Yikes.  Can't believe I'm here.  Wife of 12 years (together 15) told me two weeks ago that she's done with being in a romantic and physical relationship with me.  We'd been in marriage therapy for almost 3 years over a lack of intimacy.  We worked really hard on creating an emotional connection, but it was never enough for her.  There's plenty to that part of the story, but its less relevant to my question.  In the subsequent days I learned that she is no longer attracted to me, she is attracted to women, and she doesn't anticipate being with a man again. Ok.  I sort of signed up for this possibility.  We had been dating about 6 months when we ran into some women that I knew to be gay (they were in a similar social circle as me).  I asked my then girlfriend how she knew them.  She admitted to making out (she would also refer to sex as "making out"...I never clarified exactly what happened) with one of them...we struggled to get through that, but we did, and she stated it was just a phase and that she was all in on me.  Fast forward 15 years, 3 kids, a whole lot of life stuff thrown at us, our 12 yo on the spectrum, she's re-examining sexual abuse she received as a child, lots and lots of stuff.  

Now she is hoping we can keep our life as is (our house, our vacation house, trips we take, etc.) and co-parent our kids, while she explores her feelings for women and in particular, explores her feelings with one of her close girlfriends. I offered to let her go explore and maybe she would come back to me...her response: "I'm not coming back."

For the last couple of years I was somewhat concerned that this woman was creating an emotional bond with my wife that may be competing with the emotional intimacy in our marriage.  This woman is gender non-binary, gay, a very loving person, and mother of our 6 year old's good friend.  This person is out of the country for another month.  My wife revealed to me that in the last two weeks she expressed her feelings for her friend (on the phone) and the friend reciprocated the feelings.  So, what was at one point, a theoretical open marriage at some point in the future (wife was saying 1-2 years), is now weeks away from being open.

I'm going through a range of emotions.  I'm mad, sad, devastated that I won't be building the life I had envisioned with her, etc.  

I'm also confused.  She has said that her attraction to this woman started 2 years ago.  We've been in marriage therapy for intimacy - emotional (for her) and physical (for me) for 3 years. Her condition for re-engaging physical intimacy was for our emotional intimacy to deepen.  I'll be asking my wife if this simmering attraction had any impact on our ability to repair and become closer emotionally. 

Our goals: 1) create a supportive and stable environment for our kids (12, 10, 6).  2) remain friends.  That's as far as we have gotten.

Here's where I know I need help (feel free to provide other perspectives):  What is the best plan regarding goal #1 - the kids?  How/when do we communicate to the kids what is going on?  There have been no overt changes in the household.  My 12 yo (who is high functioning autistic and super perceptive to emotions) has noted to me that I am quicker to get mad recently (I don't have a lot of emotional resiliency at the moment -- she's spot on).  

I may have just puked all of this up and this may not make that much sense.  Thanks for reading and for your support.  I'm particularly interested in getting experience shares from other parents that have gone through this with young kids.  I'm so worried about the impact on them.  Thank you.