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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

Caught my husband out he has been seeing someone else.

440 replies

Inrealshock · 21/03/2013 09:41

Name change for me as i am so devastated. Hes on a business trip at the moment but was sent random texts between her and himfor the prior 48 hours which somehow i think maybe because if icloud landed on my ipad including a naked phot of herself which she had sent him. He replied shes a 10/10 and perfect - shes a good 10 years younger than me. They were planning to meet in a restaurant and go on to a hotel room. The last year I have suffered from breast cancer and had various operations and i know that it all strted in December when i was just bck from hospital after my fourth operation. He knows I know and is getting a flight home this morning. I hardly slept last night and am holding it together for the kids. I have though in a fierce rage cut up numerous suits ties and shirts. From the conversations we have had he is blaming the cancer as having affected him. I have done my best to make him happy we do have a sex life but my body and breasts are scarred from all the operations including a mastectomy and reconstruction. I felt i had turned a corner with the cancer which was only diagnosed last July - his fling with her started in December - he assures me it was just kissing but i know they had a hotel room lined up. Sorrybfor the rambling - he gets back at luchtime - what shall i do ?

OP posts:
tiredemma · 24/03/2013 09:51

blaming your cancer?

utter cunt.

PureQuintessence · 24/03/2013 09:55

At the moment, all he is learning is that him seeking his pleasures elsewhere has no consequence to him. He has been lying and deceiving for so long, and putting a mask on at home with you, saying all the right little things will by now be second nature to him. For him, it is just a question of calming you down so he can continue. He knows that it is just going to be a rocky week or two, and then he can get back to her, behind your back again.

It is not YOU he is staying for now. It is his home and his kids.

Thisisaeuphemism · 24/03/2013 09:57

Agree pure, and it suits his persona of looking like a good guy around friends and family.

onenutshortofasnickers · 24/03/2013 10:19

If he can do this to you at the time you needed him the most it makes me wonder what else is there?

And if you don't kick him out now, he will turn it on the other woman, he has already tried to blame you and the cancer. What a sick prick.

He will do it again, and if the OW lied that she didn't know about your breast cancer and she did, well, the two of them are probably waiting till it cools down.

He will arrange couple councelling and be super attentive for the next couple of weeks. Then things will have to go back to 'normal' as in back to work and allowing him out on his phone, but checking up on him, checking everything he does being paranoid. He will then blame you for suffocating him and tell you that you need to let it go, it has been a month now and he is sorry but you are making him feel bad and you are ruining the marriage and that it was your fault for having cancer any way. (all bull shit but he will say it along with other crap.) If he does arrange councelling he will either never get round to it as he know some one else will say he is to blame and if he does go he will say the counceller is against him and siding with you and a bad counceller.

He will then go back to the OW or someone else, more likely that skank. Then either the circle will repeat or he will move out with her, spend money like there is no tomorrow, forget about you and the kids, say he wants you to move out and sell and you deserve nothing and it was all your fault, he never really loved you, but he loves her etc etc

Then you will get harrasment from him and alot more stress and have to file for divorce, then he will say he is sorry, he wants you back, the grass wasn't greener, you are the love of his life- whildt telling the skank the sane story too.

He will tell everyone else the marriage was bad before the cancer and paint you out to be thr baddie.

All the while staying with him is teaching the kids it is okay to be in a relationship like that and treat others like that. And them having to deal with the fall out too.

And he wont get an sti test he will either say he did and that he is fine or he just wont, so go to the drs now and get that sorted.

Those things will happen if you try to 'work this out' and then he will make you think you are to blame. You are not. All the while clinging on to a glimmer of hope that isnt there-

Someone posted a mid life crises thread -mid life crisis for dummies?? - sorry mods if i am not allowed to refer to this but I think the OP would find it useful and helpful to read.

Best just to chuck him now, go to divorce laywer and make sure you get at least half. You only have 6months to file under adultery.

You are so Stong you don't need this king sized shit dragging you down.

ElegantSufficiency · 24/03/2013 10:23

I agree, whether or not you decide to forgive him, if it turns out he is worthy of your forgiveness, you need him to experience loss as another poster said. If he is at home still, he will have no comprehension of what he is on the brink of losing here. He still has his home and his family and his kids and his creature comforts and you're all together under the one roof. sure, things are tense, but it'll superficially at least get back to normal.

you need him to move out so that he is forced to think about life as a divorced dad.

ElegantSufficiency · 24/03/2013 10:27

only six months to file for divorce on grounds of adultery? that's ridiculous. Most people are too shocked and go into denial. it could be a year before you accept that the marriage isn't going to recover. so the six months should be extended to a year.

onefewernow · 24/03/2013 10:37

I expect you are not eating or sleeping well and enessly talking and trying to process it all.

How about sending out for the most expensive bubbles you can buy and running a hot bath

Then eat a little.

It will do wonders to help your sanity.

Repeat daily.

