I met up with a good friend for lunch today.

He told me about seeing my wife out on a date recently. He and his sister were having a meal at the same restaurant

He said, “Our age, and obviously accomplished by how he carried himself and the way he was dressed. Very put together, very classy, very expensive.”

And that just hurt to hear.

Being discarded and replaced by someone you never gave up on hurts. And I expect she traded up for someone with a higher level of success. I turned down job opportunities over the years because of responsibilities at home; jobs more than twice my current salary.

And she’s selling intimacy to have this person. That hurts too. I’ve always been an extremely monogamous person. My “body count” is very small because I always dated to find someone long term. That was something she appreciated about me, and I about her, or so I thought.

So that all really really hurts and sucks.

But, I also had a very attractive woman we used to know that lives in another state call me yesterday. We lived near each other for eight years. She told me she and her husband co parent the kids and are married on paper, but he’s been in an apartment attached to the house for seven years. She heard we’re separated and wanted to connect. She told me how she always saw me as “this very solid guy who provided for and protected his family.” We talked for 1.5 hours. So that attention and validation was nice. But… That’s all that’s going to happen there. That’s a dicey situation.