Partner affair, how to deal with it best.

[Jeezusmotherofgod]

I could really do with some advice and maybe a bit of a handhold.

I found out my Partner of 16 years, two teenage children, was having an affair 3 weeks ago. I found out by checking his messages of facebook. His first response was to say tgat he was in love with her, but he also minimised what had been going on saying yes only slept with her once etc etc.
This basically csme about following him recently started a new job that meant him commuting a long way and staying over a couple of nights a week.

The following day, after I found out, he told me openly he was going to talk to her and later came home and told me he wanted to try again with me. He promised me he had gone no contact with her. I really felt this might work, I realise we had been together since we are young and the middle year’s of a relationship could probably be considered quite mundane and a relationship with a younger woman with none of the commitments and general bulshit of family must be very alluring.

Things were beginning to settle down. However a day or two ago While he was staying away I had reason to believe he was lying about his location and it made me massively insecure and a bit paranoid.

When he came home from work yesterday he told me he wanted to separate and after some probing this is because he wants to start a relationship with other woman. I am bereft. We were never unhappy, never argue, we get along incredibly well and had a good sex life. We both think it would be best if he stayed at home until the new year to try and give the kids a good Christmas and make a plan of how to move forward.

I am deeply deeply hurting and upset but i love my children more and as such I really want to try spend this time positively and try and end up with the best of a bad job. Equally I just want to curl into a ball and cry. It doesn’t help really that DP seems to have given very very little thought to his decision and is seemingly looking to me to direct things as best I can for all of us. Added to this I am in a really precarious position being half way through a degree with a big set of exams in two weeks.

Please has anyone got any advice of how I can make this work out best for everyone. I just don’t know what to do. I feel completely beaten.

Thank you

I don't think you'll end up as 'friends' OP but you'll probably get angry before he becomes of no interest to you. You won't need him as a friend because you'll move on and find a better life without him

Tell him to leave. As soon as possible. Not after Christmas & New Year.

Don't let him sit comfortable and happily in the house at Christmas while you run around feeding and making everyone else happy.

You will not start to heal until he has left. Make that sooner rather than later for yourself.

It isn't good timing but if he is gone, he is gone. You won't be thinking as much about when he goes as the deed is done. If that makes any sense at all?

How are you getting in OP?

On!

Thank you for asking @Flowerpot2005

He is still here, though today he has gone to meet other woman in order to ‘make plans’ presumably about whether/when/where they will move in together. This is horrible and very hurtful I’m trying hard to keep going and not think about it.

I am hoping that all I have told him the last few days has sunk in and he is starting to think about the reality of this situation. When I said initially that he hadn’t thought it through, he really hadn’t. His initial suggestion about how things would be was that he would stay with her on his work days then come and stay on the sofa here when he wanted to see his kids...... .

Anyhow, at the very least these last few days have been an opportunity for me to let him know exactly how hurt, broken and scared I am which I really think if I had chucked him out he honestly would not have realised the full extent of. He would have been spared seeing the real pain he has caused, which I think is right and as it should be. Why should he be allowed to just up and leave and walk away from the hurt he has made, He bloody well should see how much pain he has caused. I haven’t been begging him to stay or anything like that but just expressing all the hurt and betrayal I’m feeling and my fears for going forward.

My thoughts are now turning to how best to approach telling the children, I’m frightened of their responses and how much pain their are going to feel. We have never been a toxic or unhappy couple, we have always been extremely good friends, not good enough though obviously..... :(

I’m wondering if it’s a good idea to give them a few weeks of transition where he stays at home for a week or so after telling them. If he’s here he can answer their questions and witness any distress, and offer them comfort, and also I really don’t see why I should deal with all that alone?

Does any of this make sense? Have I completely lost my perspective?

Thank you all

It makes perfect sense!

I think you need to not allow him to have a period of transition because that's outrageous...that said, I wonder if that's really what you need rather than him, as in a gentle leaving as opposed to a brutal he's gone?

Best advice I can give is go for complete cold turkey. The sooner that attachments severed, the sooner you can come to terms with it & start to deal with it. My lovely, he is going & nothing you can do or say will change that. Don't try to make it all easy for him because you'll kick yourself later if you do. He needs to feel the pain of this situation as much as you do, why should you have to be the one having the hard time & making the transition easy for him? He should be doing that for but isn't.

