Group Therapy: Love him enough to let him go

Group Therapy: We have another group therapy this week. This just came in, please give your advice and help or whatever you have to say in comments.

"I am such an idiot. I set myself up; there's no one but myself to blame. It's my fault I fell headlong into impossible love with another woman's husband. I didn't ask for it. I didn't want to. I certainly didn't plan to. He didn't either. People don't plan these things, or even seek them out.


People seek out affairs, they seek out quick fucks and meaningless momentary escapes from their lives, but I am convinced they do not set out to fall in love with someone else's spouse. This road can lead to nowhere but pain.


At first, with the newness of falling in love, the attention he lavished on me, and the myriad ways he was so different from the monster I married I convinced myself the flight would be worth the fall. I thought I could handle the pain, even welcomed it because even though I'd have to face it eventually, it would mean I'd lived. It would mean I'd rolled the dice and won, just for awhile. I embraced the pain I knew would come because I convinced myself that I could handle it. I could control how much loved him.


Oh, how very wrong I was.


I am in the pain now. I am in a world of hurt I didn't realize existed. I have never been loved by a man before. I was never loved by my husband or any of the men I dated before him. They loved my body, my looks, or my money, but never me. This man, this other woman's husband saw me. And he loved me. He loved me in spite of my flaws and my impossible situation. He loved me before he knew I was rich. He loved me before he knew of my connections or what I could offer him. He loved me.


I know what you're thinking. I know that everyone looks at adultery and shakes their heads. When the adulteress says, "it's different" eyes roll and tongues cluck in disbelief and even some disgust. That's okay. I understand that; I've done that. But this was different, ridiculous as I know it sounds.


I knew from the onset that he would not leave his wife. I don't think I loved myself enough to allow that to be a deal breaker but I know I loved him enough to understand his reason - his children - and to support his decision because I love him enough to want what's best for him. And his babies are his whole world. He is as addicted to his children as I am to mine and I don't know if he could stand the thought of being apart from them if he left his wife. He's not a part time kind of daddy.


And, naively, a small part of me I didn't even acknowledge existed thought that maybe someday, when they were grown or at least older, things would be different. Regardless, I loved him even though I wasn't enough. I loved him (at least in part) because I wasn't enough, I think. I would have thought less of him if he'd have put me before his children. I would never want him to do that and so I accepted the situation as it was.


His wife found out today. Honestly, at this point I don't know how much she knows. The phone call was brief, to the point, and so very very devastating. "It's me, baby. Things are very bad here. She knows. I'll call you when I can. I love you. I'm so sorry."


And my world has crumbled. There is an iron fist wrapped around my heart and who can I even tell? It's such a shameful, dirty secret I cannot even have the luxury of hurting over it.


There is one person in my life who knows my secret. I told this person today that his wife found out and the response I got was, "Well you should be glad! He'll get divorced now for sure!" I am many, many things, but glad is not one of them. I love him enough that I want him spared of all pain, even if sparing him means taking it on myself. No, I'm not happy he may be getting a divorce. I'm devastated for him because I know that if it happens and he is separated from his children, an essential part of him will be changed forever. I would rather never see him again than see him destroyed.


I learned a very hard lesson today. Love does not conquer all. Just because we're in love does not mean we can be together. I do not embrace this pain anymore. I'm not so sure anymore that it's worth it. My heart is broken, partly for what I am sure is the loss of this man who, despite his flaws and despite what you must think about his character considering he claims to love me but stays married to another woman, truly did love me very well, but mostly for him and what he now faces.. And I have to love him enough, now, to let him go."

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