My new thread - The lost world!

[Bworl]

Wow AD...tried to find my old posts, but I think they've gone by the wayside as I haven't had a thread of my own since early 2007.

Let's see...nutshell version.

Married in 1985, I was 23 she was 19.

Had two boys along the way in 87 and 92. I was military (army) for first five years, then back to school to become a teacher. Started teaching in 96, she was a lab tech at local hospital.

Normal marriage I thought. Ups and downs but generally happy. Never any infidelity on either part, but some issues with things I did that hurt her and let her down. She came from a family where Mom had some mental health issues.

September of 2006 she attempts suicide after an argument. She never made it back home. In patient care for a week, then moved in with a couple we knew. Unbeknownst to me began to have sex with other men, doing the dance club scene with a divorced female friend from work.

She filed in October 2006, divorce final in December 2006. She refused counseling, painted the whole 20 year marriage black in typical MLC fashion.

During a visit to her father in September she reached out to a guy she had had a crush on when she was 16. He turned out to be 49 and never married. Told her he had never found anyone better than her, she bought it.

In May 2007 she moved 500 miles to live with him, leaving behind a son in college and a 14 year old at home.

I met a lovely woman in early 2007 and we began communicating back and forth, eventually meeting for the first time in March. Our relationship blossomed and we married on June 28th of this year. She has three children (22, 15, 12) and I have the two (21, 16) and they get along great. We are living apart because of a promise I made to my youngest to ensure that he could live in his home and finish school in his school.

I'm a success story where the marriage was NOT saved. I found out a lot of things about myself that needed changed. This experience has made me think before acting. It has taught me the importance of being a man of your word and of communicating my thoughts and feelings. My relationship with my wife Debra benefits from all that I have learned.

And I guess I stay here because I know how hard this is. I lived that anguish for many months and somehow managed to find my way through it. I know that success is measured not necessarily in terms of just the marriage, but in how we handle perhaps the worst pain we will know short of losing a loved one.


Hope that sheds some light on me.


Blessings,

Bill