Now I'm Angry (kiss, children, divorced, affair)

[Rakin]

SKP.... keep the faith man, life will improve.

Just get through the divorce and you'll find a lot of burden and doubt removed from your shoulders.
I divorced a few years back after a very long marriage and just had to take it day to day.

Someday you'll have another special lady in your life and realize the big guy upstairs took good care of you.

Best of luck.

[Lilac110]

Originally Posted by SKP440

As of next week I will finally be out of the house. I found an apartment. March 1 I will be a single man waiting for the divorce to be finalized. In the meantime I have dealt with making up a budget and figuring out just how much OT I will have to do just to continue to be able to add to savings (my straight salary just covers all of my bills and money to care for my daughter. I still get EXTREMELY ANGRY when my STBX spends the night at her boyfriend's house. She can only get away with this because of my job. She knows if I loose it I run the risk of loosing my pension and freedom, so in the final few weeks I have been avoiding her like the plague. We have been pleasant with each other, and I have learned breathing exercises to deal with the anxiety. Once again last night she spent the night at his house and I broke down and cried most of last night. I did not get any sleep and I barely got it together to go to work today. Why this reaction now?? I thought I was past all of this and starting to heal. My therapist keeps saying that he wonders why she is playing such a dangerous game. I no longer carry my weapons home for just that reason and will probably continue to do so even after I move. This next week can't go by quick enough.

Someone repped me this morning for post #29 in this thread. Maybe you can go back and revisit it. It basically talks about how you may still feel anger and grief for a while yet.

Originally Posted by weezerfan84

Sounds like you just really hate the fact that you are struggling with it all and she's going on with her life like nothing happened. This is the bad part about breakups. The person who initiates the breakup, especially if it comes as a surprise to the other partner, has typically checked out of the relationship long before telling you. They don't feel the grief when it officially ends, because they have already processed the grief. When the relationship officially ends, they are already refreshed to see someone else. It stinks to be the surprised participant, but such is life these days. You either bob and weave the punches or you get TKO'd.

Originally Posted by savoytruffle

Thanks for the update, SKP. I was actually just thinking about your situation the other day and wondering how it turned out.

I agree with Raptor and weezer. It seems like your wife isn't struggling because she gave up long ago. You, on the other hand, were totally blind-sided, and she has no sympathy for it at all. She isn't worth being upset over, but obviously I understand why you still are. You were married for a long time and you said you are not used to being alone.

Like Raptor said, the healing process will start when you move out. You will still have bad days, but eventually you will get back to the place where you have more good days than bad days. I know it probably seems impossible, but it WILL happen.

I agree with the above two posts, except for one thing. Unless someone has a long-distance marriage, like if someone is away at war and the partner at home keeps up pretense while having an affair or making plans to leave, there is almost never a situation where one person is blind-sided. Anyone who is divorced, if they are honest with themselves and mature enough to take an objective look at themselves and their marriage, will be able to look back on it and see not only their own role in the demise of the marriage, but the signs that the marriage had been in trouble for a long time. The OP had chronicled problems right on this forum before the whole thing went down. Even those who live in denial on the surface tend to know that their denial stems from wishful thinking that they didn't know what they know. That is what anyone who hopes to have love and happiness again will have to come to terms with. It is part of healing, forgiving (yes, forgiving, both yourself and the other person), and letting go, so that you can be whole again.

But yes, a lot of times people already check out of the relationship before they make it official. In fact, that is why it's hardly ever a surprise. If you live in the same home with someone, as with a marriage, it's pretty hard to miss that someone is behaving differently toward you. When people begin to check out, it becomes harder and harder for them to go through the motions. Eventually, when they truly no longer care, they don't even bother to hide their change in sentiment, and it becomes obvious in their behavior. Even sociopaths crack.

Originally Posted by Raptor76

I think once you truly begin the process of being in your own place, the healing process will really begin. You are too close to the situation right now, and that is why you can't move on. Once you get your own place and get your own routine down, you won't have time to think about her or who she is with.

Wise words here. SKP, right now the proximity both to her and to the home you shared is making things worse than they might otherwise be. A new environment will do you wonders.

[ohio_peasant]

It's true, regardless of our religious orientation, that humans are fallible. No spouse is perfect. If we comb for evidence that both spouses failed in mutual reinforcement, devotion and so forth, yes, we'll find plenty of such evidence. It is also true that sometime before a relationship collapses, there are signs of withdrawal by one (and sometimes both) partners. Intimacy becomes strained, the subtle cues that partners give each other as part of their private language become less overt and more jumbled. The unity of the pair becomes less self-evident. Cracks form.