IfYoureHappyAndYouKnowIt · 24/03/2013 11:35

The six months rule on adultery can relate to a recent adultery event that triggered the final break up. In my case XH did something with ow, I found out, he gave her up ...life carried on then I caught him out six months later and had him out within a week..divorce grounds were adultery (altho he tried to make it unreasonable behavior Wink )

In any case, op, this is an awful situation and I think you will be in shock for sometime. What you think today, tomorrow is not likely to be what you think in weeks or months to come. For there to be any chance of you both making it through this he has a lot of work to do. And he would have to move hell and earth imo to make up for his appalling behavior.

I can see that your pain must be huge. Hard though it is given that he is your H who you thought was your best supporter I would really suggest that you look to others for support and have time away from him. It will be best for for both of you. Whilst its only natural to want to heal this by seeing loving signs from him, in the short term all you will see from him I think is a panic reaction...he will be terrified that he will lose his home and family and be hated for what he has done by those that find out.

onefewernow · 24/03/2013 11:51

I agree it really pays to see the situation from the adulterers viewpoint. Not in terms of why he did what he did- that was his own weakness and not related to the marriage.

I mean to analyse his behaviour now, and to see the situation in terms of how he will be thinking.

Eg he is panicking, wrong footed, worried about how others will see him, on the defensive, shocked he has been caught and damage limiting. He is bound to focus on how your illness affected him and use that to milk sympathy.

Of course he will have found it a great strain for his wife to have been so ill. But there would have been many other ways for him to have relieved those feelings.

ProphetOfDoom · 24/03/2013 12:13

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

OrangeLily · 24/03/2013 13:34

OP how are you today?

bootsycollins · 24/03/2013 13:46

Well said snickers, absolutely spot on.

DonkeysDontRideBicycles · 24/03/2013 14:36

He gave himself permission to sneak about. He banked on the fact you were dealing with this huge issue and otherwise preoccupied. He allowed himself a bit of pampering and ego stroking. It's all about him isn't it?

mathanxiety · 24/03/2013 15:32

I think you are partially blaming yourself for this -- you have talked about doing your best wrt sex, and about your body not being a '10'. I think somewhere deep down you feel he had a reasonable reason to do what he did, and that your cancer was something you imposed on him in some way. If so, you need to snap out of this.

LottieJenkins · 24/03/2013 16:17

maanxiety Shock I cant believe you are blaming the OP! Shock

LineRunnyEgg · 24/03/2013 16:20

Lottie, mathanxiety really isn't. She's suggesting that the OP may be partially blaming herself deep down and that she shouldn't.

LineRunnyEgg · 24/03/2013 16:20

I think.

badinage · 24/03/2013 16:25

Math isn't blaming the OP; far from it. She's advised the OP to snap out of this flawed way of rationalising her husband's atrocious behaviour. No one's responsible for this but him and the OW.

LottieJenkins · 24/03/2013 16:57

Ah ok sorry!!! Blush

biscuitnoodle · 24/03/2013 17:56

Just read this whole thread, so sorry you are going through this. How are you today? Hope you are looking after yourself. Stay strong, you and the kids are the most important right now xx

scarecrow22 · 24/03/2013 18:30

InRealShock, I so so feel for you.
I have not read all posts, but saw at start many which said leave straight away. I'm not saying you shouldn't, but I was in a similar situation as DH had an affair when I was recovering from a different sort of illness. I found out after it was over, and wished I hadn't. I half understood why he did it, though am still recovering from hurt. However I decided to stick with marriage as it was the first time. I did tell him I would never accept twice - only once is a mistake. It is just over five years later and I am glad we stayed together. My only regret is I didn't insist on couples counselling as I think we would (still!) benefit. But as I say it can work.
If it is your DP's first time and it sounds like he is taking it seriously perhaps consider the option of giving it a try?
I do not know the circumstances, so am not saying "do", only saying "maybe".
Above all my sincere good wishes and empathy with you. It will take a long time to heal, but I can promise you it can heal.

mathanxiety · 24/03/2013 18:54
DonkeysDontRideBicycles · 24/03/2013 19:12

How are you tonight Inrealshock?

Original poster
Inrealshock · 24/03/2013 19:26

Feeling ok just really sad. I am not asking him to leave ... Sorry I just do not think that is the answer. He is full of remorse but for me it is just deeper than that .. You see I really so love him and I want us to try and work it out together.

OP posts:
Thisisaeuphemism · 24/03/2013 20:01

You have to do what you feel is right, of course. I think people are worried that you are storing up problems for later on.

You say that he is full of remorse. I wonder how that is showing itself?
From what you've written here, he doesn't appear remorseful at all... sad that it's over, but not remorseful.

This was an on-going secret affair that he had no intention of stopping.
He lied about it.
He was paranoid about you telling people about it.
He claimed it was, variously, to do with your cancer, his hair, his age.
He suggested she is as much a bitch as him (she knew you were ill)
He didn't even come straight home?
He expected applause for giving you toast.
He now claims your marriage was in trouble.

Really, he comes across as disrespectful and completely unreflective. I'm so sorry that he is putting you in such pain when you were just beginning to feel better. Please take care of yourself.