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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

Surviving an affair....long overdue update

109 replies

LetsGoToTheHills · 19/03/2015 14:52

Dear Mumsnetters,
Two years ago I posted on here after discovering my husband's affair. I asked you whether we could survive. I had many fantastic suggestions and comments as well as some difficult but insightful questions put to me. We had about 10 counselling sessions immediately, and it's been really hard work but I would say we are, finally, pretty much back to 'normal'. It was a horrible, horrible time, and just thinking about it makes me feel sick, but you all got me on the right path. So thank you to everyone who bothered to post, it did make a difference!

OP posts:
Hansolosrolo · 22/03/2015 09:00

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Vivacia · 22/03/2015 09:39

I am in no way saying you should stay with someone who has an affair

So what is your point? Confused What are these dark clouds you refer to on a thread about affairs?

For me, it's just the very graphic thought of him putting his penis in to another woman, stroking another woman's bum etc and all the time coming home to me and pretending otherwise. Makes me feel physically sick. I couldn't bear his touch again.

JonesTheSteam · 22/03/2015 10:39

The thing is, everyone is different.

If Vivacia's reaction is how you would feel about this situation, then fair enough. And if you posted on MN about it, you would get support from everyone. No one would come on here and have a go at you for making that decision.

This was the OP's decision to make. She has made the right decision for her. For no-one else. What is unfair is the way some posters think it's still OK to have a bit of a go and tell her that she can't possibly be happy, the trust can never come back etc. How do they know? They don't know her or her husband?

It's fine to post how you think you would react. But I think it's wrong to tell the OP how she must really be feeling when you don't really know.

And it's fine to share your experiences but you can't apply them to her situation because it involves two different people.

All the OP did was share her story and thank posters who helped her get where she is. Some asked for her to elaborate and when she kindly did, then other posters started picking it apart.

Why can't we all just support each other in our own personal decisions?

jasper · 22/03/2015 10:58

there are people here who are coming across as DISAPPOINTED that the OP has decided to mend her marriage.

that's pretty fucked up.
Again, well done OP

Christinayang1 · 22/03/2015 11:24

Jones

Spot on Star

MaMaof04 · 22/03/2015 11:54

Fair enough- you have these primal pictures of bums- penis etc disturbing you. You act upon them as you find it right. Fair enough. We the non-LTB ones are fixated on other images of the adulterer (the good parent, the good friend, the generous breadwinner etc) and we fight to bring the best out of him. Fair enough.
Someone said above that the betrayer looks for passion somewhere else: you would be surprised that many of them did not go out on purpose to look for an affair. It just happened to them when they were in a bad patch and with their mind too blurred (sometimes depressed) to make the right decision (high stress at work- far away from home too often- young children taking up all the energy in the relationship), and then the OW/M turn up (they are a species on their own, desperate and often loners), doing all kind of efforts to woo them and making it look like they require nothing/no effort/no commitment from the betrayer just a bit of romance. Yeah affairs in modern days look more like accidents following mental problems rather than passion-seeking events.
We the non-LTB leave the penis and the bums and the LIES to OM/W, we scrub the betrayer and make him/her shine again.

noddyholder · 22/03/2015 12:29

Scrub and make them shine again? Now that is very strange

MaMaof04 · 22/03/2015 12:40

figurative -
yes they do feel ashamed and dirty when they realize what they did- we help them get over that shame- and they 'clean' cleanse (i.e. redeem) themselves by becoming better parents and better partners (and they do shine when they are committed and dedicated to it).
Yes we live the negative behavior with the OW/M and we give them better a second chance to become better.
We do not want the culture of shame. They are culture where shame rules and honor killing as well. WE want a culture of guilt and redemption through good deeds. They are guilty to have indulged in the affair. Now some of us want to leave the guilty behavior and the bum and the penis etc in the O/M/W's life and help them redeem their mistake through a better behavior in our relationship. Better than putting energy into another relationship with a partner that is not the parent of our kids.

MaMaof04 · 22/03/2015 12:48

I mean we 'leave' the negative behavior with the other M/W
'They are culture' should be 'there are cultures'

  • sorry for my English- not my first language.
Weebirdie · 22/03/2015 13:00

Well I met my husband when I was 16 and Im now 57, there has never been anyone else for me and Im not interested in ever getting involved with anyone again.

