DH had affairs 20 years ago

[SaintJoan]

Been with DH for 28 years, had suspicions before, but now have evidence that he had at least one affair and probably several casual flings in the first 10 years of our relationship. No reason to suspect him now. Have 2 teenage kids, he's a good father and although not perfect we've had a good family life together. Do I confront him or do I let sleeping dogs lie?

What evidence do you have?

I would talk to him. I would hope that we could then eventually work through it and get past it. If I never said anything then I'd never get past it. That is what I would have to do, but I'm not you-you know what hyou can live with.

I suppose the question is, what would you gain from confronting him?

The evidence is letters he received from these women and from third parties referring to events - nowadays these would be emails and texts that would probably be deleted but these had been kept at the bottom of an old box. The dilemma is will I cope with his reaction if I confront him and what will the fallout be for all of us? If I don't, will this eat away at me forever?
I know it's an awfully long time ago but I when I read those letters it felt like yesterday - and I still felt betrayed, humiliated and absolutely devastated. All those years ago I could easily have chosen to walk away - now that choice is not so easy.

Can you forgive this OP? If so, I would very much suggest that you clear the air and tell him you know and would now like to hear about everything.

I can't imagine living with suspicion for so long and would imagine the secrets between you have impoverished your marriage, but some honesty now might give it a new lease of life.

I'm puzzled why this stopped at the 10 year mark though.

I don't know it did stop - that's just when the evidence stops.

If it was me I would have to say something. And I don't want to upset you but I would start to think about how you could find out whether other things have happened more recently. I'm sure lots of others will dive in and suggest that you gather other evidence.

If there have been multiple OW in the past then maybe in his mind in some sense he feels its ok to do this as its separate from his marriage and in his mind doesn't challenge it. I have known someone else who feels this way and to him it is just a way of life.

Inside you do you feel it will have carried on?

From what you've found how seriously do you think he took these liaisons?

If this were me I would need to discuss it in RL and would go and see a counsellor to talk through my feelings before I spoke to him.

(Or at least I would now after having been through infidelity with XH. Prior to my recent experience I would probably have just launched into a conversation with him and all would have turned to crisis...)

I've thought the same, that there are probably others that I don't know about, but not sure how I could find evidence on that and whether it would be worth it -isn't this enough to show that he's not the person I thought he was?
Difficult to say how seriously he took the affairs cos the letters are not from him but to him. I know at least one was serious, I confronted him at the time about it and we went through a rocky patch - he didn't deny it completely but I now realise he was much more involved than he admitted at the time. The others it's hard to say, he travelled a lot and some were probably just casual. But in some letters there is reference to difficulties in our relationship so he obviously discussed me with OW.
Unfortunately at the moment I don't have access to counselling (we live abroad) but I think I would benefit from it - my head is all over the place now and I'm just questioning our entire life together and the choices I've made along the way.

My first H was hopelessly unfaithful. After a while, I didn't even bother finding out who it was 'this' time. He remarried. I heard from friends that he said he continued to cheat for several years but, later, felt it was "too much trouble" and couldn't be bothered any more. He would have been in his late forties when I heard this.

I'm telling you this because I've also heard this from other men, so it's quite possible he did stop playing around after your first ten years of marriage. I agree with IYHAYKI that it'd be useful for you to have a few sessions with a counsellor before talking to your H. It will help you to clarify your own feelings. Then you'll be in the best position to decide how much you want to know, and how to broach the topic.

Good luck!

Cross-posted! How about finding a British counsellor who works online, by phone or Skype?

I would say that if it was a one-off affair at a particularly rough patch, I'd let it go. But this is a serial cheater you're dealing with, with several affairs/flings over a ten year period. You have no way of knowintg whether it stopped, and to be honest if he kept getting away with it the likelihood is that the technology improved and as you say, turned into emails or texts.

The fact that he kept all this stuff intrigues me, though. And it implies that if he's still cheating, the evidence is probably searchable, because he's a man who likes to hang onto the memory of his conquests.

