Hi Maria,
I need some advice for an extremely painful time that I am going through right now. I want to give you a little background before I get to what is happening at the moment. My husband had dated a girl for couple years when he was a teenager. When he was 18, he moved away and then the relationship was only through letters until the girl got married to someone else that she fell in love with when she was in her early twenties.
Last year, my husband searched for this former girlfriend of his through Internet sources and found her. He met her in summer last year and within weeks was having a full fledged affair with her. She has been married for nearly 20 years and my husband and I for more than 10 years. She hid the affair from her husband and my husband hid it from me.
Through his affair with his former girlfriend my husband mistreated me very badly. He would practically tell me to leave him everyday, he ignored me brutally, and for months was never home or even around me. I took care of all household duties and our son all by myself. I was suspicious a few times, but when I confronted my husband he would swear that there was no other woman in his life.
Finally a year ago he opened up and admitted all about his affair. After that all I kept hearing from him was how much he loved this other woman and how they were meant to be together but unfortunately, he ended up with me. I went through an incredibly painful time, crying for days in a row.
This other woman was so controlling with my husband. She would tell him exactly how to behave with me and my husband would follow her orders blindly. She had asked my husband to stay away from me, and my husband, whenever home, would spend all his time in our basement and would even avoid sharing a couch with me. The details of this pain are too lengthy to go into and very painful.
I somehow got a hold of the woman's relatives and spoke to them about her affair with my husband. They all told me very revealing facts about her. Her relatives had disclosed that she was actually a habitual strayer and had affairs with several men in her married and pre-marital life.
When I told my husband about this, he was very upset with her. He promised to leave her for good. But up until last week, I caught my husband writing love letters to her and he confessed to speaking to her on the phone. That woman told my husband that HE is the love of her life despite her many other relations. She even told him that even though she fell in love with her husband, she never loved him with the same passion she always had for my husband. She also tells my husband that for the 20 years of her marriage, she longed to be with my husband and that she looked for him all those years and always only wanted him. It is possible for a woman to be madly in love with someone absent from her life for nearly 20 years, like she says?
Basically she treats my husband like a god, and therefore my husband finds it so hard to pull himself away from her. She praises his every body part, his voice, his sense of humor, etc. and makes him feel so good. What do I do? I do not want to end my marriage. I am giving my husband so much attention and love. I want to make him feel good with me, but he can not get her out of his head. And I am suffering an intense amount of pain. Please advice.
Terribly hurting.
___________
The goal of this website is to give support to people who are facing problems in their relationship related to cheating, abuse and narcissism. I am living in Europe and English is not my native language, I wish you will excuse me if I make some grammatical errors. I have a background in neuroscience and behavioral sciences and I am currently doing brain research related to these topics in university in my home country. I decided to write in English because I wish to reach as many people as I can around the world.
____________
Dear Friend,
Thank you for your email. I am sorry to hear what you have been going through. Your husband's behavior towards you has been very rude and insensitive. He got excited of his former girlfriend, started an affair with her, hid the affair from you and mistreated you during their secret relationship. You said your husband constantly told you to leave him and when you did not do it, he remained together with you but continued the affair with his ex girlfriend. It is clear that the right thing to do would have been either to stop the relationship with his ex girlfriend or to end your marriage.
Your husband seems to be unable to behave in a sensitive and reasonable way but instead is tormenting you by allowing this situation to continue. This suggests that your husband has problems related to the ability to feel empathy. He must be aware how painful this situation is for you. If your husband is a man with a normal level of intellect, he must have seen your pain.
You said you cried for days and went through an extreme pain after finding out about these things. Yet your husband did not care about your feelings, instead he increased your burden by saying extremely painful things you you. You wrote "all I kept hearing from him was how much he loved this other woman and how they were meant to be together but unfortunately, he ended up with me". This is incredibly cruel talk to someone who he has shared more than 10 years with and who is the mother of his child.
By talking to you this way your husband was diminishing everything you have shared and was making you feel as if he was "unlucky to end up with you" instead of with this other woman who was "the love of his life". That kind of a talk is incredibly cold and cruel. I do not know your husband personally, but based on these comments it sounds like he does not have a very pleasant personality. If you suspect your husband might have narcissistic tendencies I recommend you to read this article, it describes why it is often so difficult to leave a narcissistic spouse: How to leave a Narcissist.
