| Brenda writes, "I need
you to objectively analyze a difficult situation. My
husband and I have been together for 15 years, married
for 10, with 2 young children (ages 4 and 8). Prior to
dating him, I was the
other woman to his
best friend,
Robert. Robert and I
had an affair for 5 years. During
the affair,
we both got married but chose to continue
seeing each other. The
affair ended when his
wife and I
both got pregnant with our
first child within a month of
each other. I took it as a sign from
God. Although there
isn’t a doubt in my mind that we loved each other. His
marriage failed and they separated 2 years ago. I have
never stopped thinking of him or wanting to be with him,
but I made a choice to
work on my marriage. Here I am: 8
years later. My
marriage still is not fulfilling. My
husband is very insensitive of my needs even when
directly told what they are. He leaves me crying in bed
and falls asleep without a care in the world. For the
past 6 months, things have gotten progressively worse
between the two of us and after crying for a week for
his love and affection; I finally sent a private message
through Facebook to Robert and instantly got a reply
with his number and an invite to call. We spoke for an
hour, really just catching up. That is all I wanted from
him initially. A week goes by and the hubby and I are
back to routine. I write a truly concerned
emotional
letter about our marriage and pour my heart out. He
reads it and goes to
sleep again. I can’t take it
anymore so I leave the house and call Robert at 1:00
a.m. He answers! Really, I wasn’t expecting it. I am
crying and he is there for me. I have been fighting the
good battle for years now with my husband. It has been
“for the sake of the kids.” Our marriage appears fine on
the outside but inside: we
hurt each other.
He hurts me,
I get angry and say mean things. I have wanted out for a
very long time because I know that
I am not happy, but I
am scared. I have started talking and texting Robert
consistently for a week now. I am scared of him too.
It’s been 8 years since we talked but somehow we can
pick up where we left off. He wants a second chance, or
should I say, a first chance with me. Deep down, I think
I want it too. He will be in town in a few weeks and I
am thinking that I may see him. What should I do?"
If you had written to me,
say, 2-5 years after your marriage, my advice would have
been different. I would have told you to
work on your
marriage,
seek the help of a counselor/family/friends
and
improve communication with your husband, but you
have already done that.
At this point, your
relationship is truly dysfunctional and I have no hope
that you can do anything more to
save your marriage. Any
additional time you spend in this marriage is waste of
your precious life. In other words, it is time to
leave
the marriage. Indeed, it will be hard on your kids, but
they
will be fine. Research shows that when a
couple is not
truly happy, even if they are together for the sake of
kids, they can notice the
lack of love. At
that point it is pointless to be together because they
are not getting the true joy of being in a family.
Brenda, either you made a
mistake in
picking your husband or
he has simply changed
so much during this time. We all make wrong
choices in
life and the best course of action is to fix the
mistakes and
move on. Life is too short to suffer just
because you made a mistake. I suggest that you meet with
a
divorce attorney to guide you through the process.
While legal advice is best in this matter, my suggestion
will be that you do not go public with Robert till the
divorce is finalized (because this situation is somewhat
similar to that of
Shania Twain). If he has waited all this time, he
can wait for some more time. This will also give you
enough time to think through the whole thing and make
sure that he will not turn out to be yet another wrong
choice. |
