To think this is reasonable and fair?

[Woollensheep]

I had an affair - yes I know. I am a terrible awful person who deserves to be miserable forever.
I told DH about it because we went to marriage counselling as things had not been great for about a decade.
He took it better than I expected initially - he wasn’t over the top angry and he didn’t throw me out or threaten me or anything. He said that he could see why it had happened.
This was about six months ago.
However he’s now saying he wants to be able to track my phone / car at all times, have all my passwords and be able to read all messages I send / receive.
My affair is over so there’s no ‘issue’ exactly, although I don’t love him reading messages I send to my friends for no particular reason really.
I told a couple of my friends about what DH had said and they were pretty horrified but I think I’m lucky that I’m still allowed to be in the house and to see my children.
Aibu for accommodating this and just accepting it’s the outcome of my actions?

Your marriage is over. You need to go to a solicitor and arrange split of assets and formalise an agreement regarding your children. If you are frightened you need to call the police.

No it isn't reasonable, though it's understandable that he doesn't trust you, but putting everything together he sounds quite controlling and scary. I don't think continuing the marriage sounds healthy all around.

And seperating should never mean you can't see your kids.

While I understand that he needs to build trust again, I think he is using this as a stick to beat you with.
Where does it stop? When does it stop? He can't keep this up forever. Are you never allowed to have a private conversation ever again?
Think long and hard about your future - what do you want? If you both want to stay together you need to start rebuilding the trust, but he doesn't need access all areas to your life.

You don’t think being worried that she’d be kicked out of the house, threatened, never allowed to see her kids or even killed are signs that maybe there’s been some coercive control going on?

Where did I say this in any of my post? You seem to enjoy putting words in my mouth or assuming. I, too, have no issues to project but you seem all too heated up for no reason - or perhaps, there's a reason for it.

Of course, what you wrote is controlling and dangerous but did I mention that in my post? Was that what I said wasn't abuse? Or did you just add it there to make your accusation sound better?

If OP genuinely has those concerns, then she shouldn't even stay with someone like that whether he's checking her phone or not. Her life is in danger. Why mention the affair as if it's the problem when there is a much bigger one.

Anyway, I'll leave you to it before you accuse me of worse.

So you are staying in a marriage where

• you said things hadn't been great even before your affair

• your not allowed not to go out alone

• you may be tracked wherever you go

• your acted you may have been killed if he had found out about the affair

So why do you want to stay married ? If it’s for the children your assuming you’d lose them. Courts don’t award custody based on who had an affair .

What happens long term when the children leave home ?

I married someone after knowing him 6 months. I never should have married him there were red flags everywhere. But I did and I was unhappy with him being mean, shouting and bullying. After a year or so of marriage I went out with someone else. Just a few dates, not an affair. I kissed him but no sex. The guy was only 20 and I was 3 years older at the time. My husband found out and hit me and I fell into the bed frame and bruised my face. His mother said I deserved it for cheating. He controlled everything I did. He said I was not allowed to see my friends, as they were on the hunt for men. (They weren’t). He drove me to and from work and to the running club I was in. He controlled things financially (all my income went into the mortgage on our flat and running it). He never shut up about what I “had done”. He went into my workplace and told my boss about what I “had done” and kicked off there. The “other man” was transferred to another branch as a result which he didn’t want. The next year or so was filled with constant reminders with bullying and abusive behaviour. He beat me up and raped me. I apparently deserved it because of “what you did”. I was only allowed to see friends if he could go into town too and follow me from one venue to another to check I was not “up to something”. This went on for another 9 years. I was terrified to leave. He said nobody would want anything to do with me. He would make sure they all knew what I had done. I wish I had left.

It’s such a hard one op, I feel for both of you. As being on the other side of being cheated on (by previous partner) i asked if it was possible to see their phone whenever I felt anxious but didn’t actually look, but knowing I could made me feel more at ease (it’s psychological I guess).

You might have to be willing to give it a time frame of the ‘monitoring’ but make it clear it won’t be healthy for you both to live like this forever, he will need to let you get on living an unmonitored life at some point.

It’s a rubbish thing what you did but you owned up to it (most cheaters don’t and make you feel like you’re going crazy) and you’re trying to make it right so please don’t beat yourself up for it forever.

So you're not allowed out of the house and you're not allowed any privacy? Why do you want to stay in this marriage? Did you have an affair because he's a controlling arsehole, by any chance?

I don't condone what you did but you can't live like this.

Why would you lose your children ?

When there are affairs I think you either need to cut your ties and leave, or decide you have to trust that the person won't do it again. I do not think tracking and reading all your messages is acceptable, if he feels the need to do that then there is no marriage to save and he should leave you.

Having an affair is a terrible thing to do - it does not make you a terrible person who deserves to be punished forever.

Not allowed out apart from to work isnt a life and it isnt fair on him to ask. If he needs that amount of control and oversee of your life to the extent where you are feeling so beholden to him it isnt a marriage.

Oh OP, please get out of this relationship. Affair or no affair he has not right to control your life, saying you cant go out on your own? That's no life to live.

Please seek help to get you and your kids out of this unhealthy relationship. My heart is actually breaking for you, I can see why you did what you did

@Shesmyperson

I think post affair yiu do need to be open and honest and as transparent as possible. But not forever.

However, the whole you now can't go anywhere, do anything, can't see your kids if you leave etc sounds concerning.

