One about a sad pregnant lady married to a sad angry man.

[izchaz]

Before I start, please don't read this and say "divorce him, he's a shit head", much as that might be outstanding advice it's not an option I want to engage with. What I'm after is help in turning the negatives in my relationship into positives. How do I let go of the grief and hurt, and how do I persuade my husband to stop beating himself up over the protracted affair he had with my best friend (no longer)? I try every day to push the positives in our relationship: we're a good team, we can laugh and have fun together, we have an incredible group of friends that we share, we are going to be parents to a much wanted baby, and when we are both behaving we have glimpses of what used to be - it's easy to be together and we can both see how much the other loves us. However whenever times get tough - work stress, the whisper of tightening belts, having to multitask or balance multiple issues at once then the whole house of cards crumbles and one of us reverts to recriminations and aiming to wound the other. He is under a huge amount of pressure with work, an impending family bereavement, the worry of my earnings disappearing when I go off on maternity etc etc, and I try so hard to keep him afloat. On the days when I fail, as yesterday he rails and I cannot help but bite back. Last night we fought from 9 at night until 3am, and only stopped because our lodger came home. Once he has started he will follow me from room to room, verbally attacking and prickling me until I re-engage the fight. I am desperate to stop the cycle as I am conscious that our marriage is tiny and frail (married 11 months, his affair was on/off for the first 7, and when confronted twice he lied about it) and I do not feel it can stand up to such punishment without becoming a very twisted paradigm of what we wanted when we got engaged.
Please, help me to figure out how to break the cycle of bad behaviour we have both sunk into, I am miserable with him now, and would be miserable without him, but we had something so good and so precious not so long ago, and I want to find a way back to that.

"Springytotty you are without doubt the most patronising person of the internet I've ever had the misfortune to stumble across. Please don't call me "dear" or "darling", you don't know me, it doesn't make what say any more sensible. I do hope that's not too bossy for you mind, I would want my approach to upset afterall."

And you OP are the most domineering, deluded woman I've ever come across. I've lurked on this thread and viewed most of your posts with sympathy but people (in their own way) have tried to help you with their experiences and comments. Very, very few have been nasty. Some have been blunt probably because you're so thick and deluded, you still are holding your friend accountable for all this and your husband is getting away scot free. If you only want people to agree with you then you shouldn't have posted your thread because people are allowed to disagree.

In fact I do believe your nasty comments to posters who perhaps aren't coating their words in syrup are indicative of your true colours OP and they don't seem nice.

Have been reading this thread since the beginning. Am hiding it now it is making me angry. 're-engage', 'fertile soil', WTAF?

I wish you good luck, whatever you decide to do.

Part of the fertile soil for the affair was his wanting to put his cock repeatedly into your friend. That was nothing to do with not being able to exercise.

Dear dear dear! Lack of exercise made him fuck your best friend repeatedly?!!!

he couldnt exercise but he could have sex with two women.

It really does sound like you are so desperate to believe everything will be ok that you are prepared to believe a-n-y-t-h-i-n-g.

He fucked your friend because he couldn't do his exercises??

You are talking like you've swallowed the Relationship / Self Help section of Waterstone's but you're really not getting it.

Some of the anger you are showing towards some posters would be more worthwhile being directed where it belongs, your worthless, cheating DH.

I am keen to re-engage him with that.

To me, in that one sentence, is the essence of the 'problem' Its ALL about what YOU are gong to do. YOU are going to re-engage your husband with his hobby so he doesn't fuck any more women.

Really ?

You just don't get it . YOU ALONE cannot fix this. you really really cant, no matter how much you want to, or how 'strong' you are

I'm going to hide this too because you are really not listening. I hope all goes well for your pregnancy and birth and I wish you good luck, because with a husband like yours you are certainly going to need it.

Oh dear op. Sounds like you think your marriage will be ok as long as you can stage manage every waking moment your husband has, make sure he eats his all bran and gets to five aside football twice a week.

Is it worth it? Gnawing your fingernails down to the quick every time he's strained a calf muscle in case he gets his risky behaviour fix by shagging one of your friends?

Seriously. You're worth more than this. And as I said an age ago, don't be surprised if six months from now you decide you couldn't give a flying fuck about policing his behaviour anymore because you have someone who really does need you to do everything for them - your child. And he's just a millstone round your neck by comparison.

