OUR SEPARATION HAS ROCKED ME

I’ve been married to my lovely wife for 17 years. A few months ago, however, she said that she only loved me as a friend and was going to move out. She is now living on her own and I see her once a week. We still get on, but on a different level. I adore her and hate what she has done. We had a loving relationship and this ordeal has broken me. I have recently retired, but still do some work. She is 14 years younger than me, works in a stressful job and has health problems. I think all of this has rocked me and I am not handling it well. I hope the pain will ease. Any ideas? To lose the woman you adore is incredibly painful – I am so sorry. Sadly, it seems that, although she loves you, she does not love you enough to want to stay in the marriage or have a sexual relationship with you any more. It sounds as if it came out of the blue. This may be a hard thing to consider, but could she have met someone else? Talk to her about this and ask her if she could at least tell you why she left. Without an explanation, it is much harder to let go. Tell her how devastated you are and ask if she would agree to joint counselling with Accord (accord.ie) to help you understand and accept that the marriage is over. If she won’t, go on your own to help you get through this. It is hard and takes time, but you will eventually recover and the pain will ease. In the meantime, build up your social life as much as possible – see friends and family and take up new activities. When you are ready, you will fall in love again.