If you found out your dh had had an affair for 16 months would you ...

[Eggid]

Throw him out? Even if he’s all you’ve ever known and you’ve been together for nearly 40 years? Even if he’s spent the 10 months since you found out doing all in his power to put things right?

Some days I want to kill myself. Some days I want to kill him. Most days I just don’t know what to do.

Please tell me what you would do given that we’ve been together since we were teenagers. Dc are all grown up and gone, and they don’t know anything.

Thank you.

No SO21 and I’m very glad things worked out for you. I think you’re one of the few on this thread though.

It’s difficult to say based on responses on this thread. Perhaps there are many who are happy but just aren’t here or posting because they’ve moved on?

I’ve been away from MN for some time myself.

I must also say that 10 months on from discovery I was still all over the place.

It’s awful Eggid 💐 I’m so sorry you’re going through this too. Reading threads like this really drags it all up again for me so I generally avoid.

Eggid I have read the pain will exist whether you stay or leave. I wonder if the pain ends sooner when you leave as you are no longer working on your marriage so to speak. It is difficult to leave when you still love your spouse, have been together for a number of years and have dc. Though I am not to blame for my dh's straying, I played a part in making him feel rejected and generally unhappy due to financial stress. I stopped listening to him. I no longer feel any pain when the thoughts come and am thankful.

That book sounds discouraging. As women get older I think they do become less desirable to some men however there will always be someone out there who would gladly accept, love and cherish you.

I realised how much I cared about how my dh saw me. I valued myself based on his opinion of me. I viewed dh as being better than me. I have always done this when in relationships even shitty ones which gave me low self esteem. I am no beauty queen but I would have no trouble meeting someone else if I was to leave dh. He knows this.

S021
Like you I do not regret staying. In a weird way, our relationship has more depth than it ever did. I can be rather selfish and consumed by my needs and what I want. I am not very affectionate whereas dh is.

16 months out of forty! Another 20 possible years with someone you love. If he is truly sorry and really trying to make things right then perhaps time will heal a lot of the hurt. Sounds like a kind of mid-life crisis which may well have been instigated by the woman. It obviously wasn’t love or he would have taken the opportunity to break up. Sounds like a chance for a fling and excitement and he took it. Can you think of it as the result of a man not thinking with his brain? Sounds as if he has come to realise just what he was risking. I’ve been married over 59 years so perhaps the ups and downs of marriage are seen in a different perspective. I do wish you well and hope you don’t risk the rest of your life in regret of having thrown away what you had. However, keep your antennae up to make sure that there is no continuance of the affair but I suspect it is over.

eggid I once had a male doctor tell me to stay with my cheating husband as who would take me to the doctors when I was old - WTF! I had another doctor who told me in a year's time you will be grateful this has happened . I would say it took a bit longer than a year though ....I had a 30 year marriage. I was older than you are now . I too went through all the ghastly head banging on the wall stuff ( no need to rehash) I set small goals at a time - let's stay in this place ( house/town etc) and see how it goes ( was considering moving back home) . 5 years down the line I am married to someone new and now I realise what I was missing all those years- he is kind, loving, respectful, sexy, appreciative .I am financially settled due to divorce and the world is my oyster. My later years are the best I have ever had . Don't let fear put you off your decision .

Sounds like a kind of mid-life crisis which may well have been instigated by the woman

FFS happydays wake up and smell the coffee .....poor man unable to resist a scheming woman ? No control over his cock ?

@TheStuffedPenguin

My thoughts too. But she’s been married 59 years so must be right

@eggid I totally know how it is for you. It’s 4 months since I found out and despite apologies, promises, DH having no contact with OW, counselling for both of us, anti depressants (me), sleeping pills (me) I still can’t decide what to do and I still feel mentally and physically shattered by it all.

In the short term I am just taking it a day at a time and just trying to get through each day. Longer term I have realised that it might take me a long time to know what to do and that’s ok.
some days I can’t stop thinking about what they did and imagining them together. It’s awful but on those days I drink, cry, whatever I want - and I try to think that this will all pass and one day I’ll be fine with or without him.
60 is not old. we Have a lot of options really. Have courage. I have a lot of sympathy for you

@Eggid. As you know I kicked mine out the night I found his messages to the OW. The difference is that mine isn’t sorry, we’ll he said sorry, but won’t take responsibility for his affair, so we’re separated and that’s how it will stay.
I’m 12 weeks in now and feel pain like I’ve never felt before, some nights I’ve also been curled in a ball or cried in the shower so my girls don’t hear me but the house is much calmer without him. We are much calmer without him. I have to say, medication is helping. Drink wouldn’t help me because I can’t drink much and would try and ring him when drunk! Medication and counselling are doing it for me. I’m terrified of being alone (when the girls are grown) but I would be worse I think if he was to ask to come back (don’t think he would) because I wouldn’t be able to get over what he’s done. Every memory, Xmas birthdays etc as a previous poster said, are ruined for me now.

women of that age had few options
It was just a character in a film saying that. The scriptwriter is probably a clueless 22, or a bitter 60-year-old whose wife just left him, or just put that in the character's mouth to make them look bad!

In real life, people become single for various reasons in every decade of life, in many cases without any kind of choice. They don't all lead some sort of non-existence afterwards. My gm left her first husband at your age, married again, lost him, married a third time at 80 and again outlived him. All before even OLD to speed up the dating process, and as a larger lady.

