I feel so betrayed and hurt by DH

[Namechange20002]

Have found out tonight that DH has been speaking to his female friend about our sex life, relationship issues, really intimate personal things. I just feel so betrayed, hurt and embarrassed, and I don’t know how to come back from this.

We have three young children and haven’t been having a great deal of sex or intimacy for some time. He’s shared all of this with her, even messaged her: “bought xxx a toy so that she can satisfy herself, this is in the hope that it will help her feel more in the right headspace/mood”

I feel such a deep level of embarrassment and betrayal, I’m such a private person. I would never in a million years share details of our sex life or marriage problems with friends, and I never thought he would have either. Ive honestly never felt betrayed like this, I just don’t know how to move on from this.

They are only different if you are emotionally stunted and see no value in the opposite sex beyond romantic partnership.

A. Because she is female and B. because she is recently single and C. because OP's husband is complaining about a lack of sex and lastly D. they are very close and intimate as friends, and many many relationships start from a basis of a long-standing friendship that got close when 'seeking comfort in each other'.

This is 2025. Does all this basic facts about primal sex have to be explained?

FFS 'they are just friends'.

You are so incredibly and mindblowingly naive! And no, the sex of the person will never not be relevant. If you understand how sex and relationships work in the human species, you would know that. To say the sex of one of them is 'irrelevant' is mindblowingly stupid and naive.

This should be pinned to the start of every thread like this

I'd accept that he was reaching out to a friend for support if he had included the information about how his health struggles were causing intimacy issues. Since he 'accidentally' forgot to mention that, and was all about how his wife was withholding sex, then you can't help but feel he had a motivation for the chats other than solidarity and support.

This is the perfect example of what I mean.
You don't know OP, her husband, their everyday life, division of labour or dynamics. Yet you believe and actively advise she should divorce her husband and become a single mother with no idea of the consequences of that to her and her children.

I am a woman and mother of 2 under 3 with a DP.
I can't drive for 12 months due to epilepsy (hence the username) . So my DP does all nursery runs, food shops, pharmacy pick ups etc. He also does all the laundry and cooking and works full time.
I however earn more money that we rely on, do more cleaning and bedtime routines whilst DP cooks.
Without eachother both managing our roles our lives would be infinitely worse. That's how our partnership works.

But how would any stranger off the internet know that? They wouldn't.

Yet like you, they would assume that my DP does nothing. They would have 0 knowledge of the ramifications in mine, my children and my DPs life if we were to split.
So they would be giving advice and encouragement to separate with 0 knowledge of background, grey areas, history etc.

You don't know if OP actually cheated in the past. You don't know if they have a child with cerebral palsy that needs both parents for moving and handling. You don't know if OP is a recovering alcoholic and her DH stops her relapsing. You don't know if OP had a ridiculously high sex drive throughout their marriage and they had sex daily but now she no libido.

You literally do not know anything other than a few paragraphs the OP has written. So how can you say she should divorce him and her life will most likely be much better?

This is why posters get so angry with 'drip feeds'. Because suddenly all the information and advice they've given is completely wrong. But you can't put your entire life in a OP. So there will always be drip feeds.

OP could come back and say 'im in 50k debt due to a gambling addiction my husband is paying off for me and I'm also in a wheelchair so he can't leave until we sort out carers for me and the kids'.

Yet you'd honestly then still feel like divorcing her husband is in the best interest of her and her small children over messages?

Seriously, this is why you shouldn't rely heavily on an internet forum for advice. People have no idea.

Not to us but you might want to update your attitudes.

OP’s husband sounds like a juvenile over-sharer but that’s about it. Newly single women don’t go on the prowl for horny laddish men with a wife and three little kids at home. OP may be overestimating her husband’s allure.

When he inevitably falls into bed with her his excuse will be op pushed him to it....
How he had nobody else to turn to and it just happened.... He is setting the scene over and over...
No matter how many plates op will be spinning if she bins him her self respect will be intact.

And you won't be living with a fucking treacherous sap.

