WAS asked for divorce today.

[aNewGuy]

Hello to everyone on this board and a big "Thank you" for all of the wonderful, inspirational and highly educational stories I have been reading here. I appreciate
you all before even writing my first post.

So I am in a pickle as follows:

My wife, 26 and I, 39 have no children at all and have been married five years. Hold the cradle robbing jokes, we have had a wonderful, loving marriage filled with laughter and just a whole bunch of all the good things I've always hoped I would find in my life. This changed in my eyes during the last year and a half, when we had much loss in our lives (miscarriage, death of an ex for each of us, and the death of a grandparent)

About seven months ago, she started spending time with some friends from back before we knew one another and I supported her in this because it seemed to be bringing her some much needed joy at that time in her life.

And then one night seemingly out of the blue she told me, in tears, that she needed to talk about "us" and announced she wanted to separate. I reacted angrily to this announcement, saying basically that "If things are going to keep being like they have been being, then yes a separation is fine!"

Fast forward a month, she now has her own place and I still live in the house I brought to the marriage. We work together, and she prefers to communicate via text. She has actually told me that she is moving on and I should too, and that she loves me very much but is not in love with me. And that she cares about me very deeply but because we are not in love she doesn't think it's fair for either of us to stay together. And that she misses my friendship and hopes we can be friends again in the future.

Being blindsided by all of this, I immediately looked to the internet for all manner of resources and everything I could read on this subject, for I am relationship dumb. All of my research led to this site, to buying and reading DB and DR, and having so far two phone counseling sessions which have really helped me get some much needed perspective.

I have been GALing by getting a part time second job, working on my house (reorganizing, etc) and by spending time with friends and family both in person and on the phone. I have been participating in some of my hobbies which have been neglected.

Also, I have been trying to "be dark" and so far my biggest 180 has been to increase my online presence and to force myself to not withdraw when faced with tough questions. I have been applying myself at work with much more gusto than before.

So this weekend on the advice from well meaning friends, I responded to her offer of friendship with my acknowledgement that I also miss our friendship and would like to be friends as well. She responded that this made her happy, but the next day I received another message asking me directly if I thought being friends was a means to get her back and I truthfully responded that I do want her back.

Which leads to the next thing. She then told me she has been waiting patiently to ask me about a divorce because she knows I have been hurting over all of this, and told me she wants a divorce with the added message "why would we stay married if we aren't going to be together, and why would we be together if we aren't in love?"
These messages are coming in while trying to sleep and then while at work, today.

So I am in big trouble here because I love this woman and am clearly far more committed to this marriage than she is. This separation was devastating for me, and I am not certain the same holds true for her. I can neither confirm nor deny the presence of another man but in any event I think she is clearly happier than she has been in at least the last year and a half.

In some ways I am too, we were really "in a bad way" for especially the last six months.

Here is my plea for help. She wants to meet up in person this weekend to discuss a divorce that I do not want. We have already split up our finances and I have been cooperative and respectful at each step along the way. She believes divorce is the solution when I believe there are many better ways we could solve this and remain together, remain friends, and experience the best of what a good marriage has to offer. Our marriage has had the blessing and support of both of our families and friends along the way, many of whom expressed extreme shock that this was all happening. One friend even started crying when she found out.

Obviously there is way more to this. This is my first posting on such a site and I am hopeful that someone can share some tidbit that will help me turn this ship around, or at least plug the most gaping holes, before we meet up to discuss this unwanted D this weekend. I love my wife very much - she loves me too -and no matter the final outcome of all of this I want to know that I have given my 100% everything to avoid the big lie that is divorce will solve any of these problems! We really had it made in the shade before all of this happened.


Thanks for reading and thanks for being here. I am sure that this story has more questions than answers at this point, I had been hoping to think this through more thoroughly before posting! I will wait patiently to see what details I can fill in for anyone who asks.