[bluered]

H left Canada (east coast) our home last year Feb 2017 to pursue his career in aerospace engineering to Washington State. He first had his interview around October/November of 2016 and his employer flew him there for a few days. He came back and said that he “bombed” the interview and we stopped looking to make possible arrangements of moving there.

I’ve always been a home/family based person. Looking back, when we had first met, he really was not. He travelled and worked all over the world and was planning to move to Eastern Europe before we had met until we met. Both our families are in Canada in close proximity (his dad being away 3 hours which is the furthest). My family is so close to me.

To give a bit of a background, we were both in college when we met. About 8 months in our relationship, he decided to move about 1.5-2 hours away for a specialized type of school. I ended up moving with him in a matter of time. I was always over and eventually just moved in. I was diagnosed with cancer and had to seek and receive treatment, although they caught it at the earliest of its stages and I ended up in remission fairly quickly although this really tested our relationship. A year and a half in, we decided to move back home with my mom to save money since he had just graduated and we had no money. We ended up getting jobs, and at one point for a duration of 1.5 years, he decided to finish his BA and did that full time while I worked. We did take care of each other when we needed it.

From that point on until he had left to go to WA, even before we got married, our relationship was lacking sex. I had brought it up a million times and I think we just grew into this comfortable state knowing that we would be together regardless of anything that happens. Eventually I stopped bringing it up but I remember sleepless nights of just looking at him and wondering what happened. Eventually I started getting in the wagon of shaping up our marriage by initiating sex, trying scheduled sex, reading marriage books together which he did not really particularly like, and scheduled date nights. At this point prior to taking his job in Washington, our relationship took a back seat due to his work here. He was occupied with getting ahead, which I admired about him because I myself had built something from the ground up.

One month before he left, we didn’t know at the time that he was still even a contender for getting the position since he thought he bomber the interview, they offer him the job. We had three weeks to go and move. During this one month, we had talked about what we would do, when he would come back. But really, we had no time to prepare and even mentally prepare for something so soon. I was really adamant in leaving.

He left and I ended up getting my citizenship (I was not born in this country) in Canada for Visa reasons. and even explored moving to Vancouver instead to be closer and without having to worry about healthcare because of my earlier diagnosis. A few months came and went and I decided to stay. It was selfish of me, although I wanted to also go for my dreams that I had been working on for so long here. Prior to him leaving, he had stated he would only go for a max of 2 years, come back and start a family here at home close to our parents and siblings who also have their own families.

Earlier this year, our relationship took a dive. He had this built up resentment I didn’t end up moving with him, and he also resented the fact that he would have to relinquish his job that he learned shortly after was a defining part of himself. It’s funny how we are both the same in that way, and simultaneously not funny at all. Letters were exchanged of things we could not talk about, feelings, sadness, resentments, hope, love. I started to feel emotionally detached. I started to despise him for wanting me to sacrifice everything for his dreams. That’s the truth at its core.

We had 8 weeks between us every year to spend time with each other. This year, he used all his vacation time by missing a lot of work days because he was depressed. He called me in June and told me not to call him or contact him for two months to figure things out. He called me in the beginning of August and asked to separate. There was one time he checked in, sometime in July to let me know he was going on a trail on his motorbike with a few people and he would text me when he gets back home. Those two months, I would check Instagram and he would follow a lot and like a lot of women’s photos and yeah, I was blindsided because he was never like that before. He also started going to the gym a lot (started earlier this year).

The two months he was gone, I was emotionally and mentally out of it as is the norm. I was constantly tired and brushed it off often, but during a physical, my doctor felt a lump in my neck area, did some tests, thought my hormone levels were just out of whack but it turned out I had S1 cancer. I withdrew from everything, I was so angry, angry at the circumstance, angry at myself, angry with H. He was the last one I called to let him know. I didn’t even want him to know at that point, like I had resigned to an ending.

When I did tell him, he flew back for a week. He had already made up his mind with the separation and had said we needed to divorce. I found out during his stay that he had been confiding with a female coworker and had gone on this trail trips with her because he needed someone to talk to. I was livid. He did not want to talk to me about our relationship but ran to someone else who was not even slightly privy in acquaintance to myself and him. We spent the week going out to eat and watching movies as if he had never left. But his mind was set.

He went back to WA and I emailed him a long letter telling him that once the treatments were finished I would go and move there to make it work, the last of things to do to salvage everything...go to MC, things I felt, pleaded and bargained. He was not receptive.

Our last conversation was on the phone Oct 3, but we were messaging and contacting each other every other day. He was checking up on me everyday and had explicitly said that he would not be able to “manage” without me in his life as a friend. That if I were to get married, he would want me to invite him. I asked him if he had called one day and I told him I couldn’t talk because I was with my boyfriend, how would he feel? He had no words to say. He said that he loved me so much but there’s no getting around it and that he had thought about this for so long and that this was the only recourse. He said that part of why he is so angry was because he loved me so much and the pain is too much to bear. The last conversation on the phone he said he has been thinking about it too long and there’s no other way. I asked him why he wouldn’t even give MC a try, but he is set in his way. I ended the conversation rather harshly and told him “if you want the divorce, then send me the paper work. There’s nothing left to say”. And I hung up the phone.

He has been explicit with me checking in and letting him know how I am feeling physically regularly but I just don’t want to right now. I responded to a message he sent three days ago yesterday and told him that I was okay, our two dogs are ok and that I would talk to him later. I also told him that I no longer have the app we communicate on installed in my phone and to email me instead should he wish to contact me. I went dark. I removed his contact info, photos, emails, remnants of us, of him out of everything.

It’s been a week since we last spoke and two days since I texted him a short text back. Super short but, I have the odd days of just wanting to retreat and sleep and go to bed and write and do nothing but grovel to myself and replay the same scenes over and over again. Sometimes I think he’s selfish, sometimes I think I am. Other times, I want to do everything in this world and forget about him totally. I’m still functioning, although I haven’t been going to the gym as often because of the radiation treatments that are making me so freaking tired on a daily basis. I haven’t told my friends yet. I haven’t even told my mom yet that we are separated although I’m sure she knows somethings wrong when she doesn’t see our wedding photo in the living room anymore.

When he came down here, he visited his family and he did not want me to come. It was then he announced to them that we were separating. I found out before he left. It has become more and more official as days go on but there’s nothing I can do about his decision.

And that’s that for now. Sorry this is a long one. My mind is so scattered that I try to start from the beginning but other things came to play that I would remember as I’m typing and I have to include it in somehow.

Not sure if he is having an affair, but most likely an EA and I can put an 85% stamp on it.
I’ve been seeing a therapist. He says he has been as well but I’m not sure about that either.