My wife is american but we live in Spain.

For the past 14 years we've been celebrating thanksgiving even though it is not a thing here.

This year my wife's sister and her family came to Madrid and here we are, celebrating what will definitely be the last Thanksgiving of my life with people I will not see anymore, and with nothing to be thankful for.

Sorry you found yourself in this situation.

Regularly it's mentioned that he is Bisexual. No. He is not. He never was.

He also never loved you. He loved how you fit into what, at the time, he thought he wanted in life.

It takes quite a long time to accept it but once you do, you will see with more clarity.

Lots of hugs.

https://straightspouse.boardhost.com/viewtopic_mobile.php?id=3119

You can't keep a marriage that doesn't exist.

You can drag the farce out for a while until one of you explodes. Even for years.

But in the end the wife you thought you had never existed.

So take control of your life while you have a chance.

I was drowning for a few months. Even started to think that maybe things would be easy if I didn't exist.

I took all the courage I could, organized the papers for divorce and even arranged the purchase of a house for her with a mortgage she could afford.
We are still not done with it and we're living as roomates now, which is like 1,000 stabs on the heart each day.
But in a few weeks she will have her own place and she'll move out of our house, of my house.
Sorry our 4 kids will have to alternate houses each week, but they will adapt. And I will be able to rebuild myself, leaving the past behind.

I would not focus that much on her sexual orientation, really.

The question is, do both of you want to make the marriage work?

Then learn about mixed orientation marriages, talk to people who are in a MOM. Get passionate about it. Give it a chance.

If she truly loves you, she will make it work. If she doesn't, at least you tried.

Sam (Admin) wrote:

Victo wrote:

I wish I could say that I was a perfect husband. I wasn’t. I certainly started out being genuinely loving and forgiving and understanding but after being gaslit and manipulated for 15 years, I began to mirror my ex in her behavior.

And that’s just it. She literally took everything from me. My family, my career, and my sense of my own character.

I rarely post anymore about my own situation as I divorced 20 years ago and remarried 8 years ago. However, that does bring back memories. I spent 15 years of a 20 year marriage trying to be a "good husband" and always failing in my X's opinion. She did her best to isolate me and my kids from my family. She was constantly trying to get me to change careers because she resented that I actually liked my career and was good at it. She actually resented that I got pleasure out of anything and figuratively tried to suck all the joy out of my life. She wanted me to be whatever I was not. I actually tried for a while hoping she would be happy but she never was. For the last 5 years I turned off. I was dad to my kids and breadwinner for her and aside from that retreated into a shell. When she came out, part of me was actually relieved. I realized I had a "get out of jail free" card. Part co-dependent.... faced with an unknown future and afraid. Turns out I was able to learn to be happy and enjoy life again, although it took a while. 

I can relate to that so much... the idea that me enjoying my life, my career, my family, was somewhow always annoying to her... I was never able to put my head around it. But it all made sense. When someone hates herself, even in denial, they can't understand how other people can enjoy their own life.