I understand what you mean, Valexand. I don't want to hijack lost's thread, but hopefully, it is relevant.

After the 12 years had passed, I hooked up with a man who claimed he loved me dearly, and we were together for 15 years. He said that I and the dogs were his "fambly" and we would always be together. I was not madly, passionately "in love" with him like I had been with my husband. But he was a good man who made me laugh and appeared stable. I came to love him very much and our life together.

He was a long haul trucker. One day, after three weeks on the road, he called from California and said, "It's over. My feelings have changed." He immediately started living with with an old flame from college. I had to clean up a financial mess and get rid of a three-bedroom home we owned together, even though I was ill and out of work. That was it -- he said it was over, so it was over. Just like that. I asked if we could go to counseling -- I had never even guessed anything was wrong. He apparently had been living a double life for about six months. And now, five years later, I am living his choice.

Yes, exactly so. Well said.