But I disagree that these cracks are irreparable, or that their formation bespeaks the end of the relationship as the best and most sensible outcome. Further, I disagree that in all cases where one spouse emotionally exits from the relationship, that her or his counterpart necessarily gave her or him ample cause to justify such a move. I disagree with the assertion that all divorces are fundamentally no-fault, or that sufficiently thorough and unbiased search would reveal that the formation of said cracks naturally stems from both partners reneging on essential responsibilities.

Instead, it seems to me to be quite common for one partner to have more emotionally invested in the relationship. There may be mutual love and respect, but simply put, one of the partners enjoys being married more than does the other partner; one of the partners would hypothetically have more options if the marriage were to end; one of the partners feels the he or she is doing more to sustain the marriage, than is the other. One of the partners feels more liberated by the comforts that marriage provides, while the other partner feels more stifled by its chores and restrictions. It is precisely such cases which are most fraught with risk for divorce. In a more symmetric marriage, even if the intimacy is less comprehensive or the communication less successful, there is less impetus for reassessing whether the marriage ought to continue, and thereby, less chance for divorce.

SKP's situation therefore prompts this observation: the marriage most at risk isn't necessarily the one with poor communication or demonstrable transgressions by one spouse against the other, but the one with latent asymmetry. It's not that the spouse blindsided by divorce fails to admit his or her flaws, but that he or she didn't comprehend the asymmetry. Such marriages are liable to fail seemingly without cause and after decades of what appears to be a solid bond, because the asymmetry built slowly, insidiously, becoming obvious to one partner but not to the other. Then, the ensuing final rift was not a failure of communication, or of being too hasty to eschew a route towards reconciliation, but because the respective interests of the two spouses have diverged too far.

[cyberphonics]

Originally Posted by SKP440

I just have to pick up the pieces and get myself better mentally and then learn from the mistakes I made in order to be a better person.

I really do hope that you're able to move on from this and, most importantly, address some of the issues you seem to have that may not only delay that but negatively impact the way you regard/approach relationships in the future. Separating yourself from your ex and your interest in her life and rehashing of the past will be a significant step in your recovery. I'm glad you found a place to move if kicking her out wasn't an option you chose and even happier that you do have a therapist and are taking steps to become a healthier person. I wish you all the luck in the world!

Originally Posted by Raptor76

So my advice is if need be, continue getting better, except do it for yourself. When you start focusing on things to fix yourself and make yourself happier, you won't have time to dwell on the her and the break up of the relationship.

Originally Posted by ohio_peasant

There appear to be two schools of thought. One, which I'll call "traditional", says that not-cheating/hitting/cursing, being a good provider and a responsible adult are sufficient conditions for a marriage. Meet those conditions, and dissolving a marriage becomes specious and vain. The second school, which I'll call "modern", says that the principal purpose of a marriage is mutual happiness, and if one of the partners feels serious doubt that her/his happiness is propitiated by the marriage, then the marriage should be dissolved. We are seeing growth of the second viewpoint and retreat of the former, as antiquated and myopic. Personally I don't support such a trend, but nevertheless, there it is.

I would ask why you don't support the trend of people making love, happiness, and their emotional well-being a requirement and priority in their proposed life-long bond as opposed to treating it like the transaction it used to be where love and happiness were irrelevant as long as the terms of adult responsibility and etiquette were met, but I suspect I'll find the answer irritating, so I won't.

I do agree with everything else you've said, though, mostly.

What I often wonder is how those who seem to take issue with this trend feel about celebrities who marry because it's sensible rather than because they truly care for each other and are happy together. I would consider not dissolving a marriage specious and vain if its only value is that it's a perfectly adequate arrangement. Counterintuitive though it may be, there is much superficiality and ego to be found in pleasant mediocrity.

Originally Posted by Melissa78703

Neither do I. What most (mature) people don't realize about marriage is that there will be times when you wonder if you made the right choice. Normal. When you really want to check out of it. Totally normal. When you feel no love for your spouse. Again, normal. And this was coming from a marriage counselor that my ex-H and I saw.

You cannot be all things to everyone, not even a mate. I think that oftentimes people who are "unhappy" in their marriages simply don't have enough outside interests to keep them occupied, or enough close friends to spend time with. They have no one passion that drives them -- them -- so they look for passion externally.

