Woman wants to move to a different city with husband to avoid BIL. UPDATED 3X
"I'm asking my husband to move to another city so I can avoid my BIL."
My, f39 husband m50 of 11 years and his sister f41 are very close. We meet her and her husband BIL m40 all the time.
Sunday dinner is always with them at our or their place, occasionally other family members join us from my or my husband's side of the family but the constant is us four (and SIL's 3 children). I get along very well with SIL and BIL. we never had issues.
I started having feelings for BIL about 5 years ago. I know people here would call it "emotional affair" but it wasn't , yet. I kept it very secret and nobody noticed. I love my husband very much and I don't want to ruin our beautiful marriage.
We are awesome together and our bond is strong. My feelings for BIL were very confusing at first and I went years without realizing what they were because I love my husband so how can I love another.
When BIL turned 40. They had a big party and I stayed after to clean because SIL had to take care of the children so it was me and BIL cleaning. He was still a bit tipsy and he told me what I was afraid of. That he's been in love with me since I married my husband.
I was shocked. He has always been nice to me and complimented me but I never felt anything more. I tried to ignore him so he said it again. I told him to go to bed, he tried to argue but I insisted that he went to bed and let me clean by myself.
He probably knows that I love him too because of something he said. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we stopped pretending and just told them? We only live once. HOW DID HE KNOW? I cried for weeks afterwards and when my husband saw that I was sad he was very concerned and was so nice to me and it made me cry even more. The guilt is physically painful. I have developed ulcers.
This happened last summer and ever since I've tried to avoid seeing SIL and BIL. With how frequent we met before there was never one good excuse. Soon my husband was irritated with me accusing me of not liking his family.
SIL called a few times to wonder. Now she has started saying that I wanted to come between her and her brother because I never liked their closeness. I go to the dinners and ignore BIL all together and SIL is mad that it feels like I hate her when I actually love her like a sister.
My husband got a new job offer a city that's 20 hours away. I want him to take it. But its in a very small town and he is surprised that I a "renowned" city girl want to move to a small town. I don't know what to do. I want my husband to take this job but I don't know how to convince him.
BIL texted me begging not to do it and he promised not to bother me again but just not to move away. Tt doesn't sit well with me. As long as it was one sided it felt less serious but now it feels like an emotional affair and I don't want to be in it. why can I do?
Before we give you OP's updates, let's take a look at some of the top responses:
rhapsody44 writes:
Years ago, I, a married woman, developed feelings for a good friend of both myself and my husband. He is also married. I wouldn’t necessarily call it love, but it was one Hell of a crush.
I did the only thing I could think of. I told my husband “I can’t hang out with him anymore, here’s why.” He lived a couple of hours away, so it was easier to find excuses. I always had to work, we couldn’t find a babysitter...
My husband was understanding, gave me quite a bit of teasing, and allowed me to back away gracefully from the friendship.
It took three years for my feelings to go away, and even then it was because my husband came back from a visit and told me our friend had picked up smoking (again, after years and years of quitting), which is a huge turn off for me.
I don’t know your marriage or your situation, I don’t know if being honest with your husband about your BIL and why you want him to take the job would help or not. But I think my situation was made easier because my husband and I have complete trust with each other over the fact that neither of us would ever cheat.
jwords writes:
I don't think that's love you're experiencing. That's attraction. Love is something you DO. Love is something you choose to feel and do for another person after knowing them completely. I don't think you and BIL know each other completely.
You see each other weekly, yes, but you only ever see each other in happy situations when the four of you are having dinner together and it's a good time. He hasn't seen you at your worst, and you haven't seen him at his worst.
Your husband has seen you at your worst. And he still chooses you. Vice versa, you for your husband. That's love. You and your husband choosing each other every day, even after having seen each other at the lowest points of your lives.
The attraction that you and BIL feel for each other--that's all it is. Attraction. So far you've been great at not acting upon it. Now that you know the attraction is mutual, something needs to be done to kill it if you want to preserve your relationship with your husband.
