Pain & divorce & infertility & alcoholism
Well, tomorrow we meet with the attny's to hammer out our divorce agreement, and I'm feeling so sad & scared. I don't want this divorce at all, and have been trying for months to show him that we have so much still in our marriage to save and work on and he simply says I love you, I miss you, I wanted you, but it's too little too late and I'm too afraid to try again with you because it will all go back to the way it was. Love, he says, is not enough to save our marriage. I totally disagree.
He's also escalated his emotional affair to a full blown love/sexual affair with a woman 16 years younger than us. We are both 41; she's 25 and in college. They met at AA meetings and have been in constant contact since mid-Nov '07. Texting, phoning, meetings and now dates & sleep overs. He hid it from me for two months and then lied that it wasn't romantic in nature. I think it's been his plan to be with her all along - even treating me badly on purpose to make me fight back and ask him to move out. I said if we are not both working on saving our marriage, then you need to leave.
He finally confessed the affair on 4/20 and asked for the divorce. We took a vacation in Oct '07 and I had no idea this was coming - at all. I confronted him on his strange behavior in December and it went from, we have problems to I want a divorce in less than 2 hours of talking. I also made more money than him, and didn't change my last name to his when we got married - two things I never knew bothered him for 8 years, until this came up. I thought he admired my independence - turns out, he likes to 'be the big man' to this little kid who is infatuated with him.
I feel that the real reason he wanted to leave me is to have his own children - not adopt like we'd planned on doing this year. I finished my master's degree last summer, and this was the year to adopt. We married in 1999 and tried to have a family right away, and I found out I had stage IV endometriosis that caused infertility, chronic pain, chronic fatigue and depression as well as pain with intercourse; not a lot of intimacy in our married life. In the meantime, my father was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease and I threw a lot of my time and energy into helping him, and my mom (my co-dependent behavior). Perhaps, in hindsight, too much time. My husband also is a recovering alcoholic with six years sober. He focused on staying sober - I focused on the house, the bills, my job, going to school & my parents - pretty much I did it all, and he went to AA meetings most every night.
He said, just because you stayed with me while I was getting sober, I feel no obligation to stay with you now. I started attending Al Anon meetings in January - talk about too little too late but it's helped me see that it's not all my fault like he keeps insisting. And, he said, do you know how embarrassing it is to tell people that I'm leaving my wife because she's a bad housekeeper, and we didn't have enough sex. It's all about his needs being met and getting what he wants now. He feels entitled to do this for himself now, and doesn't care one bit if it hurts me.
He said your feelings are not important. Feelings change and go away and they are not important in making decisions. He said all of our time together was dictated by my feelings. I think, too it's partly a mid life crisis for him because he wants new clothes, to dye his hair, to work out, to buy a motorcycle, to whiten his teeth and his new best friend is a club DJ and his girlfriend is in college! I'm afraid for him in a way, too because he seems to me to be close to drinking again, and his girlfriend has relapsed using heroin - so I've changed the locks on the door because with his crazy mood swings, I don't want any of that coming into my home. He blames me for everything that's gone wrong, so I'm sure if they break up, somehow he'll blame me for that, too. He's also become obsessive with cleanliness - and that was never there before in our 12 years.
We went to one marriage counseling appointment and he just said, I don't want to try at all and I left in tears. The psychiatrist diagnosed him with narcissistic personality disorder due to his total lack of empathy for me and his ability to only think about his needs/wants. It's like no matter what I try to do, it was never going to be enough. Like jump thru these flaming hoops 60 feet in the air as they are swinging back & forth... nope, I knew you couldn't do it. No chance for us. I kept going to therapy on my own for a few months until I lost my job.
So I'm on my own at 41, and also got laid off of work the day after he left (in March and am still not working - worried about losing the house now, too) and was diagnosed a week later with cysts on my lymph nodes in both of my breasts - probably from the fertility treatments and hormone therapies for the endometriosis. He was decent enough to add me to his health insurance so at least if that gets worse I have some coverage.
Again, the times I needed him most - and he's no where to be found and wants nothing to do with me. Our 9 year wedding anniversary - nothing. My 41st birthday - nothing.
He sometimes leads me on that maybe there's a chance to reconcile when we talk briefly on the phone, but then a few days later says - no, I think this is for the best. Someday you'll see this is for the best, too - but swears his not happy about it. When he moved out in early March he swore to me that he wasn't moving out to have affairs, and wanted time to think, and heal and be alone - he promised me he wasn't going to be with anyone else, that it was me he loved and that we would call & talk and date and see if we could rekindle what we had lost. In less than 7 weeks he changed his mind and started dating her. We never got together even once in that 7 weeks except for doing our taxes.
I've been in a prolonged grief state from losing my ability to have children and watching my father in advanced dementia, and dying two years ago - and now this and all along I thought I was doing the right things - and that he loved me no matter what forever and ever through sickness and health and would always be there for me and now - I know it was not real or true. I'm just so heartbroken. I want him to come back and say, baby - let's try again. I was wrong to have left you, I'm sorry. Let's go to counseling, let's get our marriage back on track. Our love is strong enough to see us through this storm.
And now - with no chance at getting back together, if I want to adopt on my own - I can do that, but I can never be married and adopt because you have to be married for five years before they'll consider you as adoptive parents - so it's either on my own, or never at all because even if I do meet someone, and we get married and wait five years - I'll be at least 47! It's all come un-done. All of our plans evaporated. And, I'm not the least bit interested in meeting another man - the thought just sickens me. I want my husband back. I also found a journal he left behind when he moved out and in it he wrote about a co-worker that he wanted to have an affair with but only if he wouldn't get caught... I knew he had a crush on her, but thought it was a harmless workplace flirtation. Little did I know, it seems he's been wanting other women our whole marriage.
I'm lost. I'm alone. I'm scared. I hate this feeling of floating at sea with no land in sight. I pray I get a job soon so at least I have something to get up for each day. Meanwhile, he's got his girlfriend - I got my dogs, and life apparently will go on in some new way that I never imagined.I pray every morning for a ray of sunshine... a little nugget of happiness. 12 years together has evaporated. Thank god I have a few close friends and my pets... at least they keep me going.