So I think there's two things you need to do:
One, get as much information as possible, and I'll defer to WhenWillI on the logistics of that. You don't need to disclose that info to him if you don't want to, but the more you know the better a position you're in to decide your next step.
Two, decide what your dealbreaker point is. If he did stop after ten years and you believe that he's never again done so, can you stay with him? When you say "how will I cope with his reaction" do you mean, what happens if he denies it? Or do you mean, what happens if he admits it?

I don't think you can let sleeping dogs lie any more. You can't unknow this, and you won't be able to stop it affecting you. So you might as well go on and find out the rest.

Good luck.

like tortoise I was wondering why has he kept these letters,
I am afraid I couldn't let it go

The worst scenario for me is if I confront him and he either tries to deny it or trivialise it. That would confirm to me that he has no respect for my feelings and I wouldn't be able to continue - then I would have to make the decision to leave and break up the family. What I want from him is honesty. I'm prepared to accept that he's a different person now than he was then but not unless he shows a willingness to talk and explain things to me - if he just goes into shutdown mode (as he has done in past difficulties) then I will have nowhere to go.

I've been living with this all week while he's away on a business trip (yes, I have already imagined the worst - but with the stress he's got at work at the moment he'd have to be superhuman to be having an affair now!). He's coming back tomorrow so I have to decide how I'm going to handle this.

The timing is crap too,cos we're in the middle of moving countries (which is how I discovered the letters in sorting out the house ready for the move), upheaval for everyone so nobody needs this right now. And I want to make sure the kids don't get a whiff of it until/unless it does turn out to be irreparable.

Gosh, this is a difficult situation. I would think about what you want to happen, and if that will be achieved by talking it through with him. You need to be prepared to act accordingly if you dont get the answers you want to hear.

Very important you have a plan of action before you talk to him, as if you dont get the answers you want but then dont know what to do about it, it will affect you more than anything and you'll probably feel angry at yourself which isnt fair on you.

I would arrange an initial phone counseling session with a UK counselor. I know Harley Therapy offer that, for example. This might help you work out what you want to do, and how important it is to you to confront him.

Personally this discovery would definitely eat away at me. It would stop me being affectionate, and I think things would snowball from there. It means you have not had the relationship you think you've had all those years. You at least are owed an apology and full explanation.

For me the bit that sticks out is that 3rd parties have said things to you. Do you mean other people knew he was having affairs but said nothing to you?

I know it's years ago, but you do need to know that it's all stopped, and that the years you have ahead of you are not going to be based on false beliefs.

Some very good advice here.

Do you have access to a GUM clinic where you are?
If he has had multiple partners, particularly during the 80's, you may need to be checked out.

I'd second being really clear on what you want to happen before you enter into the discussion. And bear in mind that if you ask him to be honest about any other relationships he is highly likely to lie. Faced with your discovery and the fear of what that could mean it will be an instant reaction.

So before you do that get your head as straight as you possibly can.

Thanks for all your comments and advice - it helps to get some kind of perspective on this. It's funny but i do feel a lot calmer now I've told someone - even though you are all annoymous strangers. So thanks for that

Queefer, I have thought about the health implications but it just so happens that I had an AIDS test a couple of years ago (in connection with a visa application, nothing sinister) and it was negative. But it made me very angry to think of the danger he could have put me in.

As regards the third party issue - no-one has ever said anything to me. I know from the letters that there were other people around at the time - some of his work colleagues definitely knew. I don't feel bitter that no-one told me - they had no loyalty to me. But I have wondered if other good friends of his (who I consider to my friends too) might have known something, but I have no evidence. Either way I feel humiliated thinking I might have been in the company of people who knew.

Hi StJoan

Very sorry indeed to read about your situation. I really feel for you.

I think this is likely to gnaw away at you unless you find a way to confront him about it and bring it into the open. I think you need to prepare for the confrontation like you would a crucial business meeting. Gather your evidence; think of your strategy and what you want the outcome to be. Think of what is most important to you - knowing the full truth? Knowing the behaviour has stopped?

