MANILA, Philippines ? Dear Emily,
I?m 43, have a dream family, a good job in a government agency and have lived an honest life so far, save for one weakness?women.
My wife once said I was attractive to women. True. I have taken advantage of it and that makes me a jerk, I know. It would be so simple if it were only sex that was involved. But that is where my problem begins.
I am now in a full-blown year-long affair. She is a year older than me, separated with four grown kids. She is good-looking, intelligent and a very good conversationalist.
When we met, her children were about to migrate to the United States to join their father.
I became the shoulder that she cried on after her children left, the one she called on those days when she felt all alone.
From being a predator, I became her lover. I fell in love with her to the point of seriously considering finding a place for the two of us.
I realized that what I was doing was grossly unfair to my family, especially to my wife. She had some inkling that something was amiss when she found a text message from the other woman in my cell phone. Of course, I denied everything.
It was then that the reality of the affair hit me.
I take pride in planning well both for my profession and personal life. I have a good career and I am well respected in my workplace. Though my pay is government scale, with my wife?s salary my family has a nice middle-class existence.
This affair, however, bothers me. I find it hard to prepare an exit plan without hurting those involved?the other woman, my wife and myself.
I grabbed the opportunity to work abroad for a year when it presented itself. It was a career move surely, but I saw it more as a chance to untangle the mess I was in.
These women are important to me and I know deep in my heart that the right thing to do is to end this affair.
I am almost done with my posting abroad and I intend to come home clean, cleansed, with this affair ended. I have reduced my communications with her, blocked her calls and barely responded to her e-mail and messages.
But she continues her text messages and love letters by e-mail. She expects me to return to her. I cannot bring myself to tell her that we are through.
I am now rebuilding my relationship with my wife and have planned an extensive tour on our way home. We tenderly refer to this as ?Project Fetch Me.?
My wife does not know that she is fetching me not only from my foreign posting but also from the morass I am in.
My exit plan is another thing altogether. I cannot bear to tell the other woman that our affair has effectively ended when I left the country.
Her state of mind is so fragile. She is all alone now and she always told me I was the only one left worth living for. I worry that I may drive her to suicide if we break up.
I ask God to help me resolve this foolishness I have committed and get me out of this situation.
LOST IN A COLD FOREIGN LAND
Your letter says two things about you. First, that you have awakened from your years of being a jerk and second, that you truly love your wife and family in the deepest recesses of your sex-addled mind.
And now you are planning to make an omelet but are afraid to break the eggs? Ummmh...
Do you know of any non-messy way?
The best way to solve a problem is to go straight to the point, short and sweet. Treat it as any malignancy in your body that has to be cut off? cleanly and quickly.
The pain could be unspeakably horrible?but the suffering will be short. Sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind.
If this woman is truly intelligent she should have factored in your status from the start! She may be single again but you are not, my good man!
Unless you promised her the moon and the planets during your most intimate moments, she knew she was not getting a free man who would spend the rest of his life with her.
Breakups can drive some lovers to suicide. The pain is so unbearably physical that the thought of death becomes a very attractive option. But you are not God!
No amount of pills or bullets can end her life if it is not meant to be. Do not flatter yourself that she would die because of you.
It will only happen if her time has really come.
What is great about this whole episode is you learned many lessons along the way as you were untangling yourself from the ?morass? you got yourself into.
There is no better student than a reformed self-confessed jerk!
E-mail the author at emarcelo@inquirer.com.ph, Subject: Lifestyle, or send your letters to Inquirer. Log on to www.pbs.gov.ph and listen to Ms Marcelo co-host the program ?Kalikasan Vigilante,? 7:15-8:30 pm, Monday-Friday, on dwBR 104.3 FM.
