When your spouse loves you, but is in love with someone else

[Anonymous]

FYI, your thread is misleading. You said your husband is "in love" with someone else. No, he is not. He cares about someone he used to be with. Very different. You are making the situation up dear.

[Anonymous]

You are not the love of his life. You are the rebound he is trying to make it work. Any idea who initiated contact during the pandemic? Was there contact prior to that? Are you just finding out now that they got together again when you were on a break after giving the ultimatum?

He would rather you be distraught then give up contact with her.

[Anonymous]

This is a non-issue. He hasn't done anything inappropriate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Feeling for op here, he blew it...she in the trenches of mothering and pregnancy, a very vulnerable time and there must have been a strong urge based on history, to idealize this past love (as he does) . He did not do a great job of repair obviously...this is not a husband who showed great empathy in understanding what it might be like to see texts of your spouse telling his ex she will be or is beautiful.while you are in pregnancy and probably feel you are far from beautiful (even if you are). Op, I would share your vulnerability with him and ask for what you would like. Maybe you need reassurance, heartfelt reassurance. Maybe he can offer it in a spirit of kindness. Maybe he cannot. If it still bothers you, yes consider seeing someone.

This is just ridiculous. One women tof elegy for someone who once meant a lot to you AND IS MARRYING SOMEONE ELSE is not an affair or anything close to it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Feeling for op here, he blew it...she in the trenches of mothering and pregnancy, a very vulnerable time and there must have been a strong urge based on history, to idealize this past love (as he does) . He did not do a great job of repair obviously...this is not a husband who showed great empathy in understanding what it might be like to see texts of your spouse telling his ex she will be or is beautiful.while you are in pregnancy and probably feel you are far from beautiful (even if you are). Op, I would share your vulnerability with him and ask for what you would like. Maybe you need reassurance, heartfelt reassurance. Maybe he can offer it in a spirit of kindness. Maybe he cannot. If it still bothers you, yes consider seeing someone.

This is just ridiculous. One women tof elegy for someone who once meant a lot to you AND IS MARRYING SOMEONE ELSE is not an affair or anything close to it.

Agree. It would frankly be weird if he did not care about this person from his past, and the fact that he sent a nice message (that was otherwise not inappropriate) is totally fine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Feeling for op here, he blew it...she in the trenches of mothering and pregnancy, a very vulnerable time and there must have been a strong urge based on history, to idealize this past love (as he does) . He did not do a great job of repair obviously...this is not a husband who showed great empathy in understanding what it might be like to see texts of your spouse telling his ex she will be or is beautiful.while you are in pregnancy and probably feel you are far from beautiful (even if you are). Op, I would share your vulnerability with him and ask for what you would like. Maybe you need reassurance, heartfelt reassurance. Maybe he can offer it in a spirit of kindness. Maybe he cannot. If it still bothers you, yes consider seeing someone.

This is just ridiculous. One women tof elegy for someone who once meant a lot to you AND IS MARRYING SOMEONE ELSE is not an affair or anything close to it.

Agree. It would frankly be weird if he did not care about this person from his past, and the fact that he sent a nice message (that was otherwise not inappropriate) is totally fine.

I did not say it was an affair or that he should not care about the person from his past. I suggested he was not great at repair in terms of helping her in her insecure moments (not that it was affair repair that was needed). It is not unreasonable that he be honest about his feelings of past relationship while also being able to hear her in the moment and help her a little bit. There is a history of this person triggering the wife based on past events, a little sensitivity on his part is not too much to ask. That's my opinion.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Perfect example of how women blow things up:

1. Your husband has shown you all the messages between his ex and him. NONE OF THEM point to a possible relationship or sexual nature.

2. He has four kids with you and has not shown ONE sign if leaving you or cheating on you. Talking to an ex IS NOT CHEATING SO STOP WITH THE BS.

3. Not all wives are their husband's first choice. Mine isn't. I love a girlfriend I had in college more than I do my wife. Why? We were more compatible. But, that doesn't mean I don't love my wife. The person you marry is not going to bet the #1 love of your entire life. That's fairy tale BS.