It doesn't have to be the end of the relationship unless you want it to be.

I'm not too clear on what what you "knew" intuitively, rather than cognitively. It sounds as though you have always "known" about at least one affair, but that this was never acknowledged properly. So you've been locked in a dance where you both "knew that you knew". The fact that you've stayed and haven't acknowledged this as a truth has perhaps given him permission to carry on.

I think it would be really helpful to establish what your bottom line is. What could he reveal that would mean you couldn't stay? You see, if you feel intuitively that you don't want to be confronted with something that will make you leave, then tread carefully. But the consequence of that will be what I would describe as a "veneer" marriage. Perhaps too, that is what you've had all these years, with these massive secrets and unacknowledged truths. That is why this discovery is simultaneously an opportunity and a threat.

I can imagine your pain because perhaps you have been bargaining all these years that there were no deep feelings involved and that it was just sexual release.

This is a scary time because all of those bargains you have been making have been like a protective shell around you and were necessary to survive in this marriage. Confronting this now also means confronting your own collusive behaviour down the years. If there is anything in you that wishes you hadn't found those letters or that he hadn't kept them, then that means you've been bargaining.

I would always advise knowing everything and having complete honesty, but that's because of my personality and how much better I know a marriage can be, for having complete openness and transparency.

So I think you need to be pretty self-aware about your own personality and whether you can cope with the revelations that might ensue, what sort of marriage you want in the future and how you want your life to be.

I don't think there's a half-way house about this either. You either want to know it all or nothing at all.

Like the idea of the business meeting Mrs Jellicle - I agree I need to decide what my preferred outcome is before I just go ahead and open this Pandora's box.

Some interesting comments Whenwillifeelnormal. As to how much I knew and how much I suspected i probably haven't been very clear in these posts. Over the course of about 6 months to a year we started having difficulties, he started a relationship with OW, I found letters (again! sounds like I snoop but I don't, it happened accidently)and confronted him. He admitted there was some kind of relationship but wouldn't give details and made it sound very one-sided. We reconciled and carried on, so the affair was acknowledged - but only to a degree. this new evidence points to more involvement than he admitted at the time. But I had no way of knowing that at the time so I don't think I have been guilty of colluding.

As to the other (seemingly more casual) affairs some I had absolutely no idea about and a couple were nothing more than a passing suspicion - a photo of a group with him next to a pretty girl...mmm I wonder....no, of course not. If I had acted on suspicions like those I'm sure I would have been called paranoid. We spent a lot of time apart when we were younger (work commitments on both sides) which gave both of us opportunities to stray. I never did, but now wish I had!

I agree about the honesty. And this is what hurts. I've always said I would rather know everything, deal with it and move on rather than live with half truths and white lies. My own family was very secretive so I know how destructive it can be. Perhaps this is the root of the problem - he believes in white lies, in not telling the whole truth in order to avoid confrontation or smooth things over. I remember saying at the time that what hurt more than thinking of him with OW was thinking about the lies and deceit it entailed. So he had his chance to come clean but he didn't do it fully.

Now I just wonder how much he's actually wanted to be with me all these years - was continuing the relationship with me just the easy option as opposed to taking a risk and starting again?

I am really feeling for you as I have been in a similar situation. Due to finding stuff on his laptop I know too much and it has been very difficult. That said, at least I have a reasonably good idea of what I am up against - confronting is all very well but you have no guarantee that he will tell even half of the truth. I love him, he says he loves me and we are trying to repair our marriage as the stakes are so high. We are spending a fortune on counselling/psychotherapy in the process - without this I would be in complete pieces.

LadyButterfly good to hear from someone going through something similiar. Did DH agree to counselling and if so does he feel positive about it? Do you feel hopeful that you can repair this? I just worry that my trust and confidence in him is gone and I can't get that back unless he makes an effort.