piers

Its a few months on. At least one thing is sorted, I am no longer interested in the person I had an affair with. It was less enduring than my love for my wife, but it sure didn't seem so at the time. We are now on a slow and painful, (mainly for my wife), road to recovery. Hence; thanks to the majority of you who said stick with her, you were dead right.

It is a weird place to be, as trashy said. You feel pretty worthless, and hope somehow the whole thing will go away. Exactly how you feel depends on how far develped you are in the affair, and it probably depends on your sex life before the affair. In my case we had good sex always in my marriage, I would even say it was one of the things that was special about us, compared to the relationships I had had before. We both felt that way. At first I felt very guilty, almost paralysed by it. It was only the chemistry of the new relationship that actually made it work at all with the new lover. I didn't initially lose interest in my wife, but that came as I fell more in love with the other woman. I basically transferred affection, and desire. What is strange is that sex was not clearly better with my lover, just newer. I had actually expected it to be worse (which it was for a while). I can see how people could get addicted to it, imagine the first flush of a new passionate relationship, you know it won't last but its fun. I can see how new sex could attract even someone who has a fairly good married sex life.

I am grateful for your perspective, egirl, and its very similar to what my wife is saying. She cannot give me much more time, because her love and respect for me are being chipped away each day. I understand that. Its also clear that you are a similar age to us, and probably state of life to us. In my twenties I believed in absolutes. At 25 I had never cheated on anyone, and I continued for 14 years in the same way. Now I have, I UNDERSTAND why its forbidden by almost every moral code. Thanks for your comments.

As someone who has cheated, I would say that there is a high probability that he is up to no good. Your gut feel is very probably trustworthy. The sudden loss of interest is a classic symptom in a man who is straying or almost straying. His frustration when talking to you is also a very feasible symptom of his covering up. He can't tell you the truth so its very tough to be made to lie repeatedly. If its gone this way after a year, I reckon you would be better off with someone else. I think you should confront him, ...you have a right not to be cheated on.

SpunkyKatt, thanks for the post. Based on my current thinking we will be doing the following. My wife and I will go to counselling, ASAP. Things have got dangerously volatile, and I personally believe that moving out to a neutral space would be the best thing, particularly for the children. My wife strongly disagrees at present. We wil have to work on this, but I appreciate the comments about the kids and me, without S or my wife. I believe my wife is afraid that if I move out she will lose her immediate hold on me, the other worry she has is that she won't know what I am doing, and obviously sleeping with S will be the first thing that comes to mind. S and I work fairly closely together, so I can't break 100% from seeing her. I believe we can agree to keep things 100% business. I have no illusions that this will be easy, BUT I am trying to give my marriage a chance, while still keeping my job. I think losing job and house will just make things even worse, there really are very few good employment options here, its not the US. I am being honest with both S and my wife at the moment, even though its probably causing more pain all round.

Wildchild, you have a point asking me to seek the truth. Its not easy, I am not sure myself, but if I ever show any indecision, my wife can't cope with it. Understandably, hence it would be easier to lie to her. I don't believe I am lieing to S, which currently draws me to her. Why do I prefer S, I do think its the chemistry of a new relationship that heightens my attraction. BUT Mostly its her energy, and yes I know kids kill that, but she has more than my wife ever had, and is into the same sports I am, we have spent a lot of time together in the mountains. I do fear though that I have been lieing to myself, for example believing that I could have full closure at the weekend. In terms of 'mid life crisis' I think that there is an element of that. About a year ago I started taking my fitness seriously again, and I certainly haven't been lovesick in any way for over 14 years. Hence I am somewhere I really can't grasp. Sorry for the rambling, but I have had some good feedback here thanks.

. You have to "pick your pain". Common sense says the pain of losing S. will be the much lesser pain in the long run. Since you have children. I was miserable in my 25 year marriage, but the consequences of my action makes me wish I had stayed just to keep my family intact. Thanks for your very welcome advice. I empathised very clearly with the words "pick your pain". Basically I decided last weekend based on the 'pick your pain' principle, or rather a 'minimise the total pain' principle. I felt that S and I would suffer less total pain if we stopped than my wife, myself and my children would if I went to S. This seemed like a very good decision for around 18 hours and I felt relieved. Then I started suffering. After 36 hours I was almost physically out of control, if S hadn't spoken to me I would be camping outside her flat, waiting for her to return from her trip. I feel mentally ill, its truly pathetic, and I am sure appears utterly self indulgent.

So far thanks for the huge amount of advice. Its gratifying to get some help when I have almost noone to turn to. The clearest messages so far are: get counselling and give your wife a real chance. Where I am least clear is on the why I did this in the first place? Was our whole marriage built on sand? did I ever really love my wife? did we really have enough in common? should we have things in common? I thought she was the love of my life, and made significant compromises in my lifestyle, effectively giving up my main hobby to be with her. However I was sure that was the recipe for a good marriage, sensible compromise. The more coldly I analyse everything the less sure I am about anything. One thought that comes to mind is that I really don't see me having anything I want to do with my wife once the children leave. With S there would be loads as we share the same key interests. My wife and I rarely even eat together, except at weekends, mainly as my job means I get home late.

Bethany is right, probably about more than this, but certainly right that my wife won't respect me more for attracting another woman.

this also needed to be removed I dont know who may be able to read such stuff and it wont help

deleted this for personal reasons. sorry to anyone who really found it useful