Dear Roe,
I met my husband when I was in my 20s and he was more than 20 years older than me. Although we never had children, we had a happy marriage and he treated me well for over two decades. A few years ago he was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, which has progressively gotten more and more severe. I no longer work as he needs help with day-to-day tasks and he has nobody else to look after him. I feel I owe him this much and I could never abandon him in this condition. He gets very confused most of the time and he’s no longer the person who I fell in love with. Even if he’s still alive, he’s not really there. Recently, I have been feeling very lonely and have been having an affair with another man. Things are going well between us but I haven’t told anyone. On the one hand, I feel like I am betraying my husband after everything he has done for me but at the same time, I need someone who I can have a real emotional connection with. I really think that I could continue this without my husband ever finding out but it feels so wrong knowing he never would have cheated on me.
I'm so sorry that your husband is suffering with Alzheimer's, which is an unspeakably cruel disease. Losing your sense of self and losing your awareness of the people around you, the people who love you, is most people's worst nightmare, and your husband is now experiencing that as his reality. And I'm so sorry that you are suffering, too. This is such a layered, multi-faceted experience of having your partner get sick; the awareness that there is not a cure for this disease; the switch from partner to caregiver; the surrender of your job and work outside the home; and having your partner undergo such a huge transformation. This is a combination of traumatic events some people don't have to cope with over the course of a lifetime – and you are experiencing them all at once. I hope both that you have a therapist and have reached out to an Alzheimer's support group. The website for the Alzheimer Society Of Ireland (alzheimer.ie) has a list of support services and local support groups, so that you can connect with others who have experience with, and truly understand, your experience and this huge life transformation.
It’s obvious that you are feeling guilty about this new relationship, and that you are conflicted about whether this relationship is completely wrong, or justifiable. Unfortunately, my role as an advice columnist is not equal to that of Omniscient and Inarguable Moral Arbiter of The Known Universe. Whatever I tell you, I cannot magically make you feel less conflicted; nor is my opinion going to be shared by everyone. So I can’t tell you what one action is universally “right” and “wrong.”
No one definition or experience of marriage will ever suit everyone
But I can tell you this: Life is complicated. Marriage is complicated. And the definition and understanding of marriage has transformed constantly over time; both individuals and societies have changed its meaning. For some, marriage is about economic matches, or family connections, or stability. For others, marriage is about passion and romance and adventure. For some, marriage is about forming a family with children; for others, it’s about two individual people sharing some parts of their lives while retaining their independence. Marriage was (and sadly, by some still is) considered to be only for straight people, while entire countries have recognised that the joy and commitment and recognition that marriage offers is a right that should be offered equally. People have open marriages, people get divorced, people get remarried, people cheat, people stay in unhealthy marriages to the detriment of everyone involved.
Throughout history, marriage has changed and evolved and varied, and will continue to change and evolve and vary for one simple reason: no one definition or experience of marriage will ever suit everyone. And the reality is that marriage, with its vows of monogamy and lifelong commitment, was invented centuries before people were living into their 70s and being hit with long-lasting, truly destabilising and debilitating diseases. For some people, monogamy is “in sickness and in health”, and if that’s a vow they value and cherish through any form of illness, then they can choose to live up to that value system and everyone should respect their decision.
But for others, in life-changing situations like yours – people for whom the nature of their marriage has transformed so profoundly, people whose partners can no longer offer them physical or emotional or sexual connection, or a sense of intimacy, people who cannot or choose not to leave the relationship, people for whom having outside relationship is the very thing that keeps you sane and allows you to continue to support your partner in the ways you need and want to – I will never judge anyone for that. I think anyone with a shred of empathy should be able to understand that the circumstances of a life and a relationship sometimes change drastically, and allowances and adjustments to how we conceive of those relationships should be allowed to change, too. People leave relationships all the time, for reasons big and small. You’re not even asking for that; you’re just asking that the parameters of your relationship be widened.
The nature of your relationship has already fundamentally changed, in a way neither you nor your husband would have chosen
I’m not arguing for people to abandon the idea of loyalty or fidelity or commitment at the first sign of trouble or illness. I’m arguing for an acknowledgement that it’s fundamentally cruel to demand that someone stay in a marriage and go for years without any form of intimacy because of rules that we have already, repeatedly proven, do not work for everyone.
You have been a loving and loyal wife for decades. You are still supporting your husband and seem committed to doing so. You have become a caretaker to a person who was once an equal partner. The nature of your relationship has already fundamentally changed, in a way neither you nor your husband would have chosen. If now you want to choose to make another change in this relationship; if you want to choose to deprioritise monogamy in order to prioritise your ability to both support and care for your husband; if it is indeed necessary to choose to allow yourself some intimacy and connection in order to emotionally survive this life transformation, then I completely understand. And so should anyone else who cares about you. For those who disagree, they are free to live up to their own values in their own marriages.
But this is your life, and your marriage. Do what you need to. I truly hope this new man brings you joy – you deserve it.
Roe McDermott is a writer and Fulbright scholar with an MA in sexuality studies from San Francisco State University. She is researching a PhD in gendered and sexual citizenship at the Open University and Oxford
If you have a problem or query you would like her to answer, you can submit it anonymously at irishtimes.com/dearroe