@golfer.gal – I hope you’re OK, glad you no longer have an elephant on your chest. That’s a pretty remarkable sign.

@Tina – ok, so let’s say that he wasn’t having sex this time. He was still spending time and money with not you. Are you this delusional in the rest of your life?

The very saddest part is that Tina has given up her fertility years to this delusion. (I can’t remember if she’s too old yet, but I remember her wanting to have children, but he said No, so she’s tolerating that.)

Congrats and godspeed, golfer.gal.

Kate you are right. That is my thought process… I do want to be told I’m over reacting. I question it every day.
Sometimes I wonder if the pain to leave is more than tolerating this. I don’t have family, my friends wouldn’t do much for me. He has been my family, my home, for 13 years. Since I was 20. I can’t imagine how home sick I would be. That’s when I think that pain would be worse to leave and I’m doing everything to hold on.
But I know his behavior is not ok. I know I don’t deserve this. The anxiety is awful.
But when we aren’t talking about her or I’m just purely with him, I feel “at home, at peace. So happy.”
I know this is so f***ed up.

Also I confronted him about the lie of going to work when his car was at her house. He said he stopped by to give her the gift and then he did go to work. So… I’m questioning myself now. Is it still not ok because he didn’t tell me he did that. Or is it not a big deal to “stop by a friends house”?

Tina, the difference is on the other side of leaving is at least the possibility for happiness again. You will live in the fear, anxiety, grief, gaslighting, and pain, punctuated with increasingly short periods of feeling happy as his mistress becomes more and more of his priority, for as long as you stay with him/until he leaves you for her. I don’t understand the mental gymnastics- if you refuse to leave, why not just accept you’re in an open marriage and your husband has another partner?

Thanks for the kind words folks. I am doing pretty well all things considered. Lis, you’re right, when your marriage has become an elephant on your chest then it’s time to make a change. The next few months will bring a lot of change but I know in my bones that I’ll be ok. I cannot even explain the relief, even though it’s hard.

I never quite grasp how so many fools who are utterly miserable in bad —- no, make that hilariously obviously toxic relationships somehow always cling to the bizarre and mistakeb belief that being along would…. somehow… be even oh so much worse.

??‍♂️