Justifiable adultery

[Spudboy]

Is there such a thing as justifiable adultery? My wife and I have not been intimate for 17 years and I’ve met someone else. We’ve been friends for nearly two years and only recently became intimate.

I've been the person nursing a terminally ill partner when the relationship itself was already in terminal decline. It's really tough. There's a lot of outrage on here but not many people have been in that situation, I'm betting.

I didn't cheat but I can see how after 17 years, it has come to this.

Try to minimise the pain for your wife, whatever way you think that is. If she doesn't have long left, then please consider just waiting.

Yes if you are in agreement. 17 years, wow, you need to be honest with her but you deserve to be able to be happy

I have no idea why you are opening yourself to the opprobrium of MN. I don't know what you are expecting to hear.

I'm totally with @OrderOfTheKookaburra. 17 years is an unfeasibly long time to deny somebody intimacy. What do such deniers expect to happen? We are left to presume why you stayed in such a relationship - kids? Inertia? Difficulties communicating?

Bad timing for sure, but it's so difficult to meet somebody compatible.

I really don't think your wife needs to know. If she's in a bad way, look after and support her, but definitely keep your friend- assuming she's OK with such a situation. No need to hurt your wife unnecessarily when she's already suffering.

If your wife is likely to live a decent number of years, maybe it would be time for an honest conversation. I honestly doubt she gives a fuck if she's OK without intimacy for 17 years. Are you sure she didn't have a bloke?

Anyway, you deserve credit for staying around. I wouldn't have.

Good luck.

I agree for the record, I was sticking up for you!

And I know just how hard it is for carers - often times just as tough as what the sick person is going though.

You say your wife has become reclusive and cut herself off from people - why is that? What support have you given her with that?
If your wife receiving a terminal diagnosis means so little to you that you would continue to cheat on her, you sound vile. No wonder she doesn’t have sex with you.
You should do the decent thing and either stop with the OW or you should tell your wife so she can cut you out of her will.

Your post has an unsurprising level of vagueness about why you’ve stayed with your wife despite resenting the fact that your marriage has been sexless for almost two decades.

And now, when your wife is facing death and needs you to show the care anyone might expect in a multi-decade relationship, you find your attention focused on whether it’s fair for you to fuck someone else instead.

Your wife’s terminal diagnosis isn’t complicating your sex
life. Your sex life is complicating your wife’s terminal diagnosis. If sex was such a priority for you, the time to
take steps to change the situation decisively was a decade or more ago. The fact that you didn’t shows that your relationship offered you something that was more important to you than sex.

Get your priorities straight, man.

Oh it gets better!

This.
I always feel that those who refuse intimacy within a marriage are putting their spouse in a very tricky position. Leave seems the obvious option but what if there are children? Why should the person who wants intimacy have to give that up? If they have an affair they're immediately the bad guy, as can be seen by many of the replies on here. So really the denier has pushed their partner into a corner.
In your case OP, I can see why after 17 years you've sought intimacy elsewhere. Incredibly difficult timing with your wife. I'd probably tell her. Surely she can't be surprised after 17 years of no intimacy and her saying get your satisfaction elsewhere. Out of interest OP, why have you stayed with her?

Well clearly she's not.