A
male
age
51-59,
anonymous
writes:Dear Aunts and Uncles, Please let me share my question with you which I have discovered by reading up on articles, is labelled as ‘retrograde jealousy.’ I am 47, (male) and my wife 52. We have been married for just over 4 years since 2010. We met online in 2009 and married after 11 months. For my previous relationships, I dated a girl (17) when I was 18 for 3 years, we got engaged, she endured an abortion, (sorry,) and we split up after 6 months of this. I then didn’t have anything long term or meaningful apart from a few LDR’s and just before I met my wife, I was a recently divorced lady’s first ‘nice’ guy for a couple of months. And so I really have had few meaningful or any long term relationships.I met my wife online, messaged for a few weeks, met up, and although the whole day was a great romantic and kissing day, she told me at the end of it that she was not sure about things and so needed to get back home and leave things at that. I was sad about that, but decided that it was her decision so decided to leave her to her decision. Two days later, a text came from her and we then began dating and seeing each other etc.Her story as of when we met: She has 3 children, all now in their 20’s and 30’s. living away from home. She was divorced after 19 years of marriage and has 3 grand-children from her daughter. She explained she had been having an affair since her divorce with a married man on and off for 6 years. She fell in love with him and hoped and hoped, but it didn’t happen for her. But she kept going back to him like a ‘drug hit.’ During her on and off affair she says she met a few significant others, some used alcohol, (she doesn’t drink) some were not suitable. She then kept going back to her married man because maybe, just maybe, ‘it might be her year.’ Also, during this time, when she had ‘left’ her married man, she contacted one of her girlfriend’s ex-boyfriends and got together with him and he left her with an STI. This then involved contacting past lovers etc and obviously her married man was one of them and so they eventually got back to the affair again. She told me all of this around two months into our dating. I do feel sad to hear about ‘previous’ lovers so she told me information like this but not in depth. I didn’t ask her, she simply told me one evening when we were together. I respected what she had told me, haven’t mentioned it to anybody, (this site is the first to know) and wanted to keep dating her because I liked her, I was attracted to her and enjoyed life. I feared the married man would ‘turn’ her mind one day but although she would be sad at times and had admitted defeat in this, she grew towards me and ‘wanted’ me. We carried on dating and the affair was consigned and forgot about and we married after 11 months of meeting. I enjoy our company, we watch cinema, have holidays, enjoy intimacy, and I love her. (whatever love is!)Now here is my issue: After 4 years of marriage, out of nowhere, I have begun to play out the STI image and what went on. I think of her and this man getting it together. Her ‘girlfriend’ who was the man’s ex too fell out with my wife over it for a while. However, decided to put it behind them to save their friendship.So, if ever her friend rings up, I link her to the STI images. It’s not an issue now with them but I have made up the association.It makes me sick in the stomach, paralyses me when she calls. Further, I keep re-playing this in my mind about what happened and can’t find peace. My wife’s past upsets me. I probably only know about 5% of what happened but have added to the memory with my own thoughts. Her ‘affair’ has never been spoken about since we married, we have never spoken about the STI at all since that first time. We have been enjoying these past 4 years of marriage, yet as I say, out of the blue I have started pondering it and then I ponder her affair and then her ‘previous’ whatever that could be. However, her first husband has never been an issue for me. This doesn’t upset me. I believe this has been affecting me ever since we married but now I am suffering more inside and thinking about it daily. I suffer alone. Can anyone suggest something? It has helped me simply posting this question. I have read a lot of the articles on Dear Cupid and find that I am not alone in my thoughts. Let me make it clear, ‘past is the past’ may be true but it doesn’t help my situation now. ‘Get over it’, ‘pull your socks up’ doesn’t help! You are free to say it, but it won’t help me. I have not mentioned this to my wife, I suffer inside. Nobody has ‘recently’ come out of the woodwork. This just hit me a few weeks ago and has upset me. Could anyone help? I will fill in details on this if needed and also please feel free to say what you feel. Thank you.
