DEAR ABBY: I am 43, the mother of four children and just celebrated my 20th anniversary. Is it normal for someone to be married all this time and still not want your husband to see you naked?

I do not reveal myself to him. The lights must always be off, and I keep a shirt on. It's not because I am ashamed of my body; it's that I'm not attracted to him. I never was.

I married my husband for security and have learned to love him. But I love him like a brother, in a sisterly kind of way. I feel I owe him.

Should I tell my husband how I feel and risk losing my security after all this time? I had to talk to someone, so I confided in my best friend. She advised me to say nothing.

My husband had an affair a few years ago, and frankly, I was secretly relieved. Sometimes I wish he was still with her. Now that it's over, I'm back in hiding. Abby, please advise. -- HIDING IN PENNSYLVANIA

DEAR HIDING: What a sad situation. By marrying your husband feeling as you did, you have cheated both of you. Not only have you "not revealed" yourself physically, you have not revealed yourself emotionally or in any other way. You wish he was still with his lover because it took the pressure off you.

Your husband had an affair because instinctively he knew something important was missing in your marriage, and if you were happy you would not have written to me. What you have described is not a marriage; it is an "arrangement."

My advice is to talk to your husband about making another kind of arrangement -- one in which he supports the children and possibly makes some kind of settlement with you, while you both pursue your separate lives. Frankly, it won't be much different than what you are already experiencing.

DEAR ABBY: My boyfriend, "Will," recently let it slip that he thinks I'm less intelligent than he is. He said if we were to take an IQ test, he would score higher. I felt hurt and angry when he said it, especially because he truly believes it. He said the same thing to me five years ago.

Now I find myself feeling extremely defensive. I am in the top third of my law school class but did poorly in engineering school. In contrast, Will has a Ph.D. in engineering.

Will assures me that being less intelligent doesn't diminish me, but I'm still upset. Now I'm thinking of ending the relationship. Do you think I'm being overly sensitive? -- AVERAGE IN MARYLAND

DEAR MARYLAND: Please allow me to enlighten you about something. Being in the top third of your class in law school already makes you above average, so please stop allowing your boyfriend's egotistical comment to undermine your self-esteem.

Will may or may not have a higher IQ than you, but he is lacking in social intelligence and common sense. His superior attitude is obnoxious. Whether you keep him or dump him is up to you, but recognize that no one has everything. While Will may be brilliant in one area, he is deficient when it comes to sensitivity. Ask yourself why he needed to say what he did to you, and you may find that he's using his air of intellectual superiority to mask a lack of self-esteem.

DEAR READERS: In my many years of involvement with this column (and before), I have heard some creative name-calling and may have even indulged in a few choice words myself. But your scatological creativity in describing "The Other Woman, Anywhere, USA" (March 11) singed my eyebrows to the roots. Some readers thanked me for my reply. Others felt I was too easy on the letter writer. And others ... well, read on:

DEAR ABBY: My husband "works long hours" and frequently attends evening "meetings" or "stag functions." He is "too tired" to notice my negligee and perfume and "too busy" to meet me for lunch or respond to my loving e-mails. When I'm not at my full-time job, I'm the one washing his leftover dishes and dirty socks, cleaning toilets, fixing torn screens, preparing the drywall our kids damaged, unclogging drains and doing the other minor repairs.

He says there's no money for a night out, yet I find dinner receipts for two in his dirty clothes. (The income I bring in must make SOME difference.) I go to bed alone and starved for sex more nights than I can count. Is this the intact marriage "Other Woman" is trying to preserve? She gets the perks while I'm picking up the dirty towels.

Please, TAKE him! Give me my child support and alimony and YOU support this "wonderful" man. Clean up after him and then see how much "quality time" you enjoy, Sweetie! -- THE WIFE BACK HOME

DEAR ABBY: May I offer a different perspective? I have more respect for a man who sticks with his family and remains in the house providing support and raising his kids, but finds a sexual relationship outside the home. You want to know what I think is really toxic? A man who stays married and celibate, just letting his resentment fester and build. Try walking a mile in someone else's shoes before passing judgment, lady! -- MALE READER IN THE USA

DEAR ABBY: I am a child of an unfaithful marriage. As a pre-teen and teen I often cried and prayed to God for my parents to divorce. Children know when a marriage isn't right. I still mourn for the well-adjusted adult I might have become if I'd had two honest and separate but happy households in which to grow up.

