20 year marriage down the drain

I do think I understand, but thanks for clarifying.

You are right, I am depressed. But I'm better than I was last year when this happened, and that's a plus. It's just so sad because I do know him so well.....I really do believe, with all my heart, that 6 or 9 months down the road, he will be sorry he made this decision. I won't be able to take him back....it will have been too long for my heart to be in limbo, particularly since this is the SAME GIRL that he swore, over and over last year, that he could NEVER leave me for ever again. THAT hurts so much!

This is part of a letter he wrote to me last October:

"I was a true idiot not to open up and talk to you. I now know in my heart that I am truly in love with you and always have been. I am truly sorry for all the pain that you have endured over the past months and hope you find it in your heart to forgive me for taking you for granted. I hope you can forgive me for leaving you and being an idiot. I remember sitting in a chair by myself and wishing so much that if I came back that you'd be willing to take me back with open arms. I felt as though I was dying without you. The last time I talked to you, just before I came back, I was so thankful that you were still willing to make our marriage work. I wanted to come back, but I was so scared that you would stop loving me that I was almost too afraid to come back because of what I'd done. I prayed that we would get back together and after, I realized that we were going to make it. I felt this over whelming joy fill my body. I feel so lucky to have you again. I'll never do anything to hurt you again. I can't promise I won't do something bone headed, but I'll never hurt you. You're too precious to me to ever put you or our marriage in jeopardy again."



It was part of a 3 page letter that went on to tell me how much he loved our life now, and how "nothing could compare to the beauty that is you." Does the above letter sound like a man who isn't in love with his wife? I know she "suckered him in" again with friendship. I know that she begged and begged him to see her, "just as a friend, if nothing else." But some day, he will recognize the man in himself who wrote the above words, and he will hate himself.

And I am just so damned saddened by the futility of all of this!!!!

But, I do understand what I have to do.....I have to be free. I have to get away from a man who could write the above words in October, and then three MONTHS later start writing to her behind my back. Any guy who is that devious cannot be trusted again. But I'm really sad because I do still love him.

I'm sorry, FreedomElf....

I'm not sure if it helps or not, but from what you've said I don't think he's devious necessarily, or that he didn't believe what he said when he said it -- I just think he's very immature and narcissistic (perhaps clinically, but I mean it as an adjective). I think he truly loves you but also has very poor impulse control and truly loves the excitement/ desire/ whatever that happens with Brenda. And he just can't reconcile those two things, and perhaps doesn't really believe that he should have to. Have cake and eat it too, etc.

Of course that leads to the same conclusion -- if he could possibly do this all over again after the heartbreak and introspection of last year then it's not worth giving him yet another chance. Just some thoughts on the why of it, and not blaming yourself too much for not seeing it coming. It's not necessarily that he was lying to you per se.

You nailed it, soz.

I do agree with you. I know he really did feel what he said in October. And I'm convinced he will remember it when the "bloom is off the rose" with Brenda, and he will be crying. I hope I am strong enough not to be pulled apart again when that happens, and I don't want the kids pulled apart at that time either.

But it's so frustrating that he is so weak-willed and narcissistic that he can forget what is truly important in life for the sake of some selfish excitement. If it were just myself, I might be foolish enough to take him back. But I have to protect the kids from his whims.

I went on a site that talked about why men cheat, and one of the men put it very succinctly. He said "Because our wives let us." He said that he had been forgiven a 100 times, and knew that he always would be, no matter what. So it was just too easy to indulge the passion.

I can't put myself through this again and again....but more importantly, I can't put the kids through this. Even my college boy was crying in his room (although he denied it and said he had a cold.) I can't let them worry about it.

Maybe....if he hadn't been so loving.....if he hadn't written such beautiful letters to me and been the perfect husband up until a week before he left, THEN I could trust him again if he started acting really loving now. But knowing that he is capable of REALLY loving me, then loving her, then loving me, then back to loving her, in a wishy-washy, indecisive manner makes me know that I will never be able to trust his expressions of "undying devotion." That three page letter should have been good for YEARS....not MONTHS!!!! If he can feel that way, and change his mind just months later, I can never be sure he won't do it again.

This time, it really is over, and in one way I am better than last year, and in one way I am worse. The sadness, I think, is worse this year because this time I have no hope that we can still make it. But it's better because I'm more financially able to handle it. So it's a tossup I guess.

And when the wives are done letting them cheat, they let them move on and start anew.

Freedomelf--

How's your life moving along? New paths are lonely, but eventually rewarding.

Hold your dominion.

Freedomelf--

We're here.