just forget the whole thing and go back to "happy family" mode, so I think he is sometimes down on me. Just a thought.

And everyone is right….bathwater is complicated! I never realized how much. Well, wish me luck tonight. See you later or tomorrow.

I have been reading everyone's comments, and I can see each person's point. I am thinking back to the time when I was married to the first Mr. P.
I think that I knew on my wedding day that the whole thing was wrong, but I went ahead anyway. (The hall was booked, the dress was bought, and the invitations were sent out.........boy does that sound stupid now. I WAS very young.)

Anyhow, after about two years, I threw my hands up, and told my parents that I wanted to leave my husband. They called in a lawyer, who spoke with me. He told me that I needed a marriage counselor, not a lawyer.

The long and short of it, was that I needed to go through the process of extricating myself from the situation that I had gotten myself into. It took another two years for me to say definitely, that I wanted OUT.

In my case, the marriage was much more shaky. Mr. P. was a mamma's boy, who put her needs way before mine. When I divorced, I did not have one shread of emotion towards my husband. But I needed to go through the process, which takes time.

In Freedomelf's case, she has a long standing relationship, with a few kids, and a rather happy history with her husband. I can understand how divorcing would be a very traumatic step for her, even though her husband has walked all over her as of late.

Freedomelf- I have a lot of confidence in you. I think that you have a good head on your shoulders, and are as realistic as can be expected given your situation. Take your time. Observe what is going on, and try not to "show your hand" too much. I saw where you said that you are afraid that you are concerned that if you are too tough, he will run to Brenda. If so, so be it. In the meantime, you can be comforted by the fact that you gave it your best shot, and that you have played much more fairly than your husband.

You want to repair the marriage. He does not seem that he is quite sure. Try to stand back (I know that it is hard) and observe what is going on. I think that you will eventually come up with the right answer for YOU!

Hey, look at this:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/20/health/20case.html

(Very topical article -- I'm not sure if I agree with cancer = infidelity analogy, even if it wasn't a direct analogy, but an interesting take on the subject.)

My first marriage sounds very much like yours, Phoenix. I knew from the very beginning that I shouldn't do it, and there wasn't enough there to make it work, but I wanted so badly to get out of my mom's house, and he very much wanted to stay in this country (he was from Germany and hadn't gotten a permanent visa yet...he was actually working illegally.)

I was young and stupid. And he SEEMED so interesting because he was so, well, "European", and was the first person that was interested in me after I left the convent (only spent 6 months there at age 17, but it was hard for me to learn how to date when I got out. I look back and think the only reason I wanted to become a nun was to get away from my mom, as well. Ah, the foolishness of youth!)

Anyway, we wound up staying together, in a loveless marriage, a bit longer than you did, but when I finally got the courage to leave and take my son with me, I wound up with a better life. It was scary, but I managed. About 2 years after I divorced him, I met "Mr Right" and it was a marriage made in heaven.

I remember the night I fell in love with my husband. I asked him to tell me a story. He was surprised, because no one had ever asked him that before. He thought for a moment, and then said "Okay, I'll tell you a true story......there once was an old sea captain, who had lived his whole life alone at sea, and finally decided to retire. He was given a retirement party by the ship owners, and there he met a beautiful young girl. They fell madly in love, but her parents were up in arms because they felt she was too young for him. Still, they left her family's fortune behind, ran away and got married and lived many happy years together.

On his deathbed, she sat next to him and told him she couldn't bear to part from him, so he promised her, without a doubt, that he would find her in the next life. She smiled and said, "Just promise me one more thing.....that I won't be so young when you find me. I never want to have to deal with my parents like that ever again!" He promised, and then died.

Then my husband reached over to me and whispered, "You see? I kept my promise!"

I knew then that I wanted to spend my life with him. He has seen me through a lot of good times and bad.....he took care of my son totally without help when I spent a week in the hospital shortly after we were married. We have been through a car accident, job losses, and the biggie....we almost lost our youngest son to menengitis when he was just a baby. We've been down and we've been up, but we've always stuck together until now.

Anyway, I just can't erase those memories. They are a part of my fabric. I need to see whether that fabric is completely ravelled, or whether it can be reknit and made stronger.

Sozobe, thanks for that link! It is a different take on it, and it's funny because I do think this is a kind of disease, as the counselor said as well. He did say that only 15% of men have such a bad chemical imbalance, and I believe that does explain PART of why most men don't go through this as badly as some others.

Great link, Soz. Interestingly enough, there was an old college flame in our saga as well.

FreedomElf, don't hold out for a miracle. Recovering from this is a very slow and painful process. I liked the questions in Soz's link and from my very first post in this thread
It took both of us to get into our situation, it took both of us to work through it, and it took years before either of us could say we were happy.

Continued best wishes and hopes to you.

I can see myself in that quote.....I was a mom more than a wife, and my trust was implicit. Yes, it sounds as if we both have a lot of work to do.

It scares me to think of not being happy for YEARS......and I know that would scare the heck out of him. But I'm going to try. I'm just taking one day at a time now.

Freedomelf--

I hope things go well in your counselling session.

The counselor told us tonight that he sees many couples who really shouldn't stay together, but that he doesn't believe that we are among them. He says that if we are willing to work at it, he sees us getting stronger than ever.

I was upset today, though, when he told the counselor that Brenda was actually younger than he told me she was. I didn't understand why he would lie about that.

Anyway, all it all it was a good session. Hubby says he is beginning to like the counselor, and I do too.

Gnite all, and thanks again.

freedomelf- He probably realized that his ridiculous situation would sound even more ridiculous if you knew the truth. I know that it is hard, but if you really want to save this marriage, try to look at the issue globally, and don't sweat the details.

