This is going to be long and painful, sorry...
I was married to a man who cheated on me when I was 22. We were divorced and I started renting a room from a family so I could work my way through college. That family had a son who had just returned from 8 years in the Marines and he and I hit it off and dated very seriously for a little over two years. I was still young and had a lot of unresolved issues from my first marriage and felt I needed to have a chance to be on my own and really figure out who I was before committing to marriage again. He was having issues himself adjusting to life outside the service. He had gone to school to become a fireman and by the time he was certified CA started laying off firefighters. He didn't know what he was going to do. We loved each other and got along very well, spending almost 24 hours a day together for those 2 years. We were best friends, perfect lovers, but we just couldn't overcome our fears and insecurities. We split up. A year later I was at an all time low, drinking to the point of blackout regularly. I was still going to school and working but I was miserable and lonely and depressed. I was seeing a therapist twice a week. I started dating a man who appeared to have it all together. He was educated, said he had a wonderful, loving family and good job and was always buying me nice gifts and taking me out. He proposed to me a month into dating. I was swept off my feet and we eloped in Vegas a month later. 4 months after that we were pregnant with our daughter, who is now 3. Shortly after our marriage my husband changed jobs. He was very unhappy and ended up taking a different job in a different state a few months later. He had been getting written up and we believed they were trying to fire him. I didn't find out until then that he had over $30,000 in credit card bills, another $80,000 in student loans. We filed for bankruptcy. Since then we have lived in 3 different states and moved six times, all before my daughter's 3rd birthday. I thought he could provide the love and stability that I had missed growing up in my own dysfunctional family but he hasn't. I am grateful that I am able to stay home with our daughter but we have no stability. He hates every job he gets and ends up quitting, sometimes even before benefits kick in. He comes home every day miserable and unhappy. He is not a bad man, just not the one I thought I married. Here's where things get crappy... The ex-boyfriend and I stayed in loose touch, writing a couple times a year with updates and such. He got married a year ago. 6 months ago we started emailing more often, then calling. Now we talk on the phone every day, sometimes more than once. We feel that we still love one another, even though it has been 5 years and we are both tied to other people. We both feel that marrying others and not working through our issues together back then was a monumental mistake. He wants us both to get a divorce, get married, and he wants to adopt my daughter. I remember how wonderful our relationship was all those years ago, now he is offering to provide the love and stability and life that he wasn't able to provide back then. But how do I justify divorcing a man who has supported me for the last 3 years? Like I said, he isn't a bad guy, but I didn't marry him because we were in love, I was in love with the life he was offering me. I could never take the stability of a core family away from my daughter though. I am so confused. I don't think my husband would give up his rights to our daughter so my exboyfriend and could adopt her should we follow through with that plan. I never in a million years imagined life could be so complicated and painful. I don't want the future I see with my husband for our daughter. I want to give her the best life I possibly can, I just have no idea if that means staying with my husband, going back to my ex-boyfriend, or something else entirely. If you managed to actually read all that you are truly a saint, and if you have anything even remotely helpful to offer I would be grateful. Thank you.

You have a very tough decision to make. You must truly still love your Marine. It's a shame that you two didn't stay together though.

If you think that you two are able to find true love and be happy, you must start to plan how you will accomplish this. You can't just expect your present husband to relinquish his daughter to another man to adopt. I don't know how he feels about his daughter but adopting another man's child is NOT a typical man reaction to this type of situation. He must truly love you and feels very bad about everything and wants to make you and your daughter his. Even if you would divorce and marry him, your daughter does not have to be formally adopted by him to be his daughter.

Both you and your Marine will not be happy until you are back together again. I wish you every good luck and good thoughts towards making this a reality. Don't stay in a marriage just because someone "supported" you. That is definitely not the right thing to do as you will be worse than miserable in the future with your present husband. He sounds like he is extremely unhappy with himself as well. A person has to be happy with themselves in order to properly hold a job and stick with it.

I've always said that you can't make a person stay with you if they don't want to. They stay because they want to. If you are in a loveless marriage that gives you no emotional fulfillment, you don't have a marriage, you have a live in relationship with a wedding ring. Marriage is more than just living with someone (or it should be). It should be a feeling of friendship, love, mutual respect, companionship, cherish for the other person.

I vote that you and your Marine live happily together in your castle with your little princess. It won't be easy, but it will be worth it in the end.

Thank you. That really is what I wanted to hear. I just feel like doing what is right for me isn't necessarily what would be right for my little one. We live 2000 miles apart, I can't imagine shipping my baby halfway across the country to see her father. I've never been away from her, ever. Thank you for your vote, and your kind words. I need all the help and support I can get right now! :)

Dear Confused. Don't worry about the distance right now. Things have a way of working out in the end. Just meet with your Marine and pick up where you two left off. Right now someone 3 years old does not have too many "immediate" memories of much. Even though you feel you may be depriving her of her father, just think of the "other" father she is going to have. Does her present dad give her much attention and affection to make his absence too unbearable? Probably not since you stated you are a stay at home mom she's essentially bonded to you much more and would actually miss you more. Right now you have a guilt trip you are trying to lay on yourself about your daughter.

Depending on where you and your Marine live now, you could leave and go visit him with your child for a few weeks and just "forget" to come back. Sounds harsh, but I don't think dad would be too concerned as he's unhappy with life in general as it is so you not being there wouldn't mean too much either way to him.

I think you married this guy for all the wrong reasons and now years later is catching up to you.

Now you love someone that is married and you both want to get back what you had. Does he have any kids? I think this situation is unfair to your partners. Your husband doesn't know how you really feel and neither does the guy wife. Even if you two get back together you never know what outcome could be. It will be a chance that you will be taking because nothing is guarantee.

I think you need to do something for you and work of yourself because you have to be happy with yourself and create your stablity. Today it hard to support a family with one income and many people are losing their jobs. You have to have something to fall back in. Go to school, get a part-time job, do something for yourself and depend on no one. Because in the end you going have a child to support because again nothing is guarantee. Don't confuse your child by allowing another man around so soon. Get a divorce since you don't love your husband and never did and focus on a life with you and your child.

Thank you. That really is what I wanted to hear. I just feel like doing what is right for me isn't necessarily what would be right for my little one. We live 2000 miles apart, I can't imagine shipping my baby halfway across the country to see her father. I've never been away from her, ever. Thank you for your vote, and your kind words. I need all the help and support I can get right now! :)


You go around once in this life - you never know what tomorrow brings and you may never get another chance. Life can be unfair.

You also can't make your child happy when you are unhappy - and lots of parents send lots of kids across the Country to visit with their fathers. It's part of being separated by work or divorce or whatever. A hard fact of life but a fact of life nevertheless.

I think you have to look at how do you think you'll feel in two years if you let this chance pass you by -

I think the best people to answer this are people who are, in fact, divorced, raised children, dealt with the problems and emotions - people who have basically been there and don't offer purely "feel good" advice.