Iâm and Italian 40 years old âgirlâ. Two years ago, after what I thought had been 10 blissful years of marriage, I became attracted by a friend that I used to run with (we belong to a running group). Besides running together, we had exchanged email addresses and started chatting on computer, thus getting to know and appreciate each other more and more. Nothing physical happened for about a year. Let me tell you, before I go on, that for 13 years, together with my husband, I belonged to a very strong religious community (Latter Day Saints). Our whole life turned around the church, but I was happy about it. My husbandâs job kept him out of town during the day. We hadnât had children, notwithstanding all our attempts (included in vitro fertilization and adoption, for which we were supposed to wait two more years).
Anyway, when I figured out I had fallen in love with A. I candidly talked about it with my husband: probably, had he shown some jealousy, things might have ended differently, but he acted as if I were ill, and in a way I felt myself as if it were sort of a bug that I couldnât get rid of... In the end, I decided to take a trip abroad and spend a month with friends belonging to the same religious group, also getting psychological help. When I came back I though I was whole again, but the very next day I felt compelled to go and find A. He had had a rotten month himself, unsuccessfully trying to forget me, so in the end things got even worse and our relationship became also physical, leading, in about 6 months, to breaking up with our spouses and going to live together. Nevertheless, things havenât been exactly perfect since then: daily living together brought up the sides of our personalities that hadnât shown during our âperfect storyâ, but the main reason was, and still is, that I canât help but live with huge feelings of guilt for having abandoned a man that loved me with all his heart and adored whatever I did, plus my religion, whose standard I wasnât living up to anymore.
I actually donât miss neither of them, I just feel like sh** because of what I did: this makes me act childlike toward A: on one side I feel that heâs all that is left in my life and cling to him constantly, making him feel pressed and breathless; on the other hand, I constantly feel that I should end our relationship, but I love him deeply: itâs just that I canât live this story in a relaxed, serene way. Iâm aware that in any case things could go back to what they used to be, but still I canât help acting the way I do (feeling bad, making him sense it, and, thus, questioning our relationship and putting it to trial).
I need his CONSTANT attention and love, to be cuddled constantly, and if, for a day, I feel like heâs not paying attention to me, I start making up stories that hopefully will get him jealous, so that heâs interested in me again. But these things only make him angryâ¦
I didnât use to be that way with my husband at all, but after all my husband was dependent on my love as much as Iâm now dependent on my new partnerâs love (infact I find myself saying and doing many things that my husband used to tell me, live âI need youâ, or âI canât live without youâ).
I got to the conclusion that Iâm codependent, but is it possible to start being such from one day to the other?
What really confuses me is that I had great parents, who loved and took care of me, but I know I lack self confidence and self esteem, all the same.
Please, help me.
E.
Saving 
