Real mess of my life

Hello all,

I'll try to be somewhat brief but to say the least my life is a real mess due to the actions I have taken. I am married, have been for over 5 years, and we have a young 4 year old child. When we had our child I was still in schooling, and it made things extremely difficult in trying to go to school and raise a child and work. I had wanted to wait until after I was done with school but my wife insisted on having it, and I eventually gave in to it.

This one event is one of my biggest regrets, because it has made things extremely difficult, and as a result, I made a decision to stop pursuing being a doctor due to how much time it would take and did a different career path. As awful as it sounds, I've grown very resentful towards both my wife and even worst my child. My child I love to death but they make things so difficult. They have some kind of underlining condition that seems to exhibit ADHD, and they are going through behavior therapy at the moment.

Because of this stress and unhappiness, I ended up having an affair with another women about 8 months ago. The affair lasted for about 4 months, and neither side were aware of the other. When I started the affair I was already at the point of planning to go through a divorce, and the woman I encourage tugged at me in a certain way, that I didn't experience before. In part it could have been my mental state, but I had many chances to cheat before in school, but it never interested me, but something about her was different.

The relationship ended as she developed a serious health condition and wanted to just be alone. I was heart broken, because it ended due to a serious illness she was diagnosed with, not because either side was "bad" to one another. I was still about to go through the divorce, but for some reason I couldn't do it. I don't know if it was the guilt of having our child split up between us, or fear...... it was finance or comfort of living, as both of us work and have well paying jobs. Living separately wouldn't be an issue.

I told my wife about my plans of almost going through a divorce, but not of the affair. We have been in MC and a lot of it lies on me as to whether the marriage will continue or not. In a way I do want the marriage to work, but I am having a hard time letting go of the affairing partner. In my mind I know logically that the may draw with her was the escape when I was her, escape from having to care for my child, escape of dealing with the stress and just enjoying the company of someone new. I think what makes it worse is the fact of what she has could be quite fatal, she is undergoing treatment and waiting on results.

Our break-up was about 2-3 months ago, and I just can not get her out of my mind. I am still in touch with her once a week, to see how she is doing, and as far as being back together, that is not possible as she has no interest at all in it, and in a way I don't either. But I'm confused as to what I want to do, with the marriage and just my life in general. My wife is trying like crazy to figure out what can help snap me out I guess to be happy, but even I don't know what.

I felt like I just rambled on a lot and still have so much to say, but will leave it at this for now. I'm just not sure what I want to do, but what I do know is I am very unhappy, despite having so much...

Sorry to hear this. I wonder how realistic your feelings about the O/W are, and how much they are an expression of your discontent with your life. As well as M/C perhaps personal counselling might help make sense of your distressing situation.

But you are far too young to have made a mess of your life, and there is time and scope to make things better.

Thank you MoCS, what you said is something I think about so much. It's hard for me to figure out if it really was the O/W or if it was the thought of being with someone else and away from my current life. I would say it was the latter but for some reason she in particular stood out to me and I have no idea why. I've had so many different women pass by me at work and in school, some very forward, but to all I have declined and shut down. But her.... I just don't know, and I pursued her, not the other way around, and it took a some time to get her to start seeing me.

I have thought about going to individual counseling also, as I have not disclosed the affair to anyone. I know that therapist have the rules set of keeping what is said in sessions private, but I feel it would somehow come out or move the direction of the MC sessions a certain way if I disclosed it, so it kind of leaves me with having to find another therapist to help me individually with this.

If you feel fully confident about your marriage counselor I suspect giving them the full facts might help the counselling process.

On the other hand you may prefer help from an independent party; counselor, family, friend.

Either way you seem in a crisis when it is hard to think clearly and help may well be needed.

I agree in that seeing someone else would be best, I don't have the complete fullest confidence of the Mc keeping things separate.

I'm a real mess right now, having thanksgiving dinner with family members yet my mind is so fixated on the other woman. I wish my feelings weren't so strong for her, that I didn't feel this way. When I think about it logically, I tried so hard to make it work but it was for nothing, and even just reaching out to check on her feels like pulling teeth. I miss her and I don't even know why I miss her, why I even want her, I just do.

And I realize that all this pain and suffering I'm going through is all on me, because I can't or won't let go, I fixate too much on something that isn't going to work or be. I wish I could just go away and be by myself, but I never have any time alone, always around people be it at work or home.... just so tired of being unhappy....

wondering if anyone else had any input on what to do or think about....