4. Stop making your husband feel guilty for caring about someone she CLEARLY cared about a lot years ago. There is nothing wrong with caring about an ex. You realize they had a life together right?

You need to take a chill pill. I think you are making the entire scenario worse. Unless your husband is seeing her behind your back or sending her gifts, etc you need to just stop with the jealousy.

Oh good grief.

1. He only showed the messages when she insisted. He hid what he was doing. That’s shady and the husband saying there is nothing wrong with is gaslighting.

2. You’re making it sound like anything that might lead up to cheating is fine, like cheating is the only thing people are allowed to be upset about it. Wrong.

3. Just because you love another woman more than you love your spouse doesn’t mean that anybody has to put up with that. I love my husband more than anybody else and if I loved somebody more than I loved him, he would not put up with that. Just loving somebody is not enough for a strong marriage, and a strong marriage is what we want. I think it’s fair to expect to be #1 in your spouses eyes. The idea that you think that’s a fairy tale is frankly disturbing and shows that nobody should be taking relationship advice from you.

4. Caring about somebody is not the same as loving somebody more than your spouse.

So what's your suggestion? Divorce him and be a single mom with four kids? For what? Because her dh wished an old girlfriend well in her upcoming marriage? You think she'll find another spouse without any past relationships who'll put her and another man's children on a pedestal?

Plus one million. The posters telling her to freak out over this are idiots. You found your one in a million and never loved anyone other than your spouse? Good for you. Hope you feel great humble bragging in an anonymous forum. That's not the reality for most people. This lady is about to have four kids with this guy. Should she leave him over this non issue? See her kids 50% of the time over this non issue? Please. I've been the "other woman" in this situation. I will always be the great and first love of my ex. And we probably lived each other more than any other partner. But there were religious, cultural and other barriers. Love is one component in a happy and long lasting partnership. You have to weigh all of them. I am infrequently in touch with my ex. Maybe once an year at most (after many years of no communication). I will always love him and wish the best for him which I know is not being with me.

I love the hyperbole here, ha. Not just accepting that your spouse loves somebody else more than you is a freak out?

Maybe you think it’s a humble brag that my husband loves me more than anybody else. I think it’s weird AF that people think that you think it’s normal to MARRY somebody when there is somebody else you love more. Different strokes.

You THINK that your husband loves you more than anyone else. He won't ever actually be honest with you about it because look at all the psychos on here that go crazy anytime anyone brings up contact with an ex. In this case the husband "admits" that he has feelings for this ex but guess what he's not with her, he's with OP and creating a life with OP. I hope your bubble isn't ever shattered OP. It's my friends that are smug/head in the sand, like you, that fall the hardest when their partners cheat.

Obviously they’re the ones who fall the hardest because they were the most deceived. That doesn’t mean it’s weird for them to have assumed that the person they married wasn’t hung up on somebody else.

I don’t know what you’re dealing with or what life experiences you have had that lead you to believe that I have my head in the sand or that I’m being smug. I think that saying “my husband doesn’t love anybody else more than he loves me” is the kind of sentiment that should be so common that it’s boring and utterly uncontroversial. In a marriage, making your spouse the person you love the most is quite a low bar.

We don’t live in a world where we need to get married or stay married anymore. Nobody expects marriage to be butterflies and rainbows for decades but I would not have married my husband if there was somebody else out that I loved more. And I wouldn’t just be like “okay well he loves her more but he’s with me and that’s all that matters!” Whatever, no it isn’t all that matters, nobody gets a gold star for saying “but I love you too!”

And my husband did congratulate his ex when his ex announced her engagement. I thought that was great. I wish her well too! You can drive a truck between that and what OP’s husband is doing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Get over it. You're obsessing over a childhood relationship basically, when he was a student 11+ years ago. Move on.

No, *he* is the one obsessing about it. And he needs to stop.

[Anonymous]

I agree OP that he still has very strong, romantic feelings toward his ex.

