Can you ever truly recover from a betrayal?

[FilamentBabe]

I found out my husband had been having an emotional affair with someone he met online. When I found out he said he had been talking to her for 3 months. I was/am utterly devastated and it's been a difficult few months since I found out.

He has stopped talking to her, he's being completely open with his phone and is adamant he's sorry, was stupid, he loves me and wants to work on gaining my trust back.

We started couples counselling a couple of weeks ago to try and explore how to move forward. For me, it's to see how/if we can move forward from this and if not how to separate peacefully (we have 3 young children). For him it's purely to try and move forward as a couple.

I guess I'm looking for people's experiences on whether it is something that can be completely recovered from. At the moment I'm walking around with a knot in my chest and I just feel hurt all the time. I distrust him completely, can trust ever be recaptured fully? I've turned into a wife who checks her husband's phones, and I don't want to be this person forever. If I stay with him will there ever be a day where I'm not in pain and don't second guess his word?

Sorry you are going through this.. I couldn't. Now separated

Honestly? It’s unlikely you’ll ever fully recover. Where you trust him and forgive him completely. The vast majority of people will always have that voice in the back of their mind asking ‘will they do it again? Are they really texting their brother? Why is she late home from work?’ and the knowledge that he could betray you so badly will likely take the shine off your own feelings for him and lead you to slowly distance yourself from him, speak to him a little less openly, confide in him less frequently, want to be intimate with him as freely.

But the kicker is, you’ll never know whether you’re in the small minority of people who can recover from a betrayal or not until you’re years down the line.

Question is, do you want to take that gamble and spend potentially years being upset and torn and heartbroken to try and salvage the relationship? Is it even worth it, when in an alternate scenario you could divorce within the next six months, grieve, and be happily single or dating or with someone new for a fresh start in the next few years?

Do you feel you have the time to wait and see, or do you feel life is too short to invest your own precious time and emotion in a cheat?

Only you know the answer.

So sorry OP. Personally I couldn't forgive. I'm jealous by nature anyway so this would utterly destroy me. If I carried on in the relationship it would eat me up, id never trust again. I have 3 kids too and it wouldmt change my decision. I'd be passive actress and forever hurt so would have no choice but to walk away

Question is OP, truly, do you think you can ever fully forgive and trust him again? Only you know the answer.

Passive aggressive not passive actress.... autocorrect

Was it someone he met online, who he never met, and never planned on ever meeting?

Because if so, I can understand how that could happen between 2 people - I'm not defending it, but I don't think it's worth ending a relationship over, especially if the person is truly sorry and adamant that they won't contact that person or anyone else in the future.

On second thought, I guess it would depend on the content of the messages, e.g. Were they romantic and sexual, or just 'friendship'

My husband cheated on me when our three children were young, devastated didn’t come close. I knew I wanted to fight for him mostly for my kids a,not to have a Dad around and b,the upset it would cause them. I really don’t think I could have managed financially on my own either so I stuck it out and 7 years have flown by. I’m glad I did hang around as we get on well, he’s a great dad and I do really love him but I’ll never love him the way I did and yes I do worry occasionally and not a day goes by when I don’t feel sick to the stomach of his betrayal. No marriage or partnership is easy and whatever relationship you’ll have there is always that possibility of him/her having an affair, sometimes it’s better the devil you know? It’s made me a whole lot stronger and I’m not so dependent on his arse, I’m confident and happy, so it can and does work out. I’m not by no means a sucker or walk over I have sworn to myself if he ever does or smells the sweet perfume of another flower I will and I repeat I will cut the stem. .

'I knew I wanted to fight for him'

Shouldn't it have been him, fighting for you

I think for me it would depend on the nature of the relationship - whether it was purely a “ dick pick and sexting” situation or an “ I love you and wish we could be together “ situation. One is easier to forgive than the other ( neither is great I understand that) The other issues are much more pragmatic and relate to finances, how much disruption it would cause to the children to seperate and move and how much my life would be negatively impacted in being a single parent ( assuming they remained with you). So, in my case we live in a very expensive area and I doubt that my DH and I would be able to buy/rent 2 properties locally. If we both moved away do I take my daughter out of her Outstanding school which is on our doorstep or struggle with a commute to drop her off. I also don’t know how I would manage drop offs / pick ups since my DH and I both commute and divide the responsibility currently. These are not issues that are generally considered during these discussions but I wouldn’t want my daughter to be disadvantaged or raised in a less favourable environment if I could possibly help it. You have three young children to consider and although I’m not saying you should raise them in a situation where you are miserable I would also want to give it a good go at reconciliation for a period at least while you try and address some issues of the emotional issues.

