"We've been discovered," she said, when I picked up the phone. "He called me to tell me he wouldn't be seeing me again. The wife was sitting next to him cursing me, threatening to tell my children. It was horrible! I knew it would end, but not like this."
At 57, Gloria had been single for 10 years after a bruising divorce. She had supported her daughter through graduate school and then gave her living expenses while the girl searched for a seemingly nonexistent job. Gloria had told me many times that she felt tired, alone and invisible to society at large.
Then, he came along. Married for 30 years, he said he and his wife were travelling different paths. He adored his children and the life he'd built. He was proud of what he had accomplished and made it clear that he was not about to leave it. He couldn't. It would devastate his children. However empty the content of the marriage, it looked just fine on the outside and he was going to keep it that way.
They met each other at work, he a doctor, she a nurse. A hospital is a big place and people sitting in the cafeteria having coffee don't attract a great deal of attention. There was the occasional lunch, but with their schedules and obligations, it was hard to slip away. It was mostly a telephone call and text relationship. The contacts were brief, but comforting and anticipated. The sex, she said was infrequent and not the centre of it. It was the friendship, the attention, the sense of re-emergence into the world. The few minutes of contact each day allowed her to feel alive again. Now, she feels like she's dying. Didn't she know it could end like this?
What must the wife be going through? Betrayed, humiliated, threatened that her marriage is at risk, she had told him that she would never get a divorce. She had friends who were divorced and they were alone, miserable and counting every penny. No! That wasn't for her. She liked her life and wanted to keep it. Did she really think that making his life a living hell would help their marriage?
Many years ago, a woman I was seeing was torn between her husband and another man. Her husband suspected this to be the case. One night he approached her and said, "I know you are thinking about making a choice in your life. Choose me. I love you and our family. I will do whatever I can to recapture your love. Choose me." She did. How wise he was to approach her this way!
If only my client had been wise enough to tell the doctor, "I'd love to see you, but only if you are unattached." If only the doctor had the wisdom not to take on a parallel relationship. If only the wife had been wise enough to say, "Choose me." If only we could anticipate the possible endings before we begin. If only...
