Just checking in and reading through your thread. I missed out on all of Part 16 while I was moving into my apartment and getting settled!! I feel like you and I are in similar situations, H's that took off with no attempt to try to work through counseling for the M, very selfish behaviors, still completely married but with other women.
I really, whole-heartedly, recommend you get an IC. I see mine completely online, I've never met her in person It makes a world of difference of getting different perspective and she points things out to me that I can't see on my own. You are spending all this time with the weight of it all on your shoulders and letting him off free with no accountability. I tend to be the same way. And it is good to look in the mirror and realize what you could do better and what you need to work on, and those are things I talk about with my IC, but also I think you still have rose colored glasses on with H. And I'm saying that because it's something IC and I are working on for my own situation.
Just this last session with her I said, "I feel bad for the next guy in my life because I'm going to have trust issues after trusting H and he walked away". She replied, "why do you say you've trusted him when he has had multiple EAs over the years? What makes him a person that you could trust when he did things like that?" Those were boundaries that I didn't set for myself over the years (not very self respectful for myself and not very respectful of him) and those sort of things I need to look at more clearly to realize that I sugar coated or ignored a lot of bad behavior and I deserved better than that. I could have been the best or worst wife in the world and neither of those options would have any impact on the fact that he is the type of person to feel that it was okay to have an EA multiple times and now a PA (I would never). I don't respect that type of behavior.
I realized that for years I was trying to mould him into being a person who I thought was worthy and just and good. I would nag about doing the right thing, or not treating someone a certain way, and now I see all these extremely selfish behaviors coming out and until recently, I thought "where is this person coming from? Who is this?" and now I am realizing, it was the person he truly is and I was trying to make him into a better person instead of letting him be the selfish mean person that he is. All these things that I see now are who he is and who he wants to be and I was trying to control him into being a different person.
I have gotten a little off track with the above information, trying to turn it into my thread But I wanted to share that information with you because I am learning and growing with that information with the help of my IC.
I think you and I are cut from the same cloth in a lot of ways, where we try to fix everything ourselves, but I would not be where I am without my IC. And 'bless his heart', whoever ends up being my next companion, he is going to have to do pre-counseling with my IC before we head down any sort of path of long term commitment. And I did say, that if my selfish H ever had a change of heart and he really put the honest work of fixing his end of the situation (because of course everything is my fault because he refuses to take accountability for his half) that my IC would have to give her blessing that he had really worked through his issues before I even CONSIDERED taking him back. And even then, I might not. (my IC was our MC before he decided to pull the plug without trying to put real work in, I'm not sure if she is seeing him individually anymore. But I would have to know that he continued IC as one of the conditions for me to consider a 2.0 with him.)
At least look into online options for IC if you don't feel like you can do in person sessions. Mine is done over video chat and I tell her all the time that I dread the sessions when they are upcoming because I hate talking about myself but I enjoy my time with her during it. And I walk away feeling better after each one and it gives me things to think about throughout the week. She and I are peeling the layers off the onion so to speak.
My heart hurts for you because I see you still spinning and I know you have been in this for YEARS longer than I have. I wish we could just press FF through the pain but I also know that those of us who use pain as a tool to learn from will be healthier at the outcome. But KC, girl, you are not moving forward. He doesn't deserve you. Let him be with OW, if she is fine with a married man having a PA then she obviously is at the same level of low values that he is. Why would you want to lower yourself to that standard of being Plan B.
I *know* I'm being vilified as the mean "ex" wife (completely married still of course, because he wants to run around with his GF but doesn't want to do the work of getting the D) and I'll be damned if I give any impression to him or GF that I give 2 cents about either one of them. I'm sure their relationship is going to work out great, it was built on a really strong foundation (sarcasm) He deserves the messy outcome from that because he doesn't want to look in the mirror and examine his issues and work at them and learn from them. As for me, I'm learning what it is like to not be an extension of someone and finding out who I am as myself, and I know that when I am ready to start dating that I'll be looking for an upgrade, someone who holds the same values and ideals that I share.
It makes a world of difference of getting different perspective and she points things out to me that I can't see on my own. You are spending all this time with the weight of it all on your shoulders and letting him off free with no accountability. I tend to be the same way. And it is good to look in the mirror and realize what you could do better and what you need to work on, and those are things I talk about with my IC, but also I think you still have rose colored glasses on with H. And I'm saying that because it's something IC and I are working on for my own situation.