What I KNOW after being HERE for 3 years.......

[AntoniaB]

I'm reading all these posts about how these people seem to stay in crisis/depression for so long (if not indefinitely) and I guess this is where it SEEMS like my H differs. From what I understand, he's not exhibiting signs of depression. He's also not mean to me at all. When I see him, he doesn't look bad. His health is good as far as I know (and since I still have access to his online medical provider as I am also granted benefits from said provider) I know that he has not had a doctor visit in over a year. Sure he feels guilty and shows it in the rare instances he is around me, but he comes off as happy and well-adjusted. I've not heard one negative thing about him from the few mutual friends who remain that would suggest he is in a "bad place."

I feel like with my H either one of two things has happened: either he truly is, 100%, only now with the person he is "meant" to be with, the OW, and therefore is doing well in that new life, or, he is SO incredibly good at hiding his true depression and pain from even himself that the shift of being with her rather than me has allowed him space to go back into that hiding. As in, he hid his issues for our whole marriage quite well--by his admission, he was "the greatest actor who ever lived" and he was dealing with painful stuff for the whole marriage, much of which didn't even relate to me. And by the time he left, he had cracked, and I knew when he was hiding things, and I called him on it every time, and when I found the ultimate hidden thing--the interest in OW, he bailed on the marriage.

Now he has a whole new person to hide things from. She doesn't know him to the level I do, it will take him years to get her to that level, so now he's just got someone else to play the "perfect boyfriend" role for.

I guess I'd like to think that this is what's going on only because it still hurts me to think someone else is supposed to be with him instead of me, his wife. But of course, what it suggests is that he is REALLY a wreck.

Considering the number of times that he says things that are projections (accusing me of things that really are his own problems, for instance) I wonder if it's more likely that the second scenario is true. The one thing he has told me more times than I can count about "why she is good for him" is that he said "I've been up front with her about my issues from day one when it took me years to open up to you." But you know, people can spin their issues in a ton of ways. Just because he told her of living in an abusive home and she accepted that, has he REALLY told her of his "current" issues, the fact that he has no direction in life, huge insecurities, no goals or obvious identity? See I feel like he really is reining in a lot because that's what he does best.

I guess it's just hard to understand why my H fits so much of the MLC pattern but isn't rude or mean to me now and in fact jumps at any chance of contact with me (which he no longer is getting).