How convenient of "Other Woman" to blame affairs on the wives while overlooking the husband's part in the demise of the marriage. It baffles me that she believes she knows the whole story about her lover's marriage. Please tell her that the only "best friend" her lover has is himself. -- ANOTHER PERSPECTIVE IN OHIO

DEAR ABBY: I was "The Other Man" for 30 years. I was a teenager and still in high school when I met "Sue." She was in her 20s, gorgeous, and I was earning money mowing lawns. I was a virgin. It started with me rubbing suntan lotion on her back. Her husband was in the military.

One day she told me she was lonely because her husband was gone so much and their 5-year-old was in kindergarten. She asked me to be her "special friend." After high school she paid for me to go to trade school. For 29 years I followed her wherever the military sent her husband. I even had a vasectomy so I wouldn't get her pregnant. I lived my life for her.

Her husband has now retired from the military. She has time for me now maybe once a month. What we had is fading more each week. She is my first and only love, and I'll never find anyone to love as I have loved her, or father children of my own. Is my life worth living? -- DEPRESSED OUT WEST

DEAR DEPRESSED: Yes, but it may take counseling to help you realize it. Please don't wait. Your life is worth living. The ability to father a child is not the most important quality many women want in a husband.

DEAR ABBY: I'm responding to "The Other Woman, Anywhere, USA" (March 11). Please tell your readers if they find themselves in her shoes, they should RUN in the opposite direction.

My husband, "John," and I both left our spouses to be together. It has been 10 years, and I regret leaving my ex-husband every day. I traded a wonderful marriage for an obnoxious, self-absorbed, arrogant man.

John still spends Christmas Day with his ex and his adult children. He says it's out of guilt. He paid for his daughter's wedding reception with money from our joint account. John went alone. I was "forbidden" to attend.

My "soul mate" usually forgets my birthday, and one year he also "forgot" Christmas. If only I could turn back time. I find myself praying for the end of time and realize I'm probably getting what I deserve. -- LIVING WITH REGRET

DEAR LIVING: You letter is a reminder that there is dignity in being alone and filling one's "down time" with good friends and helping the less fortunate. As I expected, "Other Woman's" letter generated a ton of mail. Read on:

DEAR ABBY: Your reply to "The Other Woman" was 100 percent right on. I was once in love with a married woman and won her heart. I thought, "All's fair in love and war," and had little regard for her husband. Then I met him.

When I looked into his eyes, I knew what I was doing was wrong and bad karma. Here was a human being with a soul, who loved and trusted his wife, who was true to his marriage vows and trusted her to be true, too. If the situation were reversed, I wouldn't want my wife to have an affair with another man. Spiritually, it was an important and painful lesson.

My advice to married people having an affair is to ask yourselves how you would feel if you were being cheated on. Do the right thing. Honesty and integrity matter. -- FORMER OTHER MAN, ANYWERE, USA

DEAR ABBY: I was the other woman for six years. It has taken me a year to realize how unhealthy the relationship was for me. Not only did it damage my self-esteem, but the guilt became unbearable. I wish I could go back and undo what I have done. Luckily, I now have someone who cares about me and accepts me -- flaws and all -- and loves me for who I am all the time, not just one or two hours a week. -- WISER NOW IN VIRGINIA

DEAR ABBY: I was the other woman. Over time I have come to understand that I believed what I wanted to believe because I was lonely, needy and vulnerable. I learned as time went on that my lover was incapable of developing a mature, responsible and meaningful relationship. I experienced the calamitous consequences emotionally, psychologically and financially -- as did our child.

Through counseling, friendships and networking with other women and getting to know myself in a rigorously honest way, I became too healthy to be the other woman. I'm now in the marriage I always dreamed of to a man with character and heart, who is devoted to me and "our" child. I learned that the right man would find me when I became the person he was looking for. It wasn't easy, but it was worth it. -- FINALLY FULFILLED

DEAR ABBY: Thank you for the letter from "The Other Woman" and your reply. I have been divorced 12 years and involved with a married man for more than a year. The affair has been lonely, degrading, unfulfilling and a real self-esteem buster.

Your answer reminded me of what I have always known. Because of it, I have decided to end my affair and get back into the real world. I hope "Other Woman" wakes up and does the same. And soon. -- GRATEFUL IN ALABAMA

READERS: More tomorrow!

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