Christmas can be rough at the best of times, but throw in a deeply complicated love affair and you’re guaranteed to spend the holidays crying into a mince pie.
This week’s Sex Column reader is praying for a Christmas miracle that might never come.
She’s deeply in love with a married man, and totally devastated that despite promising to leave the family home, he’s spending yet another holiday with his wife and young child.
To quote the iconic film ‘When Harry Met Sally’: ‘I don’t think he’s ever going to leave her.’
But this reader isn’t giving up, and she’s willing to go to extreme lengths to get what she wants.
Read Laura’s advice below, but before you do, check out last week’s dilemma, from someone who knows all too well about the phrase ‘too close for comfort.’
The problem…
I’m about to spend yet another Christmas on my own because my boyfriend still hasn’t left his wife. He promised me last year that he’d do it, and that I wouldn’t be spending another festive season without him. But to no one’s surprise, he’s still with her and their now four-year-old son.
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I won’t be spending the holidays completely alone because I’m going home to my family — but my sister is married with two kids, my brother and his girlfriend will be there, and my parents have been married for 37 years.
So yet again I’ll be surrounded by people playing happy families while I put on a cheery smile and pretend to be enjoying myself, when deep down I’m miserable.
I know it’s crazy to get involved with a married man, but my boyfriend keeps on saying he’s unhappy at home and wants to leave his wife for me. He says that he and his partner lead separate lives and the only thing that has stopped him leaving already is his young child. He says he feels guilty and that every time he goes to leave, the thought of his little boy stops him.
We are having a very passionate affair and I love this guy with all my heart. He says he loves me too, so please don’t tell me to end the affair because I really can’t. What I need advice on, is how to get him to leave his wife.
I have so much to give and know that we could be so happy together. I would never expect him to cut off contact with his child and know I would be a great step-mum.
Cam girls keep married men company on Christmas
Metro‘s sex and dating reporter Alice Giddings recently spoke with two cam girls who regularly chat with married men and dads on Christmas Day — making sure they don’t feel ‘neglected’ during the festive season.
Emily Mai, 36, balances the holidays by caring for her two children while simultaneously sexting anywhere from 40 to 200 men.
‘There are guys who are married and have kids but just need a moment to themselves on Christmas morning,’ Emily tells Metro.
She adds: ‘Then there’s the single guys in their fifties with adult kids who live in another country and aren’t visiting for the holidays. They’re just lonely at the most wonderful time of the year – that’s why I make an effort to talk to them when my kids don’t need me.’
Alix Lynx, 36, another adult content creator, has an equally busy Christmas period, spending December buying festive outfits and removing them in front of a camera, making sure she has plenty of videos pre-recorded in her vault, as well as sexy pictures.
This year she’s had the standard requests of role-playing Mrs Claus and wearing red underwear.
She told Metro: ‘The hustle never stops, I just get more savvy this time of year and bank posts for when I’m away with family,’
The advice…
Sigh. I often wonder why people in your situation write for advice and then say ‘don’t tell me to end the affair’. You know that’s exactly what I’m going to tell you!
There’s a theory that if a person hasn’t left their partner within six months, they’re not going to. And in my experience, that’s more often than not how it turns out.
No doubt your snatched encounters with this guy are thrilling, but he has a child who he clearly doesn’t want to leave.
Even if it’s true that he and his wife lead separate lives, it’s frequently the case that a person doesn’t end their marriage because they desperately want to be with their lover, but because they find life at home so unbearable. My guess is, if he found his domestic set up that awful, he’d have left by now.
Don’t waste time worrying about how to get him to leave his wife; instead, concentrate on finding the courage to end your relationship, because that’s what you must do.
Start by telling those close to you that you need to break up with this guy, and ask them to support you. Make a new life away from him — join clubs and dating apps, and force yourself to cut him off completely. No remaining ‘just friends’, if necessary, change your phone number. He may not want to let you go, but you have to get him out of your life.
You will love and be loved again – but to really give yourself the best chance, please avoid married men.
It’s time to start afresh with someone free to give you the love and commitment you’re desperate for.
