I am relieved he was honest. I know that is a blessing. The children have been told and are very supportive of both of us. We've always tried to be open with them and this seemed too big a thing to keep from them. The oldest 2 are both in counselling at their request. The younger 2 have declined for now but know that it is available if they feel the need at any time.

As for whether I had any suspicions, I would have told you categorically no, but having had time to think and look back, I don't know how I didn't. When I met him, at 18, I was looking for safety and protection and he didn't feel threatening like most of the males I had known to that point. I knew he had experimented with his sexuality but when he chose me and we married etc, it was never mentioned again and it only came to light because I was struggling with perimenopause and was struggling to be intimate and he wanted and needed sex and if not with me, he wanted men and ultimately, that's what he chose.

Yes, of course you feel devastated, sad and angry. Of course you do - how much has been taken from you, in your future and your past. 4 months under your belt helps - it sounds to me like you are instinctively preparing to face the dishonesty, the underlying stuff, the truth of the matter, how he has impacted on you.

My suggestion is you carve out a space in your life where you can just be with your feelings, your thoughts - I live near the beach so I could go for walks, I remember this one time, it was pouring rain and windy and the sea was rough and a ragged wave rose high and black beside me and for a moment it was like the sea had come alive and was expressing my grief for me.

Also like many, I find garden, hands in the earth, helps.  

 

You asked how long before we started feeling normal and not broken.  It really takes a while.

I didn't have an honest husband; mine kept lying  depending on how much he suspected I'd figured out.  I can tell you that it was about 18 months before I stopped having obsessive and relentless flashbacks.  

For me, getting better has been a long slow process.  Married 20+ years with young adult children when he came out.  I wasn't mad at first, either.  He had been very, very difficult to live with, especially the last couple of years before he came out to me, so that one of the emotions I had when he came out was relief, because him being gay explained so much that was wrong with our marriage.   

Of course a huge chunk of our bad marriage was that he had this giant secret that he had to hide. One way to keep me off the trail was to keep finding fault with every little thing I did, so any tension was easy to blame on me.  

One part of your story that jumps out at me is that you were struggling to be intimate with perimenopause (like so many women going through perimenopause!), and so he decided he wanted to go elsewhere.   So after 28 years of him pretending, he found a way for it to be your fault, even though it is a normal part of hormonal changes that countless middle-aged couples have to work through. 

I'll never know the truth about how involved with men my GXH had been prior to us getting together.  He presented himself as a straight guy who had only dated women.  Now that I know he's gay, of course there are things I can look back and understand were signs BUT there is no way I could have seen them for what they were when I was looking at him and thinking he was straight.  

It's not our responsibility to figure out our spouse's sexuality; we have a right to know as their intimate partners.  To be misled and lied to is a grievous injury. 

It took me more than two years to start feeling better, although I had some good days in there, and some good parts of bad days.   For the first year and a half, I woke up sad every single day, and thought that was just how morning was going to feel.  It didn't lift all at once; I just started have a few better mornings sprinkled here and there.   It helped me to notice the small parts in the day when I felt ok - maybe it was watching a favorite movie or having lunch with a friend where the black cloud lifted and the sun shone for a just a little while. 

Physically I really felt the stress.   Many days I felt a heaviness in the middle of my chest, like I had a 500 pound weight sitting on me.  The only reliable way I could get rid of it was heart-pounding exercise.  (obviously talk to your GP about what's safe for you).  I did my best to eat breakfast (even though I had no appetite) and go outside to get sunlight.  I went for walks and went to the gym.  I came up with a bedtime routine to help me wind down, and I rested as best I could.  The physical self-care gave me some routines that at least shored up the physical part.  

I was very open with my friends and colleagues, and told everyone who knew me what I was going through, so they heard it from me and we could both avoid the awkwardness of the grapevine.  I tried to have a couple of social things on my calendar each week, so I could be with people.  

I also had (still have) a fantastic therapist, who would periodically ask me if I was angry  and waited patiently for the literal year it took me to be properly angry.  I think I was so busy trying to survive in those first months that I couldn't afford the energy to get angry.   It also took me time and distance living without him to fully process where I was and what he did. 

I also think I was so devastatingly injured by him that I had to be past the worst of it for my brain to let me see how much damaged he'd caused to my emotions, my self-esteem, my finances, and my sense of my own self. 



 

Last edited by freedmyself (Yesterday 12:43 am)