A couple of years ago I was in the pub with a friend, several pints deep, and he asked whether I’d ever had a “great love”. I was 62, and had been married for 30 years – but it didn’t occur to me to say my wife. I knew immediately that the love of my life was Lily, a woman who had left me broken-hearted in my 20s. Lily and I hadn’t spoken since the day she left me, in 1982 – and I’d forbidden myself from looking her up online because I was protecting myself from pain. But when I got home from the pub, I decided to take the plunge. I sent Lily a Facebook message. I didn’t say, “I’ve loved you every day for the last 40 years,” because I didn’t want to seem mad. But truthfully, I had.
Lily replied about 60 seconds after I pressed send, and after that, it was as if the floodgates had opened. Some nights I didn’t sleep a wink because I was up until dawn, messaging her. The first time we met in person, it was as if the last four decades just melted away. We spent the night in a hotel, and every touch felt so instinctual. The strangest thing was that I discovered our lives were like mirror images: like me, Lily was married but it was sexless. My wife and I hadn’t had sex for 15 years and were living like housemates, and it was the same for Lily and her husband.
For the past two years, we have been meeting once a month, but I want more. We’ve both told our spouses, so our affair is out in the open. My wife has decided to ignore it; her wish is to stay married because it’s easier financially and practically. I want to live with Lily and make our relationship official, but she finds the leap into the unknown difficult. I understand that fear of it all going wrong and being left with nothing. If that happens at the age of 25, you pick yourself up, dust yourself down and start again. But at 65, it’s much tougher.
It’s painful, because Lily is all I’ve ever wanted – she is my favourite thing. To strike out and spend the rest of our lives together would be the most cracking adventure. But I’ve resigned myself to this, and I can live with it, so long as Lily remains in my life. Once a month will have to be enough – so long as I still get to see her.
I should never have dumped Nick. I was young and superficial. I remember thinking his look was a bit uncool and very 70s, and I wanted to embrace the 80s. I thought I’d experience many loves just as intense as what I felt for him, but I was wrong. Since I left Nick, I haven’t been able to sustain desire for any man. In my mid-20s, I developed a pattern: six months in, I’d start feeling revolted by the idea of sex with my new boyfriend. I haven’t had sex with my husband for 13 years.
When Nick sent that first Facebook message, it was such a thrill. Within days it was clear that we had to get back together. I was nervous about meeting up in the flesh because we have both changed so much. I was a bit shocked by his bald head at first, as I remember him with flowing locks, but he felt just the same. I didn’t want him to see my 60-year-old body. I tried to turn off the light in the hotel room, but he wasn’t having that. Being in bed with him again was total bliss. I’ve not had an orgasm during sex since 1982, when we broke up.
I confessed to my husband early on, and his policy seems to be to pretend the affair doesn’t exist. Things have never been very romantic between us. But how do you walk out of a marriage after 32 years? My husband and I are very close. The marriage is passionless but not loveless. I don’t want to upset my daughter, who knows nothing about this. She’s 30 so it wouldn’t devastate her, but I feel overwhelmed by anxiety at the thought of hurting her. It all feels too late. At 64, I have too much fear to abandon the life I have made.
And what if Nick and I don’t get on as an official couple? I love him deeply, but sometimes I wonder whether our passion would fade if we lived together. Perhaps my six-month-curse would kick in and I’d stop desiring him. I feel guilty because I know Nick wants more, but I think it’s better to continue as we are. That way, we preserve the love we have.