I’ve given up my life to a sleazy cheat and serial liar

DEAR BEL, I’M 54 and 15 years ago I met a man (11 years older) on a dating site. I was so swept off my feet, I agreed to go back to his house.

While he was making coffee, I saw birthday cards to his wife and anniversary cards to both of them. He explained his wife had visited to celebrate her birthday with their two kids and left her cards and that the anniversary cards were from older relatives he hadn’t had the heart to tell about the divorce. He was so convincing I believed him.

He called me his soulmate and vowed to come off the dating site. We carried on dating, mostly meeting at my house or in pubs or hotels, but on holiday I could hear him in the bathroom every morning on the phone to his ex. He’d run the taps so I couldn’t hear properly; telling me he was just checking up on the shared business. I was not allowed to call him; he called me.

I can see you reading in disbelief, wondering how I missed all the signs. Later, I learned he’s an accomplished liar; I wasn’t the only woman he was stringing along.

Attractive, with my own house and a good job, I considered myself intelligent. With no idea manipulative men like him existed, I was an ideal victim.

After another two years, he said he was going fishing with a friend — so I decided to break the rule and ring to wish him a good trip. A woman answered. I asked to speak to him, saying I was his ‘girlfriend’. She went mad, said she was his wife and all hell broke loose. He ran off on his fishing trip, leaving us to pick up the pieces. She told me he’d cheated throughout their marriage. He was pleading with both of us not to leave him!

I’m ashamed to say he convinced me I was his choice. Seven years after we’d met, he finally divorced, but it was never ‘the right time’ for us to wed. I’ve never met his kids.

During all this he was still on dating sites, seeing other women ‘innocently’. All lies. I found emails to women he was having sex with. He’s 65 and mostly targeting young Asian women. Unbelievably, I’m still with this horrendous man — though I’ve never moved in with him.

I’m now depressed, unemployable, in arrears with my mortgage and too stressed to leave the house. I spend most days in my bedroom until my son gets in from work.

I’ve been in hospital three times due to alcohol and pills. This man has destroyed me. In the 15 years we’ve been together, he’s only left dating sites for three months.

I’m frightened if I don’t extricate myself from his clutches I’ll end up overdosing. Believe me, I was once a strong, independent woman. I know I won’t ever be that person again; I just want to wake up in a year’s time and for this to be over. PEARL

Let me plunge in (head spinning over a complex email four times as long as this version) by focusing on your last sentence.

You say you ‘know’ you won’t ever again be the independent woman you once were. there are two important things to say here.

the first is — you’re right, because none of us can recapture the castle of the past. things change and we change with them. You never step in the same river twice. Such philosophical truths date back centuries.

But second — you certainly can be your own woman once more. Declaring you ‘ know’ this is impossible gives ‘this horrendous man’ his most significant victory.

It will seem utterly incredible to everyone reading this that an intelligent women could waste 15 years of her life on a liar and a cheat, allowing him to ruin her self- esteem, health, emotional well-being and material stability, and make her a fragile wreck.

People will find it hard to believe — unless, that is, they have an understanding of co-dependency.

In your uncut letter, you indicate you know about this and that you have suffered terrible emotional abuse. You can use this terminology because you have seen

doctors and counsellors, to no avail. What is co- dependency? One U.s. website is a good start for information (mentalhealth

america.net/co-dependency), but there’s lots to read online for those who think they might fit this complex category.

in your case, the term describes a dysfunctional relationship where one person (you) supports or enables another person’s behaviour — his compulsive infidelity, lying, evasion of responsibility, addiction to sex etc.

From the very beginning you knew this man was married, yet refused to believe the evidence of your eyes, and thus voluntarily entered the prison you’ve inhabited for so long.

But why did you refuse? i hope you discussed this with one of those professionals along the way — seeking to discover what need in you allowed this man to continue being a monster. And why did his wife put up with him? Perhaps it was for the sake of the children — but she, too, was in some way complicit in his behaviour.

Whatever happened in the past, you need to face the present and vow to set yourself free. it will not happen while you sleep; you need to take action.

For a start, you hate this man and yet still allow him to visit you. That has to stop — and i suggest you enlist your son’s help. he must know all that has gone on (and if he doesn’t already, why not?) so now is the time to show him how much you need his help.

Change the locks on your door and your mind. Visualise yourself in a happy, normal, equal relationship, because where thought goes, energy can follow — that vital energy of spirit you need to break his sinister hold. You need to seek urgent treatment for your addictions (‘alcohol and pills’) as an essential step in fighting back.

And, as i tell Rita in the letter below, should your despair deepen, please contact the samaritans by calling 116 123 or visiting samaritans.org.

Look, this man is over: the love you felt is dead and he’s become nothing but a sad old geezer chasing young women. You and i know he is disgusting — so are you going to continue allowing a rotten corpse to destroy your life?

Now stand at an open window and shout: ‘NO!’