I think your idea of it being a 'perfect storm' of circumstances is flawed. You are trying to make it that it only happened because this freak situation happened where x,y and z all came together at once to create 'fertile soil' for an affair. If you convince yourself of this then you can believe that a perfect storm only occurs incredibly rarely so he won't ever feel the need to do it again. You need to acknowledge that he is the fertile ground, no matter what injuries/mentally unwell best friends/unmet expectations life might throw at him.

Also - you use your mum and dad as examples of how people can change. But he broke her heart for 11 long years before he changed. How much do you think a person should take in the hopes of seeing change?

Hence I am keen to re-engage him with that

OP has emasculated her DH. ^^ He has had an affair. It's no fun for a man to have sex with someone who emasculates them. It's no fun for a women to have sex with a man who effeminates them. Perhaps they do this to each other and have a shit sex life.

She will realise that she has been emasculating him and feel ashamed. Then they will both have therapy and move on.

Everyone makes mistakes.

What the actual fuck? She has emasculated him?

How?? Actually don't answer that.

What a load of crap.

I have been lurking. Sorry OP but you sound like you are deeply deluded.

I imagine in time you will realize some of the hard to take stuff that springy is saying is actually more reflective of reality.

So now you're saying your husband fucked another woman because he was injured and couldn't play sport. WTAF?! You have lost it OP.

Darling, do put a space between the paras in your posts as it's jolly hard to read as one block of bilge text. One tends to glide over it otherwise.

I. Think. You. Are. Mad. Darling.

Tell you what lads and lasses, I'll pop back in 6 months and give you all a sitrep. One group will be wrong, those who think I'm mad, emasculating, permissive, stupid, deluded, or those who think it's positive that I'm trying and that I'm giving my husband a second chance. I know which I hope for, so we'll see.

Period So if her DH effeminates her, shes allowed to go and screw one of his mentally ill friends while pregnant for 7 months.

This marriage is starting to sound like it was made in Silent Hill.

Springy, there is no reason to be a bitch.

We are really not the problem. Your husband is.

Don't throw your life away trying to spite a woman you think is nuts and a bunch of strangers on the Internet.

She is barking, Ehric . Ordinary words don't get through to her so I thought I'd give insulting a try. I'm good at it, I think

Hiding

OP you sound nuts, the ridiculous excuses you make for him. I know you love him, I know it hurts to hear it, but he did a terrible thing for a long time and then he lied about it and now he's not going to his ciunselling, won't fix your car and argues with you, following you from room to room rowing. HE IS NOT A GOOD MAN. YOU CAN'T FIX HIM.

I asked before if you would move out and get counselling....are you going to do that?

I think the attacks on the OP are unfair.

You can't force people to take your advice, she's got her rocky road to walk, and whatever you think of her choices, it would be more kind, given that she's pregnant & in a difficult situation, to be supportive.

Sometimes people have to figure stuff out for themselves.

God I sound so self righteous I'm sorry

Anyways, OP good luck with the rest of your pregnancy & birth.

Springy has made excellent and insightful comments throughout this thread. I think we can forgive her a little straight-talking; the OP needs it: she is in serious trouble:

part of the fertile soil for the affair was his blocked access to manageable healthy risk in sport due to injury

Has anyone ever read a more pathetic and deluded attempt to explain why their husband was dicking their bezzie mate?

I would also appreciate paragraphs

I posted at the beginning of this thread. If you want to give him another chance that's your decision. If you think you can work this out and be happy well perhaps you can. Good luck.

I know you love him, I know it hurts to hear it

ah now, see, I don't think the main reason for the frankly insane and convoluted reasoning is because she loves him. I think the main thrust of this deluded campaign is that OP will have what OP will have. She will create it out of her will. A minor (you would think) fly in the ointment has come along to spoil nirvana - but, no matter: we will blame an insane woman, we will blame his lack of exercise ffs , we will blame the cat, the dog, the policeman, the morning paper. It doesn't matter, as long as we get this thing back on track. This Creation.

As much as it pains us both, I will address you directly OP: the reason you feel unhinged when you start to look at the truth is because it is the truth. You don't do the truth. But the truth has come knocking - how healthy and insistent the truth is! - and is badgering to be heard. The collision between your constructed reality and reality is giving you jip. Go with the jip. It won't kill you, though it feels like it will. Go with it.