Most on this board now will not remember me and my sitch, almost three years have gone by and from the outside all seems well. From the standard ILYNILWY, facilitation etc etc to what in all appearances is a perfect reconstituted marriage. My W now says she loves me with all her heart and soul and tries (tries so very hard) to give me what I need. She dotes on me and is jealous and possesive, supportive and caring.

Of course she is, I reconstructed myself into the perfect human -- packed on 80 pounds of lean muscle, dyed my hair, styled the beard, I dress extremely well and have always been good with the spoken word. I listen actively and support her in her choices -- only giving advice when directly asked and never underestimating the truth and validity of her feelings.

But, somewhere in all of this some critical bolt or nut has stripped it's threads and I have come apart at the seams. I don't know if it's the stress of constantly being perfect or what ( OK, truth -0- not always perfect but much, much more so than you would believe).

I still don't get what I need -- asking has resulted in attempts and I know from what she gives me in her own language that she indeed does love me, it just doesn't speak to me in my heart and something gets lost in the translation.

So, the latest in the saga -- it seems I have turned into my a__hole father. In the last 3 months away at work, I have had three sexual affairs with women younger than I'd like to admit. None have been truely satisfying in all regards but nonetheless I got some emotional satisfaction from the liasons -- these were not one night encounters and two of them are ongoing right now.

I know that I am not being good and kind to these girls, they truely believe (despite my explicit words to the effect that I am not a nice man) that they have feelings for me that are reciprocated -- I don't think I can ever truely love anyone again, not even myself.

One good thing is that I no longer suffer from PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder) now more flashbacks to the emotional environment of the discovery, in fact I can quiet easily think about it without the huge emotional overload of feeling it all over again without the comforting blanket of faded rememberance -- thats all gone, replaced by dispair and disgust at what I have become.

Be careful friends, check those critical bits and pieces.

Peace Out

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