Of Marriage and Betrayal

[brazil84]

@Cat Fight

But until recently (or in certain countries), what choice did they have? Either they couldn’t legally ask for a divorce, weren’t earning their own money so they couldn’t support themselves, or didn’t want to face the stigma of being a single woman/mother.

That’s true. Even today in the United States, most women in the middle class don’t want the stigma; embarassment; financial disadvantages; loss of support; and burden to the children that comes with being divorced.

I have a feeling a few modern women wouldn’t be too happy being cuckolded or having the little man give them chlamydia.

.
Of course not. No woman wants her husband to cheat on her – whether he’s little or big. And nobody wants to get VD from a sex partner.

[brazil84]

@Giraffe

I think that, whatever you end up doing, you need to separate out your feelings about the life you’ve made for yourself from the fantasy you’ve constructed around this old girlfriend. Don’t trick yourself into thinking you could have something uniquely special with this girl – this girl simply represents newness, possibility, excitement. There’s nothing real there.

Make decisions about your marriage based only on whether you’d rather be alone than continue to be married. Forget the idea that there’s some magical person out there who will make you feel 17 again for the rest of your life – no matter who you end up with, you’ll find yourself back in a state of comfortable familiarity eventually, so you need to come to terms with that first, I think.

I totally agree. Unless your wife is crazy, alcoholic, or in jail, there’s probably not much point in throwing away a perfectly good marriage to marry somebody else. You’ll just end up poorer and in the same boat a few years down the road.

Unless you prefer the life of a serial polygamist.

[brazil84]

Obligatory wikipedia cite:

New relationship energy

[PunditLisa]

“The greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions and not on our circumstances.”

-Martha Washington

There are some folks who’ve been dealt a crappy hand and have every right to be depressed. Nothing in your OP lends me to believe that there is anything in your circumstances which would justify being “miserable.” You’re unhappy because you’ve chosen to be unhappy.

The spark is gone? Work on reigniting it. At the very least, let your wife in on the fact that you’re not feeling warm and fuzzy anymore. She has a right to know.

[Siege]

A Tattered Man, may I ask you a simple question? Do you want to hurt your best friend? The reason I ask is that’s the way you described your wife, and it sounds like a separation will hurt her. If she isn’t aware of your malaise or looking up an old girlfriend or considering breaking off the marriage, this is going to come as a nasty, unpleasant shock. Even if she is, knowing you’re thinking about walking out on her will be painful.

You are considering taking action which will hurt your wife and your three-year old daughter, neither of whom, as far as we know, has done anything to deserve this. The reason for this is because you’d rather walk away and hurt them than try to fix what’s wrong.

Yes, I’m being blunt. I know a few things about depression and malaise and how they can distort a person’s view. I also know how being caught up in a rush of passion can blind a person to the harm he or she’s doing. What I’m trying to do is cut through the fog, remove the blinders and show you the other side of what you’re considering doing.

Edited to add:
By the way, if you want a more ethical, realistic cure for malaise and depression, I really do recommend seeing a good therapist. As I’ve said, I’ve some experience with depression and, in my case, it did respond to treatment and I was able to beat it. You owe it to yourself to give it a try, not to mention your wife and daughter.