My suggestion? Open the discussion up with your husband. Casually talk to him about feeling attraction for another person, and how you have actively avoided acting upon it because you love him. Ask him for his opinion/guidance on what would be the best approach to killing an attraction to someone else.
Your husband sounds supportive and perhaps wise. I think he's old enough to understand that just because you love each other, it doesn't mean you can't ever experience an attraction to someone else. I think he might understand and even appreciate your honesty and integrity (for not acting on an attraction).
Update 1:
I was here a week ago (read that post because I will not repeat my story). I honestly didn't expect to be so judged and hated. I read my post over and over again, trying to understand where there could have been any misunderstanding about me being interested in acting on my feelings.
There was none so I guess people just wanted to judge which is sad because I have seen how people can be supportive in here.
Anyhow, I stumbled upon a few kind souls that didn't treat me like I was disgusting human garbage so I'm here again with an update because my life just got more complicated and I'm so desperate, Those who read my first post know that I haven't talked to anybody about this.
I want to stress the point that I have never once contemplated acting on my feelings toward BIL not even when he confessed that he had feelings for me. On the contrary, when he told me that he was in love with me I was more adamant to do everything in my power to forget him.
I have never spoken or looked his way since that confession and I'm not planning to ever speak to him again either.
After my post I had a talk again to my husband about the job in the little town. I told him that I wanted the new adventure, especially when it came with a 25% increase in his salary and a higher up position. My husband has been complaining about how he isn't advancing in his career in our city.
I told him that this could be the step he needed. I'm a nurse, and I could easily fins jobs anywhere we went because we have a shortage in healthcare staff everywhere. The idea started to grow on him, he was skeptical because of the distance to our families but he was intrigued.
He booked a job interview that is supposed to happen on Wednesday. If he took the job we would be relocating around new year. I was so hopeful that I could finally breathe.
Today is Sunday and it was, per usual, the day we meet up with family for dinner. this did't happen this week however and I'm spending this Sunday alone. My husband is staying with SIL because earlier this week BIL broke the news to her that he wanted a divorce.
SIL is beside herself with shock and my husband is there to try and mediate between her and her husband. BIL is refusing to talk to any of them and has only been there twice to see the kids.
My husband told me now that he couldn't take this job because he needed to stay here and support his sister. I understand where he is coming from but for me all the horror and anxiety is back. What can I do? I feel trapped like the walls are closing in around me.
I can't tell my husband my true reasons. I have tried so many times but I just can't do it. I love him so much and I know him very well.
He will be hurt and devastated . We have had issues throughout our marriage with him not being able to preform due to health problems and we haven't had sex in over 8 years. He is so self conscious about. I just can't hurt him about something like this.
I think my options now are to stay put and support my husband and SIL. If they (BIL&SIL) can save their marriage in any way then maybe my husband could find a new job opportunity in another city in the future and agree to move. If they divorce, then I won't be seeing BIL any more.
Update 2:
I don't know how I feel about this. It is probably too early for me to do this horrible thing when my SIL just got separated but I don't see any improvement in the horizon. (please read my other posts for context but if you don't want to SIL and BIL has separated about a month ago and my husband has been busy being SIL's support).
When my husband told me he was not taking the job up north because of SIL's marital problems, I understood that and was supportive. We have always been close to my SIL and my husband loves his sister and her children.
I always admired their bond because I was never this close to my family. He stopped spending weekends with me and instead staying with SIL and the children and even several days a week when he doesn't even text me after work that he was spending the evening with the children.
I didn't mind it because this is all new and SIL isn't coping well after the separation. I told my husband that I missed him though, and that I wanted to be with him and maybe I should tag along some days. He said that I was being selfish for wanting the attention now.
His sister needed the support I should be more understanding. She and BIL have been together since they were very young and she wasn't adjusting well with these new changes. I felt horrible and so selfish. I thought that I should be supportive.
