Sex File: Should I tell him about my fling?
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I'm not sure how one is supposed to refer to an ex-husband you are reconciling with. The internet throws up options like 'soon-to-be partner again or 'partner in reconciliation' but they are a bit of a mouthful and, since this letter is about your renewed sexual relationship, 'sex-husband' is a bit more fun.
I'm not entirely sure what you mean by "clearing the decks", either. You seem to be interpreting it as being open about your sexual history but, surely, clearing the decks should be about exorcising all that led you to the divorce courts in the first place.
Having said that, your letter is fascinating because it is so rare for a middle-aged couple to go through a divorce, live apart for five years and then decide that they want to get back together.
Until very recently, I would not have been able to give you an accurate idea of quite how rare it is, but at Bowling Green State University in Ohio, Susan Brown and I-Fen Lin have been studying the phenomenon of grey divorce for more than a decade.
They recently published the results of a study which tracked data from 1,115 divorcees, aged 50-plus, over 10 years. Their research found that roughly 7% of women and 11% of men reconciled with their former spouse in that time.
Interestingly, the most likely predictors of reconciliation were not resources or health, as one might expect, and the presence of children or grandchildren actually reduced the chance of reconciliation.
The couples most likely to reunite after divorce had long marriages and continued to enjoy each other's company post-divorce — also rare, I would imagine.
Only you know whether that describes your marriage but, either way, it would be a bit odd if neither of you had explored other sexual relationships in the past five years. Divorce ends the marital contract, so there is absolutely no reason for you to feel guilty about the fact that you had a life-enhancing fling while you were apart.
Maybe it is the fact that your fling was with a younger man that worries you. Are you concerned that your 'sex-husband' might feel slightly threatened by that? If so, ask him the ages of all the women he had sex with while you were apart.
I suspect that you will find that age hypergamy is not unique to you.
If your relationship with your 'sex-husband' is to have any hope of getting to happily ever after, it is crucial that neither of you feels you have to hide how much you grew during your divorce.
The success of this incarnation of your marriage is dependent on you both being able to embrace the fact that you have changed. If you were still the people who divorced each other five years ago, the chances of your relationship running into the same problems that led you to split would be much higher.
In this context, the fact that your fling has rebooted your sexual confidence can only be a good thing. It means that you are entering your newly reconciled relationship with a much clearer sense of what a good sexual relationship can deliver, and that is likely to benefit your 'sex-husband' as much as it has you.
Finally, divorce is an emotionally challenging experience that affects many more people than the couple who are separating. For this reason, it takes courage and humility for two people to acknowledge that they made a mistake and want to try again.
For this, I salute you, and I wish you both the very best of luck.
- Send your questions to suzigodson@mac.com