Why are you yourself making so, so, so many assumptions about the OP? She is not you. She clearly does not have your lifestyle. You may be trapped in your relationship, OP doesn't have to be. If any of those were mitigating factors I am sure OP would have told us. You are fancifully stretching and assuming her situation is the same as yours. Suggesting she stay for the sake of the children is damaging and irresponsible.

Also you haven't been paying attention if you think this is only about 'messages'. It's about a betrayal on a fundamental level and last but not least, Since then she has been leaning on DH to talk through her problems, keeps wanting to meet for a coffee etc, when me and DH rarely get the time to go for a coffee.
I think you missed that part. She is clearly causing more problems in the marriage than just 'messages'.

Ugh his dirty cock has given you uti's

And how would you feel if she was getting emotional support from your male partner while he told her intimate details of your sex life and sent memes saying you're not the wife he wants?

Or are you only laid back about this kind of thing when it's somebody else's husband?

I do get that.

I wouldn't be happy in this situation either but my point is, this isn't a random woman he met last week, she is a friend of 25 years. It would be much worse if this was a woman he met recently.

I do wonder if they have always spoken so openly about intimate details of their relationships but from one of the OPs update, she said it reads like her DH is pushing the subject which is very wrong of him, but does he feel a level of security with her to talk so openly or is he pushing another agenda as in 'poor me, I'm not getting any sex!'? I'd also like to know if they have had sex before.

But yes, ultimately, I agree I would be mortified if my dh told someone he'd got me a vibrator and we never have sex.

No you need to update your knowledge and experience of reality. You are so incredibly naive it's staggering.

Newly single women don't demand alone time for coffee with a married man with 3 children so much it's causing the wife issues, they lean on their girlfriends.

"everyone" wouldn't be saying that. I would NEVER discuss my private marriage issues with a friend no matter how close.

I think some people may need to read these. Many of these they were 'just friends' for years.

• Nearly 70 percent of romances may begin as friendships, new research suggests.
• Only 18 percent of people reported they intentionally became friends with their now-partner due to romantic attraction.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/au/blog/social-instincts/202108/how-often-friends-become-lovers

and

https://www.refinery29.com/en-gb/friends-to-lovers-stories

Not many people have picked up on this, but snivelling on the kids is a massive, massive red flag.

He should not be dumping his emotions on a seven year old. It's utterly manipulative and gross. He's trying to get the children on his side, and he's starting the campaign early. I can tell you exactly how it will go.

'Please don't be mean to daddy. You made daddy cry. Why did you make daddy cry, mummy? Stop being horrible to daddy. I want to stay with daddy.'

I would struggle to trust him again, TBH, but I appreciate that extricating yourself from a situation like this is extremely difficult and now may not be the right time. But I would be starting an escape fund now.

I just feel so sad and hurt and betrayed, by the one person I trusted the most.
We have cameras in the kids room as monitors and I just watched back the video from after the argument when he seemed like he didn't give a shit, and he sat on the floor in ours DS room in tears. Our oldest DS went to check he was ok and give him a hug (he's only 7 bless his little heart) and DH is sobbing saying "Daddy's messed up, Daddy's messed up"

That is really insidious behaviour. Just from that snippet he sounds like a narc, trying to get people on side and demonise you. It’s so manipulative.

@TheGentleOpalMember You've missed my point entirely.

I'm not saying OP should shut up and put up for forgive and carry on. What I'm saying is that we have no idea if their relationship, their history or their lives. We have ONE incident with little background.

Breaking up a family is not a decision to ever be taken lightly. Everyone has their own boundaries defined by their own individual life experiences and knowledge of their own relationship dynamics and history.

OP says she believes she 'had a good one' and was generally very happy with her marriage and family. We don't know why she was happy. But she was.

