[originally post on MLC forum] This is my first post here-- I appologize in advance for not being up to speed on DB method and all the abbreviations yet, but after jumping in, I promise to go to serious school.
I'm just looking for support and practical advice from someone who understands firsthand what I'm dealing with. Here is my situation: husband 51 left for 3rd time in 10 years (married 25, me 48, 1 adult mentally disabled son, no other woman, him just unhappy). I am not fighting it as I did the last 2, just laying low, keeping communications to a minimum via email and as businesslike as possible. Have finally admitted to myself the relationship is broken, and am actually the party most aggressively pushing the divorce. I just feel I need to get to the other side of it before I can heal, but anger and injured pride are also driving me to finish it.
Problem is, I still love him. Even so, if he ever wanted to come home, I don't know if I could let him-- it would take a bonafide miracle on his part to reassure me he wouldn't just walk out on me again in another year or 2. But that's all beside the point, because I'm sure he won't.
I just really need to know what to do with this grief-- it is literally making me ill (am home sick from work today, down with a nasty virus after a week of practically no sleep). If the marriage is truly beyond repair (which I'm almost 100% convinced), I still want to have as "good" a divorce as possible-- if I can do that, maybe my husband will at least be able to remember me somewhat fondly, and we might keep interractions over our son civil. I don't want to do anything I will regret or be ashamed of afterward.
Any advice anyone can give me on getting through and over this would be MOST welcome.
