Can I save my marriage after I had an affair?

[Goody2shoes20]

Last month I confessed to my husband that I had an affair with a family friend. I had been feeling disjointed and unvalued by my husband in our relationship for on and off a couple of years at least. I was a stay at home mum and felt the lowest of the low, my confidence plummeted and I always felt my husband was so much more of a rounded person than me, he is always so busy and manic and made me feel lazy and not good enough by comparison. Also he is very dominant and many would say controlling, although I will admit to being a quiet and quite passive person in contrast. Our relationship was very much parent/ child. Last year I went back to work after my ds started school. My confidence began to return a little and I was receiving friendly attention from this man who was my dd's friends dad. He was also friends with my husband and had witnessed what he believed to be unacceptable behaviour from my husband, he thought he didn't treat me properly and we began to confide in each other as he was also unhappy in his relationship. Things snowballed over a few months and we ended up in an affair which I was beside myself with guilt with. At first I enjoyed the attention but quickly realised I would not be able to get out of the situation without potentially hurting everyone involved. So, terrifying as it was, I came clean. This was a month ago and our world is upside down. To start with I was very confused and because I had to end the affair abruptly, I had mixed feelings about my affair partner and my husband and didn't know who I really loved. I have had very minimal contact with him and am trying hard to work on my marriage now. However my husband has gone from initially saying he still loved me to now, he doesn't love and and doesn't want to be with me. In the meantime he has asked me to show him love and affection and acts of love which I have done, but they never seem quite enough. We have had some awful arguments and he is full of venom and anger towards me and what I did. He has been aggressive and has really frightened me in his reactions on several occasions. I constantly am apologising but he wants to go over the same details over and over again. He believes he will never be able to move on from this and will never be able to trust me again and our marriage will never be the same. I keep saying I want to work on it but he has so many issues, for example he wants us to move out of the area and move the kids to a new school so that we are not likely to see my affair partner or his family. He also believes he is completely blameless and that there were no priblems in our relationship beforehand. Also he is full of venom towards my friends who he believes have turned me against him and so seeing them will be difficult going forward. I guess my question, has anyone else been in similar situation and managed to work through it? I believe we can but my husband is adamant he will feel like this forever and will be happier without me. It breaks my heart that he is being so short sighted when we have two amazing kids and have been together for 13 years. Any comments greatly appreciated.

Your excuses aren’t putting you in a good light OP.

His requests aren’t unreasonable seeing as you decided to fuck someone else whilst married.

If he is controlling and dominating you don't really have to worry about him leaving you. He will (most likely) stay married to you so he can continue controlling and bullying you. And he will never be satisfied, not because you had an affair and therefore are forever to blame for everything (though he will tell you that), but because controlling, bullying, abusive men are never satisfied--you can't make them stop abusing by being perfect and doing the right thing.

So he'll probably stay with you, but your marriage will be a living hell.

If he's not really controlling and abusive after all, then you need to stop using that as an excuse for the affair.

if that's an accurate description of him, then you should leave the marriage. Call Women's Aid and seek out help for victims of abuse.

My ExH has an affair.
I said I'd try but I knew it would never be the same again.
The man I loved and trusted had hurt me too much.
There was no coming back from it for me.
A lot of people do come back from it.
But it takes a lot of work and a lot of time.
This won't go away quickly for him.
You are far further forward than him.
You only have to look on this site to see that many people still think about it and still have questions years later.
This is now HIS decision.
If it's his deal breaker then he has every right to say it's over and he can't get past it.
Do you actually love your DH?
Do you want many more years of his controlling ways?
Do you think that is a good example to set for your DC?

I do think for you to say he's not taking responsibility is unfair. It isn't his fault that you had an affair. I think if the relationship had problems you should have spoke to him and told him how you felt. Not had an affair.

I would guess I would act the same as your husband and I would also relocate too. Not only that, I also think relocating would be a good thing for you aswell as it would be a completely fresh start.

I think you both need counselling. Maybe couples counselling or individual as you need to really connect with why you had an affair

“We have two amazing kids”

Moving house will be less damaging for them than finding out their Mum had illicit sex with their friend’s Dad surely?

If you marriage has issues you need to deal with them.

You can’t surely expect that after a month he’s going to say “never mind dear all is forgiven” while bumping into the other man at the school gate, parents night and sports day?