Either he is an abusive bastard. Or you are rewriting what's going on in the hops of getting sympathy off people.

Either way, all the counselling in the world isn't going to help. I don't know what to suggest because it sounds like you wouldn't leave even if you can and this sounds like it's heading to a complete disaster.

My actual advice would be that you need to leave, that this doesn't mean you can't see your kids, but the marriage needs to end.

This is really what I was saying - you said it better.

@ValerieCupcake please tell me you have left now?

@ValerieCupcake

I married someone after knowing him 6 months. I never should have married him there were red flags everywhere. But I did and I was unhappy with him being mean, shouting and bullying. After a year or so of marriage I went out with someone else. Just a few dates, not an affair. I kissed him but no sex. The guy was only 20 and I was 3 years older at the time. My husband found out and hit me and I fell into the bed frame and bruised my face. His mother said I deserved it for cheating. He controlled everything I did. He said I was not allowed to see my friends, as they were on the hunt for men. (They weren’t). He drove me to and from work and to the running club I was in. He controlled things financially (all my income went into the mortgage on our flat and running it). He never shut up about what I “had done”. He went into my workplace and told my boss about what I “had done” and kicked off there. The “other man” was transferred to another branch as a result which he didn’t want. The next year or so was filled with constant reminders with bullying and abusive behaviour. He beat me up and raped me. I apparently deserved it because of “what you did”. I was only allowed to see friends if he could go into town too and follow me from one venue to another to check I was not “up to something”. This went on for another 9 years. I was terrified to leave. He said nobody would want anything to do with me. He would make sure they all knew what I had done. I wish I had left.

This sounds horrific. I’m so glad you’re out of that.

OP, this is the trajectory you will be in. Don’t beat yourself for years because of this, or allow him to.

Do you think if he had cheated he would allow you to monitor his phone and going’s and comings? 100% no chance

He now thinks he has you on a leash for life.

Your lucky he's not ended the relationship you were deceitful in order to move forward he needs full disclosure its still new and he's still processing it.

Calm before the storm ime.
Took me tears to rebuild the relationships with my dc after exh spent years poisoning them against me.
*if he hadn't raped and mentally abused me I most likely wouldn't have had an affair.
*if he hadn't been a closet gay man he may have actually been a dh to me and I wouldn't have cheated.
Be weary op. He may be biding his time.

What does the counsellor say about him tracking your movements?

@Bananarama21

Your lucky he's not ended the relationship you were deceitful in order to move forward he needs full disclosure its still new and he's still processing it.

I agree and that's what I was trying to say too but apparently, OP has given more info. It's now known to be so much more than that and he's being abusive. So the marriage shouldn't even be encouraged any more.

I have to start with - why do you think you are lucky to still be able to see your children? Yes you done wrong but it does not qualify for being unable to see your children. It is your right to be able to see your children and if your husband did decide to end your marriage, unless there was a genuine safeguarding issue, then he would have no right what so ever to stop you seeing your children, nor would he legally get away with keeping your children from you if you went down the legal route for access to your children.

I don't think the way forward is for him to be controlling. If he can't trust you, then I'm sorry but it likely won't work in the long run. He has to learn to build up trust again and I don't think invading your privacy is the way to do that.

How exactly do you think this will work as a partnership moving forward if you have zero trust from the man you're with. Yes you did a bad thing but surely the idea of working through therapy is to re-develop the trust not an unhealthy controlling behaviour from his side.

When the trust is broken I understand the wish for more transparency - but this sounds like it has tipped over into him trying to have power over you in an abusive way. For example, knowing you are ok with him asking to check your phone is one thing - doing it religiously with every message you get is not. Asking you not to go out getting slaughtered late night at clubs is one thing, saying you can't even go for a coffee with a girlfriend is another. Tracking your car sounds like it's getting really obsessive.

On the other hand your attitude to your affair is very strange, 'the affair's over so there's no issue' has zero empathy or understanding for the impact of an affair on the other person. There is nothing approaching genuine remorse - or even that you regret it and want to work with him to move past it. There's a detached feeling and no talking about love.

It seems to me this has been miserable for a long time, it's now even more miserable but you feel lucky? The dynamic is way off here, there's something really wrong in all this - your emotions are really off and he is tipping over into abusive. I think you need to get out OP this all sounds really messed up.

@ComeOnSpringtime

I agree and that's what I was trying to say too but apparently, OP has given more info. It's now known to be so much more than that and he's being abusive. So the marriage shouldn't even be encouraged any more.

It ws obvious from the first post that he was abusive.

You've posted about this before, I think. I remember your phrasing.

The problem isn't the affair. It's that both of you know that this a loveless marriage, and that you're both there for convenience. And now he suddenly can't trust that this is convenient enough for you to stay; and he's worried you'll move on and he'll be blindsided.

That doesn't mean he can control everything you do, or read all your messages. It'll stop being enough at some point, anyway. It's a horrendous scale. Right now he's happy to read your messages and track your car to make sure you're at work. Then sooner or later your tracker will be an inch out because of the rain and it'll look like you're elsewhere, or he'll start to wonder if you're having an affair with a colleague, or his brain will tell him that he doesn't know enough anymore, and you won't be allowed out of his sight...

This is over, you both know it.

[quote 77kidsandcounting]@ValerieCupcake please tell me you have left now?[/quote]
God yes years ago!