In the words of Betty Draper, "Only boring people are bored."

I'm not really addressing this to you, only to the topics you've introduced, but it bugs me when people effectively equate accepting unhappiness with maturity. People do it with everything from relationships to employment.

This generation quits their job because it makes them miserable, but mature people realize that having a job puts food on the table and offers you stability. No, you're not going to love everything about it, but mature people realize that's par for the course. Just find other ways to deal with it! And some people do find other ways to deal with it, like, for instance, killing themselves.

To me, maturity is, among other things, the ability to recognize self-destructive choices, environments, and bonds and act in accordance with the healthiest decisions you can make to the best of your ability, even if it's difficult. Maturity is not defined by taking the path of least resistance, by opting not to rock the boat because hey, at least it's floating.

When a bond promised to last a lifetime becomes emotionally destructive, when its only redeeming quality is numbers on a page - how many years you've been together, how many things you've done for each other, how much money was invested in it - and the elements that make a relationship with a spouse different from a relationship with a friend or a parent or a pimp no longer apply, maturity is being able to see that.

And to know what can be salvaged and what can't for the benefit not only of yourself but of your children, assuming you want them to grow up with an emotionally healthy self-regard and perspective on relationships and on the kind of expectations they should have for the dynamics and qualities defining the shared life that may one day become their life.

Anyone can make a relationship work whether that relationship is a healthy one or not if the way they define working is by whether or not you stay in it. So - some seek counseling to make their marriage work while others seek counseling to make their marriage better. Either can result in a marriage that lasts, so if all someone wants is a marriage that lasts, they can forego the reckless whim of wanting anything more out of their marriage than practicality and civility and just stay together without that stuff.

But understand that choosing to stay in a relationship does not define the successfulness of that relationship or the quality of that relationship or the value of that relationship. All staying means is that you weren't willing to leave and there are plenty of people out there who've been run into the ground, driven to violence, driven to substance abuse, driven to infidelity, driven out of themselves until only a shell remained because they weren't willing to leave.

It's not a choice to be objectively praised, then, yet I encounter people who are proud to be miserably married for a long time just because they didn't leave while looking down on those who are happily married because they refused to stay in relationships that offered them anything less.

We're conditioned to believe that marriage is more important than any other kind of relationship we'll ever have because it involves legalities and big investments (as if those who don't get married never build lives together, build families, build homes) and idyllic vows. Unfortunately, I think what people come to discover is that marriage is a whole different animal because it's not a whole different animal.

Marriage is not this divine culmination of all things perfect that will complete and fulfill you in a way that no other relationship ever has or ever will. It's not the fairy tale we're fed, it's not the point that all roads lead to, that life drives us toward. It's the same sh-t in a different toilet.

And when people realize that - when they get married thinking this is it, this is the beginning of the rest of my life and this person I've bound my soul to will burn my fire every moment of our eternity and discover, sometimes pretty quickly, that all of the doubts and insecurities and angers and problems they had when they weren't married and in other relationships are still possible and still relevant - they question it.

Why is this happening? We're married! Doesn't that count for something? Doesn't this ring mean those kinds of worries are behind me? Didn't those vows mean that everything would be fine and I'd be happy and everything would work out for the best without me ever being miserable again? Didn't the walk down the aisle mean the end of waking up next to someone I sometimes can't stand?

The lowest low is when you're knocked from the highest high and the way that we've romanticized marriage as a society is pretty darn high. People may, at first, have difficulty coming to terms with the fact that no ring, no dress, no ceremony, no vow, no name change will change the fact that you're still just two human beings in a relationship just like you always were.

But once they accept that it would be pretty silly to expect marriage to be all wine and roses, especially if none of their previous relationships were wine and roses and double especially if things weren't wine and roses with their spouse even before they got married and triple especially if they have their own problems independent of the marriage that they're bringing into it, that maturity kicks in and they start to prioritize and yes, they start to realize that this just comes with the territory.

Marriage isn't different. It's a relationship. It has a fancy name, but that's still all it is and I've had plenty of those. Of course there might be times when we fight or when I ask myself if we should be together, but what makes me say that this is worth it? At the end of the day, how do I know that this is the right choice for me now?

That question is what all couples, not just married couples, struggle with and the strongest relationships find their answer not in how well they're provided for or how amicable things can be between them, they find it in that seed that grew within them, that drew them to the fairy tale: the love that made the thought of life without this person in it unbearable. The bond that makes a future by their side the only future in which they can see themselves happy - truly happy. Not comfortable, not cared for, but happy.

