In the Name of Love

Being with the same man in over 2 decades I am having an extramarital affair.

I still love my husband and I will stay with him and grow old. Yet I am having an emotional affair and will probably soon make it physical.

My lover is single and older than me. He is the most confident and stable man I ever met and aware of my situation. He had a long and prosperous career in the same line I am working and we connect extraordinary both mentally and physically. He is retiring and enjoys seeing me making my way forward.

We meet occasionally on travels and he does everything to assure that I am confident in what I am doing. there is no intentions on either behalf to change our longterm situation but to add a dimension and support for us both in our lives. We share a very strong infatuation for each other.

My husband recently was under a lot of pressure from work which makes our home situation though, especially for me. This is however not the only reason I pursue my affair.

My lover gives me full support where I would be given envy from my partner. I guess when you are in a long life together you are competing about resources. My partner is egoistic and altruism is closer to my nature. I am not judging but observing this. I share a good life with my partner otherwise I would not be with him still. But with my lover I have found a piece in the puzzle that was missing.

I am not looking to verify my behaviour by writing here. I am cracking my romantic boundary with my longterm love. Traditional counselours would probably advice me not to pursue my affair. But I dont think I will regret it.....

Thank you Aaron for you blog i find it very enlightening.

Your situation is one of the reasons some people choose a polyamorous lifestyle (ie, not restricting yourself or your partner to physical/emotional intimacy with just each other). It's not the supportive intimacy of another lover that is harmful, it's the ongoing and deliberate deception that will eat away at you and at your relationship with your husband, and possibly also erode the relationship with your other lover.

Consider cracking another boundary, and finding a way to share your situation with your husband. It would be gentler on the relationship to gain his assent before you begin your affair. (Consider that the longer your affair lasts, the more likely he is to discover it at some point anyway.) Perhaps begin by learning more about people who live polyamorously, and then explore the concept with your husband in the abstract, to see if he could be open to the idea.

If he is by nature an envious person, as you say, he doesn't sound like a prime candidate for polyamory, but people often surprise us. Consider granting him the respect of forming his own opinion, and the gift of finding the kind of fulfillment you have found for yourself, having your assent and support. No doubt there is a piece of the puzzle that he is missing from his relationship with you, that perhaps he could find fulfillment in by being open to the possibility of having another lover. (That's not a negative reflection on your relationship with him; no one person can "be everything" for another person, and we set ourselves up for disappointment and failure when we expect that of our partner or of ourselves.)

Your new relationship has the potential of enriching your marriage, if you want it to. It sounds like you still love your husband. Love takes many forms, and changes through the stages of a long-term relationship. Rather than excluding him from this new and vital part of your life, see if you can find a way to mold this new stage into a new way of loving your husband as well, and expand the possibilities for both of you. You can have a second lover *and* maintain the commitment and integrity of your marriage. It's something to think about, anyway.

Best wishes for all three of you, as you break new territory and courageously open your heart to new ways of loving and living.

Truly