Have followed instructions I think but not sure I've linked correctly.
Thank you all for your support.mi wish I could stop dwelling and feeling bad.
H was unhappy with me....I made him unhappy that's that. So he found someone else who made him happy . Makes me feel sick but maybe I should just accept that I am nothing to him now.
Ummmm......no, you don't have that power over him.
What happened is HE got depressed and unhappy, looked around for a quick fix, fell for the temptation of an affair which gave him a high that TEMPORARILY relieved his depression symptoms, lied to you about it and blamed you.
You did not cause him to have an affair. Many if not most of us here have loving cards and letters from our Hs right up to the moment they started their affairs.
Could you be improved? Sure, we all could. This is a great opportunity to step outside your comfort zone and grow (read Ciluzen's last post). But you didn't cause him to have a crisis and an affair, and you can't fix him. What you can control is being the best YOU that you can be, and making a fabulous life for yourself and your kids. He'll recover or he won't; you may be willing to take him back in the future or you may not. But right now, he's been taken by aliens and replaced with a pod person, so go about finding happiness and joy and new horizons for you and your kids.
Why do I have so much trouble believing that. He must've been very unhappy with me to walk out on his kids and find ow a better option.
I am so down on myself. I know . I can't snap out of it. At work I put on this great act ( I'm a teacher) and in front of the kids but at home , especially when I am at home on my own ( which I am this weekend) I just feel so crappy.
Just keep thinking of all the things I maybe should've done.
After 20 years together what did I do or not do that made him this unhappy to do this to me and our kids. What gets me is everything we have been through together and when it comes to it ow makes him unhappy and his history with me doesn't.
Mia i am sorry you are going through this. you need to stop blaming yourself. yes we all had issues but so did they. He cut and ran that speaks volumes about him not you.
If you have read my thread you can see that I'm in a complete meltdown at the moment. My IC just told me that our H are adults, so they know right from wrong and they made the decision to cheat on us. It's not your fault and I know how hard it is not to believe me. We also might have been unhappy in our marriage but we never cheated, so as you can see it a choice we never made.
I don't what to say to help you but know that you aren't on your own.
He must've been very unhappy with me to walk out on his kids and find ow a better option.
No - he must have been very UNHAPPY. Period. End of sentence. Not due to you but to depression. And a rational person who feels his marriage is failing goes to counseling and works on it with his spouse and works on becoming a better spouse himself. (I have a childhood friend whose wife of 25+ years has terrible OCD, treats him badly, is quite difficult. he's gone to counseling with her, but she's not receptive. He's a pilot and could easily have affairs. He's committed to the marriage though and keeps working on his side of it. )
Your H, like mine and others, took the easy way out - have an affair, feel temporarily better from the brain chemicals of infatuation, THEN decides he must not be "in love" with you, and blames you.
It's not your fault he got depressed and it's not a comment on your worth that he had an affair. (BTW, EVERY guy that I have dated since my divorce has thought my ex was NUTS for leaving me! )
Interestingly enough, you almost never see a spouse here leave for someone objectively "Better". Some leave for money. Some leave for younger if they're panicked about their own aging. Most seem to "affair down" with someone who is "lesser than" and sees them as the "big man" instead of an equal. Often the OP turns out to be a whackadoodle or an addict.I can hardly remember a case where a guy left for a Christie-Brinkley-rocket-scientist.
And just for the records, I met a number of DBers in person in the past and they were an absolutely normal, attractive, interesting group of people. Not a lame reject in the bunch. So believe me when I say, while we all can and should improve, THIS WAS NOT ABOUT YOU. And if you H says it was, it's because he has to find some way to justify his actions to himself.
What KML said. He could not find happiness within himself and it's easier to blame it on others. My ex gave me the same BS. Yeah, he married his A partner, and he "affaired down" so he could feel like the man.
For YEARS I figured it was me, I was unworthy, I was a bad wife, but you know what? I wasn't. I improved me for me, gained back some of my self respect and confidence he destroyed. I can find happiness within now, and he can only find happiness from external sources, and he continues to blame them when he isn't happy.
I have also met a bunch of DB'ers in person, some are very close friends now and we spend time together, my kid has met them I am friends with their friends too, and like KML said, very down to earth, attractive, successful, head on straight loving people. Who were cheated on and blamed for it. Anyone who would leave these people were not happy with themselves.
I know it is an instinct to take this on as you making him unhappy, but please don't.
And Mia? Figure out what it is in your childhood that would cause you to accept his claim that you made him unhappy. Usually there is some childhood abandonment or abuse or other issue that we have been replaying with our partner. Figuring this out and healing it is key to making better choices in partners in the future.
Hi, well I brought up the photos on the cloud and the jerk looked pathetic and said oh sorry didn't think you'd go on there!! The man hasn't thought about anything for months.
My childhood, well. I was ostracised quite a lot of t as a child at school. Had a difficult time at school. Was bullied quite a lot and was very self conscious.
When I met my h and we got together it made me feel that I was worth it. I know that sounds pathetic but it's true. I couldn't believe that this good looking man could fall in love with me. H knew about my childhood so for him to say I don't love you anymore and do what he's done...he knows in his heart of hearts how much it would devastate my self esteem.
