Questions if you left your marriage years after discovering husband's affair

[WastedTears]

I discovered DH had a 10 month affair 3 years ago.
We have had loads of ups and downs over the last 3 years. I love him more than anything but hate him so much for what he's done.

He never properly went NC with OW.
I'm in touch with OW who still has feelings for my DH and told him she loved him recently. DH denies he has feelings for her but still defends her and their contact. I am not sure he hasn't told her he loves her recently too.

DH does love me and our DD and wants us to get through this but I am tired, fed up and feel flat. He cries for what he's done and begs for forgiveness all the time. He is more attentive now, more affectionate and we have a better sex life. BUT I STILL feel empty.

Its different when people leave immediately after discovering an affair as I think the fury is still there. I wish I had left 3 years ago to spare the heartache I've suffered because of him.

Our marriage isn't so bad now and I don't feel like it's bad enough to leave.
We have fought so much and in front of DD and I can't go through the agony of dredging all this up again but I don't want to keep feeling so flat and miserable.
It comes over me in waves.
My family know what he's done and are supportive of whatever I decide but they make the point that I'm miserable now but I'd be more unhappy without him.

How long after your DHs affair did you keep trying before leaving?
If I leave now, can I still blame his affair for breaking up our family?
I don't want to destroy our family and DH has nothing, no job, no family except mine, no friends of his own and I feel trapped that I cant do this to him? This is stupid of me?

I do love him and our life together but I can't get over his betrayal.
I can't get over images of him and OW and I can't forget that he told me her loved her.
She is 15 years younger, thinner and so much more attractive than me. I am my DH's usual type, blonde medium length hair and pasty. and its really affected me that he picked someone who looks so different to me, she is taller, thinner, dark skinned and has really long dark hair. I know he can't find me physically attractive anymore despite what he says. Not compared to her.

We have had counselling which hasn't really helped me. It did more for him than me.

I just don't know what to do. I read that it takes some people up to 5 years to recover. Do I keep trying until the 5 year point? WHat if it doesn't work? What a waste of my 40s. What a 'celebration' my 50th will be.

I'm feeling very down I'm sorry.

This sounds dreadfully sad - you poor thing.
I don’t really understand why you think you’d be more unhappy without him? Your marriage absolutely sounds bad enough to leave. Perhaps family members telling you otherwise have old-fashioned views on this.
You’ve given it a shot, it isn’t working, time to leave. Take care of yourself and your daughter: that has to be your priority.

He made the choice to have an affair, despite having no job, no family except you, and no friends. He thought so little of your marriage that he gambled it, despite it being all he had.
He made that choice, the consequences he suffers are his to face, whatever you decide. It is not your responsibility to support him, and I think he is emotionally blackmailing you to stay with him because he knows he can’t support himself. There’s a term for men like that, cock lodger.
Unless he has a giant penis or something, I don’t see why you’d want him? Is there anything good about him?

I don't understand.

He is still in contact with ow. They make professions of love to each other. It's just now out in the open and still you stick around, appearing to facilitate it.

What was your question again ?

The affair hasn't "ended" at all.

I do love him.
We have been together for 22 years and affair aside we get on well.
People often remark on what a good couple we make. The irony.

He is am amazing dad and we have had a hard time with DD but he's always been faultless and completely hands on with her.
I only had my career because he was able to be home with her and that affects me.

The affair has ended and at the moment he says he hates OW for what she's done and for always hanging around.

I don't know what to believe.

There is no point in you trying to work on your marriage if you DH is not willing to. If he really wanted to be with you he would have stopped all contact with her 3 years ago.

He is playing you for a fool, and you are letting him. Have some self respect.

The affair hasn’t ended.

LTB.

He could easily have stopped her “hanging around” by ending contact.

I don't want to lose him to her.
But I don't really know what I'm fighting for when I feel so upset and flat so much.

When he's happy and I;m not thinking of OW we get on well and things feel OK again.
But it never lasts even a whole day.

He says he's stopped contacting her but she contacts him.
But she says its only because he still tells her he misses her and he loves her everytime they bump into each other

He denies this.
They are both stupid liars.

He hates her for telling me this and I don't think he'll speak to her ever again.

She wouldn't be hanging around if he had made it absolutely clear to her that she wasn't wanted.

I'm worried, though, that if you divorced, he might want your daughter to live with him and for you to pay child support while you work. I'd wait until he was working before taking any action, but then I would definitely leave him.

I think that staying in this travesty of a marriage is slowly grinding down your self esteem and happiness.
What is in this marriage for you? What needs of yours are actually being met at all?
It’s easy to see what your “D”H gets out of it - money, family, friends, a convenient wife while he also has an OW. I don’t believe for a minute that their affair is over, if they’re still in contact and exchanging declarations of love. At the very least, it’s still an emotional affair, which is in some ways worse than just physical.
You seem to be considering his feelings rather than your own - worrying about how he’d cope without you, etc. Please, I urge you to prioritise your OWN feelings and needs. Why should you live in misery so that he can be happy?

What was his justification for remaining in contact with OW all this time? Because that was really, really shit.

What kind of age is your DD?

Does he WoH now?