If you don't have that, not even a shadow of that - if the best answer you can come up with is, "Well, we went through all that trouble to get married, might as well stay that way," That's not mature. That's defeatist.

Beyond that, like some have said, there's a difference between being unhappy and being bored. I agree that when a relationship gets boring, which can easily happen if it's full of predictable routine - especially the kind of routine that often plagues marriages out of necessity - it's time to just spice things up, find a way to get that pep back in your step.

Divorce certainly isn't the solution to boredom. But, more often than not, it is the solution to unhappiness.

Originally Posted by ohio_peasant

Let's consider this: if, at any point in one's life, there's the prevailing risk that one's partner might leave, just to chase a greater happiness - well then, why would a reasonable person make any substantial investment in the relationship? If this risk is pervasive and incontrovertible, we as a society ought to rethink how we couple ourselves into family units.

This is akin to asking why anyone would invest themselves in anything knowing that, at any point in time, they could die. It isn't as profound as it intends. All things are contingent upon all things. Humans live for the experience of living, they love for the experience of love. They accept that there are no guarantees, they accept that nothing lasts forever, and yet, because they believe deep down that to experience these things - to experience life in this moment - is worth the potential for heartache and loss, they pursue them as if that loss will never come.

We can, for the sake of some interpretation of stability and values, remove that human element from the equation and ask that no one seek out the conditional or breakable and to only provide the unconditional and unbreakable and we can build workplaces and homes and societies wherein everyone aspires to nothing more than what they've agreed to accept and eliminate any possibility that anyone might, for any reason, change their mind and dare to do something about it.

We could build a world in which being happier, being healthier, being more than you are today is a forbidden longing and everyone will just be who they are who they're with until death do they part and I'm sure it would work - but I'm not sure what we'd have left would be worth working.

Originally Posted by manteca man

Okay, I needed to chime in here, long time reader, first time poster.

I HATE it when people say those things; "not a cheater or abuser, etc, is the bare minimum."
It's not the bare minimum. We live in a society where cheating is glamorized and encouraged, abuse, both physical and mental is commonplace, and unhealthy relationships continue like bad television. Men and women who are faithful, treat others with respect, and who think before they act are a cut above the baseline of the average person. To think that some people take those qualities for granted makes me think they have blinders on.

Maybe it should be put another way...

Woman: My husband is incredible!
Friend: Aww, really? What makes him so amazing?
Woman: He doesn't beat me!

How'd that sound? In a general sense, I think the point is that we shouldn't necessarily praise people for not being horrible. That's the mark of a society that has set the bar incredibly low and I don't believe that most people are willing to do that nor that they should.

Moreover, I don't think anyone is saying that a good mate doesn't deserve credit for the ways in which they're being a good mate and for not being like the dogs that run around these days abusing their mates' love and trust. I think what people are saying is that what makes someone a decent human being isn't necessarily enough to build a relationship on and it doesn't always make up for all the ways in which you fail that relationship otherwise.

Let's say that your girlfriend (or boyfriend) was never around, never showed you any affection, never supported you when you needed her, never made you feel loved and you started to feel like you were the only one in the relationship, like you didn't even have a relationship, so one day, you said, "Sweetie, I love you, but I feel like we're not connecting. There's no intimacy, you're distant, we barely even talk, and I think we need to do something about it...".

How would you feel if she said, "What are you complaining about? Some women cheat on their boyfriends, ya' know. You should just be happy that I haven't done that"? Sometimes, what they get right isn't the point. Especially when it's something that anyone worth walking the earth gets right by default.

[Frihed89]

Well, it seems you set the bar too low for yourself. Not hitting your wife: what an accomplishment!

[weezerfan84]

I think relationships and marriages, that definitely have the ability the last fail, because they don't RRV (realize, respect, value) each other. I can look back on my relationships from a year ago. It wasn't the most awesome relationship, but it definitely had qualities to go the distance. Each time I think about why that relationship failed, I come back to RRV. I didn't realize what I had, which caused me not to respect my partner, which in turn caused me to not value the relationship. It's not about realizing that your partner doesn't beat you or that they don't cause fights with you over the littlest of things. Those relationships I feel are situations where you're just not gonna get ahead, because you will always be a square peg trying to squeeze through a round hole. You have to be able to realize what you have at hand. Can you see all the good and bad that your partner has and make yourself happy? Too many people run for the easiest way out, which included myself at the end of my last relationship. People have a tendency to play the upgrade game where the new person meets the desire that they didn't have, but fall short of what the prior partner did right. You keep upgrading on what the last person failed on, but keep losing on what the last person did right on. You wash, rinse, repeat till you realize that you're going around in circles.....