Every Christmas, on Boxing Day, my husband and I travel to somewhere warm and spend 2-3 weeks. It has been our tradition since we met. We book this trip months early (April). Yesterday when I was talking about our trip, my husband was so surprised.
He said that he was actually astonished that I thought that we would just go on with our plans when SIL's life is turned upside down. I told him that this was our thing and that his sister has her own family. I wanted my family, HIM.
I told him that I fully understood that she needs his support but that I've been very lonely lately. He told me to drop the subject.
Today I chatted with the traveling agency to see if I could add my SIL and her children. I thought that maybe it would be a good change of climate. Well they would have to take a separate flight but other than that it was possible even with such short notice to add them so I called my husband to tell him the news.
He was very excited. when he came home later, he told me that his sister didn't agree however so we are staying. I asked him why and he said that she didn't want to be around "happy couples" right now. It was all I could do to hold back my tears.
When my husband got that job offer in the small town up north, I started browsing job opportunities and I sent my CV around. One hospital answered me a week ago. I think I want to take the job.
After what happened today I just logged in and made an appointment for a job interview. I know that my SIL is hurting and that my husband is admirable for being there for her.
This is all just so new for everyone and a big life change for SIL and her children but I feel like I'm no 2 in my own life. I feel neglected and like I have the supporting role in my own movie.
I'm leaving my husband. I'm taking the new job and I will go with the plans and move to that small town and get away from everything and everyone. I think I need this new start. Judge me all you want. I know you will.
Update 3:
Thank you so much everyone, I never expected the amount of the heartwarming comments and the awards. I have been crying since yesterday reading your beautiful DM's.
I felt like some of you hit the nail on many details that I have left out and I'm astounded and even scared that some of you seemed to know my innermost thoughts and fears but then I remember that nobody who knows me in person knows any of this.
I love my husband, I will probably never love anyone like I love him but yes, I have been very unhappy for a long time. As I said I always admired my husband for the love he has for his sister.
He basically raised her because their parents were having issues and she was left for him to raise when he was a child himself. His warmth and compassion is what made me fall for him but does it make sense that it is also what's making me miserable?
I have always known I'm his second but I have always thought that this will change with time. First I thought because I'm not family and after I became his wife I thought because we dont have children.
When SIL started having children I felt that I was pushed down the ladder of my husbands priorities. I have told him this before and he just told me I was being ridiculous "competing" with children.
I remember telling him that it wasn't just that. We should be each other's priority because even if his sister loves him, he is not her priority and never will be because she has a family now.
We never agreed on this matter. I felt like there was some truth in what he said too, I was competing with children and his sister, besides I thought he would be there when I needed him.
Except he wasn't. my mental health has been declining this year but he wasn't as warm and compassionate as I always known him to be, the very things that made me so much in love with him. And these past months since BIL confessed his feelings, my husband never once tried to listen to me.
Never once he tried to understand why I didn't want to join them for the usual Sunday dinner and never once told me he was staying with me instead since I obviously didn't want to go, on the contrary, it became something he was bothered about even with my body physically reacting to my mental state. I have developed ulcers and lost crazy amounts of weight and hair.
I guess him cancelling the Christmas trip was just the straw. I love him but I can't anymore. I have spoken to him today before he went to his sister. I told him that he has known for months now that I'm unhappy and that I wanted to leave this city.
I told him that I couldn't do it anymore and I apologized that I chose this very inconvenient time when his sister is suffering but that I couldn't do it anymore. He looked at me and was silent and the disappointment in his eyes just broke me.
He said that he couldn't believe that I have no compassion what so ever when a family member is suffering and yet I still want to go about my life as usual.
Would the world end if we skipped our tradition ONCE when he is needed somewhere else. I started crying because I couldn't reach out to him and yes if simplified he is in the right.
This looks like me sulking about a trip. I told him that I couldn't do this anymore. we are talking past each other and none of us wants to understand the other. He left. He texted me now that he never thought me to be selfish and that if I should do what I see fit. He will not stand in my way. I don't know if he will be coming back.