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Relationships

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

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Original poster

Has anyone got through an affair and stayed together ?

175 replies

jimmijam · 07/09/2014 20:17

Just wondering, I know couples who've survived and those who haven't.

Was it a full on affair or one off?
How long have you been together (so far) since? And are you happy in that relationship?

Or , did you try & it didn't work ? Why didn't it work?

Thankyou
X

OP posts:

tootsey · 07/09/2014 20:28

I stayed after I found out. Although there was a short break straight after finding out. It started after we were tog 6 months and I found out I was pregnant. It continued on and off for 3 years and it was with someone he had already been out with a couple of times. We are still together now but just, into our 15th year, it has been wonderful at times and hell at other times. It will always be in the back of my mind, it doesn't leave you.

strong123 · 07/09/2014 20:48

Yes I stayed after his first affair - he then went on to have a second and third affair. We have now split up because of a different reason but once the trust has been broken it is very hard to trust again. It is 16 years since his first affair and even now silly little things about it still hurt me. The thing is he had the affairs but they all turned out to be nothing to him - if he had meet someone that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with, then I think it would be slightly easier but he has destroyed our family for a very poor reason.

dolicapax · 07/09/2014 21:11

Why do you want to know? Your OP reads like a research brief .

Original poster

jimmijam · 07/09/2014 21:11

#tootsey well done you!!! I hope he knows what a great woman he has by his side!! I think every marriage has big ups and downs?

#strong123 I'm so sorry to hear that. There are no words to describe the hell, & to keep going through it... :-( you certainly are very strong being able to get out of a relationship like that, to outsiders it sounds like the easiest thing to do, but it certainly isn't!

I'm in a situation (it's on another thread) where I need to figure out if I can forgive, & my reasons for not wanting to let go of him.... But he knows I won't take him back properly unless he gets another job. I cannot handle them both working together ! Trouble us , I've always said he married his job before me. I suppose if he hasn't left there a few months down the line (I've found him jobs he could do with pay he'd take), then he's chosen his job over his family....

OP posts:

Original poster

jimmijam · 07/09/2014 21:12

#dolica hopefully my last post answers that, we must have been typing at the same time :-)

OP posts:

Original poster

jimmijam · 07/09/2014 21:13

The other post is titled 'this hurts so much '
Only daily I go between it's over , to desperately wanting him by my side ...

OP posts:

tootsey · 07/09/2014 22:02

Jimmijam, I thought i was the only one to go back and forward, back and forward, want him, dont want him. Doing me know good at all.

MrsParker · 07/09/2014 22:11

It's a year on for me, we stayed together. Biggest mistake I've ever made, was just so thrilled that he wanted me at first, but now I look at him differently, I hate him for lying, I know he can't of loved or had any respect for me. I am now finally realising it'll never work, he broke something that can't be fixed. All the grand promises of communicating more, helping round house more, have been forgotten. I don't trust him, he's a liar, probably not helped by the fact he expected me to forget it ever happened without any reassurances after initial discovery. There not worth it, if he's lied once he'll do it again, and really why give him the chance to hurt u again. I've now finally got some legal advice and I'm figuring how to get out of this misery. Good luck, I think staying is more torturous than the pain of living without him

FelicityGubbins · 07/09/2014 22:14

I know of a few couples that have survived an affair, they have lasted because the cheated on partner has pretty mush checked out of the emotional side of the marriage and don't really love their OH, they live more like brother and sister (with the occasional shag, more of a scratching an itch sex than any emotion to it) and have no real emotional dependence on each other,they just co parent and share a home.
Its not my idea of a marriage tbh

Hesaysshewaffles · 07/09/2014 22:56

I so desperately wanted to stay together when I found out, he didn't know who he wanted and carried affair on. He continued to break me and made me feel that it was my fault. I went my separate way and had a weird FB/casual relationship - it ended badly but I'm glad I experienced it as it made me revaluation EVERYTHING. As I grew stronger, my ex actually grew weaker.

He then changed and I found myself wondering what if. Thing is whilst I may be attracted to him in a roundabout way, he is STILL the man who lied to me for a year and treated me awfully.

Only you know what you are willng to put up with, but I guarantee something will always be at the back of your mind. For example I was doing some admin stuff at home and came across a diary from 2012. My ex used to give me dates he would be away from home. I flicked through the diary and noticed all those dates and it came flooding back to me.

All I would say is try and get some proper space apart and enjoy being you...you never know how you'll feel.

Hesaysshewaffles · 07/09/2014 22:58

And if you get back together you would have to treat it as new. Can you give him a blank canvas to start off from? If deep down you can't, walk away, it's not worth the heartache.....why walk backwards when you can get somewhere going forwards x

LineRunner · 07/09/2014 22:59

Eekaman · 08/09/2014 00:48

We managed to stay together after I was dumb enough to get tempted by a smile and that look.... it wasn't a one off thing either, the affair lasted a few months.

