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Here's looking at you kid: You probably watch Casablanca with tears pouring down your face and tell yourself that you and your former lover had an even more epic romance.

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QUESTION: When I was in my 20s I had a passionate affair with a married man. He was the love of my life, but I knew he would never leave his wife and that I had to break from him to have any chance of a home and family. But when we parted, we made a pact that we would have a secret, one-night rendezvous on my 40th birthday. I later met my lovely, kind husband and had two children with him, and we’ve had a pretty happy marriage, even if the sex isn’t sizzling. Now, I’m a month shy of 40th birthday and my old love has tracked me down, saying he hasn’t forgotten our pact. I am in turmoil: one side of me wants more than anything in the world to have another night of passion with my great love; the other says this is madness. What should I do?

ANSWER: No wonder you feel such torment; you’re like a recovering alcoholic who’s being offered “just one little glass of champagne”. The temptation is overwhelming, and you can suddenly remember every moment of intoxication - but you also know how fatal it would be to indulge.

You have spent years weaning yourself off this man and pointing yourself at true happiness. All that hard work will be undone in a second if you meet him.

I understand, of course, the temptation to view the situation as a heartbreaking scenario straight out of a movie. You probably watch Brief Encounter and Casablanca with tears pouring down your face and tell yourself that you and your former lover had an even more epic romance. The truth, however, is somewhat more seedy and prosaic.

You slept with a married man and he strung you along, while making it clear he would always choose his wife over you. I have no doubt you loved him, but I wonder how much he really loved you.

If you truly love another person, you conspire for their best happiness. But this man seems committed to unsettling your state of mind. He hasn’t had the grace to release you to your husband, who truly cherishes you, but has spent ten years or more keeping you twitching on the line. His attitude is motivated by selfishness and vanity; the bottom line is that he wants to prove you love him more than your spouse.

You have to ask yourself how you’ll feel if you go ahead with this rendezvous. It seems to me that any pleasure you might take in meeting your ex will be fatally undermined by guilt at deceiving your husband.

Meanwhile, the fact that you had incredible sex with your ex a decade ago does not mean it will be fabulous now. For women, good sex tends to take familiarity, time and ease - instead, you will have one night with the stakes ratcheted sky-high. If the tryst is more lacklustre than you hoped for, you will feel miserable and sordid.

However, your long-term happiness will be even more compromised if the sex is good. Your short burst of ecstasy will be followed by gnawing dissatisfaction with your husband and fruitless yearning for your former lover.

This is a cool, calculating man who can casually wait ten years to lob a hand grenade into your home life, then stands back to watch the devastation without a single scruple.

I know a woman who struck a similar deal to meet her married ex lover once a year (on the anniversary of their first meeting) for a couple of hours in a hotel.

She said it soon became clear that while he relished the no-strings sex, she was made miserable by the brevity of their meetings and what she described as “my overwhelming yearning for what the two of us used to have”.

She realised that the assignations were stopping her from putting down proper roots with anyone else. She said: “I’m just not the sort of person who can put my emotions on hold for a year.”

The other question you need to ask yourself is: how would you feel if you discovered your “lovely, kind” husband had spent the night with a former love? Surely it would tear you apart.

It’s always tempting to think that sex with an ex doesn’t count; what’s one more clinch between old friends? The truth is that a tryst with an old flame is almost always more wounding for a current partner. There’s nothing more daunting than the powerful lure of the past. Most of us are jealous enough already of our partner’s previous lovers without having them become clear and present threats.

What you need to recognise is that your ex holds huge sway over you precisely because he always has - and always will - short-change you.

Meanwhile, your husband has given you everything you ever wanted: kindness, commitment, love, a home and children.

There’s nothing brooding and mysterious about that package, but it does represent the steady happiness that is most women’s notion of Shangri-La.

Do you really want to jeopardise long years of family joy for a couple of hours’ tryst with the ghost of passion past? - Daily Mail

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