I haven't told my story at length here but I will try to give a brief background.
I've been married to my wayward wife for 16 years now, although this last anniversary passed with acknowledgement from neither of us. I am not a professional but I honestly think my wife has borderline personality disorder. Throughout our marriage she always had such an exaggerated fear of abandonment. She was always excessively jealous and insecure. She would rip me to shreds if she thought I looked at another woman for even a split second. She was always accusing me of flirting with other women or accepting their flirtations, based on what I thought were normal human interactions. There were a few times when she crossed the line into physical abuse, and certainly many times of emotional abuse.
A few years ago, we went to visit an old high school friend of hers. At one point, her friend's daughter sat next to me on their living room couch and handed me cookies, which I accepted and ate out of politeness. The daughter was 16 at the time, and I was 39. So in my mind there was no question of anything inappropriate happening. My wife literally treated this as if it were an extramarital affair. She fought with me every day about it for a year. She accused me of being enchanted by this girl and wanting to leave my marriage for the girl. Completely ridiculous, but that's what she thought.
Then later in 2016, she makes friends in Facebook with a guy who went to her middle school in Nepal, although they didn't know each other at the time. I trusted her blindly when she said they were just friends. After all, she was the one who was always accusing me, right? In October of 2016, she finally got fed up with the trivial things about me that pissed her off so badly and she bought a ticket to Nepal. As I would find out later (on December 22, 2016), she slept with him the night she landed in Kathmandu. She claims to have slept him "only" three times but God knows, because she was there for five months. I also found out that morning that before she left for Nepal, their online affair included explicit video chats with mutual masturbation and exhibition of private parts. So essentially she had a revenge affair even though I was loyal. But there's more to it than just revenge - she thought he was hot, she said she loved him, and even considered him a second husband.
I was in shock and grief for months after my D-Day. I probably cried more in the 11 months after she left that October (because I thought she was leaving me for him - in retrospect, I wish she had done so instead of just cheating and coming back) than I had in my whole 42 years of life before that. My doctor had to put me on Lexapro to stabilize me emotionally. I had to go see a counselor. I drank and I drove like crazy and I lost all my self-confidence, which wasn't that great to begin with. It was a spiritual wilderness, the worst time of my life.
Starting last May, I have told her many times that I no longer love her and want a divorce. For many reasons I have decided that I am not interested in reconciliation. I have not taken extreme measures yet and she has resisted this with all her might. She says it's because she loves me. That may or may not be true; I really don't care. I think she has other motivations in any case, including economic and physical comfort, and health insurance, and fear of living on her own. She denies this when I accuse her of it. I make much more than she does. I've promised her all this support including all of my retirement (which admittedly isn't that much due to some bad decisions we've made) and told her that a judge would probably order me to support her for some time anyway. Nothing is good enough for her to just take it and run.
So anyway, we are just stuck in this limbo hell and can't seem to take the next step. I don't want to have to resort to cruelty like throwing her shit on the lawn and changing the locks. We had an agreement that I would at least wait until April to see how I feel, but honestly, I don't see it changing.
She works as a substitute teacher but has been looking for a permanent job with a local school district. Recently she told me she thinks she has been successful and will be making more money. So I replied by telling her that's great, now she will feel more comfortable living on her own - which she resisted yet again. I told her for the thousandth time that it's very selfish of her not to set me free, to refuse to give me my space to be alone and to keep decent women away from me who might be interested in me.
Much to my surprise, she responded to this by DEMANDING that I give her a shot a reconciliation. By this she meant, I need to spend time with her and communicate with her more (by this she means, like I used to before she cheated). We need to travel together to our old college town where we met. We need to go out on dates and movies just like we used to, so she will have a chance to show me that she's "changed". I told her I didn't give a shit if she changed, that her next guy can benefit from that if true, that I'm out and no longer interested. I might as well be talking to a brick wall.
I told her that I would be talking to a few divorce attorneys next week, and she responded, "No, you won't!" As if she can fucking stop me lol. Like, watch me do it.
I told her some of the many reasons why I'm not interested in reconciliation, which I can share here as well, but this is long enough already. One reason is because I'm no longer physically attracted to her. Because of her emotional instability, she gained tens of pounds after marriage that she's never been able to lose, so much so that our doctor was afraid she would get diabetes. As her faithful husband I felt the lost attraction but I overlooked it anyway. Now that I owe her nothing I don't feel bad about it anymore and I told her point-blank that I'm no longer physically attracted to her. She has responded by walking around the house naked as if trying to prove me wrong. I tell her to put some goddamn clothes on and she just laughs like it's a big joke.
So I guess this is where I am now. I am thinking to go to our old college town with her on some weekend between now and April, and dinner and a movie on some other night, and then tell her I still no longer feel anything, so let's proceed with the big D. So I'll at least take that excuse away from her.
Has anyone ever been in limbo hell like this? It's just crazy. I want it to be over.