Dear Friend, I understand you still love your husband despite everything that has happened and wish to hold on to your marriage. It is very hard to let go of someone we love and have shared so many years with. You also have a child with your husband and I am sure you would not wish to break your family. But you need to ask yourself could you ever again feel happy with your husband even if he decided to end his affair and return to you. The way your husband has been behaving towards you is very disrespectful. We do not treat the ones we love that way.
Your husband has shown with his behavior that he does not respect you. Additionally, he does not seem to care for your feelings since he has been saying some incredibly insulting and hurtful things to you. When one hears such talk from one's spouse it is very likely that one starts to feel depressed. If your husband is making you feel depressed with his behavior, you need to consider leaving for the sake of your own health. Please do not stay too long in an environment that is emotionally unhealthy for you.
You asked is it possible to be madly in love with someone who is absent from one's life for 20 years. Based on the personality of your husband's ex girlfriend (she has had numerous affairs) it is likely that she would have searched your husband long ago and started an affair with him if she truly had such strong interest in him. Additionally, if a woman is "madly in love" with someone she is usually not capable of having numerous other affairs with various different men, while constantly thinking of the love of her life. Ask yourself could you have romantic and sexual relationships with several other people if you are very strongly in love with someone else and constantly thinking of that person? I think your answer is no. Most likely this woman is using such strong expressions just to make your husband feel special.
It is very unlikely that anyone spends 20 years just thinking of a former lover without doing any serious attempts to try to contact that person. Is it possible that this woman could not have found your husband if she truly wanted to? Your husband found her quite easily through internet.
You said they were together for several years. Even if she could not have found him via internet, surely she knew some of your husband's family members and friends who she could have contacted if she wanted to find him. It is a bit surprising that based on your email your husband seems to believe what his ex girlfriend says without using his common sense (her being madly in love with him for 20 years and trying desperately to find him).
Dear Friend, I know you said you do not wish to end your marriage and I do respect your feelings. By everything I have said above, I just wanted to give you some other points of view so that you can consider them and make the best decision for you. If you wish to stay together with your husband, the only thing you can do is to wish that he would see the pattern in the behavior of his ex girlfriend (her nature as a strayer) and would understand that she is most likely greatly exaggerating when she is claiming she has loved your husband madly all these years. This might make your husband reconsider his relationship with her. But this is a very fragile chance and you should not count on it while you are planning your near future.
In a long run I do not believe their relationship has good chances to succeed. You said you feel your husband cares for his ex girlfriend so much because she is fulfilling his every need and treating him like "god". Based on what you told about his ex girlfriend it seems very unlikely that their relationship is going to last for the rest of their lives. Your husband will have increasingly hard time trusting her in the future since he knows she is the kind of a person who is capable of cheating on her own husband and seducing other women's husbands. Their relationship started as a secret affair, in other words their relationship started with a lie. That is never a good basis for a strong, trusting relationship. It will be very hard for your husband to trust this woman fully if he remains together with her.
Dear Friend, you wrote that you are giving your husband love and attention and yet he refuses to end his affair. I strongly encourage you to consider do you really wish to spend your life with a person who is incapable of showing you respect and caring, who is dishonest and deceitful and who shows no remorse after he has been hurting you this badly, but instead keeps his affair going, in the same time remaining married to you. Do you think you could ever trust your husband again after this? It is very stressful and depressing to live with the person one cannot trust. You would always shave to worry if something is going on behind your back again.
You have many things to consider. It can be that your situation is such that it is very difficult for you to leave your husband even if you would wish to do so. Please think about all these things carefully. In the end you are the one who decides the direction of your life. You only have this one life, we all do. I do not wish you to spend your life suffering because of the bad behavior of your husband. You deserve to be happy.
You find more articles regarding narcissism and a relationship with a narcissistic person here: Narcissism.
Warm hug,
Maria
If you wish to submit your own story and get feedback and support for your situation or if you wish to contact me for any other reason, send me email to
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
