I’m an affair baby

[wildgreyseas]

I don’t know how to process this information.

My parents had always, always maintained that their marriages had ended long before my mum got pregnant.

Anthony this is technically true, it’s come to light that they were both still married when they started seeing each other. Both in very unhappy marriages that were all but over, but still legally married and not separated. My mum was in an abusive marriage, so I kind of view that a little less harshly, but I feel sick to my stomach to think of it. It’s awful. The hurt they caused, and I’m a physical representation of it. I can’t even look at them.

Both marriages were unhappy and dead in the water, and one was abusive.

I don't think you represent as much pain as you imagine you do. You appear to represent a much better and happier union. And even if there was pain from the affair, it's not your doing or your fault.

I was a proper affair baby. My dad left his wife at home with his kids and he knocked my mum up in the back of a Volvo estate. My family had no idea he was matured and still living at home with his family until after I was born and that only happened never the wife went through the phone book and caused my nan up and told her.

The shame isn’t mine to carry.

Honestly? I think you’re being both harsh and a bit self centred. Your parents and their previous relationships are their business. Are they good people? Are they good parents? Did/do they make you feel loved and secure and support you? Rather than judge them so harshly for something they did a long time ago to other people which hopefully all parties are over by now, look at the people they are.

I say this as someone whose father cheated and married his affair partner. My mum was, and still is bitter and she raised me and my siblings to be the same. It wrecked my relationship with my dad for years until I became an adult and realised that my
dad leaving didn’t wreck my childhood, it was being dragged into the mess by my mum. That didn’t have to happen.

@wildgreyseasoh good! It was something you wrote about him paying a lot but leaving her in the lurch that made me think he wasn’t.

Well if he was a good Dad to you and them and the affair was long ago, I would move on personally. People aren’t perfect.

Sorry you were cheated on but this isn’t necessarily the same. Every situation is different.

I think she was just used to having him around. She’s still incredibly angry about it thirty years on

I can understand you're shocked, but your reaction is disproportionate.

In an ideal world, people would move on and be honest before affairs happen, but life is not black and white; it's shades of grey. People are flawed human beings who make mistakes; no one is perfect. Try not to judge too harshly.

I would look at all the good your parents have done for you (assuming that's the case) and weigh that up against your shock about something that happened before you were born and doesn't affect your life.

If your half-siblings have an issue with their father, it is for them to address, not you; it's not your trauma.

I get how you feel and why you feel it. Feelings are feelings and can't be controlled. I would say to you though that you were not there and shouldn't judge.

How did you come to find this out at this point in your life?

That’s a shame, but you know, that’s on her, not your dad. She’s doing that to herself, and by her extension her now adult children who presumably have had to hear all about it for all these years. She could let it go. She’s had literal decades to do that.

Some people seem to thrive on drama and if there isn't any have a need to create some. OP, you need to weigh up your shock at what you have recently found out about an historic event and everything your parents have meant to you and done for you over the course of your life. Deal with this like a mature adult rather than an overdramatic teenager

It’s not clear whether they got pregnant which ended the marriages. Or if they had an affair, then got together properly and then had a baby. Not that it really matters tbh. If they had ended the relationship and then got together it would still have ended up in a split family for your step siblings and all that entails.

But so did your mum.

reframe it in your head, your parents found love & you are the product of that & happiness to them after a not very good time in their lives

Jesus Christ. Talk about wanting to be a victim. I’ve never heard such nonsense. Find something a little bit more productive to waste your time on. And maybe hope that one day people don’t judge you as harshly as you clearly do to others.

We were talking about my ex-partner. They liked him and wanted to know why it ended and I said it was because he cheated. I said I hate everyone who cheats and they should be like my parents, who ended unhappy relationships before they got into new ones. My dad raised his eyebrows and laughed, and then they explained.

Were you loved? Cherished? I learned a long time ago that my parents were adults and as such they were entitled to a private life and a personal history that did not involve me.

You are ridiculous and dramatic. Although if this your usual personality your parents are silly for telling you

Feelings definitely can and should be controlled. A lot of modern harm has been caused by the idea that Feelings not only trump everything but have to have free reign.

But you said both their marriages were unhappy so it would have ended anyway. Kindly, l really don’t see why this is any of your business, or the need for your judgement. We’re all fallible.

I would be happy that ur mum found a bit of happiness and had the guts to ltb, would u rather her abusive ex be your dad? Not actually any of your business what they did and when. Ur overreacting.

Your judgement isn’t grounded in reality. Life is complicated and getting out of an abusive marriage may not have been possible for your mum, without your dad’s support. Their marriages were at an end. They haven’t done anything wrong.

I typed out my situation then deleted it because I don’t want anyone being horrible about people I love.

You need to stop acting like a victim for attention.

So am I. I don't let it define anything about me or my life, why would I?

Was she actually in an abusive marriage? Were both marriages as far down the line as they say they were? I ask, as cheaters (often men but I'm sure women as well) seem to have a script; they were being abused hency why they had to get out of the relationship/marriage, the wife/girlfriend was crazy. the marriage was a marriage on paper only ie separate rooms hadn't slept together in years etc.

It would definitely cloud my.judgement of them.

What your dad did wasn’t great but it was years ago and it sounds like he’s been a good person in the years since. You’ll have to find a way to forgive him and move on. What’s done is done.

So you're still judging your mum, albeit to a lesser degree than your father, for cheating on an abuser?