notonyurjellybellynelly
I wish it wasn't familiar. But talking to people over the years, unfortunately it seems that even those of us who grew up, but did not feature in the "poorer outcome" category, can carry the can for two adults' egocentric behaviours for the long haul.
People who are saying no have obviously never been cheated on. Poor guy deserves to know
Obviously... despite them saying in their posts they have experience of just that.
A shared similar event does not turn people into carbon copies of each other, with a hive mind. There will always be a spectrum of experiences, opinions and beliefs.
I posted from the persepctive of a daughter. Becuase that is the experience which resonates with me even today. Particularly so since the recent death of my father. But my first husband cheated on me, so I know how it feels from the perspective of a spouse. Changes nothing in terms of my thought process and final conclusion.
He may, or may not decide that knowing was better in the final summing up. Some people do, some people don't, some aren't sure, perspectives can change as the years pass. But if he is told, one thing that can avoid the telling becoming yet another sore spot that is hard to heal, is him knowing that that he was told by somebody whose entire motivation was care and concern for him. Rather than the telling smelling strongly of him once again being somebody else's acceptable collateral damage.
The person who told my mum put herself in an untenable position in the workplace when she did so. I can't tell you if it would have been better not to know. I suspect things may have turned out very differently if the affair had had the chance to bubble, sparkle, then fizzle out. But without the benefit of an alternate universe to measure against the one I live in, we'll never know for sure.
We'll never know if her belief and action was an avoidable event that exploded into a life shock, fracturing my family so badly that the only surviving relationship is that between myself and my sister.
We'll never know if her making a different choice would have let us escape mostly unscathed from my father's feet of clay.
But I do know she told us becuase she cared about us. Genuinely. She stuck her own head on the chopping block to do what she thought was right. Both then, and now, that aspect matters a lot to me.
Having lost so much, I think I'd cope less well with the event that directly led to the cutting of the family's carotid if it had been an act of personal agenda, with us perceived as mere bit players in somebody else's personal drama. I need another sore, "hard to properly heal" spot in this like I need nine holes in my head.
The whole experience, short, medium and long term, has been very coloured by how much people didn't give a fuck who they hurt as long as they got to make a priority of their wants. The motivation of the person who told my mother exists as a rather solitary bright spot of us actually, genuinely, mattering to somebody.
Maybe if she had made a different choice I wouldn't be struggling with how to grieve for a father who compounded a stumble with a spectacular free fall from grace once the cat was out of the bag. Maybe I'd still have a mother and a brother in my life.
Those are large question marks to have. I'm grateful that in that context I have no doubt that she did what she thought was the right thing by us, and we were her priority.
It is no small thing. Not then. Not now.