First of all I am new to this site and found it through Google. I really need someone to talk to and don't have anyone to talk to about this. I am a 43 yr. old woman who is unhappily married to a man for 18 years. I have left him 4 times and always have come back to him. He is a bitter and angry man who hates everything. He is so emotionally abusive and he has hit me a few times in the past. He also has off and on again drug binges. He says he loves me but I really think he just uses me to get anything he wants from me. I have enabled him in the past because of fear of him but now I stand my ground with him and I don't care anymore. I don't love him and he always says he is going to change but doesn't. Anyway, the reason why I feel so sad and heartbroken is I was on a social website and found someone that I have always known since I was a child. We even lived in the same neighborhood and we are the same age. He started chatting with me on this site and told me he has always reserved a place for me in his heart after more than 25 yrs. We haven't seen each other at all since we graduated from high school in 1984. Well back in August we started communicating through emails, cell phone calls, and text and video messages. We just connected so easily and bonded so close to each other it was like we were never apart. We never dated as kids but we have the same feelings for each other and he told me everyday he loved me soooo much and we both thought the same thoughts and there was a bonding and I knew deep in my heart he was the right man for me. We had so much in common and I knew I would jump through hoops just to see him and be with him. Well, anyway the downside is he is married to the same woman for 22 yrs and has 10 kids together and he does love her but he got caught one day and then we had to be careful and I had to wait on his calls. He would call me once a week using a pay phone and he wanted so badly to see me and make the day special. I was and still am in love with him and he makes me feel like a queen and very special. Well, one day here about 2 weeks ago he stopped calling and he was making comments about how much he loves his wife and she is the best and all the same stuff he told me and put it on the social website for everyone to see. Over the past few weeks I have commented on his posts and made nice comments but never answers me back anymore. Just with more sweet and nice comments about his wife. I feel like I just lost the love of my life. I have emailed him hopefully he didn't get caught but told him if I said anything to make him mad at me but he never replies or anything. I don't know what is going on with him but I still love him and I tell him so. I don't know if his wife gets those messages or if I said something that made him mad. I don't know what to do. I want to call him using *67 and blocking my number so I can talk to him but I am afraid... I cry everyday and I am so depressed because I really felt love from him for the first time in 20 years and I still love him now. HELP!! Should I call or what??

No you should not call him. He is MARRIED with ten kids. You should seriously look at your own marriage, deal with it without outside influences and then move on one way or another.
Seems like you have been through enough drama in your own marriage, why would you want more by getting mixed up with a married man? You think a woman with ten kids is going to let him go without a fight?
Not worth it, not the right thing to do and there are consequences. Believe it or not, there are other men who don't have wives that you could fall in love with after your divorce.

Your marriage is unhappy so you thought it would be OK to connect with someone that flattered you and made you feel wanted. But, he already told you he loved her, and you didn't hear him.

I can understand that you want love and have had an awful marriage. But, it's been your choice to stay, and it's been your choice to have an emotional affair with a married man.

Now you have a really good excuse to leave your abusive husband. You know it's possible to find love and affection in the big wide, world.

Leave your childhood friend alone - he's not for you - hard as that may be. His silence is telling you that.

He has however, given you a gift. He's opened your eyes to the fact that you can no longer stay and that it's time to move on. Isn't 18 years of unhappiness and abuse enough?

I know what we were doing was wrong, but he has been the only man that has ever made me feel this way. The old boyfriends and all of that was different. I just cannot stop thinking about him 24/7. He knows Im married too but he said he will never stop thinking about me and he has always kept a place in his heart for me over the past 25 years. He even joined reunion sites just to find me over the past years. It just makes me feel special that someone from my childhood who kept searching for me and wanting to make contact with me after all these years. I have never felt so special in my life. Plus we just connected with everything, from what think about to what we have the same way of thinking. Its amazing! But I just cannot help it, I miss him so much it hurts. I guess I need to try to put a smile on my face and go on, but its hard. I cry all the time and miss him so much.

Yes, your life has to go on and may be really difficult. Maybe a separation from your husband would help things. Could (or would) you leave him to get your mind clear, especially since he is abusive?

You played with fire and got burned. Your lover with the kids has a lot of responsibility on his shoulders and it is not just how much he feels about his wife, it is about his children too. It is respectable that he is trying to stay together w/o splitting his family apart, even if there are issues.

I know what we were doing was wrong, but he has been the only man that has ever made me feel this way. The old boyfriends and all of that was different. I just cannot stop thinking about him 24/7. He knows Im married too but he said he will never stop thinking about me and he has always kept a place in his heart for me over the past 25 years. He even joined reunion sites just to find me over the past years. It just makes me feel special that someone from my childhood who kept searching for me and wanting to make contact with me after all these years. I have never felt so special in my life. Plus we just connected with everything, from what think about to what we have the same way of thinking. Its amazing!! but I just cannot help it, I miss him so much it hurts. I guess I need to try to put a smile on my face and go on, but its hard. I cry all the time and miss him so much.

I'm so sorry. I really do understand what it must have felt like to be wanted and special after many years of neglect. Clearly, for both of you it went too far and he realized too late that had put his family relationship at risk. Now he has had to do the right thing and put his wife and family first.

In the end you were living out a romantic fantasy with a knight in shining amour that simply wasn't available to you. Had it gone further it would have turned difficult and ugly with an ex-wife and 10 children.

Your 'knight in shining armor' wasn't able to rescue you, in fact in some ways he deceived you - so now you will need to rescue yourself.

