The sad truth

I haven't posted for months because I have been too confused to have anything to say. I'm sure many peope would judge or pity me for not knowing exactly what to do: GET OUT. It's much simpler when it's just conceptual. I have to throw so much away. I've been with the Addict since 1988. 34 years. Most of my adult life. I've had a child, bought a house, gone through parenting, a lifetime of wonderful experiences and memories, discovery in 2007 and repair process, the most formative things and the most wonderful things. I thought I had a one-in-a-million love. It's a lot to let go of. I'm not going to answer to anyone for my process. It's mine. As yours is yours. What I want to talk about is what I'm feeling now, 9 months after I discovered, again, that the Addict was betraying me with prostitutes. Right now, I'm feeling depressed. I feel like I'm being taught, AGAIN, that I am the only thing in this world I can count on. Really not true, as I have great friends that love me and support me. But I have no safe harbor where I can relax and not be the person providing all the structure and holding everything together. It's not even just the Addict. It's my dad, my mom, the discovery in 2007, the discovery in January 2022. Over and over, I keep having to learn that nobody is really there for me. I'm alone, and I'm the only thing I can count on. It is lonely and heartbreaking. I thought the Addict and I had repaired and that I had that safe harbor with him. But, not the case. Another thing I'm feeling: I'm not enough. There are logical reasons for why the Addict did what he did that have nothing to do with me and only to do with his fucked-up-ness. But experientially, I am left with the experience that whatever I could bring to our relationship was insufficient, deficient, not enough to fill the emptiness inside the Addict. It's not my job to fill his void, but I didn't know until recently that this void was there. I was just mystified by how different his experience of our relationship was from mine. But that void, the one I didn't know about, explains it. I was never going to be enough because no person can fill that spiritual void. That's his journey. Intellectually, I understand. Experientially, I'm left with the feeling that everything I brought, everything I gave, who I am--it was not enough. So a lot of pain and grief in this moment. Do I regret my decision in 2007 to see if our relationship was repairable? No. I was able to give my son a happy childhood. Son and I were blissfully unaware of the Addict's continued secret life. We were happy. But now, it's a lot of heartbreak. What I would say now: Do not hope for a good outcome in a relationship with a sex addict who has lied to you. My experience is that a person like this is too broken and fixing will take a lifetime of willingness and work, and at best they will be holding the beast at bay. I don't know yet what I'm going to do, but I'm leaning toward letting my relationship of 34 years--my life--go. I can't trust him to be a safe harbor for me. I can't be 100% real with him because he's not 100% real with me. Even after 34 years. There is so much going on in his head that I'm not part of. It's exhausting to think about contending with that for the rest of my life. It fucking breaks my heart to let go, but I don't see anything else that makes sense. I'll be fine. I'm strong. I'm independent. I was just hoping that there was more to life than being strong and independent and, in the most intimate ways, alone.