Dear GirlShrink,
We’re both in our mid 30s. I met M a year and a half ago. He was in a 13 years marriage. We were strangely connected the first time we met at a social thing at work then we realised we both painted a similar subject of painting at a point of our lives and it was scarily identical. We lived in different countries and I told him that I would not be involved with a married man so we kept it platonic.
He pursued me for half a year and during those times, I made it as harsh as possible to let him know that it would not be possible for us to pursue a relationship while he was married. He travelled often to my country to see me. I was wary although I was attracted. Finally I stopped all contact for 2 months with him although he text me everyday.
5 months later he called me and told me that he was moving out of his house. Then he told me that they’ve decided to get a divorce, and soon the wife/kids went back to their home country. I was still very wary at this point but decided to talk to him. I questioned and questioned and I felt that he was utterly honest with me.
M got married when he got his wife knocked up at 21. He felt responsible and married her, and had a problematic marriage (according to him, jealousy, fights, trust issues) but they continued the marriage because of the kid, and 6 years later they took another try by having a 2nd child. Relationship between them didn’t improve despite the kids and counselling but turned for worse as he cheated on his wife with a short affair. His wife didn’t know about this. He told me that he was emotionally detached to his wife for more than 10 years and I wasn’t a rebound.
I agreed to try long distance for 6 months and we fell madly in love with each other. Then I found a great job in his country and I moved. We had a lot of debate on whether to live together, and we took the plunge. His divorce got very complicated in the midst of all these, wife sued, didn’t want to settle, dragged on for a full year. He got into an emotional distress and became obsessively paranoid about everything. I had to hide when someone rings the doorbell.
During this period of 6 months living together, I was going through his divorce with him everyday. It was very stressful as I was coping with new country, my stuff was in storage all the while, he would pay for another apartment and made me move at any point he felt that his wife was going to send someone to check on him. I was the ‘hidden’ relationship. I wasn’t happy but he kept me going with his love and assurance and told me to have faith.
I started to get into emotional swings where I doubted him but he always managed to convince me all will be fine after his wife finally let him go. Last two months we had huge fights, I got so frustrated with him that I wanted to break up and move out, and I broke glasses and pushed him. I’ve never done that to anyone before.
Finally he agreed that I moved out. And 2 weeks later he broke up with me. Then 2 weeks after the break up, he told me the wife finally signed the papers. But he had no intention to get back together.
I am in a place where I felt that we did the right thing breaking up but at the same time I felt that we could’ve worked things out and it is partially my fault. I’m not sure if I’m being objective in this situation because we were both at faults – he shouldn’t jump into relationship with me and convinced me I was the one for him and I shouldn’t have lashed out at him the way I did.
I want to give it a try again so badly because I’ve had many relationships before and I know when I met the right one. Unfortunately I only managed to realise this just before he broke up with me 3 weeks ago. He’s called me several times after the break up and wanted to be friends. He told me he still loves me but he realised that he couldn’t give me his 100% and it would be unfair to me. He realised that he shouldn’t have started this while going through a divorce. I let him go, didn’t plead with him, and finally told him not to call me again and let me move on and stop giving me hope. And he said he has hope for us but he respects my decision not to keep in
touch.
I guess I have the answers – move on, don’t wait. If he loves me he will come back. I just don’t know if he feels the same way about me and if he is truly sincere about being hopeful about us and all he needs is some time to sort himself out?
Dear In Over Her Head,
I call you that because you made a lot of big life decisions and got in way over your head with this relationship. Is it not the cardinal rule to not get involved with a married man? The reasons for this are not just moral but also because it is extremely difficult for any human being to be 100% in a relationship with someone while they are still married to someone else.While he may have married her for the right or wrong reasons years ago. While they may have been young. The bottom line is is that they were married, they made vows, the lived together for years, slept together, created and raised two children. There is an emotional connection you form with someone based upon a shared emotional journey. So to think that they were both do disconnected that this would be smooth sailing is a bit naive on both of your parts.
So now you are in his country. Building a life without him when you probably only searched for a new job there because of him. Chances are you will connect with him again because everything there probably reminds you of him. Yet I still think that everything is still new and raw for him and his ex. Let things settle down. Let him get into a new rhythm as a divorced man. After a while, date if you want, but stay in separate residences. There is no need to rush things. He does not need to go from one serious relationship into another one.
Does he still love you? I’m sure he still does. But divorce is emotional. Volatile. People outside the couple get involved. No one likes change. So people get anxious and say crazy things. I’m saying that you should allow the dust to settle, and then see where things stand.
