DEAR EMILY,

I lost somebody I loved dearly for 31 years. I was only 20 when I met him, the greatest love of my life. He was not very handsome nor well-off, but I was so comfortable with him.

He was 15 years my senior, married with four kids. I fell madly in love with him, even now that he’s gone. I am still young, having just turned 52.

I really enjoyed my young life because he was so good and loving. I was blinded with so much love that I started to love his wife and kids. When his wife found out about us and talked to me, he assured me that he would not leave me.

Then I got pregnant. I told my family about it and they accepted him without any reservations. He was a very good man, that’s why. During this time, I was the one working and helping him out.

My friends would tell me that “martyrs are usually shot.” But I couldn’t help but love him. He was with me so much that his family learned to accept our situation. When I hit it big-time with my business with his help, everything went better. I paid for his family’s health insurance and other amenities, even the funeral service of his wife who died of cancer.

With her gone, he started to stay with us longer and longer until he stopped going home to his children. They were all grown-up but without jobs. He had been supporting them from the rentals on his mother’s property. They all felt that it was their father’s responsibility to pay all their bills, which for many years I did out of my love for their father. But despite my generosity to them, they’ve not stopped badmouthing me.

Last year, his complaints about his back turned out to be lung cancer. He died after seven months. We were married by a retired priest at his bedside, but there were no papers. I gave him the best funeral service, and now I am alone.

His children have continued to hate me even after I gave them their share when the family property from my husband’s mother was sold. But their harsh words don’t bother me anymore. I just miss my love so much that I just cry all the time.—BYJU

You’re lucky you actually met the love of your life. Some never do, despite being in a long marriage or a relationship without commitment. There is a missing element they can never find or create.

You’ve had it for 31 years, and for that you can say fate has been kind and generous to you. Stop crying that he’s gone. What you’re doing is akin to pulling your hair and cursing the heavens for his demise.

Why not say thank you instead and spread the happiness he has given you? Be grateful that that boundless joy you had with him happened at all.

This man will find more peace, wherever he is, if you start forgiving and forgetting the hard feelings you have for his children. You messed up their lives by being his longtime mistress. You just didn’t have a fling with their father—you had a family with him!

You may think your largesse contributed to their well-being in a very large way, and it may have. But, long story short, you destroyed their family. However much money you’ve appropriated for their education and health, they’d still think it’s their father’s money, that it was something you owed them whatever you gave their way, and that you became what you are—a success—because of their father. They probably feel that, since you stole their father’s love, they’re getting what they lost, in kind.

Didn’t you yourself say that your business boomed because of this man’s help? Accept the past so you can move on and find the peace of mind you sorely need.

No matter how thin you slice an apple, there will always be two sides to your illicit affair. Stop counting the ways. Start burying the hatchet. Start the change. Prove to your dead lover how much you still love him by not harboring any more bitterness toward his children. Life is too short.

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