This really isn't a pleasant time for you & as much as you feel it will crush you, it won't. Just remember a day at a time, hour at a time if that's easier.

I'm sorry to say but you really don't seem to understand the mind of a man who wants to leave you for an OW . Being in the house with you and you expressing your hurt and betrayal will be like water off a duck's back to him . He is planning to start a new life . He will have rewritten history . A few weeks of transition ? Blimey I wish that is all it would take . Good luck with that ! I'm sorry if you think I am being harsh BUT I fear that you are hoping that he is going to come to his senses and realise he wants to stay with you . These things are NOT clean cut and orderly and some part of a sensible progress . They are messy and go back and forth . I'm sorry but you are being a doormat . Time for him to go and for you to start standing up for yourself.

So you told him how hurt broken and scared you were and he went off to see the OW to make plans?

If you’ve showed him the pain he’s caused he really doesn’t give a shit.

I mean this in the nicest possible way - stop being a doormat and get a grip, otherwise he will walk all over you and your kids.

Don’t fall for the ‘but I’m not ready to go’ line. Best of luck with your new life

Hi there, I’m sorry this has happened to you and I wish you the strength to overcome the fear of being alone, what your life will become and that of your children, but you need to focus on the here and now and reel in that anger and put it towards something useful like kicking him out. Honestly your children will understand and appreciate later on that their mum had the strength to show them that she valued herself more than being treated and ACCEPTING this whilst putting yourself back of the queue in this. Your needs matter, you matter, find it within yourself to think of that mothering strength that all mothers feel when they think of their children and show yours that mum is a f@@@ing lioness and will not put up with this disgusting treatment from anybody.

Sweetheart, I believe you can do it. The longer you leave it the more control you give him over the situation. Do not beg, do not feel self pity when you talk to him, you may be broken inside but woman for yourself further down that road, own your dignity and pride and show him the door. X

I've been where you are. Wanting to stay friends and be magnanimous and mature.

It's a very Noble impulse.

In my experience and opinion though, the way you get there is to separate completely (physically and mentally), move to a strictly cursory and polite relationship, no discussion of anything except the children. A complete reset. A new foundation/baseline of normal needs to be established where you're separate people who are no longer personally interdependent.

And then after a few years - 2-3 minimum - perhaps (perhaps) there will be space to rebuild from that new foundation. And maybe what can be built will be a friendship.

But if you try to build a friendship on top.of the mess he's lately made - no. That's just going to turn toxic.

Ask me how I know

If I were you I would do a perfect 180. He needs out of the house. No niceties. No Christmas, if you insist on doing it (I did and I although I don't regret it, I can't recommend it) then be polite to him but he gets a list of tasks and shopping, and you let him fail. No facilitating. Cool off, get distant, and start radically refocusing your energy onto yourself.

Kick him out now, he can explain to the children. Atleast they are teenagers. They will get over it. I understand that you are upset but you sound pathetic and are enabling his disgusting behaviour. Only communication now on needed will be about the kids.

You need to tell him that this is not working for you and you want a clean break and he has to pack and leave. Tell him that he can have children on x amount of days (discuss best for both) and that visits won't be at the home. Tell him you want to move forward with things and to make a new life for yourself. Let him know you are no longer sure about your feelings towards him. Interestingly this will shock him and possibly bother him. He won't expect you to show strength. Let him go and you may find that his "in lust" dies a death within 4 months when they really get to see each other. You may even find him wanting to try again etc but that will be down to you.

It's probably different for anyone, but personally I found the "transition period" the worst thing of all. It was a relief to everyone when he was gone, and we could get back to a normal life without that awful tense atmosphere. The kids could see me alone and their dad alone, we could start getting some sort of new normality.

He needs to go before Christmas. He'll probably be spending a lot of his time with her anyway over the Christmas break. Far better that you all don't have to continually be thinking 'will he be here today or not - will he be back tonight?' If he's with you, you will all have terrible memories of this Christmas Day which will colour Christmas memories forever. Get him gone and start anew with Christmas memories of the three of you.

