Hiding a relationship

For the last 4 years, I have been hiding a relationship with a friend that has turned into "more than friends". The first 3 years were out of survival, because I was married and my ex hated him. The last year, even though I was divorced, I continued to hide it. Only my closest friends knew. I didn't want to trigger my ex, who was always jealous of our friendship. During our marriage most of our arguments were about my friend, and to placate my husband I even stopped talking to my friend for 5 years. But we couldn't stay away forever. My husband never understood that we were just close, affectionate friends, and assumed we were screwing each other behind his back. The truth was we never had sex, not until after I filed for divorce. My ex did not trust me or believe me, which obviously was one of the reasons we split up. But I was falling in love with my friend (which took years to even admit to myself), and to protect him I got in the habit of downplaying the relationship and hiding my true feelings from everyone.

This last weekend I went to a festival, without my friend, specifically not inviting him because I knew my ex would be there and I didn't want to upset him. My ex went with his new girlfriend, and they had a great time. I was happy for them. When I was talking to my best friend about it and mentioned that I was happy for my ex, he looked at me and said, "You know, it's ok for you to be happy too."

So now I'm trying something different. Instead of vaguely mentioning "a friend" when I talk about going out of town to visit him, I mention my friend by name. I even talked about him to my mom last night (she knew I was seeing someone but I've never talked about him). I realized I'd still been hiding the relationship out of habit, but I don't need to anymore. He may not be my boyfriend (we're not interested in possessing each other), but he is in my life and it's ok for people to know. It feels good to finally be able to talk about it. If my ex finds out, he can be mad all he wants, and it doesn't matter because he no longer has any hold on my life.

I may not be ready to come out to the world just yet (we're both pretty private people), but I'm proud of the little steps I've taken to let people know I do have someone special in my life. And it feels good to tell someone about this, even if it's a discussion group full of anonymous strangers. Thanks for reading and letting me share.