But luckily my wife was tolerant enough to realise mistakes can be made but can also be overcome, and while things were pretty on edge for a year or so, they eventually settled down. That was over a decade ago, we are blessed to have a happy healthy boy and a terrific marriage.

Tl/dr... yes, it can work.

Original poster

jimmijam · 08/09/2014 07:18

#eakaman, it's nice to hear from the other side.
At the time he was telling her he wanted her baby (we have 3dcs together), loved her etc.
Took him just over a week to 'see the light' if I meant that much (we were together over 9 years) should it have taken that long? Since he's been saying he made a mistake , should have put the effort with her into us etc.

Yes here too we have promises of doing things around the garden... And communicating (something I've spent our whole relationship complaining he doesn't do- I pointed this out & he said he hadn't lost me then etc).... I do worry this won't change long term.... But I can't move him back in (if he gets another job & I've decided) and then out again- the 1st time broke our kids hearts enough & I couldn't be part of putting them through that again.

OP posts:

JadeJ123 · 08/09/2014 07:25

An ex boyfriend of mine cheated on me and no we didn't stay together I've always said if they cheat they're out. The thought of them sleeping with someone else then myself is vile.

KeemaNaanAndCurryOn · 08/09/2014 07:32

No. My ex couldn't keep it in his pants. He probably was tempted by a smile and a look - or actually just couldn't keep it in his pants, when other men would've as he was that kind of bloke.

I couldn't and wouldn't live with the uncertainty that he'd do it again. I've now been with someone who has managed to resist all temptation for 15 years. Much better.

MrsWolowitz · 08/09/2014 07:39

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

nooka · 08/09/2014 07:43

My dh and I are together and it's been over ten years since his affair. We are very happy and I have no regrets in staying together. But it was not easy at all, and we did live separately for almost two years, after a very difficult first year after discovery, with too many noisy arguments. It was an emotional affair that turned physical and lasted for quite a while (perhaps a year?) and involved significant deceit.

For the first couple of years after we got back together again we talked as if it was a new relationship, but now the affair/difficult time seems like an odd blip along the way (we have been together for almost 25 years, so three painful years is relatively short in that scale). We still talk about it from time to time, and sometimes something happens that resurfaces the pain momentarily.

For us it was important to decide quite formally to make a new start together, although as we saw each other and talked to each other more almost as soon as dh moved out we really went from a not-working marriage to a working pretty well boyfriend/girlfriend who also happened to be parents dynamic. I took a big risk in starting again (involved emigrating, very unwise!) but I've no regrets.

startinoveronmyway · 08/09/2014 07:44

No. If they are looking outside of the marriage, then it means they are not looking inside of the marriage. They are not fully committed to the marriage, emotionally. I think it will only be a matter of time before they leave or they make the other person so miserable that they leave instead.

Trust is essential. The cracks always show once broken.

nooka · 08/09/2014 07:46

Oh and MrsW I didn't read that post that way because I suspect my dh might see things a bit like that too. Not that people who don't/can't forgive are to blame, but that he/we was/were very lucky that in the end I could. Because now he does see his behaviour as a big mistake (of course it's not quite right to call sustained bad behaviour as a 'mistake' as obviously it's intentional but it's an easy shorthand I think).

startinoveronmyway · 08/09/2014 07:47

I've now been with someone who has managed to resist all temptation for 15 years

I am amazed at all the men who manage NOT to cheat!! They really do exist.......what a concept!

Badvoc123 · 08/09/2014 07:53

It seems quite common to try and stay together after an affair (at least of mn is anything to go by)
But - in life as on mn - it rarely works.
Sorry op.

upnotdown · 08/09/2014 09:22

I think it depends on your outlook and the behaviour of the cheater, post-affair.

Some personality types can forgive and some can't. Neither is better than the other, just different.

I think you need to be strong whichever decision you make, but both options require strength of character and determination. Don't be manipulated by people telling you you're weak for not 'LTB'. Do what you think is right.

However, if your OH/DH thinks you should 'get over it' or are 'going on at him' or 'it's your fault' etc etc etc, then you are flogging a dead horse. If he's contrite and prepared to do whatever it takes and listen to tears and outbursts and accept that it was all his own making, then you've got something to work with.

I hope you get the solution you want :)

WorkingGirlJem · 08/09/2014 10:29

Hmmmm. . . .'manage not to cheat' or just haven't yet been caught the latter is more likely than the former ime

Original poster

jimmijam · 08/09/2014 11:20

Is it really THAT common? I'm still sure there are plenty of men out there who won't

OP posts:

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