Him having SAH (if that’s what you mean?) for a time to parent your DD is by-the-by with respect to your decision about your marriage now. It’s just how you, as a couple, decided to manage paid work and parenting.

If three years on you still feel terrible and don’t have confidence in your H it makes sense to call it a day IMO. YOU have tried damn hard.

The likeliest explanation here seems to be that, at the very least, he has strung OW along with something like “I have strong feelings for you but care about DW too and won’t leave my DD”.

He's still in contact, and OW doesn't think it's over completely. Time doesn't start to run until contact is cut!
Seriously though, there is no time limit morally speaking. If you don't feel that he's fully committed to you, then it's your prerogative to end the relationship whenever you want, even if that's 10 years down the line.
How come both he and you are in contact with her?

Why isn’t your husband being a liar, a cheat, untrustworthy and not meeting your emotional needs not good enough grounds for divorce? I don’t understand

Loopytiles: if this is what he has said to her do I keep trying?
She says he said he still loves her.
I made him text her in front of me telling her he loves me and DD and that she should leave us alone. He did this but I think he told after I made him do it because she knew I made him.
She knows he wont leave us for her.
Why does she still hang around?
I don't understand why he lets her.
I don't understand why I actually give a shit anyway.

DD is 7.
He doesn't work properly - freelance work when he gets it.
He does all home chores admin and childcare in working hours and then evenings and weekends we split it.

Oh OP. I don't mean this in a cruel way but if he really loved you and your DD, would he honestly have done this in the first place?

You sound completely broken down and clearly (and understandably) don't trust him.

If he wanted to make your marriage work, he would have completely cut off the OW. He hasn't. It sounds like he wants to have his cake and eat it and is treating you like crap.

Please leave. You deserve so much more than this. And with regards to your family saying you'll be more unhappy without him, how the hell do they know?! With this awful weight off your shoulders, I bet you anything that you'll be much happier than you've been in many many years.

OW used to be my little sister's best friend.
When he tells me things I can't help it but ask her to see if he's telling the truth.
The two of them can't even keep their lies consistent.

How can you bear this? Knowing he had had an affair would be one thing, but with a friend of the family who is still hovering around, saying he loves her? That's unforgivable.

Give yourself a break and tell him to fuck off to her. Honestly, the relief will be enormous.

It does sound rather that you don't want him but you don't want OW to have him, I guess because then she's "won"? But there are no winners here. Especially your DD who sees her parents unhealthy relationship.

I have a friend whose parents stayed together despite not really wanting to and it has affected her adult relationships.

I think you would be better to leave. You sound in a pretty good position TBH, it's him that would struggle.

No, it’s obvious to posters, who are outside the situation, that to “keep trying” would not be in your best interests because your H is untrustworthy and still having an emotional affair.

You are at significant legal risk with respect to money and sharing residency of DD: suggest seeking legal advice on that asap if you haven’t already done so.

As a first step, given that DD is of primary school age, your H should seek a job IMO!

Leaving a marraige is a scary thing to do and when you aren't in the midst of an affair revelation I can understand why you feel uncertain.

Can you take a step back and try to look at your husband objectively rather than the man you married and the father of your child? Imagine if he was a friend's husband and your friend was going through what you are, what would you advise her to do?

How has OW still managed to contacthim?
She should have been blocked on every social media chanel, mobile etc.
He is being contacted as he is allowing this to happen.
Could it be that he has no income at present and you are the "cushier" of the 2 options.
Whatever remember if you decide to end the marriage -you are not losing him to her, she is the second option and getting your cast offs.
She will know that......

You are he are both allowing this woman to stay in your lives and you will never have any chance of moving past this all the time she is around.

It's like constantly picking at a scab on a wound that will never heal.

If you are certain you want to stay with your husband (and I'm not commenting on that - your life, your choice) then you both need to ensure she is cut from your lives completely. As others have said NO CONTACT, blocked from all lines of communication and if either of you run into her you ignore her - point blank. No small talk, no hellos, no conversations, no emails, phone calls, texts .... just a firm 'fuck off' conveyed through all your actions.

But for reasons best known to yourselves you are allowing your contact with her to continue - to the extent that she even tells you what your husband has said to her?

This is utter madness and you know it.

The alternative is to continue as you are ..... miserable, unhappy, insecure, fighting (and worse, in front of your daughter) and as Princess Diana once famously said, with 'three of you in the relationship'.

And the other alternative (and the option most of us would choose I suspect) is to leave them to each other, and take yourself out of the equation. Go and make a good life for yourself and your daughter.

He hasn't blocked her completely.
So yes he still either wants or loves her and that's the bottom line. If he bumped into her, he should have walked the other way. It's really that simple.
He hasn't and its time you moved on and made a life for yourself.

He's loving having two women doing the 'pick me' dance. Expose him by doing the 'I don't want you anymore' dance. You are massaging his ego. You cannot do this any more. It will never end of you are accepting his behaviour. He must have NO CONTACT with OW. It's the only way to recover from this. Openness and honesty. Not just that you don't want to lose him to someone else. That's not a good enough reason to stay. She will not have 'won' if he chooses her, you will have.