You are welcome Oksana! I was hoping I could be of assistance to you in one way or the other.

Three things. First, you say that you are a woman who has learned much from all of this. Terrific! What did you learn? Was it wisdom? If it was, how will you apply that wisdom to help you in this situation?

Second, you might consider shifting your paradigm around this issue. I can tell you how I have learned to experience more happiness, freedom and less baggage in my own life. I did it by making a fundamental paradigm shift. I had to switch from placing the responsibility for happiness on other people and return it the only place it belongs: myself. I bring this point up because I notice that you contrast your husband’s approach to you with the new man’s. The implication is that “what gets you going” is dependent on what someone else (in this instance, a man) does or doesn’t do. When it comes down to it, what gets any of us going – into happiness, joy, and freedom – is how we choose to relate to ourselves, our thoughts and our world. We can wait on other people to behave in the ways we believe will make us happy. That seems to be how most of the world thinks! But I have noticed that the way of the world isn’t working well in creating happy lives and neither is yours, hence your post here. Your husband, your children and inevitably your new man, will all let you down if you place the weight of the responsibility for your moods squarely onto their shoulders. It’s a burden none of us can bear! But the good news is that happiness and mood management are inside jobs, meaning you can do it for yourself, right here, right now! There are many techniques you can use to generate all the happiness you could want, all with or without a husband and a lover on the side. YES YOU CAN! :) The truest joy is the kind the world (anyone outside of ourselves) can’t give.

The next shift you could consider involves how you see your husband in all this. Are you sure you are as unconnected to him as you believe you are? For someone so unconnected, you sound as if you know him pretty well. You know his habits, how he thinks, how he is likely to respond and so on. Perhaps you are unconnected to the fantasy husband, the one you wish your actual husband was. Is your fantasy husband one that reflects your ideal self (the person you think you are or would like to be) while your actual husband might, just might, complement your actual self? And if there is any confusion about who you actually are, just look at your actions. You also said in your previous comment that your husband wants to work things out with you. That doesn’t sound like a husband who is disconnected from his wife to me. You’d know when he was truly disconnected by the sound of the door slamming as he walked out of your life for good. Couldn’t there be more connection there then you think?

Third and finally, you could try an imaginative exercise. You could imagine what your perfect outcome would be. Vividly see it in your mind. Who’s there, in this perfect outcome? Who are you with? Where are you living? How are the kids feelings? More importantly, who are you in this perfect outcome, as in, what are you thinking, feeling and doing? Coming out of this imaginative flight of fancy, who would you have to be (thinking, feeling and acting) to make this vision a reality? What steps would you take, right now?

Oksana, I don’t know if your thought processes are on the right track or not. Or rather, I could say they are on the right track because they are what they are. Reality is. But that’s another discussion. Only you know what the right track is or is not. You can look within and without to notice which track your thoughts are really on and whether you wish to stay on it. All I can say is that happiness and freedom aren’t hard. They are just ego free. And to reiterate, I’m not saying you should or should not stay with your husband. None of my comments should be interpreted that way.

I don’t think you are a bad person Oksana. I think you are a loving person. You have a lot of warmth, affection and fun to share! That isn’t a problem, that’s a blessing!