A few days ago I learned that my wife (who still goes to meetings and so forth) has/had a "crush" on a man in the Hall. In her own words, she became obsessed with him.
daniel-p,
I think that we as guys, do something pretty self-defeating when we feel that we have somehow let our mates down. We go to the extreme. We figure that we've ruined their life, we figure that we owe them big time and it will take a lifetime of repayment to even the score.....but in the process of doing this we turn from self assured proactive dudes, to reactive mamby pamby victims. We are the ones to blame for that....not because we did anything so wrong to begin with, but because our self inflicted penance was way out of wack to begin with.
You have turned every ounce of power over to your wife and given her the green light to inflict any amount of pain that she wishes upon you. What was your grave misdeed? Infidelity? Child abuse? Criminal activity? DUI? No, you simply decided to think a different way. Your actions don't justify giving her the green light for anything.
Crushes happen regardless of whether you are a JW a Mormon an atheist....but a considerate mate will do their best to go through their early married-life or mid-life crisis without dragging the other person through the ringer.
When people stray its usually because communication has slowed to a crawl and they are looking outside for the solution. It requires absolutely no skills or talent to recognize, console and wow another mans unhappy mate who is convinced their particular Romeo has gone south. Why??? Because every single relationship goes through the exact same dynamic.
What you can do to stop the bleeding is to recognize this and to stop allowing your wife to inflict pain at will, simply because you feel that you deserve it. You DON'T deserve it. Nobody does.
The sting that you feel will lessen once you resume a more proactive role in this relationship and develop a mindset that is more in tune with reality.
This may involve telling your wife to make a decision...and either go for it, or never bring it up again. This may involve counseling for you alone and it may involve marriage counseling. The most important thing that you can do is take back the power you have turned over to your wife.
Can marriages survive infidelity, crushes, outside influences, changes of direction?.....absolutely....mine and many others are proof.
But you don't replace one unhealthy dynamic in a marriage with another and expect it to solve everything.
You are not alone.
R's Hubby