But going back to bums etc, it not just the OW a persons husband has been with - its also everyone she's ever slept with and all the people they've ever slept with and as someone who had not had experience apart from her husband I kind of objected that my vagina had become a bit overcrowded. And that was a big part of it all for me - just how many people had I actually been with without knowing it? Crikey, for all I know it could be a cast of a couple of hundred. And god only knows what they could have had!

noddyholder · 22/03/2015 13:00

I think that is all very dubious tbh

Weebirdie · 22/03/2015 13:01

What is noddy?

Vivacia · 22/03/2015 13:03

So the cheat is a poor over-worked man, depressed and stressed with all of that work and parenting young children. The other woman is not even human, just a woo-ing temptress? Give me strength!

I am not pro-LTB in most cases. However, I am very much for transparency and openness. No keeping grubby secrets. And I absolutely believe that the cheat has to accept full responsibility for their actions and earn back the trust of their partner. I don't think it's the partner's responsibility to cure them. Or make them shine again.

noddyholder · 22/03/2015 13:06

Sorry weebirdie not your post!

Weebirdie · 22/03/2015 13:09

Mama, is it your husband who had the baby with the OW or am I confused again? And if so - does he see the wee one? Do you see the wee one? Or is his family just your children and him?

Christinayang1 · 22/03/2015 13:22

No I don't think it is the partners responsibility either, the one that was unfaithful ( I will use the word him) is responsible for fixing themselves and to prove ( If they can) that they are the person you thought they were. I wouldn't take any ownership for his behavior nor would I try to lessen his shame.

The relationship is never the same again, that doesn't mean that it can't be good or even better but there is a new dimension to it. I also think it depends on what they have done...I would struggle to get over a long term thing , where he had spent a lot of time with someone and invested emotionally

JonesTheSteam · 22/03/2015 13:49

I completely agree with your 2nd paragraph Vivacia.

This situation is of my husband's making and he has had to do everything he can to repair us, which he has done. And I wouldn't even have contemplated being here now if I felt he wasn't 100% in this to make us work. He completely accepts that he is to blame, all our friends and family know what has happened so there is no 'keeping his dirty secret'. He has worked very hard to change himself. Our marriage is very different to what it was even when there was no affair (and we were pretty happy, which he acknowledges, maybe just in a bit of a rut!). Now it is much more equal, we are much more appreciative of each other, more affectionate; we both realise how very close we came to losing what we have and we are both determined to maintain what we have now. There is a huge amount of love between us, our sex life is better as we are closer (and after 14 months I refuse to call it hysterical bonding now!), and he does lots of lovely thoughtful things just because he wants to. We both put the effort in now because we know what a good team we are.

And I don't dwell on the 'details' of what he did with the OW at all now. I choose to remember the loving supportive man he was for 20 years, and the extremely loving husband and supportive man he is now and is completely determined to be for the rest of his life, safe in the knowledge that should he fuck up monumentally again I will be strong enough to walk away from him. He knows this too.

Christinayang1 · 22/03/2015 14:01

Yes Jones, I agree

Springtimemama · 22/03/2015 14:16

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

MaMaof04 · 22/03/2015 15:49

Again: we all agree that the onus is on the betrayer to rebuild trust and heal the betrayed partner and their relationships. It means for him/her a huge willingness to work extremely hard- to lay himself 'naked' (complete honesty)- etc No doubt about it. No doubt about the fact that they have first to grasp the enormity of their mistake. They must be truly repentant and humbly seek to repair the damage they did and to improve their behavior. It is tougher than LTBs think. 'Successful rebuilders' (the betrayers who try to atone for their mistake) allow us to prod them day and night about their behavior, they allow us to poke jokes at them as betrayers more often than not, and they become humbler and much better from all points of view.
Now of course it is up to us betrayed partners whether we want to allow him/her to be a rebuilder or not, our healer or not .
I will not let the idea of penis and vagina and bums interfere with my decision to give them a second chance. What will determine whether they will be successful rebuilders depend on their hard work and humble and considerate deeds. And yes more often than not successful rebuilders shine through their post-affair deeds.
Yes my H's affair resulted in a child. I would have liked to have the child with us. (A child is a child is a child). However her f**ed up mum is too ashamed that it will be known that the child is a produce of an affair with a married father to let us meet her (we keep calling her and we hope for the best when she grows).
For me OW/Ms belong to a species I just pity.
I do trust my H now. Fully.
He is too ASHAMED of his acts. But I do not like the word shame. I prefer the word guilty because the word guilty allows punishment and atonement through deeds.