And I would not be happy about them communicating during the pandemic.
If you stay w/this man - you likely will always feel inferior to her.

I wouldn’t blame you.
I would not sweep this under the rug.

Hugs. 🤗

[Anonymous]

This post makes me think of that song “In my Life” by the Beatles.

[Anonymous]

My ex is not married but I am sure I would look at his wedding pictures if he posted them. I’m sure he looked at mine.

I will always care for him. He was my college sweetheart.

I’m married with 3 kids. I am pretty sure everyone who has an ex has some lingering feeling for an ex whether that is friendship, lust, memories, anger, disappointment, any emotion.

I have one friend who seems to have anger towards every ex. She is twice divorced. She seems angry at all her ex boyfriends and husbands. If you spoke to her, it would almost sound like she is not over any one of these men.

[Anonymous]

He needs to agree to stop communicating with her. Sometimes it’s okay for exes to occasionally communicate, like maybe once or twice a year, but the facts you give, it’s just not ok. I mean if it didn’t bother you, that would be one thing. But it does. And I think you reaction of not liking it is rational and understandable. He needs to stop.

[Anonymous]

Wow. I can't believe the responses on this thread.

OP's husband has been carrying a flame for someone else their entire relationship and marriage and she should just shut up and deal because they had a bunch of kids.

My questions are where do I, and where do we go from here? Do I insist he stop all communication with her? Do I insist on marriage counseling?

In response to the bolded I would go full on diva b!t$ch. Your husband needs to grow up and give up the ghost. There is literally nothing good that can come out of him being in contact with his ex. Either he grows up and starts living that or not. I wouldn't do counseling - what for? So you can "understand" him? He stood up in front of probably God and everyone and said he was committing to you. Time to COMMIT and leave the past behind.

He can either commit to his wife, children, and family or continue to chase some counterproductive relationship with a woman that wouldn't marry him back in the day and will never marry him. He has a chance at love and happiness and he should take it.

[Anonymous]

Op here,

1. I am not planning on divorcing him.


2. I'm not going to leave temporarily to teach him a lesson. I've got 3 small kids and that wouldn't be fair to them.


3. The reason we broke up when we were dating is that he was in constant communication with her, Talking, texting, and seeing each other. I was understanding at first because they had dated throughout college and I figured it was okay for them to be friends,, I started to feel like I was the other person in the relationship, not the girlfriend. I talked to my now DH about it and things got better for a little while before going back to how they had been. I told him that he needed to make a choice, and he said that he would always have her as a friend so that was that. We were split for about 4 months. Before he came back to me, asking to work things out. He promised that things were over between them and that was that. To my knowledge, there has been no communication between them until this last year. I did not know until Saturday that they had been talking for the last year, or that they had resumed their relationship during the brief time we had broken up. He says they both kind of reached out to each other because the pandemic had them both wondering about old friends and how they were doing. He says he didn't tell me because he didn't want me to get upset.

4. What's bothering me the most about the messaging and texts is a combination of things. It wasn't just 1 or 3 messages of checking in to make sure all was well. It's been a year of communication. While the messages aren't explicit there's a lot of memory sharing, and I assume inside jokes with emojis. It's also t that this was happening when he was likely with me or the kids, he should have been focused on us when he was focused on her. I only found out about it Saturday because I got tired of him putting off doing something I had asked him to do and saw that he was looking at her wedding pictures.



5. I haven't asked him to do anything yet like, not to communicate with her or block her etc. . I realize the messages I saw were not explicit, but I don't want things to get to that point. You always hear about things starting off innocently and then not. I'd rather not get to that point.

[Anonymous]

I would be livid if I found my DH communicating with his ex girlfriend behind my back. If he’s happily married to you with 4 kids, why feel the need to talk to an old flame? What good will come out of it and you must be really dense to not realize how much this will hurt your spouse especially when you broke up with him because of this person.

I would put my foot down and tell him to not be in touch with her at all because it hurts you and makes you uncomfortable and why would he want to hurt his wife and the mother of his kids?