[ohio_peasant]

Originally Posted by cyberphonics

I would ask why you don't support the trend of people making love, happiness, and their emotional well-being a requirement and priority in their proposed life-long bond as opposed to treating it like the transaction it used to be where love and happiness were irrelevant as long as the terms of adult responsibility and etiquette were met, but I suspect I'll find the answer irritating, so I won't.

My view is that while "love, happiness and emotional well-being" are indeed imperative when forming a lifelong partnership, (1) these criteria are not sufficient in making the choice, and (2) there is stark difference between evaluating the formalization of a nascent relationship and decided whether to end a longstanding relationship.

To the first point, we have many objectives to fulfill when finding a mate. Some are more practical than others. We tend to undervalue the practical and overvalue the emotional. I'd not advise to disavow emotions entirely, by any means; but it seems to me that our judgment should not be excessively clouded by attraction or perceived emotional symbiosis.

To the second point, the considerations in selecting a new job are very different from the tradeoff between quitting (and seeking a different job), vs. persevering at one's current job. The considerations in buying a house upon moving out of an apartment, are different from those when deciding whether to sell one's house and to move to a different one, vs. remodeling one's current house and remaining in it. Something similar is operative in relationships. The overarching point is that something has to be seriously and profoundly wrong before choosing to dismantle the status quo. But when selecting amongst fresh options without a status quo, persnickety analysis and weighing of options are perfectly fair game.

Returning to the OP's situation and divorce in general, it seems to me that marital partners are evaluating their options much along the same lines as if they were not married. I bristle at such nonchalance. I would opine that the marriage must degenerate into something onerous and perverse, before it becomes necessary to give serious consideration to its termination. In other words, when first considering whether to marry, one's prospective spouse has to meet some standards for the marriage to be initiated. Once married, again one's spouse has to meet to meet some standards for the marriage to continue. The crux of my point is that those standards in the first case, should be vastly higher than in the second case. I support the negation of the statement that for a marriage to continue, one's spouse should remain as appealing as the person was during the courtship period.

Originally Posted by cyberphonics

...it bugs me when people effectively equate accepting unhappiness with maturity. People do it with everything from relationships to employment.

My perception is precisely the opposite. I regard "maturity" as the accepting of not merely unhappiness but outright suffering as the essential property of the human condition; and I say this not with some beatific hope for a blessed afterlife, but as an avowed atheist. Childhood is blind acquiescence to whatever is imposed upon us. Adolescence is the fighting against things that we don't like. Adulthood is the acceptance of impositions upon us, through the understanding that all conceivable alternatives are even worse.

Originally Posted by cyberphonics

To me, maturity is, among other things, the ability to recognize self-destructive choices, environments, and bonds and act in accordance with the healthiest decisions you can make to the best of your ability, even if it's difficult. Maturity is not defined by taking the path of least resistance, by opting not to rock the boat because hey, at least it's floating.

Maturity, in my view, is the recognition that rocking the boat will only cause the boat's contents to jostle about, while making you tired. It will accomplish nothing, other than raising entropy. The point isn't to revel in the boat's uncanny ability to remain afloat, but to recognize that most attempts at improvements are ultimately only detrimental.

Originally Posted by cyberphonics

if all someone wants is a marriage that lasts, they can forego the reckless whim of wanting anything more out of their marriage than practicality and civility and just stay together without that stuff.

But understand that choosing to stay in a relationship does not define the successfulness of that relationship or the quality of that relationship or the value of that relationship.

There are many ways of measuring success. One such measure is personal happiness. Another is the fulfilling of duty. Yet another is undertaking great and strenuous labor for the furtherance of some achievement, while perhaps along the way there is much suffering. I remain convinced that divorce is a public testament of personal failure - and I say this as a divorced person. Further, I'm convinced that few people are genuinely sufficiently competent to rationally judge what does or does not make them happy. To make decisions on the basis of furthering one's personal happiness therefore amounts to flippant and frivolous choices. Whenever I choose what I like, as opposed to what I ought to do, or have a duty to do, or am commanded to do, invariably I screw up, causing harm to myself and to others.

