Husband leaving for a fling - 10 month old and 4yr old

[Peanutbutterislife]

It’s 5am and I am already awake crying where your heart feels like it’s physically hurting.
How do people truly survive this? My husband has told himself that he will be happier leaving his beautiful family that we created and nothing I say is going to change his mind. It’s been 2/3 months of him being cold distant and not wanting to work on our relationship issues (which are SO normal given our tiny baby and just turned 4yr old) - he kept saying he’s “not been happy for some time” and “never gets space” and “doesn’t see this working long term and we’re too different”. I was arranging counselling, trying to give space despite my heart breaking, trying to discuss issues - you name it. He’s been becoming more and more difficult and even nasty during this time which has made me desperately sad and confused. Turns out OF COURSE he’s fallen for a younger girl who is childless and probably thinks nothing of him - he’s such a charmer and loves ego gratification so it just doesn’t even surprise me as much as it should. I’m only 33 myself and I have tried so hard to get into shape after our second baby so that I could be attractive to him, but he doesn’t even look at me. He finally admitted he had met someone he “thinks he would be happier with”. He gaslit me so badly for having suspicions and my gut was 100000% right. It is actually sickening and so so so beyond naive and sad- he’s willing to overlook the hard work of marriage and destroy our home, the impact on our gorgeous babies.

It feels like a cliche. And yet I have to somehow find a way to crawl out of this hole. How on earth do I even begin? I didn’t want my life to be survival, I am a fun person and I feel like I’m going to surely be depressed for so long and this is going to take years from me 😞. How will I ever be happy knowing what’s happened? And how do I co parent when I’m going to see my love for this man turn into hate and anger for his actions? Also - surely he’ll regret this in time but the pain I’ll have been through must mean I can’t take him back?

desperate and sad beyond words 😣

Lmao at the suggestion of family times and holidays 😂

If you were a man, would he treat you like that???

My exh moved out leaving me with two small dc and didn’t want to see them or pay for them for that matter. He appeared to be having a great time online dating. A year later, yes a whole year, he wanted to come back and try again. I couldn’t believe it.

He also did the asking for days out as a family. He had not wanted days out when we were together so I said, no way. Then he got very nasty and we had a terrible divorce which went to court and cost thousands.

I am telling you because it is a common cycle - leave, come back, want to try again, doesn’t work out, gets nasty. Not all the time of course but the fact it hasn’t worked out already with the lady friend says it all. (Btw my ex is still online dating ten years on.)

It's bollocks isn't it.

Basically "I want to swan off with Miss Thing but I also want to be a doting dad without doing any more labour or mental work than I do already, so how about I live my life as a single man and then you can organise everything for the kids and I'll pop along on some holidays and trips that you've planned and be a totally fun-time Disney dad"

🫠

@Peanutbutterislife id sleep in the room with your eldest and let him sleep in the room with the youngest . Tell him he needs to make plans to rent somewhere in two months once you are settled at work . Also the sleeping arrangements where he does the night time with the bay as you need sleep for work now too and he has to get use to solo parenting.
Dont make his life easy . This is his new reality.

Do not sleep on the same bed /room as him , do not agree to family time together. Make sure you head out and take time off without the kids even just to a mate for a coffee ( he doesn’t need to know that ) but start building a life separate from him.
I wouldn’t be letting him slip back into any sort of comfort relationship it’s you , as like you say there will be someone else along and he would hurt you all over again .

Yes. "I'm finding it too much and found a 24 yr old who's a blast. I'll be leaving you with the kids to do all the overnights, school and daycare runs. That will be more fun for me."

Stuff like this doesnt help. My ex is still with the woman he cheated on me with and they married and had kids.

Move the focus away from them and onto the OP.

This man is a total loser to walk out on his lovely wife and children without trying to sort things. Have no doubt whatsoever, you are so much better off without a deadweight like him. I have no words for men like him.

hi my love - I'm only just seeing this but had to jump on and lend support. I was you ten years ago. Mine were 3 and 5 at the time and I was blind-sided. He did exactly as you described "I've not been happy for ages" (we got married less than two years prior) and whilst originally quite "kind" out of guilt, that didn't last and it all got quite nasty when he realised what the fallout financially was. I'm sure you've had loads of good practical advice so I will keep this short:

1. Get and stay angry for a few months. You need to be as cold and passive as he is to deal with the practicals.
2. He needs to leave the house. He cannot expect you to cope with knowing he is pissing off out and coming back having been with her. That's not reality. If reality is a shitty flat or his parents, so be it.
3. Try not to obsess about her, or in what way she is better. It is irrelevant to you. Don't be hung up on if they stay together. There is no such thing as karma, he may not get his just desserts and they may end up together and very happy. My ex and ow did. In a way I prefer that as it means it was "worth it".
4. Lastly, find support in RL and on here. At the time there was a thread in relationships with a bunch of us all dealing with it at the same time and we gradually migrated onto FB and became friends in RL - one lived round the corner from me. It was great and saved my family and other friends from hearing about the minutiae endlessly.

