I’ve(37f) been with my husband(38m) for 21 years this Saturday. Married for 16, and two (almost grown) teenagers. We were high school sweethearts, fell hard and fast, but knew we loved each other. We were the best friends type of relationship for so many years. I was able to stay home with the kids until they were both in school and worked part time during that while he worked and provided for us.
It wasn’t well but he did and I was happy for the most part. We weren’t perfect by any means, we struggled a lot and never really learned how to communicate effectively with one another is my biggest takeaway from everything.
Well, late 2022 something changed in an instant. He had just turned 37 and suddenly decided he wasn’t happy. He wasn’t happy with himself, he wasn’t happy with our life, he confided in me one night in January of 2023 that he felt this way, he said he wasn’t living he was just alive, quoting a song he had heard about wasting life just working. I felt so awful and I wanted to do anything I could to help. I was still working at my part time job but it just wasn’t enough to sustain a life where we could enjoy nice things, trips or even going on dates very often. Yet he was making more than we ever had in our whole lives. I tried to be supportive and find ways to make life more interesting. Saved money here and there to try to go out more, the kids were starting to get older at about 15 and 13 so I was looking at letting them stay home alone for the first time.
I found out by the end of that summer it just wasn’t enough. In October he asked to separate. I was honestly shocked and unsure of what I would do for myself. I worked part time at the same small business for my family for the past 9 years, no real career and no opportunity for advancement. I also love him dearly and was heartbroken that it was even a possibility. We talked and cried all night about why and how and things and he had a change of heart the next day. He said he didn’t want that but things had to change. He communicated his needs for the first time and I listened. So the next couple months things seemed to get better until it hit me one day. The wave of intuition and everything came together about what was off about him lately. I went home from work, shaking and nauseous just going to simply ask him to go through his phone to put my at ease. When I got there I could hardly speak and blurted out, are you having an affair? He just looked at me and said yes.
After a ton of trickle truths, I learned he had been seeing a woman from work for about 7 months. From there we’ve had a turbulent 2024 that went from a limbo about our future, to a separation where I moved out, to three days later him crying saying he DID want to work on our marriage and leave her, to finding it he’s still seeing her in April, to me filing for divorce in July, to me moving back home 3 weeks later, to finding OUT AGAIN he’s never stopped seeing her in August, to him proposing a poly relationship with the three of us, to us three dating for about 4 months, I lost my job in September and became unemployed and he convinced me to cancel the divorce, to me breaking things off in January and the last 2 months have been back to a hellish limbo of who’s he going to stay with….
I know this is insane, and pathetic and honestly kind of disgusting and unbelievable. TRUST ME I do know. I have been so lost and so stuck in what to do and where to find my self respect. I ended up in a position where i was unemployed and stuck with very limited options so when i decided I would not entertain this “lifestyle” he now decided he wanted, I thought it might be best to keep the peace, and start looking for a better job and get all the resources I can together to try to end this shit show.
Here’s where it gets messier. He got me a job. Where he AND she works. I started on Monday. He’s in a somewhat powerful at this place and it is honestly an amazing opportunity for me even just personally. The benefits, the top end pay, the bonuses, all of it would allow me to live my life more than comfortably without him. But I have to get through a temp hire phase of around 4-9 months… oh and another fun complicated fact AP lives literally across the street from this place..
It’s so messy and I have no idea what to do other than bite my tongue and press forward and put myself in a position that would allow me to move on. It’ll just take time. But for now he stays with her half the week and me half the week like a fking split custody child. I hate my life and I’m so heartbroken that this is where I am after devoting 21 years of my life to this man who swears he loves me and could never love with losing me. Yet he’s pushing too far. I keep hoping this is some fked up midlife crisis and it will end eventually but at this point he’s been in a relationship with her for 2 years and claims to love her equally as much.
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Yikes