Trouble in Paradise
nicole1087
member
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Mixed up feelings
Sorry this is going to be long....Ive been having all these mixed feelings for the past year. My husband and I have been married for 2.5 years but together for 12 years. For the past year I have been questioning my marriage. He is bipolar so tends to get very angry and has a difficult time keeping a job and his anger under control.He has never physically hurt me but I feel has verbally. I tend to feel more like a mom then a wife. He doesnt get a long with my family. This month we bought our first house, which I was hoping would help ease our relationship since we were living with my mom and that was causing tension, but then he got layed off from his job causing more issues.
Anyway on top of all this uncertainly with my marriage. I have a family friend whom I have recently reconnected with. When I was 13 years old, he gave me my first kiss but lived in another state at the time. When we would see each other, we would hang out and kiss but never dated due to distance. Anyway he ended up getting a girl pregnant and then marrying her. I had to sit through his wedding, in fact my mom married them. It was very difficult for me cuz I had feelings for him. I ended up avoiding him as much as I could. He is now divorced and dating another. I saw him for the first time in probably 10 yrs last yr. I had a dream the night before I saw him that he pulled me on the beach and told me he always had feelings for me and kissed me. We talked and reconnected last august and added him on facebook. It was here now 13 yrs later. He told me he had feelings for me and I married the wrong person. I knew that I always had these feelings for him, in fact I wanted him to come to my wedding to feel how I felt at his. but I never knew he felt this way about me. We've been talking a lot this yr and he ended up coming and staying at my moms house last january for a week, where once again he told me he loved me and always has, and always felt like I was his other half. My feelings are very strong for him as well. As much as I try I cannot get him out of my mind. He tells my friends that he would leave his gf in a heartbeat for me, but when I ask him he tells me he does not know. I would def. not break up my marriage just for this guy, I know that the grass is not always greener on the other side. I would spend some time single.He was in town helping me remodel my bathroom this week and we all went out for my birthday. I hardly saw my husband the whole night. All my friends told me they have never seen me so happy and lite up as I was with this guy with my husband. I am so confused as to what to do. I love my husband but I am unsure if I am still in love with him. I also love this other person but am afraid of ruining a friendship. I feel as though our feelings are just too strong and I do not want to regret. I just feel like I have a connection with this other guy that I have never really had with my husband.
My husband sees it to and we have had a lot of talks recently. He tells me he just wants me to be happy, even if it is not with him. He has started taking medicine for his bipolar and he is truelly trying to change for me, I just dont know if its enough anymore. Its always the same things over and over that we fight about or I am unhappy about.I want to be fair to my husband and I know right now I am emotionally cheating on him. We talked about going to therapy, I Just dnt know that I still see a future with him. Anyway just looking for some words of encouragement, or if anyone else has been in the same situation. Thanks for your help.
Re: Mixed up feelings
But yeah... do NOT go running to this guy. You need a LOT of time alone. A lot.
And really - maybe I'm just not a romantic, but I really side-eye this whole "we LOVE each other" even though, in reality, you hardly know each other. Re connecting on FB and seeing each other for a day here and there... you DON'T know him. And he doesn't KNOW you.
And I'm trying to make sense of th etime line. you first kissed when you were 13. You comment about it "now being 13 years later". And you've been with your DH for 12 years??? So, you're 26 and you've seen with your DH since you were 14??
Maybe you can clarify this a bit.
But really- I think you're over romanticizing who this guy was/is in your life.
Sit down with your H and tell him how you feel. Maybe this relationship was long over and you and he got married because it was the next thing and the "right" thing to do.
For the verbal abuse alone, I'd leave. As I said, he's got a chronic illness --- but that doesn't give him carte blanche to treat you like trash.
He needs anger management -- I don't know if you are interested in sticking around long enough to see if and when he improves, or if you are equally interested on walking on all t he eggs you can find hoping he doesn't have another angry little outburst.
What else you need to do:
Drop this bum from your past like he is the proverbial bad habit
Get to a conselor on your own also; tell him or her what you've told us
Speak to your H --- tell him that the 2 of you need to be working on your marriage together like a couple and that you demand he see a marriage counselor with you and that he also get anger managment for his problem.
If he doesn't agree to counseling, perhaps it's better you throw in the towel and go.
If you decided to do that:
NO dating for at least 5 years.
I'm serious. You were with your H for a very long time and the marriage went on the rocks. It probably was rocky right about the time you married him.
