Since I posted here. Almost 3 years since I came out to my wife. Since then, we've been trying to hold it together. Yesterday, things got rough again and I wrote this. rough day i could tell she’s been teetering on the verge of another metdown it’s been a while she is hurt humiliated vacant it’s all my fault she yells in a 3-hour texting fight i should have been more accountable to her our vows the kids i tell her i should go that we are both hurt miserable sad she says she stood by me when i told her i loved someone else tells me i must stand with her in this mess fuck fuck fuck i am trembling uncontrollably i want to die i deserve to die i hate everything about myself and who i am I tried several times during the conversation to get her to acknowledge that I need to move out. But she "doesn't want that." She wants to "continue pretending." I finally convinced her that we both need to be seeing a therapist. She agreed that she would look for one for herself. It's been THREE YEARS since I told her. Hopefully, a therapist will help her see that she needs to let me go.
Hi taxodium, I do hope you and your wife see a therapist, I believe that she can heal from this, and with the help of a therapist can manage deep issues that are making this so particularly painful to her. All of our spouses and all of us face a lot of pain when we come out after marriage (don't forget we have deep pain and difficulty with all of this!), but this is the kind of pain that is possible to heal constructively with time and effort. Because she is finding it so hard to move forward, I believe her pain goes beyond your sexuality and your marriage breakdown/difficulties. I know you find it very difficult to take yourself out of the cause of her pain, but both yourself and your wife will do mich better taking much more of the blame away from you. In the centre of all my own questioning and the decisions I made about myself, I too felt guilt and blame and regret. But now I can mostly see (I'm there 90%) that this is not really about blame, it's about growth. The marriage breakdown for me included pain for us both, and I took responsibility for that by being sensitive to him, and making decisions as responsibly as I could for his welfare and his relationship with my daughter. I owe him no more than that, and he the same for me. Please try to take care of yourself. We're all here to listen if you need to talk more.