Have you been to the gp? I found sleeping tablets helpful when I really couldn't do without sleep. And I was put on ADs, and got counselling; all very helpful. Look after yourself, you're in a crisis and need to go out and get help. There's a lot out there.

Like I said, now I get on with my ex well enough again that I can imagine how we might have stayed together, if both of us had wanted to. But don't do it just because you are afraid of breaking up. That's scary, yes, but not the end of the world.

I agree RavenMum

Lots of women lose their partners in their 60’s because they left or widowed. Life goes on!

I had another doctor who told me in a year's time you will be grateful this has happened
My counsellor said that many of her patients said afterwards that even though it was a hard time, they were glad that they had gone through it, as they came out the other side stronger, or with a different life. I feel rather like that myself. After reading his emails I spent months obsessed with how best to kill myself, but now I am grateful to my ex, as without his affair I would have just gone on living in mild dissatisfaction, hoping that he would be a better companion when he retired. I'm not ready to remarry any time soon, if at all, but I feel a lot less lonely now, living on my own, with an attentive bf...

Happydays I read on www.goaskzuzie.com (excellent website) that if you compare the period there was no infidelity to the period there was infidelity it can help put things into perspective.

I will use my circumstance as an example:

Married - 15 years (Not accurate as I do not want give away exact year and month of marriage) which is 180 months
Period of unfaithfulness - 1 month (was on two occasions in a month but I have chosen to write off the whole month)
Unfaithful - 1 month
Faithful - 179 months

If a woman has been married for 20 years and infidelity has been for two years:
Married: 240 months
Unfaithful: 24 months
Faithful: 216 months

That’s interesting RavenMum and I feel similar despite different circumstances.
I felt my marriage was smashed to smithereens and if we were going to rebuild it, it would be to a new spec.
Essentially, it’s like a new relationship with the same person.

Here's a lovely cup of tea. It is 99% tea and just 1% faeces.

.... and I know I will never, ever find myself in the same situation I was before.

it’s like a new relationship with the same person
I would guess that it would have to be, for it to work...

It sounds like you weren’t happy in your marriage anyway RavenMum
Many marriages are 50% tea and 50% faeces without infidelity.

I literally got no sleep last night, none sad. Most nights these days I only get about 4 hours but every so often I get a night like last night. I’m so sick of feeling this way. Don’t know how much longer my sanity will hold on for.

But I bet he sleeps like a baby.

I've lost count of the threads on here where the poor OPs mental health is in tatters, exhausted, yet the cheating partner snores their way through everynight without a care in the world. I doubt this is a coincidence.

Eggid I'm so sorry he did this to you, I wish you all the best whatever you decide.

The sheer amount of pain expressed on this thread is absolutely heart rending. Some of you describe being curled up in a ball, sobbing in agony - that was me as well and sometimes still is, especially at night when I have nothing to distract me. When I read your stories I wish I could make the pain go away for all of you (and myself), it is just so fucking awful. I think that those who have cheated may sometimes struggle to fully comprehend the level of trauma they have inflicted on their betrayed partner because they have possibly not been on the receiving end of being cheated on themselves, and frankly it is impossible to 'get' how horrific it feels unless you have experienced it first hand. I wonder if had they known how bad it is and how much irreparable damage is done whether they would have gone through with it after all - if they had a crystal ball and could see the fall out in advance. I am currently dealing with the ONS my DH had and which I found out about in June - I think if it has been a full blown affair I would not be as far along in the recovery process as I am now, though I know there was flirting in the office and rumours about them prior to the actual event (he went back to her place after a work do). I do know that if he could turn back time and un-do it he would. I think he never thought I would find out and it wouldn't do any harm, he hadn't engaged his brain and has sorely lived to regret it.

I watched a video recently by a marriage counsellor who said that a person's propensity to become a cheater starts in childhood, and that influences at that time (which can be a variety of different things) can mould them into a person who is less successful at regulating destructive behaviours than others. A lot of it really rang true. I've also heard a lot about how a shock within a relationship such as an affair can re-wire a couple in a way that eventually proves to be a positive thing (if you can even believe that) - deeper understanding, no more complacency or taking for granted, more commitment and lots of other things, however that is not all couples, only some, and some betrayals are frankly too awful to get past imo. Today I feel positive about it, other days I feel nothing but paranoia and pain, but it's only been a few months.

I'm not really sure what I'm getting at, but at the end of the day I am going to wave the flag for those of us who would NEVER cheat on a partner - we do exist, the world is not 100% made up of people who would or might cheat. I absolutely determined to be a person who can say with total confidence that there are lots of people out there who are totally faithful and always will be.

It sounds like you weren’t happy in your marriage anyway
I wasn't unhappy, but it's only since we broke up that I've realised how much better a relationship can be. Obviously, with many women that won't be the case. But I imagine I'm not the only one to have that experience, either.

the world is not 100% made up of people who would or might cheat
Personally I don't find that very helpful, as even in the most optimistic scenario, you can only know yourself. I don't want to go round thinking that I have found a faithful person, only to be disappointed again. So I'm just going to assume that anyone could be unfaithful, and maintain my independence and strength to deal with that.

SO21 I agree that bad marriages exist without infidelity. You can be mistreated via a number of ways - infidelity is only one of them. Each betrayed spouse has a very different marriage therefore different reasons to leave or stay. For some infidelity is icing on the cake following perhaps domestic violence, emotional abuse, rejection, financial abuse, cutting spouse off from family. For others infidelity is the only bad thing to have happened in their marriage.