Hyper that is horrendous, you must have felt absolutely sick when you found that, a total rat. I'm so sorry to hear what you had to go through, I can;t begin to imagine how you must've felt at the birth - and how on earth to explain that one to your DC when they are old enough??
I confronted him last night. I just picked up his two phones then sat down and asked him for the passwords. I said I wanted to show him something. He unlocked them both straight away. Then came the comical part - for some reason I just cannot work the flippin' Blackberry. I try to use it like an iPhone, get it all wrong and can't seem to navigate around the bloody thing. So I sat there, shaking trying to find her emails. I eventually found a couple of messages but only managed to click on one (hopeless!) before I started talking.
I asked him why he'd initiated the conversation in the first place, why he flirted, why he tried to make it dirtier, why he sent his email address and why he felt the need to take it to private email.
He said because he's an idiot, straight up. It was a ridiculous, stupid thing to do and he apologised. He said he was drunk, home alone, a bit bored and it was easy to just type away anything really without thinking what he was doing. Mindless. She means absolutely nothing to him (I didn't doubt that) He agreed that it was just cheap thrills although at one point he tried to suggest it wasn't just him that initiated it. Having read their conversation about 10 times though I know that it was entirely him (whether she then played game and got dirty on bbm, I don't know) I pointed out that she was in no way to blame because of x and y etc and he agreed.
He said he had deleted most of the emails but could probably retrieve them from work. I asked for them today but he says they were in fact deleted and he can't ask IT for them because it was to an external address (non-work related, obviously!) He wishes he did still have them because he maintains that I could then see that it wasn't email sex, it was just stupid banter, they chatted about the night they slept together but not much else. He said that what was on FB was about as ridiculous and senseless as it got.
He then offered some 'excuses' if I was willing to hear them. He said that he has been worried for a while that he has a problem with alcohol and has been trying to let me know or hoping that I would challenge him about it so he could talk to me. I have questioned on occasion why he always needs to take a drink to bed and when I found a rucksack full of empty miniature wine bottles he just fobbed me off saying it was rubbish to get rid of etc. Denial being the number one sign of a problem! He was afraid to talk to me about it because of my Dad (history of drink problems) and because of all I have been through with the miscarriages etc he has felt that I have been fragile recently and not strong enough to deal with it. Not true, I am very resilient but hey. He feels he has mentally had a lot on his plate (he went back to a counsellor not long ago as he feels the need to talk about his emotions on a constant basis and didn't feel like he could talk to me at times or that I cared when he did.) I'm ashamed to say he does have a point there.
He also finds it hard that DD and I are so close - she's very much a Mummy's girl and it can be hard for anyone else being with her if I'm around. She is v clingy with me and can push others away - sadly my amazing Mum being the latest victim for no apparent reason (but that's another thread entirely!)
Without boring you with all the ins and outs we agreed that we have given everything to our DD this past 3 years but the downside is that we have neglected our own relationship. We probably do something jusy the two of us about four times a year - usually a birthday or wedding anniversary! It felt good to talk and there is lots more to be done. He desperately wants to be a good husband and a good father and by all accounts he genuinely is. As he no longer has the emails he will have to put up with me grilling him over the contents of them (which I'm sure he will find worse than actually having kept them). Only then can I work things through in my head.
The alcohol thing I have experienced my whole adult life (apparently he was really drunk when I came back from the antenatal class but I didn't even notice - he said because he is hiding it) so we can deal with that separately. This may sound ironic but one of the reasons I married him is because he is so open and very easy to talk to (the exact opposite of my dad). He wants to talk and needs to talk so will always admit to something and open up if asked. He said he wanted me to notice him again, to draw attention to himself so that he/we could talk. He's certainly done that, albeit in the worst and most untimely way possible!
I feel like I've gone on for long enough now, if you're still reading then thank you and thank you to everyone who posted, you've all really helped me get through these last few days. If I'm being shortsighted and missing something blatantly obvious, and need a slap around the chops then please feel free to point it out! I'm officially full term today so baby brain is still very much a cause!