Okay, here's my situation. I've been with her for over 10 years, we've been married for over 7. Her son from her first marriage is 15, I love him as my own--met him when he was 4 and for all purposes I'm his dad.
I love her too, and would like to make it work. The bomb dropped on me on October 30th. I was sitting on the couch next to her watching TV, she was sending an email on her laptop. I looked over and saw her type "I love you too" and click send. My heart sunk. I shut the TV off and asked "who was that to?" She said it was to her aunt, her mother figure in her life (her mom and her don't speak). I challenged her, and then it all came out in a shock to me.
She's been dating her boss and she loves him. They are both about to lose their jobs due to layoffs. She's been very stressed about this for months--the layoff date was decided and then pushed back another month. During that timeframe there have been a lot of happy hours with the coworkers and I personally have had to travel due to work. I got to go to 2 of these after work things in the midsummer, actually met the guy which makes it even worse since I know what he looks like and he's shaken my hand, which is awful. I've been a tad distant in the relationship over the last few months--it's been a steady pace of her complaining about work, and although I thought I was supportive, in retrospect I can definitely admit that there where times when I just nodded into "yes yes yes" without actually hearing her when she was concerned about work. The boss, in the same situation, certainly would be more understanding than myself. Supposedly he is leaving wife and kids as well, they are in "love." At the onset of this discovery I got all panicked and hurt and sad--asking how we can fix this and asking her to come back to me. She cried, and said "there is no coming back" and "my first husband cheated on me and I know that feeling in the pit of your stomach where you never trust the person again." In our marriage, I've made statements like "I can't believe people who need counseling" or "I would never forgive cheating" but now that I'm in the situation, I'm going to admit I'm wrong wrong wrong.
So, now she spends 5-6 nights a week at the other guy's house, and son stays home with me. Son isn't getting enough time with either of us, I've sought support from my friends and family while I come to grip with what is going on. She will show up at home, do laundry, buy groceries for the son, sit around looking for a job and then disappear for the night again, not showing up for another day or two. When she does stay at the house she's sleeping on the couch. We're civil, I ask how she's doing and vice versa. The reality is inside I'm a wreck. I really do want to spend the rest of my life with her, and I want to understand what happened between us.
She's had a tough life, she had her son at a very young age in a house with a mentally abusive mother. She left and married early to escape her mother, then ended up married to the son's biological father, a troubled guy with intense ADHD and the inability to hold down a job. She finally couldn't take the emotional and physical abuse from him, and fled him as well. I fear that her toolkit consists of only pulling the ripcord--it's the first time our marriage has been tough and it's like leaving and rebooting is the solution?
I didn't make it easier on her, in retrospect. When the prospect of her job loss came up she considered starting her own company, a choice that would put considerable financial stress on me. Our finances are separate, partially because I'm the one that pays everything on time and she's the one that lets bills get to near collections before she does anything. This concerned me in starting a company as financial management is a big part of success.
I'm also the cleaner in the home, the one that can't leave a stain on the floor while her and son can sit in a mess and not care. I've gotten to the point where I just take care of it, but she's so sensitive to my years of nagging about it (and I have tried to stop) that me cleaning up anything in front of her produces a mean exhausted look.
Her aunt has taken her side, like all good family members would, but her aunt doesn't have a good track record with men. She's been divorced twice herself, and I've watched her humiliate her then-boyfriend in front of a bunch of people, berating his knowledge.
So my wife has had all this reinforcement that I've been "unsupportive," "incompatible" and that she feels like she's in an empty marriage. This weekend a book about Walk Away Wife appeared on the counter--am I supposed to read this? It's in her usual pipe of stuff--is there a message here?
Her career has been intensely stressful as she's had limited success in job changes. Each job is more of an escape from the previous rather than a move up. She'd paid her dues, but hasn't found the next step. After the bomb dropped on me, I found out a business trip for the current job was actually a job interview in another state 1500 miles away. She hasn't heard about that job yet--it's still possible they will offer to her.
I feel terrible, I thought I was in a successful happy relationship, and we had a breakdown in communication over the last 5 months-the classic "drift into our own things." There hasn't been a day I haven't kissed her goodbye in the morning and said I loved her, up until the bomb dropped. I care deeply for her, and I do want to work through this. It's been 3 weeks of me living without her for the most part. In retrospect I could see she was cutting me off--leaving early to hit the gym, coming home late, avoiding going to bed with me, until I caught her. I suspected a few things a month in advance, but didn't pursue. I work with computers and could have gotten into read her email but didn't because either 1) I'd find something, or 2) I'd not find something and I'd become "that guy."
I see her a couple of times a week, when she makes her pit stops at home. Her job ends on Wednesday, at which time she will have more time at home. She needs support--I was thinking this would all blow over going into the job loss and this was my time to step up and support her during unemployment. We have the financial success, happily, to survive this. Over the years she felt I haven't been helping enough--she brought this up leading up to the pre-bomb, and I made adjustments to what my expectation was from her assistance (starting in late September I pay for everything except our gym membership and our benefits, which are with her company). I think her coming to me about this was too late though for this to matter much.
It feels like she went and had this affair with the other guy in an effort to create an irreversible wedge. I don't necessarily see it as that way. I want to have this conversation with her, to talk about these things, to see if there is a chance we can work through this. I'm not happy without her--she is my sunshine and someone who always made me happy, even if I was blind to what she's missing. I can change, I'm a guy so obvious to her wasn't obvious to me. She has said "no chance" but I really want to get her and me to a counselor. I need to understand if there is a chance, if there is hope, or if there is something else she needs.
How can I get her to the table, to at least communicate? How do I ask, when it seems the ultimatum has already been given down? I cannot walk away from this person without knowing I did everything I could--I made promised to her I never intended to break.
