This is a letter I have written a thousand times in my head, but only now in my heart. It has been three days since you said your final good-bye to me on the telephone. I never had the chance to tell you what I know about all of this. About our 'relationship.'

I am sorry. I am not sorry for having met you, for you added so much color to my dreary world that I am changed forever. I am not sorry that I came out of your computer monitor and into your heart, though that was certainly not my intention. For my part, I resisted the fact that I was actually in love with you for so long that it probably seemed as if I were stringing you along. But I was not - I genuinely cared about you and knew you were a special woman. I still feel that way. Yes that giddy feeling of someone new and exciting was addictive. But I am not sorry for that either. I somehow knew, deep down, that admitting I loved you would screw everything up. And it has. Despite everything, I am not sorry for ever expressing the way you made me feel. But I am also not sorry that knowing you made me realize that what I still have is very much worth keeping, and in the face of the bitterness with which you tendered your final good-bye, I wonder if I really COULD have made you happy, if circumstances were different. It was you, after all, who expressed some guilt at wanting to take me away from my children, but never any for my wife, whom I always told you I loved. And your disbelief that I could be happy for you if you really have found someone else was more than a little telling. But I am happy if this new man can give you what you so desperately seem to want.

You were always looking for more than I could give. I should have known on that day almost four months ago when I found out you were even considering a clandestine meeting for sex with a man who was neither me nor your soon-to-be ex. That is still a painful memory, because I know you never told me the entire truth about that... And I had the right to expect more from you. But I forgave that because I love you. In the end, I suppose that I am to blame, because I let my heart take us both too far. But also in the end, I am not sorry that I never was given the final temptation to actually cross the line in reality that I had cannot now believe I ever considered crossing in my mind and my heart.

So I am truly sorry for having hurt you. I never thought that just loving someone would hurt them. I am sorry for having hurt us both by admitting that I was in love with you. I know it was real, what we shared, or else you would not have been so embittered, and I not so hurt. If you really don't care about someone, they can not wound you so deeply as this. But I cared about you. Not just the idea of you, but the heart and soul of you. You always were a person, not a fantasy. You turned my life upside down, as well as my heart. The people around me never will really know how much you affected me. I am sorry that you could not accept me as I am. I am sorry that with you it turned out to be all or nothing. I know I have hurt you, and in truth the main reason I resisted acknowledging my feelings for you for so long was that I knew you would be hurt much more than I.

You were the more vulnerable, and also the more desperate for real love and affection. I alone am responsible for the turmoil I caused, and for that I am also sorry. I never meant to screw up your life, but I also was never less than honest with you about everything. I never ever lied to you about who I was or what I felt. You expected something from me I could not possibly have delivered. I could not betray the woman I have pledged my life to. I suppose that means I am even sorry that I have a sense of honor. Vows taken on a Saturday many years ago mean far more than simply the words I uttered one afternoon. Words have always conveyed more of me than simply intent. Even now, in this letter. I am therefore so sorry that I finally did tell you I was in love with you. Somehow I knew you wanted all of me, even before I spoke those words. I am sorry for the irresponsibility of that act. I never tried to make you fall in love with me, but I am sorry that I did not try harder to resist the effects of your charm on my heart. I am sorry most of all that I could not be the one to love you in every way you need.

I do still love you. I will miss you, and I do hope you find what you are looking for, and had hoped to find in me. I hope you can one day forgive me for ever telling you that I was in love with you...

Always with love,