Losing the cats.
Losing my mother-in-law.
Losing the marriage I believed in and cherished...

Losing my innocence.

(((((((((((((((((((((TML))))))))))))))))))))))

Seeing him treat me like we were never close in our lives...
Thinking he never did love me one bit...
Seeing him happy...
Losing the person I thought would always have my back...

I agree with wishinwell...having him act as if we are total strangers is a killer. thinking of how he will probably be happier without me despite how many years i tried to keep the family together. him putting the blame on me for not being able to "get over" his affairs.

It's been 3 years since my ex left too. The pain isn't that bad for the most part. But one thing that did hurt was him taking the kids to see a Christmas lights display with her kids. That's something that he did with her the first Christmas he left....and well....it still stings.

It's the sort of thing that I was always wanting to do as a family....and he never seemed to be able to fit it in, or if he did, it was at a really really high cost to me.

What hurts the most is the not knowing, what went wrong, why, and wondering if he feels the same way.

what hurts me now is to see that she has a man who is giving her the world on a silver platter. she is like a little girl frolicking in it with very little responsibility. eventually though, she will tire of him, find something wrong with him too as she always has, and dump him too.

men are merely means to an end with women like that.

after reading my comment, i see that what hurts me now is my own reluctance to just let it go and accept that it is truly over. i guess the bitterness is somehow preferable to the emptiness of such a huge loss.

faithfull, you are right. there is something very protective about bitterness and anger. it can also be motiviating. emptiness is much harder.

TML, why don't you try no contact. Are you divorced after all this time? If yes, you need to start referring to her as your ex-wife, not at your wife. She has moved on, as mine did, but, if you don't accept that she is living a different life then you, it will sting forever....

Sending you good thoughts.

The only thing that still stings is that my ex told me he had not been in love with me since our son turned 4 years old (he is 20 now) which means my ex wasted the best years of my dating life in a marriage that was a sham, he wasted the career building years of my life taking care of a family that was a lie.

I am letting all that go though, making a brand new start in 2012. I cannot regret the past, I can only move forward or else I will get "stuck".

Hang in there and quite getting invovled in her personal life, even if it means telling the kids you don't want to hear about what their mother is doing....

I don't have any hurt left I don't think,
but I imagine if I saw him
or he contacted me
or I ran into him again
that it would HURT

it makes me hurt when i look back to any given year of the past 20 ones, when i look at pictures of our happy family or when a song, a smell, a place takes me back in time, it hurts when a memory enters my brain......yes, i still hurt very much whenever i look back
thats why if i am to survive, i am left with no choice but only look ahead....
i have to learn to forget, its like having "selective" amnesia (the medical term is anterograde amnesia, after a head trauma) and starting to build my memories all over again...

If she would have boyfriends while married to you would feel any better?
Everybody has to go through some kind of difficulties in their life. I was never able to leave my husband and he was never able to leave me but I had several affairs. It probably hurts him too but I was hurt for years by the fact that he was not sexualy attracted to me (which was always obvious).
We still are struggling with it (for 2 years). This year I did not try to look for anything more too because I feel like brocken toy too. I feel like I do not have energy to remain in marriage and do not have energy to look for new relations too.

sometimes, we forget that our life with our exes was just one role of many that we have. we also have roles as sons, daughters, fathers, mothers, employees, friends, neighbors, etc. since our ex abandoned their role, sooner or later we have to abandon our equivalent role because there is no one to dance with. since they left the dance, we have to leave it too.

Being called bitter and abusive and having g the whole shebang blamed on me. But especially today I'm hurt because I have to put my sweet, sweet dog to sleep today. And being told by him that I don't care. All I can do is cry, and hope I have the strength to do what's right.

when a young child is first told that Santa is'nt real, when same child realizes the Easter bunny really doesn't leave chocolate eggs, or that the tooth fairy is not going to pay anymore $.
when you realize that your cowboy hero, is really an actor, and there are no 6 guns that shoot 15 times with out loading. When your best dog ever in the whole wide world gets run over in front of you and limps, broken and bloodied to die in your arms, when your Grandfather lay in his death bed and rubs your head, the same way he did when you were a kid, cept now your 45yrs old.
Yea it still hurts, not as severe as those, but maybe for a longer duration, To believe so strongly in another human being and to have that belief ripped to shreds with the "I want a divorce" phrase.
I see her from time to time, I do my best to ignore her completely, then later, look back, look at now, and look to the future, all which seem hollow, unforgiving and vast with little hope for safe haven or rest. I suppose we all have a small amount of love for the ones who walked away, ran away or were never there to begin with, I wish her no ill will, nor do I wish her happiness. Thats something that hurts, being indifferent is better than hating her, but wondering how and why, are things I hate, and so I do hurt.
I got used to Santa being unreal, do not even like chocolate much anymore, wish to heck the tooth fairy would pay a few dentist bills, and heck, all the cowboys are gone, had other dogs die, maybe not as graphic, but still heart wrenching, Grandpa is preparing a spot for me, I hope. I grew up those things, I will grow up from this, what does not kill us makes us stronger, well the good people on this board who have been to hell and back, LOL better not be anyone challenge us to a tug of war using emotions as the rope, we would kick their a$$