Dear Steve,
There’s a backstory to this. I fell in love with a married woman in the 90s. She was someone I'd known since we were kids, and I ended up getting hurt. I reconnected and fell in love with her again 10 years later when she found me online. It ended badly and thought I had learned my lesson.
Well, fast forward to a couple years ago, I met a woman who was honest with me about everything (including the fact that she had a husband), and we had an affair. In the end, she said she didn't want to hurt her husband by leaving him, even though he is verbally abusive among other things.
She and I are now best friends (the physical relationship is over), and yes, her husband knows everything, but he doesn't care as long as she never leaves him. He knows everything about us and that we talk still every day. I fell into this trap once again and it hurts.
Why do I continue to do this? I invested my heart in this relationship. I know it sounds selfish that all I'm thinking about is me. I just don't want this to happen again. And it's hard just to be friends after what we had (or I thought we had). What can I do to move on and not fall into this again with a married woman?
– Hurting again