Can’t Get Over It

IAmmarried for almost 40 years and can’t get over my husband’s cheating on me. I have been married to the same man going on 40 years now and our relationship has reached the point where we can’t be around each other without arguing.

I have put up with so much from him and I feel like a doormat. No respect, no regard for my feelings, and If I complain or disagree with him, I am a ****. He says I put him in a bad mood and so as long as things go his way, we are fine. I am disgusted with my life. I sit at home until he decides we have some place he needs to go, like the pharmacy, or he has an appointment. When we go out, we will have lunch, but only if he is hungry. So, we do errands until he is ready to go eat. If he is not hungry we go home.

Everything in my life revolves around him and what he wants to do. He has cheated on me several times during our marriage, but has yet to come clean and admit it. He will only say, ‘oh, she was an old girlfriend that I ran into and nothing happened.’

He takes me for a fool, just because I didn’t catch him is suppose to make things ok. I am angry because at the time, I had just had a baby and was living out of the country. By the time I found out, I was in the United States (US) and pregnant with baby number six already.

He claims she was just an old girlfriend even though family members say it was more than that. He tried cheating again, but I found out and he lied again. I called the girl and found out that he had tried hooking up with her, but she had turned him down.

He refuses to acknowledge it and when I ask for details, he tells me if I had answered his questions or not. His questions can’t be answered because they are about some weird obsession he has about our first-born son not being his son. He has brought this up before about his older brother possibly being his (our first-born’s) father. This is absurd since I was only 14 when I married my husband and he was my first. My husband claims he doesn’t blame me since I was young, but because his brother is so dirty, he thinks it is possible that I may have been forced into having sex with him and got pregnant.

This has also hurt me throughout our marriage, because I have always been faithful to him and also been very modest in both dress and my actions around other men.

We have eight children together and I find this accusation very offending. Everytime I have ever tried to defend myself, he just says he knows I was young and he doesn’t want to know if it is his son or not.

I am so sick of my life. I cook, clean and wait on him hand and foot, and as long as I am smiling, he is bearable to live with, but if I am in a bad mood and show it, he gets angry and starts swearing at me.

I want to just get away and do what makes me happy. I am isolated from my children and grand kids just because he chose to move from our hometown after 34 years. He chose with no regard to how I felt. I had just landed a new job that I loved and was happy, but had to move away.

Now, we have moved again and it was his choice again, as usual. I can’t work anymore because of things that he has arranged and doing so would mess it up for him. I hate that. I am a caregiver that loved helping others and now, I have to sit back and take a back seat, because my working would mess up what he got into.

He kept after me to apply for disability when I didn’t want to. He got so angry with me, calling me stupid, just because I said I didn’t want to apply.

I need to get away and have some peace of mind, but I am afraid to leave. I know I can make it work for myself, but I am afraid, because I don’t want him to have health issues and then I will feel guiltier for leaving him.

He is diabetic and takes a lot of meds for other health issues. He doesn’t have any life threatening health issues, but I just don’t want that extra burden on my shoulders should something happen to him. Even though I have no health insurance myself and it is fine with him. Maybe I am wrong to feel this way after 40 years. Maybe it is too late for me. People say, well you have been with him this long, why leave now?

I had eight children to raise and I guess I just always felt guilty, like I do now. If someone could please just give me some advice.

Advice: Dear readers, mail your comments, reactions or true love stories, quiz or personal experience you wish to share to: simonclar@yahoo.com