Originally Posted by cyberphonics

Marriage is not this divine culmination of all things perfect that will complete and fulfill you in a way that no other relationship ever has or ever will.

I wholeheartedly agree! The corollary is that the more that we expect out of marriage, or from any relationship, the more likely we are to become disappointed. And the further that we lower the bar, the less we stress and enervate ourselves in pursuit of an elusive and evanescent "success".

[SKP440]

Originally Posted by weezerfan84

I think relationships and marriages, that definitely have the ability the last fail, because they don't RRV (realize, respect, value) each other. I can look back on my relationships from a year ago. It wasn't the most awesome relationship, but it definitely had qualities to go the distance. Each time I think about why that relationship failed, I come back to RRV. I didn't realize what I had, which caused me not to respect my partner, which in turn caused me to not value the relationship. It's not about realizing that your partner doesn't beat you or that they don't cause fights with you over the littlest of things. Those relationships I feel are situations where you're just not gonna get ahead, because you will always be a square peg trying to squeeze through a round hole. You have to be able to realize what you have at hand. Can you see all the good and bad that your partner has and make yourself happy? Too many people run for the easiest way out, which included myself at the end of my last relationship. People have a tendency to play the upgrade game where the new person meets the desire that they didn't have, but fall short of what the prior partner did right. You keep upgrading on what the last person failed on, but keep losing on what the last person did right on. You wash, rinse, repeat till you realize that you're going around in circles.....

Well said and yes I DID NOT RRV the relationship. I can only speak for myself, so I do take that responsibility for the demise of the marriage. The reason I feel so disrespected is because if the roles were reversed and I was the one who decided to have a relationship BEFORE filing for divorce (or even announcing my intentions to do so to my spouse) I would be considered an a-hole plain and simple. Some in this forum have stated that I somehow forced her into having this affair with her subordinate, and even my STBX herself has stated to me that she is doing this as a means to cope with the way I made her feel, and therefore she has no guilt in handling it the way she did. She also said she did not mean to hurt my feelings, but I hurt her feelings for six months. She knew I was (and continue to be) going through a really bad depression during that time, yet that was no excuse. Me telling her I needed a little time (to get myself together) still was not enough to stop her from wanting to end the marriage and carry on the affair. The way I see it in the end my daughter suffers because here was a really bad time in a relationship where instead of trying to work through it WE BOTH (although I DON'T WANT TO) decided to call it quits like the previous 24 years was not worth fighting for, or didn't really mean anything.

[lovesMountains]

Originally Posted by SKP440

Well said and yes I DID NOT RRV the relationship. I can only speak for myself, so I do take that responsibility for the demise of the marriage. The reason I feel so disrespected is because if the roles were reversed and I was the one who decided to have a relationship BEFORE filing for divorce (or even announcing my intentions to do so to my spouse) I would be considered an a-hole plain and simple. Some in this forum have stated that I somehow forced her into having this affair with her subordinate, and even my STBX herself has stated to me that she is doing this as a means to cope with the way I made her feel, and therefore she has no guilt in handling it the way she did. She also said she did not mean to hurt my feelings, but I hurt her feelings for six months. She knew I was (and continue to be) going through a really bad depression during that time, yet that was no excuse. Me telling her I needed a little time (to get myself together) still was not enough to stop her from wanting to end the marriage and carry on the affair. The way I see it in the end my daughter suffers because here was a really bad time in a relationship where instead of trying to work through it WE BOTH (although I DON'T WANT TO) decided to call it quits like the previous 24 years was not worth fighting for, or didn't really mean anything.

Each of you have your own point of view, and neither of you is completely innocent in the demise of the marriage.

The bottom line is, she views your marriage as a corpse she wants to bury. I'm sorry you don't agree and can't get her to see it your way.

But unless both people can agree to "fight" for the marriage, it's time to let it go and fight for your child instead.

That means you have to learn to deal with your anger and hurt in the most productive and healthy ways as quickly as possible.

Reframe your focus my friend.

[newdixiegirl]

Originally Posted by Wmsn4Life

She realizes that is not enough to live on for the rest of her life. It's not a marriage.

She could live with ANYONE who would be "there for her." Even her parents.

And it's possible that she's been feeling very lonely for a long time. Perhaps she finally decided that she'd be less lonely alone than if she were to remain in the marriage.

Having said that, she has no excuse for beginning another relationship while still married, if that is in fact what she did. In that part you have NO responsibility. I can understand temptation if one is unhappily married, but I cannot understand choosing to actually participate in that kind of deceit.