You are too vulnerable and you are bound to choose the wrong person --- you are already doing that, by virtue of encouraging this other bum to be "your friend." This guy is poison; no decent man goes after a married woman, as I said.
Wishing you luck. You'll need an attorney for the house issue, if you do decide to go your separate way.
And you lived with your mother up until you purchased the house?
You weren't self sufficient enough, either, to live on your own: tell us again why it was a great idea to marry your H.
The horse is now out of the barn but this is why it is a good idea to wait about 3 or 4 years after you're married before you can even think of purchasing a home --- your marriage needs legs and stability. As you can see, you don't have either one. You probably would never have had either one, judging by what you told us.
Hasn't he ever heard of a hotel???
And he is more or less a high school friend of yours, and gone and out of the loop --- surely she knows his past; why is he even in the picture at all, let alone stay at your mother's? This is whackdoo in itself.
This whole thing is a mess --- decide if your marriage is worth saving.
If you decide no, retain an attorney -- you will need one for the house issue, as I said -- and no dating for at least 5 years. You need to grow up --- you haven't -- you sound like you are still in tenth grade --- and you need to spend vital time alone. No boyfriends, no dating no jerks from the past.
Spend at least 5 years on your own with no dating at all.
You need counseling to move on from the past --- for some reason you've "held onto" this guy from middle school and no, nobody stays hung up on a boyfriend from way back then.
And when that time is up, no boyfriends with rocky pasts and screwed up past marriages or shitty relationships with girlfriends. Don't accept damaged goods.
I’m sorry that it’s been difficult with your husband. This sounds like a complicated situation. You mentioned in your post that you talked about seeing a counselor, any further pursuit of that? It might be helpful to work through some of the hurts and disappoints that you’ve experienced in your marriage? Sometimes those things alone can impact our view of things. Wish you well!
teedaalee0712
When you saw that this wasn't going to be a strictly platonic contact from 8th Grade Boyfriend, you should have said "John, I am no longer comfortable speaking with you. Please do not contact me again" and made sure the contact ended right there.
A decent guy would never have impinged on your relationship. This "friend" is no friend.
I am still shaking my head how your mother had no clue what was going on with this guy when you were 13. 13 is barely old enough to date, let alone be placed in a compromising position..
I bring up this example to say that it is possible that your husband's verbal abuse issues are directly related to his disorder, and that after medication (and possibly counseling - I'm not personally aware of what treatment is recommended), that aspect of him can go away. Of course, as another person said....it is also very possible that the verbal abuse is him - and not his disorder. In that case, he can still seek counseling to help manage his anger.
In romance, that "heart flutter" feeling passes, and feelings change as a relationship grows and matures. Choosing to continue to love someone takes commitment. When you took your marriage vows, you made this commitment to your husband, although from what you tell us, you didn't have much desire to follow through with them from the beginning. If you wanted to, you could find ways to spice up your marriage, and rekindle a flame for your husband (or start one now, if you never had it to begin with), but it takes your willingness to work.
As every other poster has said - whether or not you decide to stay with your husband, this relationship that you have going with your friend is completely inappropriate. Nothing that your husband has done means that he deserves to be cheated on. As @Drwifephd said, this excitement that you're feeling for your friend has a lot to do with your disinterest in your husband, and his verbal abuse towards you. It is nice to feel desired, and feel wanted. It's also easy to fall into lust, and desire what we can't have. Right now, your Mr. perfect looks so perfect because you're building up this "if only" situation in your mind (and how often do we factor reality into those day dreams?). However, once that relationship begins, the sparks will stop and the flame will dim. No matter how great your connection (or more accurately - your lust) is to begin with, all relationships will take continued commitment to grow deeper and remain strong.
Encourage your husband to continue seeking treatment for his disorder, and go to marriage counseling with him. Go on dates, and rekindle your flame. Most importantly, completely ditch the attempted wife stealer. He isn't nearly as wonderful as you've built him up to be in your dreams, and as long as you remain married, you owe it to your husband to honor your vows. Just the idea that you've asked your friend if he would really leave his girlfriend for you is deplorable. Regardless of whether or not you stay with your husband, you owe him an apology for your cheating behavior.
I could have written large parts of this post. My friends commented about how much happier I seemed when my H want around, and I started finding myself thinking about other men. We eventually decided to split up, and we have both been so much happier since.
Even if you decide to end your marriage, you should find out what was really wrong so that you don't make the same mistakes again someday. It can be very hard to self-analyze the root causes of our own behavior or to recognize ways that we can change. This is why counseling can be such a big help, beyond just trying to fix a relationship or decide what to do.