I'm new here so I apologize if I don't use the correct acronyms...

My nightmare started 42 days ago (less than 2 weeks before our 10 year anniversary). 43 days ago, I thought I was happily married. We've been together for a total of 13 years (no kids).

Although our marriage did need some attention and we needed to work on reconnecting and rekindling our passion, we always had a good strong foundation. We were best friends. Until recently, we've always been kind and respectful to each other. We have fun. We're ourselves with each other and we get along well. Maybe it seemed too easy.

But I guess all of a sudden there was a perfect storm of influences. Work has been extremely stressful for almost a year-- long hours, impossible project timeline. He was so stressed and having such a hard time that he started taking antidepressants in December. Soon afterwards, he became distant and was on his phone/social media a lot. I was feeling ignored but I didn't want to add to his stress so I told myself to let it go, that things would improve when the project was done. I really thought it was just work stress. I had no idea my marriage was in trouble.

So after dinner one night, out of nowhere, he tells me he wants a divorce. I was in total shock. It didn't even seem real. He left the house and I, with my bottle of Sambucca, went upstairs and decided to snoop on his Facebook account. The password had been saved on our computer. (I'd never snooped before.)

There, I found a long ongoing conversation with an ex he dated before me (out of state), who is married with 2 babies. It started out innocent and then later became sexually explicit. He said he was thinking of divorce months before he told me. He told her he loved her. He told her, "it should have been you." I felt like I'd been stabbed in the heart.

There was mention of moving the conversation to a private email address. I felt like my whole marriage was a lie. 13 years of my life. I thought we'd had this beautiful, sweet, rare love between us. I'd trusted him completely. I took screen shots of the entire conversation.

The next day, I took off to a hotel for a couple of days. While I was gone gone, I emailed the screen shots to the woman's husband through Facebook. Then, when I was looking through the phone records, I found a call to a number at 11:30 pm the night after he told me he wanted a divorce. I called the number. It was a different woman who gave her name, which I looked up on Facebook. (Someone he worked with.) When I asked him to tell me everything a few days later, he said "nothing's happened." I asked about the phone call. He said it was just a friend from work who knew what was going on and called to check on him. I knew this was lie because he called her, but I accepted the rest for some reason.

He went to one marriage counseling session with me but only "because I told him to", he told the counselor. He told her that he was just "done." But then he told her I was his best friend.

He stayed in the guest room at our house for about 10 days. In communications, he was very careful never to call it "home". How that happens from one day to the next, I have no idea. We were quiet, but cordial. It seemed he wanted to maintain my friendship without the whole package. I was a mess. I could barely function. It took me forever just to get dressed. I was (and still am) averaging 3-5 hours of sleep per night. He, on the other hand, was going out at night to see bands and movies and reading books like he was totally fine.

During this time, I came across a couple of scientific journal articles about antidepressants shutting down the neural pathways involved in romantic love and long-term attachment. I found a forum with hundreds and hundreds of people who'd had spouses suddenly walk away after starting antidepressants. I became convinced that this was the cause of my marriage falling apart.

The last night he was there, we'd planned to talk a bit. It was then that he told me he was seeing someone. I lost it like I've never lost it in my life. I was already beaten so far down, stabbed in the back, stabbed in the heart and I felt like set me on fire. Just two weeks prior, I thought I was going to grow old with this man. Now I didn't even know who he was. He was so cold, so cruel. I felt like he was purposefully pummeling me emotionally, like he was trying to destroy me and he didn't care.

I broke a lamp. I hyperventilated for so long, I finally had to breath into a bag because I couldn't breath. When I could finally talk, I asked, "how long?" He said not long. (I now suspect an emotional affair was going on well before he asked for a divorce.) I asked if they'd had sex. He said no. I asked him, "can you not, please?" He agreed but that's probably not believable either.

The next day, I texted this woman a photo of my wedding ring and told her that in a few days it would be 10 years since my husband put that ring on my finger. It was a very mature text considering all the names I wanted to call her (I didn't). I asked her to stay away from my husband for as long as he was my husband.

Later, I texted my H and told him it was unacceptable for him to be dating other women while he was married to me.

He left and for two weeks he stayed somewhere, but I didn't know where. He came by the house a couple of times to pick up mail and clothing. The last time, he told me he'd gotten off the antidepressants. Not sure if I believe him, but if his vows have already been broken and his attention is elsewhere, it may be too late to know if the drugs took him to this place.

In any case, it seems the MLC symptoms are exactly the same as the antidepressant loss of attachment symptoms, so it's hard to know if it's one or the other, or both.

For weeks, I had no idea where he was staying or what he was doing. I didn't know if my texts had worked. (Or the letter I gave him that I know I shouldn't have.) I thought maybe I'd been able to talk a little sense into both of them before it went any further.

Then he left to go back home to Indiana to see his parents a couple of weeks ago. I bought a GPS tracker and put it on his car while it was parked at the airport (I know where he always parks). I had the settings wrong, so I'm not sure where he went after he got back yesterday, but today after work, he went to this woman's place. His car is parked about 3 blocks from where she lives. So now I know he's still seeing her. Tomorrow morning, I will know if he stayed the night and then I can probably assume he's been staying with her this whole time.

I can't believe this is happening.

For weeks, I've been very much wanting to follow Michele's 7-step plan and find a way to rebuild my marriage, but knowing now that he's been with her this whole time, just fills me with hate and disgust. I'm so deeply and profoundly hurt. I would never ever have hurt him the way he's hurt me.

I still can't figure out how he could do this to me. We don't really have friends in this state so for the 11 years we've been here, it's just been the two of us. (Not good, I know.) I am very much alone. My mom passed 8 years ago. My dad has dementia. My brother and friends are all in another state that's too expensive for me to move back to.

I can't believe what's happened to my life.

Even if he did come back around, how can I possibly ever forgive him? How can I ever not want to get back at him and hurt him the way he hurt me? How could he ever make it up to me?

Why do I even want him? This isn't who I married.

I've decided now that I'm going to see a lawyer this week because I want to look into a legal separation and I want to be sure I don't make any mistakes. I need to protect myself.

I've been chasing him, trying to talk him out of throwing our marriage away, talking about working things out... It stops now. I think he needs to see a side of me that is ready to walk away. This makes sense, doesn't it?

I will continue to work on myself. Exercise, get back in shape, get filler and botox, acupuncture, etc...

I don't know what the right thing to do is. I'm so tired of all these awful feelings and knowing he's out having fun with another woman makes me sick.

How do I not hate him? How do I keep hope alive with all these horrible feelings?