Hey TxHubby. Thanks for reply. I have laughed! It is kinda sad he is sooooo cliche and can't even see it. I haven't even talked to him since kids walked in on him and other woman yet somehow this is all my fault. I see you were separated for almost 2 years? How did you reconcile?
We were in zombie land. Her A crushed me. You're taking it much better than I did. I sedated my pain daily with alcohol and prescription pain killers. I checked out. My adult sons could handle that, although it upset them, but my daughter who was 12 at the top had huge problems. Her mom had moved out because of her shame, lived in an apartment a couple miles from home. Her A was over, the douche OM fled the state and has yet to ever come back. He lives with his mother now. His W divorced him as fast as possible. What snapped me out of my pain/rage was my daughter's school counselor and asked what's going on. Said she has noticed that my daughter had completely changed over a year. Gained about 40 lbs, lost her cheery disposition. Was always sad. Withdrew from her friends. Was getting bad grades. Her mother was the neighborhood whore. Her dad was a zombie laying on the couch all the time wasted and feeling sorry for himself.
That snapped me out of it. I knew I had to ruck up for her. I focused on her and my health. Stopped all booze and drugs, exercised with her, engaged with her all the time, was there for her. We got better. Then I decided it was time to address my WW. I spoke to her and asked what she really wanted. I said we can't live like we are now, it's good for no one (btw, neither can you, it's bad for your health). I asked what she really wanted and she said me. I knew I had to stop raging on her. I was mad all the time and just exhausted by it. No more hate, no more anger. I had to let her A go. I had to forgive and forget. It was the only chance we'd have. Where it was a little "easier" for me is that she wanted to come home. She wanted to work on everything. I was the one that didn't want her for what she had done to me. I realized deep down, however, that I did want her. I did still love her even after all that had happened. Once I really knew that, and was sure that she also loved me, then it became easier to let the other things go and here we are. Definitely not done working through things but much better and both pretty convinced that we're in it for the long haul.
I do know how affair fog works. You don't have a chance as long as his A is going on. He'll be under a spell. He's a 50-something year old man running around with a younger woman. He might as well buy a sports car and get a spray tan. He's making a joke of his life. Someone close to him needs to ask him at the end of it all, when his life is about over and he thinks back on it all, what kind of man was he? What would he like the story of his life to be? That he made a joke of it by being a MLC cliche or that he overcame his stupidity and became and honorable man. You can't force his hand, it's his choice in the end but I do know that it'll be really hard to work on your M while his A is active. Almost impossible.
