Long rant
I do appreciate the concern. Really I do.
But I think some of you are making assumptions on bad data.
My wife and I had stopped communicating quite some time ago. I can’t even say when.
We were talking at each other, but not communicating.
So, unless you are one of the people I have talked with about my feelings, your information is incomplete.
My wife has told me how she viewed my words and actions. I can’t fault her for coming to the conclusions she did. But, that doesn’t mean they are the right conclusions.
My conclusions about her were wrong as well.
There are things that if they were happening, I would agree I needed therapy.
I’m not driving by her boyfriend’s house with my swords out. Yes, I know where he lives. I know that from getting a big phone bill and saying “who did she spend an hour and a half talking to?” I know where he works the same way. 1300 minutes of calls made me look that up.
I’ve had at least one offer of someone who was willing to pay a “visit” with me. Or, to pay a “visit” for me while I was publicly elsewhere.
These offers were turned down without question. (The strange part is the offers were from someone I hardly know. How often do they offer that? That person might need some help.)
I could tell his wife about it. I could get him in trouble with his job for 10 hours of calls to my wife on company time.
I have not done either.
I have not take up drinking again.
I have not gone off somewhere to pick up another woman to prove anything.
I’m not thinking of doing anything to myself or others.
Am I sad?
Yes. Absolutely. A 24 year old relationship has disintegrated around me.
I love my wife. I’m sad she loves someone else.
I’m sad I let things get out of control.
I’m sad I assumed she knew how much she meant to me and didn’t remind her.
I’m sad I only spoke the bad because I thought she knew the good.
I’m sad she came to think the bad was all there was.
Am I lonely?
Yes. Absolutely.
It’s been 17 years since I lived alone. It’s been 14 years since my wife and I started living together married.
I’m in that same apartment. There is no place I can look and not be reminded that I’m there alone.
Do I envy that she is staying with friends? That she goes to a house where there are people who are happy to see her, talk with her and support her.
Yes. I do envy that.
I go back to an empty apartment to sit there by myself.
I’ve asked her if she wants to trade. She said no.
But, I’m also happy she has that. I’m happy she has a place to stay. And of all the people she could have stayed with, I think she made the best choice out there.
Does that make the silence I get when I come home better?
No. Not really.
But, I have lived alone before. I have faced the silence before. I can take it.
Sleep with the radio on. Keep the TV on even if I’m not really watching.
Write. A lot.
Am I angry?
Sometimes. It comes in flashes. But, I don’t cling to it. It comes, I feel it, it goes.
Do I doubt myself?
Oh yeah. I let the best thing in my life fall apart due to inattention.
How can I not doubt that?
Everything we had together she was willing to give up because the pain was so great.
How can I hope to win her back if everything I have wasn’t enough for her to stay?
What do I have left to offer if it all didn’t measure up already?
But, I have a pretty good group of friends. And, there are a few of them who started with “you’re going to doubt yourself, but don’t forget you are a person of worth no matter what it feels like at the moment”.
So, I hold onto that. Several people I respect think I’m a person of worth.
It might not be enough for my wife. And, that worries me and makes me sad.
But, it’s enough for me. Not all I’d like, but enough.
The things that really wind me up are external. And, no personal therapist can help with that. Group can.
My #1 biggest worry is my wife’s feelings towards her boyfriend.
No, I don’t like her loving him.
No, I don’t like that she’s fooled around with him.
But, that’s not the core of my problems. There are 2 cores to it.
1) Her hiding and lying about it made it far worse than the actual event. I don’t like what happened, but in the scheme of things it isn’t that much. Six months elapsed before I found out what went on. Six months she was still with me. Six months I could have been trying to repair things while she was still with me, but I didn’t know how bad it was. She’s fallen into a habit of not sharing her life with me. Yes, there is bad, and it hurts to hear it. But, not hearing it didn’t stop the damage. If (big if) we are going to continue together, I have to hear more. Hurtful or not I can’t make changes if I don’t know the problem. Yes, I should have known. Yes, I should have noticed more. I didn’t. Some times I need to be shown.
2) My wife is no longer sure adultery is wrong. That bothers me on a fundamental level. I’m not talking about her cheating on me. I’m talking about her cheating with a man who is married to someone else. She hasn’t done more than one “swept up in the moment” thing with him. But, she isn’t sure if she’ll do more. She isn’t sure if she will stop if the moment comes again. One thing we have always shared is a sense of right and wrong. It worries me that my wife is so lost that she is no longer sure about this one. She wants it so much that she isn’t sure it’s wrong. She describes their first encounter as something that got out of control. But, if she does it again, it’s a choice. A choice to steal someone else’s husband. A choice to go to a man who isn’t hers. And, it bother’s me she isn’t sure that’s wrong.
So, those are my two big things. I don’t see how my going to therapy is going to change them. I do see how us going to couple’s therapy could.
Again, I’m happy to hear a pitch on why I’m wrong.
But, I need reasons. I need logic behind it.
I remain an engineer. “You should” doesn’t cut it.