Really, you weren’t thinking about your “amazing kids” when you decided to cheat on their father.

Two separate issues here;

1. The affair

1. The controlling behaviour

No matter whether your version is correct or whether you have done the usual affair thing of rewriting history to justify your behaviour splitting up is the answer.

With the former mini is absolutely correct that he is lording it over you because he is controlling.

With the latter he doesn’t trust you and you are not out of affair think.

You need to separate.

My advice, for what it's worth, is to walk away.
You weren't happy before the affair and you're not happy now.

Why would you want to stay with a controlling bully?

Leave. You have, what sounds like, an awful marriage. You should have been a grown up and dealt with the issues.

Your affair will only make the controlling, bullying worse.Get some counselling to figure out how to have a healthy relationship.

The bad marriage you both own, your affair you own.

Right so your still having contact with the OM, your up in arms because your DH is struggling with this and he's made out to be controlling

Wasn't that controlling if you managed to sneek around for a bit with someone else!! Your DH frightened you? Weren't that frightened of him when you fessed up to be a lying cheating wife

What you want him to say? Ah its kool go fuck another man

I'll get criticism for this but saying what I see

I would metaphorically boot you into the middle of next week if you were my spouse.

Your marriage is over. Both of you are worse people for your actions. Do your husband a favour now and fuck off out of his life

I can't understand the mindset to come on here just to be mean - how do you think that impacts someone who has come on MN to ask advice? I don't believe you live lives of saints yourselves!
For what ever reason, the OP seems not to have been back...

People have affairs for all kinds of reasons, because they can, they're unhappy in their marriage, because they want some excitement so I'm not going to judge you for your affair.

However, do you want to uproot your kids and move them to a new school to repair a marriage that might not be salvageable. Your DH running away from the problem by moving area isn't going to lessen the fact of the affair. In your shoes I would not move and if it was a deal breaker for your DH then I would look to end the marriage

To start with I was very confused and because I had to end the affair abruptly

To be honest its rare for anyone to admit it off their own backs, so were you about to get caught? I hardly think you fessed up because you cared about your husband...

I don’t think this marriage sounds worth saving tbh. Neither of you sound particularly nice.

OP I haven't read all of the responses after your inital post. I will say only this: you need to own this. 100%. The entire first part of your post is self-justification. There is none.

He believes he will never be able to move on from this and will never be able to trust me again and our marriage will never be the same.

He is correst about your marriage never being the same. Once trust is broken the entire dynamic of the marriage changes, and it is a LONG road back.

The venom and anger you see is the covering for another emotion: hurt. He is severely wounded and he needs healing and it is a long time coming. I highly recommend you refer him to survivinginfidelity.com where he can share in privacy, find a safe place with other betrayed spouses and get some help working through this from others who have been there.

Good luck to you both. If you want to save this marriage you will need to go through a lot of soul-searching and a lot of sucking up. Is he, is your marriage, worth that to you? You need to decide. It's hard hard work for both of you. Please understand that your relief in coming clean (and good on you for doing so) has resulted in him feeling like his heart has been ripped from his chest.

In the end, you may or may not be able to forge a new marriage, your old marriage is well and truly gone.

You can't honestly expect your husband to get over the fact you shagged someone else within a month. And whatever his shortcoming, you cheated, you broke your marriage vows. You hooked up with a fellow cheat (bet you're not the first school mum he's shagged either) so own your behaviour and stop playing the victim.

Before anyone else puts time and effort into this, it is nearly 2 years old!!

ZOMBIE.

Oh that's what comes of reading Mumsnet in the wee small hours! Bumped by someone selling something too...sigh.

The dynamic of your relationship has changed and not for the better. You sound incompatible but you are reluctant to acknowledge this, instead you distracted yourself by having an affair and have succeeded in putting yourself in a worse situation than before.

The only shortsightedness on display here is your own. Your choice is either to stay in an unsatisfactorily marriage that will be blighted by an escalation in controlling behaviour or to grab this opportunity to leave and to work on yourself.

There is no happy ever after here or ‘the affair has made our marriage stronger’ rhetoric. You’ve handed your H justifiable (in his eyes) cover for more abuse. The point where you might have been able to turn your marriage around has passed.