My husband and I have been married 22 years. On Wednesday he confessed to me that he's been seeing a friend of his for a couple months and it has turned into a sexual relationship. He wasn't sure he loved her at first, now he says he doesn't love her. He says in his heart he knows he loves me, but it's fuzzy in his head how he is feeling and he's confused. Fair enough, but this is the SEVENTH woman I know about in our years of marriage. How can I possibly stay this time? At what point do I become a fool for continuing to take him back and then being surprised and hurt when I find myself in this situation AGAIN? I am Catholic and of course the church wants us to try to work this out because of their stance on divorce, although my priest did say that the church does allow divorce under this sort of circumstance. My husband called Catholic charities to arrange counseling, but I must say I don't hold out a lot of hope for it. He says he wants to stay and he wants to find out why he keeps doing this so he can stop doing it. I don't believe anything he says to me anymore and there hasn't been trust for years. How can anyone stay in this sort of marriage? Why should I waste my time and energy and money on a counselor? We've gone to counseling before and it got better for a while and then it got worse again. I just didn't realize we were at this stage this time. I thought we were doing really well. I've been having health problems and he said it really scared him that I was going to die. So he goes to another woman to talk about it and ends up falling in love with her? She has told him repeatedly, when he's called her to end the relationship (I've heard HIS end of two of the conversations) that she will wait for him as long as it takes. She keeps sending him messages and calling him and since he works alone in the evenings, she could go up to his work anytime she wanted. That's where they were having sex on the night shift! I just don't believe he'd be strong enough to turn her away. The conversation I heard was one of a man apologizing to her for leading her on and telling her they would just have to stop, but there was no conviction there. I could tell he was heartbroken to hurt her, yet he didn't seem that heartbroken when he told me about it. What do you all think. Should I just let her have him? She's always going to be a threat hanging over our relationship and if my husband wants to, even if we manage to make our marriage better, he's going to find something to be unhappy with me about so he can justify going back to her or having an affair with someone else. How can I know what is the right thing to do? Would any of you bother with counseling? I've been with this man since I was 17 years old. We have four children together and right now I don't have a job or any way to support our kids. I've never lived on my own and I don't hold out a lot of hope for me ever finding someone else if we do divorce. I'm not a pretty woman, I'm 42, I have some health issues and I'm overweight, although I'm losing weight due to diabetes control. I've lost 30 pounds in 3 1/2 months, but I've still got about 50 to go. I don't have any friends, either. Do you think this marriage builders program could help even extreme cases like ours? Do you think going back to church will help him? I know he's terrified that he's going to ****** because he's committed a mortal sin multiple times. That's not enough to change someone, though, is it? I don't know what to do. Should I tell him right now to get out or let him stay and agree to go to counseling for a while to see if we can work it out before I make any final decisions? I know if I asked him to leave, although he denies it, he'll run right back to her. Guess I'd have my answer then, huh? Problem is, how would I know if he said he wasn't seeing her if he was telling me the truth or not. God help me. I can't do this again.
