DEAR Emily,

I’ve been involved with a married man for nearly 25 years; we had kids and now have grandchildren as well. He married me supposedly, but we both knew it was a farce. We just got married for the sake of saving face with my family. He also got another girl pregnant and married her, too.

He is abusive, but three years ago he got worse and became paranoid. He won’t let me go out without asking a child to accompany me, curses me on the phone nonstop if we come home late, and would lock the gate and beat me up upon returning home. He always badmouths me because I wasn’t a virgin anymore when we first got together. He is always suspicious that I’m seeing my ex through reunions and Facebook.

Lately, I got involved with an old friend who got widowed a year ago. He is almost 10 years younger than me. He says he loves me very much and is willing to accept me despite my ugly past of being a mistress. I have already fallen in love with him, and he with me.

Since I’m already pushing 50, I want to leave the father of my kids and start a new life with this guy. Do I have a future with him? My fear is his family won’t accept me, as they don’t want their father to remarry.

CONFUSED WOMAN

Why not clamp the lid on the abuse precipitated by your ersatz husband’s paranoia? You’re in a toxic relationship!

And why this compunction to marry all his pregnant girlfriends? Isn’t that sheer lunacy? How did you all sign your marriage contracts? With invisible ink? Did your families actually swallow this song and dance?

The nerve of his unabated temerity—raging about your lost virginity! Was he unsullied and pure as driven snow himself?

Bolt from him pronto, and save whatever is left of your sanity as there isn’t any legal string to tie you to his rib at all. In the eyes of law and man, you have no obligation to stay with him. But salvage whatever is rightfully yours.

But with this widower, won’t you be jumping from the pan into the fire, considering you’ll be bringing your village with you—clearly unwanted by his own village—if you marry him?

Yet love conquers all. It’s a cliché which oftentimes holds water, whatever naysayers say.

Now you’re worried about pushing 50. With the mistake you’ve harbored, shouldn’t you take stock and start being prudent? If there’s no raging fire anyway, or anyone in the throes of death, surely there’s no reason for you to rush into what could be another looming disaster—like marriage.

Make sure it’s love that is propelling this new attraction, not just lust. Give it time to bloom. To paraphrase a line from “Desiderata,” “Allow the universe to unfold as it should.”

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