Thanks for posting JK. In reply:

​1. I do not want to offend you or make you feel defensive, Sean.  Actually, my intent is quite the opposite.  I do want to understand, be compassionate, heal...& I hope for the same for my husband.  I appreciate your input here, as you are helping me, immensely...which, in turn, helps my children and even my husband (who I know is also struggling).

​I appreciate that. 

2.  What were you thinking...really thinking...when you married your wife?

​I was very happy...joyous in fact. Until I came out four years ago, I never thought of myself as gay. This is very bad analogy, but it's a bit like someone who doesn't think they have an addiction. I simply didn't see any problems. Yes I watched gay porn for years and near the end of our relationship I was hooking up with me, but I was very much in denial. So to answer your question, I was very happy to be married. I loved this woman very much and looked forward to spending my life with her. 

3.  How long were you married?  

16 years married, together for 25 years.

4.  What were you thinking, when you had children?

​I have three children. For the first two children, I was thrilled to be a father...over the moon really. I suspect my wife got pregnant with our third child as a way to reboot our relationship. By then we were only having sex a few times a year. And she more of less forced me to conceive our last child, a boy. We could both sense the end coming so I was reluctant to have a third baby but she was very adamant we have another. But I'm happy to be a father and for the most part, I didn't think about separation/divorce...even after the birth of our third child.

5. I am questioning every memory from our marriage.  I do not understand why he married me.  I do not understand how I truly believed that he loved me, as a husband.

I think it's normal to re-evaluate any relationship after a break up. For me, this was part of the grieving process. In my situation, the signs were always there that I was gay but I can't stress enough that I didn't think of myself as a homosexual. I only started to accept I was gay when my (then) wife asked me the question. Before that conversation, I just thought of myself as a straight man who watched gay pornography. But the music of our relationship always felt like an out-of-tune piano. Something was always off and sadly I made her feel it was her fault. I was incapable of loving myself which made it impossible for me to love this wonderful woman or our children. I was also lying to myself so naturally I lied to her as well. Up until very recently, there was nothing positive about being gay. While growing up in the 1980s, to me being gay, groping children under bridges, catching AIDS and dying a very gruesome death. This was how the media portrayed homosexuality just 30 years ago. I was actually in Washington DC on a family trip during the very first AIDS march complete with the famous memorial quilt. I believe it was 1987 and I was 15 years old. Those adolescent memories were burned into my conscious that being gay was bad, but being a straight husband and father was good. So I was happy to be the latter.  

6. I am even questioning whether or not my husband ever wanted children.  He has always interacted with them in a kind way...a "nice" way...a black and white, dull, no-joy way...  I always thought it was his depression.  He never looked like he felt joy, not even in big life events, such as the children's births.

I can relate, although I was very happy to have kids, participated in their births, and I think I was generally a good father. I agree with what you wrote about life being black and white. My life was so stale, kind of like food without taste. It's hard to explain the self-hatred I lived with for most of my life. It eroded my soul and I found myself in a terrible depression which I'm only just coming out of. The only way I can explain the process to a straight spouse is how they felt when processing their gay in denial spouse's homosexuality. It's that cold, hands slowly closing around your throat, gut-punch of a feeling. It's that sense of impending doom but so wanting to avoid it. I guess our experiences are the same, hiding, denial, hatred, then hard-earned acceptance. But what the straight spouse feels over the course of a few months or years, the gay spouse experiences over a period of decades. It warped me. It warps us all.   

7. He did try to take good care of us, but there was no joy or feeling of fulfillment, on his part, that I ever noticed. I know that sucked the joy out of life for all of us.  Again, we looked "okay"...sort of happy.  We never looked like full participants in our own lives. After 25 years of that, I really have some work to do to recapture the feeling of living life to the fullest.

​I can imagine.

8. In reflecting upon the way my husband has always acted with me and with the kids, I think he may have felt trapped and in the wrong life, this entire marriage.  Of course, that thought just kills me. I think he married, because he thought he should.  I think he had children,  because he thought he should.

The only thing worse than feeling trapped was perhaps fashioning my own cage...then willingly getting in. Up until very recently, society has always been very hetero-centred. From our first, "Do you have a girlfriend?" starting age 5 or 6, through high school, college, and even now with "Are you married?", I was taught that liking girls was normal and acceptable. Liking boys however was wrong, dirty, and evil. Once married, the natural thing is to have children. And so it goes. Coming out and divorcing went so against the grain. It was the hardest decision I ever made.  

9. I know he feels obligated to do the best he can to support us, post-divorce, but what a mess. What a huge mess:  financially (We went from upper middle class to husband getting himself fired to Medicaid, food stamps, on the verge of losing our home, suicidal son...all in these 10 months post-disclosure), emotionally...on every level, a huge pile of damage to repair. I do think we can do it.  I think all of us here can do it.  I think we can all move forward, into a better future.

​I'm so sorry you're going through this.

10. I am hoping you can help me understand.  I do NOT want to move forward in bitterness or anger. I also want to get to the point that if my husband ever accepts himself and finds peace...that I can be happy for him.    That will be a true amount of forgiveness needed. So, so much excruciating pain and damage and wounding of hearts and souls, at the very core. I think my husband is a broken man, but a good man.  I'm guessing you are, too, Sean...you wouldn't be helping here, if you weren't a good man.

That's very kind and compassionate of you. I'm here because I need closure and in order to get closure, I feel the need to understand what my ex-wife went through. When someone dies, we have a funeral, bury them, and move on. Unfortunately, we can't bury a marriage...particularly when children are involved. My gay/straight break up is like a dead relative coming back via every text message, phone call, or family event. I do feel like a zombie at times although I'm getting better. I've found a degree of closure thanks to a new (gay) relationship and I hope my ex-wife will eventually find someone to make her happy. That's all I have to share for now.

I hope that helped.