It was someone he met online, he says there was no chance of ever meeting her in real life because she lived in another country. According to him it was just friendship and someone to talk to, but he deleted all the messages so it's hard for me to know the true extent of it. He claims he deleted the messages because he knew they would upset me because he did cross a line in that he opened up to her about my recent struggles with pnd (our youngest is 7 months).

I'm a sahm so financially I am a bit dependant on him. But I do have a career that I could easily get back into if I needed to. Luckily I don't think he would be particularly spiteful in the case of a split and would be quite willing to support as much as he could while I got myself sorted. But I do worry about the effects on the children and is one of the reasons that I was willing to explore things in counselling. It's hard because I do love him as well and despite what's happened I know he loves me. We have had a hard few months after the birth of our youngest, I'm not excusing his behaviour but I do acknowledge that it's been tough on us both.

I think you'll get through it.

The fact that she lives in a different country might have made it feel 'safer' for him, i.e. that he wasn't really doing anything wrong, she wasn't a threat to your marriage, given that they were never likely to meet. (In his mind)
Again, I'm not defending him.

I went through the betrayal of discovering a 11month affair with a woman 20 years younger than him. It was full but on and he was in love but ended it in the end. When I found out he was just starting the next one.

We went for counselling and I decided to end it. He was no longer the man I married. He was so shocked and begged me not to when he realised that I meant it. He thought we were having counselling to fix it!

Honestly though I think I could have forgiven a one off fling or emotional affair - but in my case his betrayal was too much for me to bear.

Only you can know - counselling will help. But take the time to reassess how far the relationship meets you your needs not just getting over the short term issue in hand. You will survive but do it with your eyes open. And know what you want.

Only you can decide what is right for you, if you feel you can work on your relationship I would say go for it. It will be hard. I have Just recently found out my husband had an affair, it had ended when I found out. We are working through it together, it has made us open up to each other. It is hard and some days are much harder than others. My husband has been honest with me when I've asked him any questions. Make sure you do whats right for you. I am ready to start forgiving but I'm certainly not going to forget x

He seems to be willing to work on it so that's a good start and in my experience it's not that common to be allowing open access to his phone so maybe you can work through this. It will take a lot of time though.

I personally haven't been able to work through similar things with exes. It's turned me into the phone checking distrustful person I never wanted to be - however, I've caught out every partner messaging other women because I'm secretly checking their phone.

How does one "meet" someone online unless you are actively looking for sexual hook ups ?

personally, if I were you, I'd pick up my career now and make sure you have autonomy and a plan b should you decide sometime down the line that going solo would be better for you.

good luck OP
I wish I had taken my own advice

He definitely wasn't looking for sexual hook ups. I've got no concerns of it being a physical affair. But the emotional aspect of it is still just as big a betrayal to me though which is why I'm struggling with it. I've had post natal depression quite bad, he's also had a stuggles with depression, our youngest has been a difficult baby and with two other children we haven't really had much time as a couple. So I just believe with all those factors he was lonely, maybe wanted a bit of an ego boost. This doesn't make it any easier for me to accept but I can see how he might have got to this point.

What was he looking for then ?

Friendship ? Why would he look online for that ?

What site did he use to find his "ego boost" ? A dating site ?

The thought has crossed my mind about getting back into work for that reason. Will break my heart though as my youngest is only 7 months so was planning to stay home till he started school. But this situation has brought home how vulnerable I am financially, so yeah I have been considering returning.

I guess counselling will be exploring what was going on for him and what he was looking for. I just know it's very out of character for him and things have been hard for us in general lately. And no it wasn't a dating site.

How does one "meet" someone online unless you are actively looking for sexual hook ups ?
I did.

I was on an app, no intention of meeting anyone or cheating in anyway. Just friends and then...it spiralled. Phone calls, sexting, phone sex and an emotional connection.

He ended it after he felt guilty, and although we talked about meeting we never did.

You are making excuses for him, op

He has no work to do if you are looking for his get out clauses. All he has to do is sit back and let you do all the "work on the relationship" when you are not the one who fucked it over

I'm not making excuses for him, but I can't deny the fact things have been hard lately, for both of us. He has hurt me, he has done wrong but he is not a bad person. And he is taking full responsibility for what has happened. He's not getting off lightly like your implying. But things are not as black and white in these situations and it's not easy to call time on a relationship when you've been with them for 15 years and there are children involved. Life is not that simple.

It’s not but I would agree with AF that you are making excuses for him. There are no excuses anytime but within 7 months if you having a baby? Christ is he that needy that he needs attention and validation when you are struggling with pnd and the demand of a little one?