49 Male BS/ 41 Female WS who is still having an emotional affair. Separated since June 23 2024.

Separated after my wife’s emotional affair

This is my first post after finding out about this site this week. My wife and I have been together for 17 years and married for 13. We have one child (almost 7 years old). In 2012, I was disagnosed with late onset adult diabetes. I could not have imagined how life changing this diagnosis would become in my life. For the first few years it was manageable but as I was informed, this disease progressively gets worse and became very difficult to manage through medication alone (I was diagnosed as type 1.5 - neither type 1 or type 2).

In 2016 I started to have to make major life changes like no longer drinking beer or eating lots of the foods I loved. I found it to be devastating and began a downward spiral into depression. At the same time, my wife decided that she wanted more companionship and to start playing music (we are both musicians). I felt secure in our relationship and said it was ok for her to spend time with her ex boyfriend for those reasons. Oh, how I regret that decision.

After our child was born in late 2017, our relationship became very strained due to my wife having post partum depression and then in 2020 the death of her father and the pandemic. I had resorted to smoking marijuana at this point because I couldn’t have alcohol and began to use it to relieve my stress and anxiety. My wife had never cared about smoking MJ before but now wanted me to stop because it was becoming too frequent. She was right but I couldn’t stop and felt like she was controlling me. At this time I felt upset deep inside at her relationship with her ex which had grown to a best friend status but I was using MJ to keep my feelings suppressed.

Then in 2022-2023 they started spending pretty much all their time together. So much that people at my daughter’s school thought that he was my child’s father. My depression had gotten even worse and I stared therapy in late 2021 mostly because I couldn’t talk to my wife. My efforts paid off and I started to come out of the depression but my wife was now taking private vacations with the guy, going to concerts , and dinners with the guy and not spending any time with me. I asked her to get a babysitter so we could go out together instead of me staying home to take care of our kid while she did stuff with her "friend".

Finally, they went to England together to record and I saw a picture of them alone (they went two days early to London before the arrival of the rest of the band). Seeing them happy together there sent shockwaves of realization through me that this was not ok. They had been sleeping in the same bed multiple times (supposedly with pillows between them). I knew that I couldn’t have this anymore.

When my wife came home, I was angry, hurt, betrayed and unsure of what to do but not realizing why I really felt this way. I knew that things had to change and so I stopped smoking MJ and began to change. Weeks after, the wife came to me to say she and the guy were going to take another trip together. I finally confronted her that she was having an emotional affair and that these private vacations had to stop.

She couldn’t accept that is what is happening and said I’m just a good ol boy who doesn’t accept that a woman can be best friends with a man. I’m a feminist from way back and in places where it means something. This behavior has nothing to do with feminism. It has to do with her inability to keep appropriate boundaries.

After this, she has continued to be in the fog of denial. Blaming me for the loss of our relationship, finding things great and small that I did wrong (some even before our marriage) to justify her wanting to leave. In June, with help from her Mom, she finally moved out and since then we have been separated.

I have shared custody of our daughter 50/50 and that has been very hard as a little kid needs their mom. My wife still has most of her belongings in our shared home where I am living. She has never filed a change of address so I am still getting her mail. She is not working towards divorce and we have stopped couples counseling after trying two therapists. The last one was abusive to me and would not even try to get her to discuss her affair. She wanted to blame it on problems in our marriage which is probably partly true. I have told my wife I will not go to counseling any longer unless she is willing to actively work towards reconciliation.

Unfortunately, I am trapped in our house because I could not afford to buy a new home near our child’s school with half the proceeds from our house. I’m stuck in a limbo that could go on for years.

Does anyone have experience in a situation like this? I’m not sure about taking any advice as most the advice I have received has been bad. I want to reconcile but I think it will not happen at this point. I have made major changes in my life such as: stopping all MJ use and drinking, starting karate for my mental and physical health, getting a new job, continuing individual therapy, starting to meditate, working on mindfulness and being in the moment instead of in the past or future, pursuing my passion for music, accepting that I am type 1 diabetic and going on shots, and most importantly making my daughter the focus of my life. Self help books have been good and helpful but I still am grieving so heavily. It’s so hard to have my child constantly asking for her Mom and wanting to know why we are living like this while I’m also asking the same questions.

I appreciate your support.

10 comments posted: Sunday, November 17th, 2024