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abortion, affair, divorce, engaged, fell in love, jealous, kissing, married man, met online, split up, text Reply to this Question
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reader, anonymous, writes (2 May 2014): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionDear all,
Thank you for relying. I really appreciate your help. Thank you.
Lola33, Thank you. You may be right about something at the bottom of my worries. I will definitely work on this.
wise-guy, you are not too young to advise. I will listen to anybody that takes the time. Thank you, perhaps the conversation with her may help. I feel a little strange to start it up though as it really would be coming out of the blue. However,just writing it out on DearCupid has actually helped.
Caring AuntyA, Thank you for this. Oh I really do sympathize with you. I share your inner struggle and feel a lot of the same agony in my position.
I think my wife's GF was so furious about what happened that they didn't speak for over a year. So, the GF would never bring it up again. They moved on from that. I still make the connection though.
Thank you female anon. You really cheered me up. You are right of course, my wife does love me and the marriage is great.
Thank you again, I will do a follow up in the future just to let you know how things are going and what I did to move forward.
A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (30 April 2014): I think yours is a genuine case that hurts you and you try and understand it. You sound like a really cool guy and I bet she would never dream of been with another past or future.
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A
female
reader, Caring Aunty A  +, writes (29 April 2014):
 There was a small time period between my partner and I that I’d like to forget and not have play over inside my head... We temporarily separated; he ended up living and socialising with some recently bitter separated guys who were dumped by their cheating wives. Here those guys liked to party to put it politely. I saw their destructive influence over him and how he grew to act like a complete shithead towards me. He’d say they were great mates! They were perfect strangers, but for him these guys gave him a sense of confidence to be single again... He is so naïve!
Without going into further detail of our circumstances, this time frame is something I’d rather delete, much like the scene playing over inside your head when this particular girlfriend of your wife rings up. It triggers and provokes negative thought patterns etc!
For me I had expressed my feelings and wishes that where be no contact with these guys again because it triggered bad memories of his conduct towards me at that time. He agreed, understood and life continues with his ‘real friends’.
Personally I eradicate (potential) triggers and negative people from my sphere in the physical sense. This however might be hard to ask of your wife to forego the friendship she has with this particular girlfriend or request her to have very minimal contact with her. It might be time for her to put this friendship behind and save the marriage? You can only try, and work on yourself at the same time.
Meanwhile your retroactive jealousy is about your wife’s past resume of lovers since her divorce, one (casual partner) in particular that keeps playing over like a cracked record. Here you have not accepted her past being the past, and probably discovered you are a man who subconsciously prefers a woman to have less lovers than you!? Especially one without lingering consequence (STI) that appears to have given you side effects, not her?
Yet how would you rate the quality of your marriage overall? Is this worth you attending some personal counselling and using techniques when these negative thoughts come into play?
CAA
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A
male
reader, wise-guy +, writes (28 April 2014):
Call me silly and maybe a little young to address issues of marriage but I am pretty mature for my age. I can only imagine what you're suffering inside, even worse alone - going over things. I know that part if not the marriage part. I remember when a girl I loved admitted to having sexual relationships with other guys and I will admit the thought of it drove me crazy! I just couldn't seem to forget about the conversations we had about it. Have you thought of having a good long talk with your wife about your thoughts and feelings? Not the best conversation to have over dinner I understand, but if the two of you have a good honest long conversation about how you feel about the situation it may help a huge amount - even if you dont know how you feel about it, at least get it out in the open and start some progress. Importantly though is not to make it an argument etc. Just a open and honest talk about things. It's never a good thing to bottle things up inside, hence why I and the other users of this site feel the need to post on this site - So we don't feel hopeless and alone
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A
female
reader, Lola333  +, writes (28 April 2014):
Sometimes, things trigger us and we don't know why. I suspect you are going through something in your life that has little to do with your wife's past, My recommendation is to talk to her about your fears. Say honey, I am feeling insecure out of the blue, and I want to talk to you about this. I also think you should seek individual counseling to get to the bottom of what is really going on.
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