There has been a girl*. I’ve been working with her for over three years and whenever I’ve spent time with her (which is relatively rare, I am/was an aircraft captain, she’s a first officer, and I fly with lots of other crew between flights with her) I have felt happy, even though all we have done is chat. We seem to have a connection that I haven’t felt with anyone else including my wife.
So anyway, over the last six months things picked up a little, I invited her out for a bike ride with me and we had fun. She invited me to dinner at her place with her “husband”**. Husband and I got on quite well and are both interested in music. I started going around there regularly to play music with him and to chat, have dinner, and watch TV with both of them. I should probably mention that they live in the town where I work which is several thousand kilometres away from where my wife and I live. When I’m working in this town I’m feeling a bit lonely and appreciate the company they offer.
While this facade of a friendship is going on I realise I’m falling in love with her, and she, as I later found out, was falling in love with me.
Things eventually come to a bit of a head when our texts to each other go a touch beyond what can be dismissed as platonic. We go for a ride and stop in a secluded area where we each refuse to tell the other that we are in love, but manage to say that we really really really like each other, and we both decide we have too much to lose and that if we did anything about it we’d hurt too many people so we’d just keep the friendship going. That night I slept in their spare bed, something that I’d done several times in the past instead of riding my bicycle back to my temporary work accommodation late at night. The following morning I was awake while she was getting ready for work and “husband” was sleeping. I saw her walk past the door to go and feed her cats. When she walked back, I called her into the room, drew her towards me and kissed her. Then we kissed some more. We were still kissing fifteen minutes later when her “husband” popped his head around the door, got a startled look on his face and then disappeared.
“Oops” she said.
“Yeah, that’s gotta be the shortest affair ever” says I.
That day I went home for my two weeks of days off with my family while girl had to work and mull things over. She’d been having problems for a long time and had nearly left him 12 months earlier but he manipulated her into staying by implying he’d kill himself if she left him (he has a history of mild mental illness.) I’d made her realise what it’s like to be happy, something she hadn’t felt in a long time, likewise, she made me realise there was something important missing from my own relationship with my wife.
That night I told my wife what had happened and that I was questioning our relationship. The girl talked to her partner and decided to take some time away from him and to go and visit her family for a bit to try and get some perspective on things. After much soul searching and discussions with my wife I decided that I was depressed about various things such as finances and career and that I really wanted to stay with my wife. I told the girl this in an email and she, despite knowing that I wouldn’t be there for her, decided to leave her partner anyway and go it alone. That detail is important to me because it shows that she was ready to leave him regardless. She didn’t leave him for me.
I had a rethink sometime later and finally admitted to myself that I didn’t want to stay with my wife, I am not happy with my wife, but I am happy with my girl, I was just scared to leave the security that my wife offered. So I left her and moved into a hotel. In contrast to the girl, I did leave my wife to be with her, I couldn’t have done it just to be by myself.
On my next work rotation I spent all the time I could with the new girl and I haven’t really looked back.
Since then I’ve taken a new job that will keep me in the same town as my wife and children so I can spend more time with the kids but I’ve been seeing the new girl regularly and we’ve decided we are worth doing the long distance thing for. It is looking likely that she will be able to get the same job I got and move down here with me pretty soon anyway.
So here I am. On one hand I feel happy and excited. I feel like I have taken control of my life again and steered it in the direction I want it to go instead of the direction others want it to go. On the other hand, I know I’m a shit for doing this to my family, and I know it hurts them and I know this is a selfish decision. My wife is angry, hurt, and confused and I know I’m responsible for this. For that I am truly sorry, but I couldn’t be happy with the future that I saw with her :(.
- I say “girl”, she’s 29, 7 years younger than me.
** I found out later that she is not married to him, he gave her a possession ring so other men would back off :rolleyes:. That didn’t work out too well for him did it? 
She didn’t fuck around, but point taken, I guess we deserve each other.