Moving forward

[Rita]

My H was the same. He never even told his mom that he filed. When I finally told her because it seemed weird to keep trading recipes via e-mail without mentioning it, she said she hadn't talked to him since June, and that was in September. He had already been speaking to her almost never since MLC started. And he of course stopped speaking to my (now 91-year old and very forgiving) dad, with whom he regularly had 2 hour phone conversations before MLC.

But my MIL also has abandoned us since this happened. She can't face it. She was a huge part of my kids' life and then my mom died in year two of MLC -- so my kids have no idea what happened to their dad and everyone else. They are totally isolated from loving family except me.

I don't agree with the selfish jerk characterization. The outcome is of course selfish and painful. I believe that they have to create a new reality in order to not completely implode or kill themselves. My H wrote me a long letter explaining how he wasn't leaving a marriage but a feudal civilization. It's totally insane but it is a good way not to face the fact that he is actually leaving a marriage and that his W and kids do not want him to.

You can be sure that any relationship based on lies, whether it's lies told to all who love them or the lies she is telling herself, cannot last. It's only a matter of time before that affair relationship sinks into the sand on which it is built.