The very best of luck - there will be ups and downs and progress is not linear but the NO 1 thing is to take control - YOU are in charge of your life and what happens from here on.

You don't know what goes on behind closed doors though. You reap what you sow and all that, I don't believe you can badly hurt and betray a person and get away with it.

Sadly that isn't true.

But you're diverting the attention away from the issues, which are this lady Needs to sort out what she wants to do and leave them to it.

Please stop focusing on those two.And what may or may not happen to them.

Of course they do!! Unless you are both immortal? 😂

Please don’t let him brush this under the carpet OP. He WILL do it again even if you reconcile.

1. seek urgent legal advice and ask him to leave immediately

2. see your GP for counselling options and support with low mood

3. apply now for childcare funding for when you go back to work

4. once he is not living with you apply for CMS which will help pay for childcare

Or if you both die in the same car crash, then technically, a relationship never ended.

People don't realize that death ends a relationship. Most of the time, one of you dies, first, very few couples died together.

This!
Whatever happens now op you must never go further than pretending to trust him. Always make sure you have an escape route ready.

I believe it is, it's an awful thing to do to a person. I agree with what you're saying though about sorting her own things out.

Of course you can...but what that looks like isn't obvious. Far too many women who have been left behind pin their future happiness on what's going on with the ex and it's unhealthy.

No one of fb ever puts up pictures that are usually the ‘normal’ ones. Most people put up the perfectly posed, slightly filtered with hair and make up done perfectly, so please don’t compare yourself to those and torment yourself.
He is the one that has said he will be happier elsewhere so it makes sense for him to leave…. Hopefully he will go without a fuss and then you can get some space to breathe.
Our youngest still doesn’t sleep well at almost 5 so I’m not in the camp of letting him stay until the children are more settled in night time routines because you could be stuck with him for years, and he has shown you he has no loyalty, he has been unfaithful and is a liar.
Can you manage financially on your own whilst you sort out going back to work after maternity leave/childcare etc?

What a horrible man. Hopefully you have lots of support in real life. please ensure you get legal advice and prioritise yourself he’s not your friend.
He can leave you but not the children. He needs to be doing his share of the care not just the fun stuff.
I’d knock any suggestion of playing happy families on days out and Christmas on the head. It’s as though he expects you sitting around grateful for any scraps.

Oh yes, I forgot...do ask him when he's going to sort out suitable accommodation and childcare to facilitate 50/50 care. I was so blindsided that when ex pissed off and saw them 2/30 nights it didn't occur to me to kick up a fuss. It's not a given that he gets to walk away and just do some fun stuff EOW.

That should never be the case. I agree it shouldn't become an obsession.

Finish it. Tell him to move out. You will be tired. You will struggle sometimes. You'll be ok. You'll be moving forward, not stuck in limbo. You will be healing. Best of luck x

Go back to work, find yourself again and use the b*stard for all he's worth. He can get a good taste of being a single parent himself. Make yourself as busy as possible away from the house.

P.s you sound like an awesome Mum. You've totally got this! X

Reading your posts he’s dropped the bombshell yet is expecting you to carry on and care for them like nothing has happened. That’s unfair to you and the dc.
If baby isn’t breastfed I’d definitely encourage you going to a friend/your mum overnight you need to be able to cry and talk without worrying about children. I’d suggest a 50/50 care arrangement this week. If he says about work he’ll need to take leave. You need time to rest/cry/seek legal advice.

I'm sorry to hear this. You've done nothing wrong.
When your head is a bit clearer start consulting a solicitor. And when the lizard realizes what a fuck up he has made, remind him where he made his bed because your home and bed are no longer available to him.

So basically he wants to be a family for all the fun things, but single/childfree for the hard things. He wants to separate/divorce but can't be bothered to figure out what it entails and move forward with it.

It doesn't work like that. Use his uselessness to your advantage. Take your time to think what you want custody/money/practicalities. Talk to a lawyer