Leave your abusive relationship - it's time to take change into your own hands, not leave it to someone else.

I know it is very hard for me. You see when I was a young teenager I really did not get any dates or boyfriends because all my life people have told me I was ugly and won't mount to anything in my life. But this man which I love soooo much has always overlooked any flaws that I had. He did not see them in anyway, shape, or form. He liked me when I was a kid but we never acted upon our liking each other. In high school he always wanted to go steady with me but was shy and scared. We graduated and went on our own lives and he has always thought of me over the years wondering what I am doing with my life and the thoughts of "the what if's" with me. Now he has found me and we live almost 280 miles apart and I long to see him face to face and just to hold him and tell him how much I love him. He has told me the same over the phone, emails, and texts. Now the past few weeks it has been silent. I really don't want to lose him because the feeling for me is so hard to explain that no one in this whole wide world has ever made me feel this way. I dream of him every night and can't focus during the day when I am at work. I do try to keep myself busy so I won't think of him but nothing seems to work. I have talked to a co-worker who I trust deeply with this matter and she seems to comfort me because I am hurting. She also says to give him time because he has eyes watching him all the time so he is trying to be careful, but I just don't believe it. I am so distraught that I am getting bad stomach aches from this and also my husband gives me hell about other things. My body aches all over and cannot sleep or eat good because I really miss him so much. As I am typing this I am crying sooo hard:( I just want to be happy and he was the only one to make me happy. My husband does not make me happy and he never has made me feel this way that my lover does. Even though we have never been together face to face in person, this relationship with my lover/friend has been the most wonderful emotional relationship ever. I would jump through hoops, climb the highest mountains, swim the deepest oceans just to be with him. I love him dearly and cannot stop thinking of him. I really need some help.

I know it is very hard for me. You see when I was a young teenager I really did not get any dates or boyfriends because all my life people have told me I was ugly and won't mount to anything in my life. But this man which I love soooo much has always overlooked any flaws that I had. He did not see them in anyway, shape, or form. He liked me when I was a kid but we never acted upon our liking each other. In high school he always wanted to go steady with me but was shy and scared. We graduated and went on our own lives and he has always thought of me over the years wondering what I am doing with my life and the thoughts of "the what if's" with me. Now he has found me and we live almost 280 miles apart and I long to see him face to face and just to hold him and tell him how much I love him. He has told me the same over the phone, emails, and texts. Now the past few weeks it has been silent. I really don't want to lose him because the feeling for me is so hard to explain that no one in this whole wide world has ever made me feel this way. I dream of him every night and can't focus during the day when I am at work. I do try to keep myself busy so I won't think of him but nothing seems to work. I have talked to a co-worker who I trust deeply with this matter and she seems to comfort me because I am hurting. She also says to give him time because he has eyes watching him all the time so he is trying to be careful, but I just don't believe it. I am so distraught that I am getting bad stomach aches from this and also my husband gives me hell about other things. My body aches all over and cannot sleep or eat good because I really miss him so much. As I am typing this I am crying sooo hard:( I just want to be happy and he was the only one to make me happy. My husband does not make me happy and he never has made me feel this way that my lover does. Even though we have never been together face to face in person, this relationship with my lover/friend has been the most wonderful emotional relationship ever. I would jump through hoops, climb the highest mountains, swim the deepest oceans just to be with him. I love him dearly and cannot stop thinking of him. I really need some help.

You need to get some counselling. You've put all your hopes and dreams into someone that can't, or now won't, give you what you want. Crying, hoping and dreaming will only make you feel worse. You need to speak to someone who will give you strategies for coping.

You must get it into your head that he's married and always was. He has made his choice and he's chosen his wife and children. It was always long distance relationship and perhaps this made it easier for both you and him to turn the relationship into something that it wasn't.

I'm sorry if my words are blunt - I do feel for you - but you have put your happiness into the hands of someone that was not able to deliver the goods. You knew he was married but you still thought it was OK to continue a long distance emotional affair with him.

By all means grieve and talk to your friends, but you need to accept that it's over and begin the process of moving forward with your life.

Therapy is always really helpful. I practice what I preach with my own extreme hardships I faced. The therapy that has helped me the most was EMDR. It desensitizes you to trauma so that your emotions do not get the better part of you and you can function.

Never would I have thought going to therapy would help, but in a matter of months, you will see a different person in yourself--and you may need this for your mental survival. Once a week at least is a good start. There are many emotions that you carry around with you that need processing and need to be put at peace. This peace is what will make you happy.

I hate to say this, but you are your own worst enemy. You are 47, not a teenager anymore, married. Your online friend is also married, also not a teenager, and the father to 10 children. What are you thinking!!

I'm sorry I don't feel sorry for you. Rather, I see that you would likely do anything to break up his marriage, destroy his family, cheat on your husband, and for what?

What makes you think that you cannot control yourself. Why are you so helpless to see the damage this is doing.

Concentrate on your marriage first. If you cannot find a way to make it work through counselling, then get out, and let your husband get on with his life. Let the past stay in the past, and leave the friend alone. He has his own marriage to work on, let alone the responsibility to raise 10 children.

Think of others here. That you have no self respect or values, should not put you in a place where it is okay to destroy other people's lives. If you have personal problems, get to a doctor, get into therapy. Figure out what it is in you that is lacking, and fix it.

I do hope you have happiness, or find happiness, but not at the expense of your husband, you friend, his wife, and their 10 children.