How did I get him so wrong?

[iwashappy]

I ended my marriage after discovering my husband of 25 years had cheated on me. He was having an affair for nearly a year with a woman I know. It then came out that he had cheated on me before with lots of different women and had cheated on his first wife too. He had lied to me about the reasons his first marriage ended.

He bragged to some of his friends about cheating on me and came over as a total sleaze in his texts to OW.

I thought he was a decent man with values, morals and respect for me. I never had him down as a cheat let alone a womaniser. I was totally oblivious to what he was up to. He was really the last person I thought would do anything like this and yet it seems he's cheated for most of his adult life.

How did I not realise what he was like. I don't understand how I can live with a man for 25 years and not have any idea at all that he is such a bastard. How could my judgement be that badly wrong for all of that time?

As Cog says.

Everyone has their own personal definition of good and bad, things they'd do and things they wouldn't. Most people generally agree on the major things... and some people don't.

Feel sorry for him, but don't blame yourself. Nothing you or any other person he was with could have changed his fundamental perception of right and wrong wrt fidelity. Sadly for him, he's wrong- most people aren't serial cheats because they have the emotional capacity to see that faithfulness brings its own rewards, they WANT to be faithful to their partner because that in itself is a joyous, sexy, fulfilling, lovely place to be, and that while cheating your way through life can be momentarily exciting, if you want to pretend to be an honest married partner and father - you lose far more than you gain. Your Ex has never been able to see that, any more than a fraudster can understand that other people derive a deep sense of right and peace from not stealing from people. His definition of good, fun, lovely - it's all superficial stuff. An awful place to be and an awful way to go through life.

Like I said, pity him. I can see why you would hope for his new 'relationship' to fail (deliberate inverted commas there - no relationship where this person is a participant is a valid one, simply by definition - poor OW!) - but it doesn't matter. He'll cheat on her, and even if he doesn't, it won't be because he is a true and faithful partner to her - he doesn't have the capacity for that. You'll know in your heart that if they're together 20 years from now, it'll partly be because she's either ignored or is ignorant of his continued cheating.

Pity him in other ways too. Many years from now, when you and he are long gone, your memory with your descendants will be an unsullied, honest, loving one. His? Probably not so much. He's lost a big part of his relationship with his children that he'll NEVER get back.

'If you want to sleep around why get married'

That is the six million dollar question. I think there is a type of personality that wants to be seen to be doing the right thing, respectable in society, values the praise and good opinion of others, maybe even would claim to have strong views of right and wrong....... but. And the 'but' is that they are have a whole other side of compulsions, self-indulgences, weaknesses and they believe, if they keep the two scrupulously separate, that never the twain shall meet. It's somewhere between self delusion and a cloaking device.

Cheating is horrible behaviour but you don't have to look all that far to see some truly extreme examples of people living double lives. I mentioned my wayward uncle but think about the whole Yew Tree investigation and how shocked we've been to find that people with very public personas of kindly, regular family guys are actually very nasty criminals.

Yup. The kind of person who just wants 'it all'. They want to move on into adulthood, have a family, be married, be a pillar of the community type perhaps, have the support and help of a partner. But they also don't want to stop what they see as the perks of a single lifestyle, i.e. the right to not consider the feelings of that family one jot when it comes to deciding to do fun things for themselves such as having sex with random people.

The joke's on them though... as what they don't understand is that most people don't make some big effort to 'settle down' and eschew random sex when they're married, they naturally grow up and don't want to cheat on their family, they meet a partner and value and enjoy being faithful to them. They don't look at the prospect of sex with lots of random people and think 'wow', they think 'ick'. Your H doesn't know it fully, but he's utterly lacking as a person, and he will suffer for it - he's got no security, because he gives none, he's got no love, because the love he did have (from his children as well as you) he's thrown away like yesterday's rubbish. But hey, he gets to have sex with someone new and exciting on a regular basis - and that really, honestly IS enough for him. It really, really does matter to him more than his children's security.

Be thankful you're no longer standing on shifting sand, and be sorry for this husk of a person.

Auburn yes it has been such a huge shock. I spent a lot of time wondering if he would have still cheated if I had done certain things differently, I have come to realise now that I think he would have cheated no matter who he had been married to. It seems to be something that he thinks he is entitled to do if he thinks he can get away with it and he did get away with it for a long time.

I don't think I projected my image of a perfect husband on him. I certainly didn't think he was faultless before, no-one is, we used to row now and again, there were things we used to disagree about. But, the qualities that I think are important in a person I thought he had. I obviously got the faithful and honest qualities wrong where he was concerned.

I have very much found out that he isn't who I thought he was in a lot of ways, it's just such a long time to get someone so wrong and it does make you question everything.