Now good luck to everyone in his/her choices.

Vivacia · 22/03/2015 16:11

However her fed up mum

She didn't fuck herself, did she? I wonder what her side of the story is. I bet it's not "I'm not even human, I'm just a pitiful sub-species that conned some poor stressed and depressed man".

Vivacia · 22/03/2015 16:13

And I'm sorry 04, your advice to the women on another thread who is staying with her cheating husband and upset with him complaining constantly about her housework is to buy storage on wheels... I just find that so damaging and cruel.

noddyholder · 22/03/2015 16:13

Nuts

ginge0407 · 22/03/2015 16:18

Makes me laugh how ppl go on. Oh it's ok he's a fantastic father, friend provider! Lol lol lol so because he earns good money you don't want to walk away and give up your "happy life" what a crock of shit! Seriously.... Most men lie and manipulate innocent women often creating profiles on dating sites pretending they are single etc letting other genuinely single women fall in love with them. If he was that great and thought so much of your wonderful 20 years he wouldn't be having sex with another woman. As for I'm doing it for my kids. I personally wouldn't want my son or daughter ever putting up with a situation like this. Chikdren lead and learn by our examples... So what do we teach them that someone who we share our life with can betray us in the worst way but it's ok.

HaverinCuddy · 22/03/2015 16:42

Ive been contributing to this thread but Ive now namedchanged for this post for the sake of the children involved.

Ma, my husband also had a child with the OW, he has a child the same age as youngest grandchild. And yes like you I was also for having the little one to live with us but then I realised that I was so desperate for me and my children to be his family, his proper family, 'the family' that I was actually advocating a child being taken from his mum and brought to me and mine just to prove a point. And what a point to have to prove eh.

As it is I have no idea what the situation now is between my husband and the woman who is in fact the same age as one of our daughter. I suspect the wee one is in a very far away country and that his mum sometimes visits my husband in a country not far from here - I know this because immigration issues would make anything else possible. But you know what, I dont care. I dont even care that it took out separation for my husband to see his son for the first time - he was about 3 I think and as much as it has hurt in the past I would rather he had contact with the wee one than not because it is never the childs fault. My husband not doing anything (apart from pay very good maintenance) to forge a relationship with his child didnt say anything good about him and it certainly didnt say to me 'oh see how much he loves '.

Ive read your posts for a few weeks now and each one has left me thinking you have intellectualised so much and you think you are so much at ease with whats gone on yet you continually have to spout vile things about the other woman, the crazy fucker, you were wiling to take a child from for the sake of your pride and desire to be 'the family'.

And just for good measure, over the last 4 years Ive been contacted by 3 half siblings all born to different mothers during the course of my parents 14 year marriage. One of them is an alcoholic and i can no longer have her in my life, one was upset by what her search unfolded and she has gone to ground, but the other - well no one would ever know we have only known each other for 3 years. We are brother and sister in every sense of the word and our families are all very close - even my beloved stepfather who brought me up can come here on holiday and at the same time as my brother and his family.

As it happens my children have no intention of wanting to meet their half brother but they know if they want to I wont stand in their way. There reasons for not wanting to are very simple - because we'll never put the seal of approval on you being called a bitch by his mum and anything to do with our brother would be doing just that. And that did happen. I was in bed on my wedding anniversary and the woman/girl phoned me and called me a bitch. Im sure in time my children might change their mind and I have absolutely no intention of bad mouthing their brothers mother to them, and not just because she doesn't need my help in that, and one thing else is for sure - any bile spouted at her is bile that my husband is equally deserving of. It takes to to tango and they are as bad as each other just as your husband and the mother of his youngest child are.