Deciding Whether to Separate

[brutus3]

Hi Everyone, this is my first post and I'm in a bad situation. I'm 42, she's 39 and we have a little girl we adopted who is now almost 3. We've been married 10 years. We moved across country in 8 years ago to be closer to my wife's parents to where she grew up. I left behind friends and family.

We ended up working for my wife's family with the goal to take over their business in about 3 years (hasn't happened yet). Anyway, it was a poor fit for me and I was unhappy. I delved into my hobbies and we slowly stopped having sex. We were trying to have kids at the time and we were having problems. I've had a porn problem since I was a teen and the internet doesn't make it easier. Also getting older doesn't help the libido much, especially when your wife is your boss and you see her almost every hour of the day. Once we adopted our daughter, I cut back on work to 25-30 hrs per week to spend more time with her and help with the housework. I became pretty resentful and unhappy.

Anyway, the fighting started this summer and it got pretty intense. She brought up something weird: we should try an open marriage. I was pissed and she back peddled saying she said it to hurt me. Anyway, I pretty much withdrew but found out around Halloween she brought a client over for dinner while I was out of town visiting family. I was suspicious of them before and even confronted her about it. She of course denied it. I hacked into her computer and found out she had strong feelings for him and wanted more. It sounded like he broke it off though and she realizes a mistake. Anyway, I confronted her about it and we've been sleeping in separate rooms since. I also quite my job at the family business and found a new career but it won't pay nearly as much and won't take off until April.

Wife said a couple of months ago we should separate. I said I needed more time to get my career in order and to work on myself. However, she wants to move on and says life is too short. She suggested we buy a smaller 2nd home for me to live in. She acknowledges I helped her get to where she is today (she made $100K last year) and she says she owes me. However, it doesn't feel right for me to leave when she's breaking up the family. I know I can't afford the $1400/mo mortgage of our current house and rent in our area is scarce (isolated resort area) with rent for a small apt being about $700/mo.

I'm not sure what to do. I was going to hold out and try to turn her around but I'm suspecting she's having another emotional affair with someone else. Lot's of texting, single guy, good looking, fit. I confronted her about it and she said she was only sending him LOTR memes because he liked the trilogy. I found it really odd and her body language made me suspicious like before when I confronted her about her first affair. I could be wrong though.

She keeps saying we are best friends and she misses me at the office but she still wants to split. Her sister, who had 2 physical affairs under her husband's nose, just split with her husband over Thanksgiving and her therapist is an advocate for divorce (wife told me this, therapist is biased). She definitely has a cheer leading team. I'm pretty isolated from support. I have to phone family and friends since they are all out of state and I haven't really made many new friends in her hometown. I felt awkward working for my in-laws and it's a really small town. I'm trying to change that now, getting out more and joining groups.

Anyway, I'm tired of living this way. I don't want to split up my family but I also don't want to be suspicious all of the time and live with someone that doesn't want me back. I don't respect her anymore for doing this to us. I read the 37 rules for what to do about a WAW and they make sense. I'm actually detaching a lot right now, mostly because I feel angry and I'm not interested in being around her right now. Detaching is pretty easy but I know I'll feel that pull when I get weak.

I think I have all of the important stuff in there. Let me know if I need to fill in the blanks.