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Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Original poster

Affairs: Can you really get over one

424 replies

Disbelief · 01/09/2005 20:49

I found out my husband was having an affair three months ago and athough we are both trying to make a go of our marrigae and sort things out I wonder will the pain ever really go, also if they stray once is it likely that they will do it again????

OP posts:
maturer · 10/09/2005 20:50

MM talk to us- you are not alone!

spidermama · 10/09/2005 20:53

I haven't read the thread yet (don't you just hate it when people start postings with that?) but my husband had an affair about ten years ago and it hurt very badly. We both wanted to stay with each other so we worked at it. I needed to know everything so I could trust him again.
Our relationship has been much stronger and though it's a cliche I would say it has been the making of us.
That said, it hurt very badly for about a year or a year and a half the gradually began to dwindle. I can honestly say that I haven't felt any pain or doubt for about seven or eight years.
I'm so sorry you're going through it now though.
All the best of luck. x

kath4kids · 10/09/2005 20:59

MM so sorry your not feeling good but please don't hide yourself away. You can find such support and encouragement on here from people who have been there and come out the other side one way or another.

kama · 10/09/2005 21:00

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

maturer · 10/09/2005 21:05

spidermama, thanks for posting. I'm at the year/ year and a half stage after my dh affair. We stayed together and are still working at it. there are still days when I feel the pain like it was yesterday but on the whole I feel we have got closer and stronger. it's good to read it can still get better as on the days I feel down I despair that I still feel like this and wonder will I ever truely move on- you show it can happen. thanks again.

nooka · 10/09/2005 21:06

Hi MrsMiggins, are you OK? Sending you lots of hugs, and hoping that you are feeling a bit better now?

nooka · 10/09/2005 21:08

I'll second that too. It makes me feel that perhaps my decision to stick it out wasn't so insane after all! Spidermama, one thing I'd really like to ask is whether your dh has come to terms with having his affair and forgiven himself? My dh is still really struggling with this, and I think it's really putting a break on our relationship recovering.

spidermama · 10/09/2005 21:14

It took a while for my dh to believe I could ever trust him again. He used to try far too hard to please me bending over backwards to help and show how much he loved me. It was too much and unsustainable. He felt really guilty for ages and ages.
It did get better because we (or mainly I) talked and talked and talked about the whole thing until we'd covered every aspect a million times and it was boring.

nooka · 10/09/2005 21:24

Sounds like we are going the right way then! To me it's already so much in the past - I just want to get going with the rest of our lives (hopefully together)

spidermama · 10/09/2005 21:25

Good luck.
It's very positive that you both want it to work.

maturer · 10/09/2005 21:50

Starting to get to the boring stage, but not quite ther yet. still need to talk about it but also want to start a new chapter. it's driving me mad-I want so much to move on, I know it's just another stage and time and honest taking will get us through but at times I worry i can never move on. It's good to hear SM that it can happen.

MrsMiggins · 11/09/2005 08:20

had the worst day & night
started yesturday lunchtime when couldnt trust him & asked for his phone
pretty much set the mood for the day
last night thought we were OK as did some talking but by bedtime (and beer & wine) we had an arguement and he ended up in spare room
I went & persuaded him to come back but i havent slept all night
hes in bed stillnow & dr0ea0ding him waking up & saying hes leaving
unlike you lot, i cant say hes going out of his way to make me trust him

feel v scared & alone

spidermama · 11/09/2005 10:17

Oh MM I'm so sorry. I don't know what to suggest. I think I'd have to get some space from each other. I can understand how scarey that would be, but it seems to me you both need time and space to think.
Whne my dh had an affair we had a week apart working out what we wanted to say to each other and booked a hotel room (neutral space) to meet in one evening to talk. We sat in this hotel room just him and me, with notes we'd written containing stuff we wanted to say, and no booze and threashed it out for hours. Sometimes crying, even fighting, taking turns to make sure each of us said everthing which wanted saying and answered each others points.
It worked really well but before it could happen we needed space from each other.

maturer · 11/09/2005 11:35

MM so sorry this is happening to you. All I can say is sometimes it has to reach crisis point to get better. My dh left me- he sat the children down and said he loved me and loved someone else and had to leave (I never asked him to) I thought it was the end for us. He came back the next day saying he'd made the biggest mistake of his life. Afterwards he started talking more and he said he almost had to create that crisis point to bring reality into the sistuation. It was the worst night of my life and it took months to start healing (hurts now to think about it) but he got himself out of "limbo" he made himself make a decision and says he never regrets the decision he made. The worst thing for you is - he then carries on as if all is ressolved when you are left traumatised and asking basic questions about your relationship. I do not wish this upon you at all but perhaps something still needs to happen to "bring him to his senses"- he's certainly not acting like a man who has made that final decision, but give it time. He's probably still trying to get his head round his actions and as SM said the guilt comes. My dh kept in touch with HER for a while after they ended the affair - he says he felt guilty to all of us for the pain he'd caused. he finally realised he was the problem and not the solution and stopped all contact.Take care.

kath4kids · 11/09/2005 12:33

mm sending you huge hugs, and so sorry you are going through this. There are days when you wonder whether your ever going to get through this but i think maturer is right, he needs to get to that point of wanting to make things better.

