Not the only one!

by samantha wishart
(port douglas australia)

I am on the tail end of a fifeteen month old affair: never in my life have I felt such pain: everyone says walk away but the damage a lying cheating married man can do is a very hard thing to recover from. I had just come out of 3 years of cancer treatment a failed relationship and a lost pregnancy when I met him. The day we met he was doing some electrical work at the house I was staying and as I was feeding the horses one of them threw me: he nursed and dressed my wounds and asked over coffee if he could come back tomorrow and have breakfast with me.

For several weeks we had coffee, breakfast and lunch: he never told me he was married: then i invited him to a party and he confessed he had a "partner" who I later discovered was a "wife". I was very hurt and angry as I really fell for the guy: after three weeks of not seeing him he called me and said he couldn't bare not seeing me and could we talk: all the usual stuff: his wife and he were unhappy, they slept in seperate ends of the house and were discussing divorce, he couldn't bare to be without me: blah, blah blah.

I think what hurts the most is that I am usually an intelligent wise woman: I once sacked a company director of mine for kissing me when he was married: this one however was so good at charm and lies I fell completely for all he said.

Worse is that I live in a very small town and people found out about our affair and as is so typical I was called a whore, slut, and worse. Out of loyalty to him I defended him and his character on many occassions and lost several friendships for doing so. I couldn't believe what people would tell me about him and what they accused me of as a result of being involved with him.We seperated for three months but he came back into my life again saying it was too hard not to see me and to be my friend. and it was hard as i would see him everywhere I went: hazards of living in a small town!

For the past 5 months he had been calling me daily, e-mailing me late at night, texting me sometime 9 times a day: it has been very hard for me to be just friends and to try and respect his choice to stay in his marriage. I adore the man and love how I feel when we are together, but hate how it feels when he goes home to the wife. Three weeks ago he made a sexual pass at me and I turned him down: he apologised and said he was being a stupid male and begged me not to stop seeing him as a result of this. I felt it was getting too hard and confessed that I still had feelings for him and as a friend I would hope he could pull back a little and stop hugging me and touching me becasue it was hurting me too much.
He then begged me to stay friends, said he valued me and my friendship and after an hour of this said "IF MY WIFE FINDS OUT ABOUT US SHE WILL TAKE ME FOR EVERYTHING" I was horrified: a) If I were the type to tell his wife in fifieteen months I would have done so b) it dawned onme that he had been playing me the entire time just to protect his interests: that he never really loved, cared or valued me or my friendship.

I am devastated, furious and deeply hurt that my loyalty, trust and reputation has been damaged by a man who is nothing more than a predator and a sociopath. AND YES I WANT REVENGE: especially considering his wife phone stalked me and I suspect it was her who keyed my car 6 times as there is no one else who could possibly have issue with me. She is 14 years older than her husband and a very sour bitter woman.

I no longer can even go out in a town which has been my home 3 times longer than it has been home to this man without being reminded of him, seeing him or being bad mouthed by people who should know me better and I don't know what to do with myself over it all.

CAN ANYONE HELP?!!!!