I think I will be less naïve in the future but yes I would rather have trusted him and been let down than to have not trusted him in the first place. I don't think I could have lived with the guilt if I had cheated on him, but it seems it wasn't a problem for him in any shape or form. Thank you.

I have been in the same situation. Found out a few months ago my OH was having an affair on and off for over 5 years. I thought he was a kind man and not remotely the type to have an affair. So did my family. It turns out he is a complete womaniser and a compulsive liar. Through counselling they have told me this type of man often go for the trusting, less cynical people because they know they can get away with things. They are very charming, willing to do anything for anyone, but really it is all a lie to cover up a more devious nature.
My OH told me all sorts of crap about the OW, she was a friend, we just got on well, she was nothing, she was just someone to talk too, I never had sex with her. Eventually I dragged the truth out of him.
Dealing with this deception is very hard & I know exactly what you are going through. Reading some of these comments have reassured me we are not in the wrong here. It is true you judge people by your own standards, we have high good natured standards, unfortunatley others don't and it is the real devious ones out there that manipulate and abuse that good nature. Thoughts with you X

Cecily I am so sorry you have been in this situation. From what you write I think we were married to the same man! I thought he was kind, would never have an affair, my family thought he was great, charming, would do anything for anyone too. OW was just a friend, didn't mean anything etc.

It's very interesting what you say about that type of man deliberating going for a more trusting, less cynical woman because they think they will get away with it. Can I ask if that therefore means that there was an intention to behave like they did or was it more of a subconscious decision to go for someone trusting.

I suppose I'm asking if he knew quite well that he wouldn't stay faithful to me when we got married or if he intended to be faithful but at some point chose not to.

As you say dealing with this level of deception is very hard. I am pleased you have found some of the comments on this thread helpful to you too. There have been a lot of thoughtful, insightful comments that have been of great help to me. Look after yourself. x

Hello Gilded, thank you. I am not coping too badly at the moment.

I am sorry to hear about your deathbed discovery about your father. That must have been awfully distressing at an already difficult time. I very much feel a need to get answers. My ex-DH has basically said that he did because he wanted to, it was fun and exciting and he thought if I didn't know it wouldn't hurt me. Obviously that last bit came crashing down. But, his answers don't seem enough.

Why did he want to? Wasn't our life enough for him. How could he do that to me when he claimed to love me and why did he never show any signs of guilt. Saying he didn't think he would hurt me because I wouldn't find out doesn't explain to me how he could behave like that. He had to live with what he was doing and it really didn't seem to cause him a problem.

It is very hard when you feel like your whole life was a lie. He claimed he first cheated on me after our son was born although he's told that many lies it could have been before that. That is over 20 years out of 25 that he was a cheat.

Everything does feel tainted. When I look at a photo I have of the four of us with our daughter as a newborn I just see a cheat rather than all the joyous memories I had. Every second of our daughter's existence he has been a cheat.

The future scares me a bit, it is so unknown whereas before it was settled. What you say about trusting yourself is helpful, you have to build your foundations up again and that's a good way of starting. I'm not really sure about counselling, I just don't fancy actually talking to a stranger in person about my private life. I think I would find that difficult. I will see how I go as I'm not too bad at the moment.

Thank you so much.

We all do things that, with the benefit of hindsight, make us feel stupid which is very different from being stupid. Many of us have had relationships with people who have betrayed us; they turned out not to be the person we thought they were and it hurts.

You can't change what has happened, but you can find ways to deal with how you think about it. Maybe the answers you crave need to come from yourself during counselling?

"Why did he want to? Wasn't our life enough for him."

No it wasn't. Doesn't mean that you personally could have done anything to change that. Neither does it mean that he was doing something bad 'to you' necessarily. This is no comfort to you, I realise, but in his mind it probably wasn't done maliciously. He was behaving extremely badly (and of course he knew that) but, his warped rationalisation would have been that, because he went to quite some lengths to make sure it didn't affect you - and succeeded for 20+ years - he is not a bad person. Moral relativism in action

Did he choose you especially for being trusting and non-cynical precisely so that he could get away with it? I think, to a point, yes he did. Again, that's not something you could have changed or something you should reproach yourself for. A different man would have taken your trust and loyalty and behaved quite differently.

I think I said earlier, you probably won't trust anyone quite so unquestioningly again. This experience is bound to change your outlook. But it shouldn't change your fundamental values. Nothing that happened is your fault.

Sadly this thread was also a total lie....I have met "iwashappy" and she is not this person.

Eh?

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/relationships/2585739-Iwashappy

bogeyface nothing was true, none of it . catfish.

I get that, I am just wondering why open up one of her old threads again, it will just hook more people in before they get to the end and realise that they have been trolled.