When i said to my dh last night how do i know your not going to go with someone else when the going gets tough he said ' because i think differently now. I now look at what i have and not what i want or haven't got.

So i do think they need to come to that point where their thinking changes.

Keep talking to us, if it's only to scream or cry, but please don't shut yourself out. We are here for you.

nooka · 11/09/2005 18:41

Hi Mrs Miggins,
Sleeping in a seperate room is not always a disaster, and as others have said a bit of seperation may be a good thing.

My dh moved onto the sofa a few months after I found out. He's still there now (alternates with a futon on the children's floor). I have invited him back, as I don't like him sleeping with the children or on the sofa (esp as he sleeps with the back door open). We don't have a spare room. Actually I quite like to sleep on my own, as dh often woke me up with his snoring, and likes to sleep at sub-zero temperatures. We are hoping to move house soon, and my preference is for a bedroom each. dh thinks we should live seperately for 6 months so he can be independant for a while, and we can both make a choice again to be together. For me that's the heart of the matter. We both need to make an active choice to be together. For me I have made that choice, but because dh is financially dependant on me he can't make that choice yet.

I think that you need to think about what might make you feel a bit more empowered? I felt so much better once I felt that I was making the decisions about the future, and that was really the turning point for my mental health after the affair.

Wishing you all the best!

MrsMiggins · 11/09/2005 21:23

DH deffo not trying too hard - not enough if you ask me. He;s still here & things seem ok.
away Tues night, maybe Wed too

after yesturday with the phone, and then last night when he seemed to deliberately pick a fight, I just dont know what to do

a part of me wishes he'd leave with the hope it would bring him to his senses cos I get the feeling hes still not being entirely honest

he even said yesturday that we didnt discuss previous relationships in details so he doesnt want to discuss the affair he cant see that the difference is we were together while he embarked on this "relationship/affair" so it IS my business.

he is definately calling all the shots but short of telling him to leave I just dont know what to do

nooka · 11/09/2005 22:36

Could you cope if you told him to leave and he did? I hate to say this but I think that you may need to do something drastic. But think through exactly what you want out of any move first (check your legal position, finances, support mechanisms etc). My dh took months to really acknowledge that he shouldn't have been having his affair. In the immediate afterwath I think he was just upset because his mistress immediatly dumped him, and he didn't have anyone to talk to. Alternaltely it may be a head in the sand thing, and he wants to pretend it didn't happen.

overdraft · 11/09/2005 22:39

i am so angry for you MM how can he be picking fights at a time like this he should be sucking up big time.You really need to tell him the pain he has put you through and talk about it.

overdraft · 11/09/2005 22:41

don't want to hyjack just a quick question.Do you all celebate your wedding anniversaries now? our first one post affair of two months ago is Friday.

nooka · 11/09/2005 22:45

Interesting point. We didn't last year (first time not to do anything, although it's been a bit low key for the past few years). This year we are coming up to 10, and I would really like to renew vows or something (I have taken off my wedding rings, and would like at some point to put them back on!). however I'm not sure we will be ready (it's in December) and dh would probably be horrified at the idea.

overdraft · 11/09/2005 22:49

Its our 10th this friday and he was planning to take me away to celebrate while he was seeing her( he didn't get around to booking anything).Now he asked if we could go out for eve and i said no because i didn't feel we had anything to celebrate.We are making a go of it but this is a day when he promised to be faithful to me and it feels strange and nothing to celebrate now.I am gonna have such a hard day on friday i am dreading it

nooka · 11/09/2005 23:01

Ooo. Good luck! I must say the worst one I had was the year just before I caught him, as I had a lot of evidence by then, just not the final proof (I had overheard things, and I had known something was up for several months, but it wasn't until I intercepted his e-mails that I could finally say you are lying when you tell me there is nothing going on, and thrust the piece of paper in his hand). I wish you all the best for Friday. Try doing something quite else without him maybe? At least for a bit of the day.

nooka · 11/09/2005 23:02

Alternately do go out, but to somewhere you want to go, and on your own terms. We recently went for the first time to a restaurant that we used to visit a lot of times in much happier days, and I found it quite cathartic. Reminded me of why I was still there with him.

overdraft · 11/09/2005 23:28

i will make plans with friends for the day time but don't know about eve it will be hard.