Hat’s off to you for trying to remain friends! I couldn’t do it, sometimes I think it’s part of the cheaters script to stay friends so they can minimise what they’ve done..

“Yes I cheated, but everything’s worked out for the best..see we’re both still good friends”

5 years since me and my ex split and I don’t want to be their friend after the Cheating, lies, expxosure to STD’s, tearing our family apart...

Don’t get me wrong I’m polite and civil but I don’t want to be their friend. Friends don’t do that to each other, let alone a wife, husband.

But good luck to you if you choose to remain friends.

I would go so far as to say we are "friendly" after 4 years - not just polite and civil. But definitely not "friends". To me that would mean actively seeking out one another's company. Now the kids have gone our only interaction is pet sitting (we kept one each). Eventually I imagine we will only meet at the kids' big events. But when we do meet, we get on fine. For me it took a couple of years even to be civil in private, tbh! so I'm amazed I feel that comfortable now.

OMG why are you acting like a doormat and giving him all the power and depriving yourself of any respect - you need to stop this now, he's away planning a future with OW and is in and out your door; enough is enough, it ends today, tell him to feck off, get his bags packed, he's beyond cruel, his actions are not that of a man that even has compassion for you OP, he's using you until he jumps ship, you need to take back some control and protect yourself, friend? I wouldn't want him as my worst enemy.

Really sorry that you are going through this.

The last thing you want now probably is to be around him. If I were you, no matter when in the year it is, he needs to leave the house and give you some space and air. Is there anyway for him to spend Christmas away without telling the kids the whole story now? You can wait until Christmas is over and you've calmed down/thought things through before telling your kids

I think you're being very brave trying to put the kids' needs first, JMOG, but there is a bit of a limit to what you can do. Christmas is tricky. Will you have to go and sit with his parents for hours and all put on a happy face while he sneaks off to chat to OW, for example?

Will your ex even cooperate properly if you try to make things nice until January? I remember the last New Year's with my ex, it was a total farce - his phone battery was running out and he wanted to text his (unadmitted, unproven) OW, was running around looking for a socket, ignored me and the kids, refused to smile in photos (as I was supposedly being horrible by suspecting him) so I couldn't even look at them afterwards, with his nasty, unfriendly face on them.

You might have the best intentions, but will he play along? It's not like he's being unselfish lately, right?

I think I just really feel that the best outcome for the children long term and into adulthood is for me and their dad to be good friends and have no animosity towards each other. I just don’t quite know how to facilitate this when i feel so upset and vulnerable.

You can't be friends with someone who would do this to you.

You can't facilitate a relationship with someone who would throw you and your relationship away for nothing.

HIS relationship with his kids is HIS responsibility. YOUR role is to show your DC what happens in life and how to get through it. Pretending it's all normal while dying inside won't work, you'll crumble, we all will, the kids WILL see that there is something wrong and that is FAR more likely to unsettle them than their dad staying away with work for longer.

The ONLY way to have half a chance of shocking him into the harsh reality is to take a deep breath and tell him to go, now, today and SHOW HIM what his life will be on the other side of his betrayal of you.

Chances are that SHE doesn't want him full time and he WILL miss the kids and very likely that he will miss the comfort and familiarity of you and it might just jolt him back into reality.

He spends part of the week away, he can go there for christmas and see what life will be like when he is an EOW dad. he needs to make sure that he pays you a decent amount to make sure that the kids and you have what you need to get by.

It's actually uncomfortable reading that HE is the one that has destroyed his family, yet, it's HER who is feverishly trying to fix things and put a brave face on for the children, so once again, he has an easy ride of things.

Sorry OP, let HIM now solve how he tells HIS children that he has left; you have enough to fricken deal with, it's not your job to fix his life.

You need space to process this and to start to heal. You can't do this without demanding that space and on your terms.

You need space to process this and to start to heal. You can't do this without demanding that space and on your terms.

First thing you need to do is tell your tutor at the university. A major emotional event like this will probably impact on your work and could have an effect on your final mark. Also, student services might be able to point you in the direction of counselling.

Secondly you need to see a good lawyer.

I think when you're telling the children it's important to emphasise that you both still love the children as much as ever, even although you will not be living together anymore.

I'm very sorry that this has happened. Your DH is behaving really badly.