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I have been married now to my second husband for almost 16 years. I was divorced for several years prior to that from a serial cheater who left me for greener pastures back in 1991. I swore I would not trust another man, but took a huge leap of faith when I meet the next one I am currently married to now. Mr.E we will call him. Mr. E by all outward appearances is the pillar of his community. He even leads classes in our church and we do a class for recovering Divorcees, he has been solid. reliable and Mr. True Blue. Everything he has told me for the past 15 plus years has been true to his word. Or so I thought!

We have recently finished raising our blended families and had the added stress of caring for my dying parent, in our own home. He handled everything with flying colors and stood by my side. Mind you in all of this, he has been suffering with bouts of depression and anxiety and seeing therapists off and on for many years on multiple meds. Because of this condition, he does go through the motions and help me as I said, but has not been expressive in his feelings or problems related to this. We also had the stress of his only child (our youngest in the nest) who was rebellious and extremely difficult to manage from the day I married him. He had full custody for his son and I have the primary Mother figure in his life. Which I have thoroughly enjoyed in spite of the hardships these past 16 years. I love them both very much.

Now when the nest in finally empty, he decides to fly the coop! Into the arms of his Asian massage therapist, 15 years younger. Long story short, after months of his future distancing himself from me and the family, I pieced together the charade, the thousands withdrawn from our accounts and separate pay phone with her pictures, texts and love messages in his desk drawer one day, which he left obviously in a hurry one day last Friday.

I was shocked and devastated to find this phone with all these gushing love messages from only days before. I had confronted him asking him about the status of our relationship and why he was not answering his phone for long periods of time during the day or night. He also was lying and telling me he was visiting old friends out of the area, when he was in her arms making love.

I just confronted him a couple of days ago now and he started by asking about the withdrawals of all the money. He admitted to the affair before I could even ask him and poured out all the details and is answering my questions as they arise. He says he went to see his counselor days before and wanted to stop the affair and repair the marriage. But the texts proclaiming his deep love for her were quite contrary needless to say. He said he was trying to figure out a way to stop it. I told him to send her a no contact letter which he did, showed me and mailed in front of me. He thought that was cruel to her but I said this was the only way to do it to salvage the marriage. Which leads me to believe he still has feelings of course for her.

I told him I am so devastated and shocked that yet another man did this to me, I do not know if I can ever go on in this marriage. I love him, and have invested many years with him, but he has truly burned down our house. I am looking for shreds of what we had, but can only see the lies and deception and envision him holding and thinking about her, when he is pretending to say he wants to be with me. He has apologized and wants to make it work. Where do we go from here? I have read the 180 rule and am applying it as I did before in my first marriage to no avail.

He claims he was so lonely and in despair like never before because of his depression issues. He had stopped his meds cold turkey several months ago he said, I am sure so he could enhance his sexual involvement and has created a new snazzy dressed thinner & tanner man which cost a small fortune in the process as well.

How can I rebuild this trust with someone again? He wants me to look at the 16 years that he was there for me, but who knows was he really? God only knows. Thanks for your input. So broken hearted and confused. Taking the advice I have read in the forums getting tested etc. Making appt for legal counsel. Want to run away if only I could.

[This message edited by Brokenuma at 6:11 PM, July 23rd (Tuesday)]

First off, welcome to our club. No one wants to be a member-but there are lots of awesome people here none the less.

You don't have to make any decisions right now. You can take all the time you need to figure out if you can go through this again. I would suggest a lot of reading and some IC to help you sort it all out.

I have been on meds for depression for years and have just recently weaned off them. I have to say that depression is real and that some of the meds will F you up. Since getting off cymbalta (what i now call the devil drug) I am like a different person. I have a clarity now when before I was kinda dark and cloudy in my mind. I hope that makes a little sense. I needed the meds when I was first diagnosed and in a clinical depression-but I don't need them now and probably didn't need to be on them for the past 18 years or so. Depression/anxiety are WAY over diagnosed nowadays. Big money for big pharm. Primary care doctors write an RX for just about anyone. I was on meds for 20 years and until I started IC I thought I would be on them forever. After a while in IC I started to question if I needed the meds anymore. Was the history of my depression really depression-or was it a person without the life skills needed to deal with those situations? Was the "depression" a cop out? I just want to point those things out because it means he has other issues that he has to address in addition to the A.

He claims he was so lonely and in despair like never before because of his depression issues

this may be true but is not an excuse. He has to figure out why his treatment for depression is not working. Wrong meds? Different therapist? Is he not doing the "work" of therapy? you said therapy "on and off for years" Was there any progress??
Depression is real and may be a contributing factor but it cannot be used as an excuse for infidelity. In fact being depressed usually makes you withdraw and unable to interact with people. Ask him to explain how he managed to put forth all the effort of an A if he was sooo depressed? And you said he was thinner now-that takes effort too! He needs to do some soul searching and find the real reasons for the A. I just feel that blaming it on the "depression" is just a form of rug-sweeping.
*hugs*

That is a classic mid-life crisis. It doesn't mean you have to forgive him. Depression + empty nest = asshaterry.

What do you want? Do you know? I think it's sad he's damaged your marriage for a hooker. Call a spade a spade. She's a hooker.

Asian massage therapist equates to a hooker. Your husband will find that when the money runs out, her love runs out.