Can I sleep with my wife while spending thousands on my lover?
DEAR BEL
I HAVE been married for 24 years and met my wife three years earlier. We have three adult children (21, 19 and 16) and several businesses together.
She does all the administration and paperwork, i ncluding banking. She has always worked hard, fitting work around the children, doing the school run and with an office at home.
I also worked hard. Over the years I had some business i deas that didn’t work out, but my wife always supported me and together we turned things round.
In July, I met a 34-year-old woman with two girls, aged eight and 12. There was an immediate connection we could not ignore. She’s l eft her husband and I’ve moved her into one of our rental apartments.
She’s the opposite of my wife and has opened a whole world sexually for me.
I’m more or less now living with her full-time, only going home if she has friends or family staying over. They all know about me. I’ve told my mother, who is disgusted, but I know she will get used to the idea.
My wife found out and I was surprised how well she reacted. She is still very calm. But she does cry a lot uncontrollably. She suggested we visit Relate or at least talk about things, but I have made up my mind.
We are going to mediation to sort out money, business, house etc and I shall admit adultery for the divorce. I know I’ve hurt my wife, who looks fragile and broken, but I love this new woman and want to spend the rest of my life with her. I feel happy, young and sexy and know I can help my girlfriend have a better life with me.
I can help her a lot — and have already spent thousands making her and her girls happy.
My wife asked me how long I had been unhappy, but I didn’t know I was unhappy until I met my new partner.
I still want my wife to be my business partner, but my question to you is this: why do I want to have sex with my wife when sex with my girlfriend is mind-blowing?
Yesterday I told my wife I find her very attractive, and she said: ‘You never told me before.’
But before we separated we did declare love daily and were intimate throughout our marriage.
My life with my wife was calm with no dramas, but my girlfriend has several dramas each week, which is exciting.
JAMES
Your handwritten letter gives no address and (to be frank) seems strangely immature. You can often tell a lot from holding a letter in the hand — although previously people have shouted at me for evaluating scruffy paper and poor handwriting.
An amateur graphologist would have guessed this came from a 15-year-old boy rather than a successful businessman. You don’t give your age, but since you were with your wife for 27 years it’s reasonable to suppose you are around 50.
Before I deal with your question, I’d like to ask if you have any idea how your letter reads to others?
In this job, I am so used to people poleaxed by sudden sexual passion that I make no judgment on this aspect of human experience. What I will judge is how people treat each other.
Therefore let’s look at the outline of the story you tell here: a devoted wife who supported her husband through thick and thin, balancing motherhood with work, is now cast aside by her erstwhile loving husband because he feels ‘happy, young and sexy’ with a younger woman he’s known for the squeak of a bedspring. So far, so predictable.
But it gets worse. This husband behaves with extraordinary cruelty. He moves his
girlfriend into a flat partly owned by his wife, spends ‘ thousands’ on her and her kids, and only visits his ‘fragile’ wife when it’s convenient for him.
What’s more, he refuses to ‘at least talk’ to his wife (let alone go to counselling, as she has every right to ask) because he has ‘ made up his mind’ that the marriage is over. no talking, Wifey — I know what I want, and it’s no longer you.
This man makes no mention of his three children, one of whom is only 16 and so surely in need of maximum support. But hey — his father is spending ‘ thousands’ on the girlfriend’s kids, and wants to ‘give them a better life’. (You know, I can’t help wondering if this girlfriend is from another country. Just an instinct.)
What do you think this guy sounds l i ke? A middle- aged fool? Or a seriously selfish, hard-hearted man? It’s as if you, my friend, are so deep in lust that you’ve forgotten all that gave your life value.
You disgust your own mother? not to worry — she’ll get used to the fact that her son has behaved like a s***.
Your blameless, ‘broken’ wife can’t stop crying? never mind, she’s still ‘calm’. You no longer care about your own children, who are bound to be shattered by this situation? Too bad, they’ll probably get used to it, too.
Your girlfriend is a tempestuous minx who lives off ‘drama’ — as well as your money? hey ho, at least she’s ‘exciting’.
Do I sound just a tad irritated? Well, fancy that. My heart goes out to your poor wife, who has done nothing (by your own admission) to deserve this treatment. I rather wish she would decide to hate your guts and employ a tough solicitor to ensure you immediately stop giving your shared money to your gold-digging girlfriend.
And tells you to stuff your ‘business partner’ idea. And takes you for every penny possible.
I wonder if the girlfriend would hang around if you couldn’t spend those ‘thousands’?
Oh, The more I think of this situation, the crosser I feel. I repeat, it’s not your passion that I judge: such feelings are ancient. But your lack of friendship, compassion and respect for your wife just stinks. Your letter is not from a real man, but a self-indulgent kid.
So you ask me why you still want ‘to have sex’ with the poor woman who has loved and supported you for 27 years, but whom you have betrayed?
Could it be that you’ve become so revved up by Ms hotstuff that you can’t switch it off? Or that there is still some residual love left for an abandoned wife pathetically grateful for your attention?
Whatever the reason, I have no hesitation i n telling you that it would be entirely wrong — even outright wicked — for you to take advantage of your wife’s bewildered and bruised f eeli ngs and her wish to keep you, and l ure her into bed as s o me sort of consolation prize. It would be outrageous behaviour.
So stop even thinking about it. Instead, think about the future — and how you will feel when this passion ends and you’ve thrown everything away.