The real issue for you, IMO, is whether you are going to be able to trust him after all the lying that he has done. The particulars don't really have to matter.

I'd guess that Mr. F. lied to you about Brenda's age because he was under the influence of hormones.

Hormones trump ethics.

On some level he knew she was young and adoring and balm to his ego--but he didn't want to be a stereotyped Man in Mid-Life Crisis, enamored of a young Poopsie. His Mid-Life Crisis is special because it is all about him.

Reality doesn't count in Mid-Life Crises.

That certainly could be.

Last night when I went into the guest room to bring him his tea, he was crying. I sat down to ask him why, and he said he was just being silly. He told me that he had fallen so hard for her that he could easily see himself married to her, and that there was "something missing" from his feelings for me, even though he knows he still loves me. He said that he was crying because he wants to feel what he felt for me when I was younger, but he doesn't know if he will get it back. That's why he came home….to see if he would, and so far he hasn't. It's only been a week, so I guess I'm not surprised at that.

He also told me that although he told the other woman not to wait for him, he knows that she is waiting, and that thought drives him crazy because he doesn't know if he made the right decision. But we got to talk some more, and I asked him how he felt when he spent that month with her. He said that there was always something wrong, but that he is hoping that it would go away if he decided, once and for all, to end his marriage. He did say that little things about her irritated him, but nothing major so he ignores those things. He concentrates on the good….and there is a lot of good, such as the fact that it is so easy to talk to her, but hard to talk to me.

I have to admit, that made me laugh. Here I was, listening to a man who broke my heart ramble on about a woman who tore the very fabric of our lives, without getting mad, raising my voice, crying, or being anything less than supportive, and he was telling me how "hard" I am to talk to. And I reminded him that about a year after we met, he was telling me that I was the only person he had ever known who was "perfect". Yeah….I know you are laughing, but that is honestly what he thought. He didn't have things that irritated him from the get-go! And he looked back and answered honestly….there really was nothing about me that bothered him then, but there are things about her that bother him NOW.

Finally, I asked him if he is positive that he is back for ME, and not the kids, and he said yes, he was sure of that. He thought about it very carefully before coming home, and knew that he couldn't come home if it was for the kids' sakes. It had to be because there was a chance for our relationship. He is just missing her, that's all. But he also says that he feels "guilty" because he has been taking more than he is giving lately. I agreed with that, but told him that marriage was give and take….sometimes one person got more, and the other less, but that it balanced out in the end. He felt a lot better when I left the room (he actually wanted me to stay, but I didn't.)

I don't know….it's strange……the more he talks about her, the less "needy" of him I feel and more like I can handle living on my own if I have to. I did it once before, in my first marriage. I guess if I need to, I will do it again. I'm beginning to see him very differently than I did before. Before April, he was always "larger than life"......my hero, my rock, my super-human love of my life. He could literally do no (major) wrong. Now.....I see him as a man, not a hero. That saddens me, but it also empowers me to be stronger. That strength may, eventually, bring us closer and make our marriage stranger than ever. Or, it may give me the means to find someone else. At this point, I just don't know.

The counselor, however, was very optimistic about our marriage. He said it sounded like we just let "us" go, in order to be mom, dad, worker, etc. He wants us to date more and get out by ourselves. We have been doing that somewhat, but he says we really have to focus on getting away by ourselves. I was thinking of a weekend in the mountains. Hubby and I both like to hike.

Freedomelf--

Interesting Freudian slip here:



Hold your dominion.

I thought about this for a while before deciding whether I'd even answer it. First of all, I'm not taking my frustration out on anyone... why? because I'm not frustrated. I am thinking very clearly about what happened in this relationship, and if Free is half the woman I think she is, she will eventually be living on her own. I've already explained why.

Perhaps I'm coming across as harsh because of my word choice and because I don't mince them. I believe that's a large part of it. Also, I believe in directness. Perhaps I should have given her more time before saying anything at all. Yes, I can see I may have jumped in too early, when her wounds were still so raw. But she hasn't even gotten to the anger part yet - and when she does, look out. She's still justifying and excusing him. This is a phase and it too will pass.

What I am a little confused by is everyone's support of her confusion. She's in a quagmire of unreality and nobody except me has been telling her to get some perspective on the situation. I believe she needs tools to help her see this situation clearly. Different perspectives from different people, and yet most of what I see is support for her trying to save her marriage.

It's completely admirable to try and save your marriage, but you do not do it when you're in pain and in a confused, betrayed state of mind. You do it when you have calmed down, accepted or resigned yourself to situation, tried to analyze what happened, see who was accountable for what, etc... When you're in pain, you go and lick your wounds and get comfort from your friends.

I don't care if she stays with him or not; I don't care if they have the truest love of all time - What I have been writing about is looking at what REALLY happened, by whom, to whom, and why. Take a look at the events and actions of the situation, and if she can remove herself from it (as if watching a movie), what would her perspective be? What if he had come up and smacked her in the head with a hammer? Would she stay, saying, "This is the first time he's ever done this but he's hormonal and chemical and I forgive him", meanwhile, she's bleeding from both ears. Just because it's on the inside doesn't mean it's not there. He has wounded this lady and keeps on doing it, seemingly unaware or unconcerned with her pain.

Freedom, if or when you arrive at the point I'm talking about, please tell me and I'll be right there, standing beside you.

I am really sorry if I have offended you... truly. You are already in pain, and I sure don't need to add to it. I know you'll come through this stronger and better. And alone (99% sure -wink)...

Peace out.