If like you, we go down the gender stereotype route then she'll be single parenting 3 small kids, whilst working and her ex husband having them EOW and maybe an overnight during the week.
Her husband can live the life of a single man most the time. Go out on dates, take up hobbies, hang out with friends. Meanwhile OP is running herself ragged juggling lots of plates, doing school runs and uniforms, rushing home from work to pick up the kids and get tea on and take them to activities, cleaning up and falling into bed exhausted. Maybe even financially struggling too.
Just take a look at the tons of threads from single parents exhausted. If she doesn't have active family support then all it takes is for him to cancel his weekend with the kids due to illness or whatever excuse and bamn, 3 weeks of solo parenting with no breaks.

Its not a decision to be taken lightly. Because if we go through the gender stereotype like you have, the ramifications would actually be massive for OP, especially if she loves him and actually wants to be with him. It would actually be fucking herself over long term if once the dust settles, she realises that actually, with some relationship counselling, communication and time aside it could have been resolved. But now it's too late and he's now dating and moved on and loving his freedom whilst she's surviving on 6 hours sleep, drudgery and a growing overdraft.

It's not abuse or him shagging about. Which is something I would instantly pull the plug on. So I would want to try and salvage the relationship and preserve the family unit first and foremost before going nuclear. And no, not just 'for the kids' but for myself too.

Agreed. Why did he go into the kids’ bedroom? Why not the bathroom or to his car?

Not only are you going through his computer, you're also spying on him when upset at home? Does he get any privacy?

No wonder he wanted to confide in him. He likely feels trapped and needs to talk to someone. Not necessarily the best way to do it, of course but legitimate enough.

The op is angry he's spilled his secrets, because it reflects bad on her. He feels trapped in a sex less marriage and hasn't done anything particularly wrong, but not has his privacy invaded and is being kicked about for... Actually very little.

You need to have a good chat with him. Clearly, he's not got much emotional support which is why he's messaging in the first place or crying with the kids. Sticking the boot in and being angry isn't going to resolve anything.

Men share silly videos all the time.

Wow.... @Nodddy Victim-blaming at it's finest. Chastising the OP for following her instinct (that is almost never wrong in women), and ignoring the fact that this is a married man sharing offensive videos to a single woman who clearly wants him. NO, good decent men do NOT share things like that at all, let alone 'all the time'.
And you are forgetting the part where OP said : Since then she has been leaning on DH to talk through her problems, keeps wanting to meet for a coffee etc, when me and DH rarely get the time to go for a coffee.

That alone is clearly causing problem in their marriage.

what????? he's blowing a hole in his wife's privacy and mindfucking the kids and he hasn't done anything?

@Namechange20002 this thread has clearly got into LaLa land now and you might be better off away from it.
This is your life and how you proceed for yourself and your children is up to you.

How you view the relationship between your husband and this friend is up to you, not every single male or female friend is a predator, of course not, but it’s also undeniable that some are. You only have to hang around here for a while to find infidelity threads inevitably citing the ‘office wife’ or ‘old school friend’ going for coffee as confidantes on here as where it started, so being suspicious, whilst not always warranted, is a legitimate response whether it’s 1985 or 2025. How you feel about it is what is important.
What is not a boundary for others might be a legitimate boundary for you, opinions vary wildly on some topics like boundaries around porn or having friends of the opposite gender. What you can or cannot tolerate is down to you, so go with what you feel comfortable with and ignore the rest.

Book the counselling, OP - if he won’t, do it for yourself.

Things to address:

Boundaries with his friend – What you’re comfortable with going forward.

Rebuilding trust and respect – The messages were a huge betrayal; he needs to acknowledge that.

Communication and emotional maturity – Why could he cry with your DS but not show remorse in front of you?

Sex life; expectations vs. reality – His view of intimacy (like the frigid wife meme) sounds more like a teenage fantasy than a healthy adult perspective.

Whether you stay or leave is your decision but counselling can help you get clarity on what you want and need.

I don't share those kinds of details with my closest female friends I have had since childhood.
I just wouldnt have a conversation that weve just bought a new sex toy, or share details of my husbands labido.
He is in the wrong here, something is not right in your relationship for him to start sharing this level of detail with someone else.