Here's a story...of a very sad lady

[NotCrackingUp]

Dagny-2,

I've just read through your thread from start to finish. So many of the emotions you describe have rung true. Feeling the loss of friendship and physical love, the betrayal of so many years together, watching children cope with the selfishness of someone they looked up to so much.

My H has been acting in a way I'd never have imagined he would.You've posted on my thread so you've read some of it. He's not the same man. So wrapped up in himself (and his affair?) that he can't/won't see what he's doing to his kids.

As for you, weekends are the worst for me - Saturday nights when I'm sure he's out (or in) with the hairdresser from hell. Moments when we used to be a couple. Like you, I don't like being around other couples, or hearing about friends' husbands.
This community, reading posts and rambling on myself, has been a lifeline. When I really feel ready to die, I log on and it calms me. Someone told you that your kids will react as you do. In my experience, it's true. If I'm upbeat and can smile and seem ok, the three of them are relieved and more relaxed. I do my best to cry in bed when they're asleep, and then only.Not easy.I haven't always managed.

My H takes the kids to his flat on 2 weekdays and every second weekend; however, my school timetable is very stable, but he often has meetings and competitions (and romantic things he hasn't done with me for a long time?) that clash with that arrangement. For the sake of peace for my kids and being a "good" wife (=silly eejit=doormat?), I've been as helpful as possible with this. So boundaries are difficult.

You got some very sound advice from "puppy" and others, which will help me too. I'm going to read up on "setting free" and "letting go". The affair-busting paratrooper stuff is not for me (yet). I'm inclined to stammer and lose my footing in a confrontation. I'd feel much more embarrassed than he or she would, even if I caught them red ***ed. My H made me feel I obliged him to have an affair, made me feel so guilty. Over what? Looking after three wains, working very hard and studying at the same time. I took my eye off the ball, maritally speaking.
I know it's rubbish, but that guilty feeling is still there. So I don't feel the right to "out" his affair. But it sure would help to know.

Getting a life is what I'm trying to do, for myself first. I still love him, as he was before this addiction took hold (he told me once he couldn't forget her, it was like a "drug"). I don't love the selfish bullying actions I see now.

We've got to salvage ourselves and children from the wreckage and try to get good out of life again. And if Hs decide to stop wrecking their lives with OW and come back towards us, well and good. Hope things work out for you, I really found my own feelings in your story.
NotCrackingUp