It's four in the morning here in the UK...Christmas morning. We've left the kids' presents outside their doors. And here I am sitting at the PC. My eyes are puffy with crying, and I'm full of gin thrown down in the hope it will get me a few hours' sleep. So excuse me for drunken posting.

Last Christmas, I cried all the time, too, because his gifts were so few and so perfunctory, and his card might have been made out to his bank manager, it was so impersonal. Now I know that he emailed OW on Boxing Day to tell her how depressing I was being, perhaps he could spend next Christmas with her? I cannot, cannot, CANNOT make it to another Christmas Day in this kind of misery. This has been the worst year of my life - my father seriously ill, my aunt dying unexpectedly, and between the two, d-day.

Tonight we talked about the future. He just can't quite give Her up. He knows it's risking everything - his kids' security, his marriage, everything. He doesn't even want to live with her - says she's a pain in the [censored] in many ways. He says I've been a fabulous wife, he's so lucky, what the hell is wrong with him, he says, for me not to be enough for him? Yet he can't end it with her, can't finish it off. It 'wasn't just a fling' - it was deep and 'very special'. The thought of NC wrenches his guts. He says he thinks he has major personal problems, which he will have to sort out. So as Christmas Eve turned into Christmas Day, we were discussing separation and the absence of a future for us. Oh, joy.

I have to rebuild ME. I know that. Yet I can't stop crying. I'm struggling even in my part-time job - I can't concentrate, can hardly keep the tears at bay most of the time. This is ME - a year ago I was a high-flying IT consultant, working for one of the big consultancies and grossly overpaid. I gave up the job in an desparate efort to save the marriage, where I knew something was badly wrong, although I hadn't guessed about the thirteen years of EMAs. How can I be such a wreck - me that used to be such a bright spark, such a career success?

I put EVERYTHING into this marriage - I can't do less than 100%. He never put in his whole self, and still hasn't. I know I have to get a life, any life at all. But I don't know where to start. He's sleeping peacefully now, the adulterer, the cheat, the liar. And I am sitting here, pissed, wanting to be dead. This is not right.

I hope your Christmas is what you want. Please enjoy it, MB friends.

There must be more gin somewhere...

Me (BS) 44, WH (45)
Married 17 years, two teenage children.
D-day July 02 SA, 4 As, still in A#4
Aug 02: A#4 ‘ended’

TA,

Merry Christmas!

It is midnight here in northeastern USA and I sit here with my anger and bitterness. So... you are not alone!

Put the gin away and try to get some sleep... you won't be any good when the kids get up.

Keep your chin up!

<img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

What power we give them. Ironic isn't it? We put 100% of our heart, souls, and dreams into our marriages and kapuff everything we ever believed in, everything we know to be right is wrong.

I read that we see others through a mirror of ourselves. In other words, if we are capable of offering unconditional love we see others as being able to also. Sadly, this is not always the case. Some of these men cannot hear the language of love. They simply want- and pay no heed of the consequences. When we see others as we see ourselves it is absolutely mind boggling to us when they pull their stunts.

On a better note

Each and every one of us here is someone SPECIAL- before, during and after our spouses horrific A. I know it is so much easier said than done when we say "live for ourselves" this is especially true if we have conditioned ourselves to live for our spouse.

I don't have a lot to offer in the way of making you feel better except this.

You are an individual, unique in a way that no other can compare. Please remember that you have to keep that part of yourself close and sacred in your heart. No one, no matter what harm they inflict can take away the "you".

God Bless you and have a Very Merry Christmas. For Christmas is not about our spouses but rather about the love that our heavenly father has for each and every one of us. Let's put aside our hurt and pain and celebrate in the knowledge that we are alive, we are able to communicate, and we are able to love, ourselves and our children if no one else, but love non the less.

Merry Christmas

<small>[ February 05, 2005, 09:45 PM: Message edited by: hanora ]</small>