Just found out that OW has a kid!!

[Hope_11]

Ophelia,

I wanted to post to you because I thought that I might be able to give you a different perspective.

I have continued to follow your posts and I still sense a lot of anger on your part. Not that you don't have a right to be angry, but I just don't think that it's helping your well-being. I know how you feel...I know how it feels to be rejected, betrayed, and lied to. I've been there too.

I know way back when I first posted to you, you had mentioned that you didn't know if you would ever re-marry if you got divorced because you can't fathom loving someone else. Is this still the case? Here's the hard question....are you still in love with your H or do you just not want to be divorced? I think that is a question that we all ask ourselves. No one wants to be divorced period especially at 28 or 29, but I can honestly tell you that sitting on the other side divorced can be a whole lot better than living in hell. By the time my marriage was coming to an end, I learned a lot of things about my husband and my marriage. By the end, I was willing to stay because of my vows not because I was "in love" with him anymore. He was broken....he needed to do a lot of work on himself to be a good man and I don't think he ever will take the hard work to get there. If he would have given us a second chance, I would have taken it, but sitting here 2 months post-divorce I am starting my new life and I am enjoying it. I think that when affairs happen early in a marriage and there are no children involved, you have to take a good hard look at the situation and your spouse to see if there is anything worth saving. Our husband's made BAD choices for an extended period of time....they would have to do a lot of work on themselves before our marriages would ever have come to the point of being salvageable.

Someone posted this on another thread and I thought it might help you....

In response to the who is at fault question. I have looked at this myself and it is a difficult question to respond to..especially on this board. We are tainted by 'being ourselves' while looking at this question. Pointing fingers is probably a method of 'denial', a way to try and ease our pain by heaping more fault on our spouses.

Honestly tho', I think the real issue is that, because of some of OUR issues, we probably selected people who were due to 'break' at some point. Perhaps, we should take 100% of the blame for choosing the wrong person to marry? I've read all the comments about human imperfection, hurting the one you love, etc, but, is there really an excuse for lying, having an affair, lack of committment to a promise to stay 'for better or worse'? Did we fail to see that the person we married lacked the inner character to express the trait of integrity? Not sure there. There is no doubt that most of us here gave our spouses a little shove down the stairs, but, did we fail to see warning signs before be signed that marriage license?

When we get bombed we all tend to blame ourselves:
what did I do wrong?
this must be all my fault
shoulda, woulda, coulda


The real focus is WHY? Why did our marriages fail? I think too much focus is on WHO IS TO BLAME. I think we need to sort out what brought us together:
-why did we fall in love with our S?
-what were the attraction buttons?
-were they healthy?
-if healthy, where did we cause harm? was it faulty programming from our childhood?
-did we just grow in different directions
-etc
The final result is that we should choose to abandon fault, guilt and resentment. Focus on growth and change and learn how to cope with the loss of our beloved spouse...grieve..and move on if reconciliation is not possible.