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.

@Eggid my husband had an affair for 18 months. We have now been divorced for 8 months and I tried to keep the family together for years.

Here is the difference: he was never unkind to you and never treated you differently. I think that is a huge difference.

It makes me think that maybe he IS telling the truth that it was just an exciting thrilling fantasy that was separate from his life with you.

When you describe how devastated you feel, that you wonder what was real and what is really your life - we so get you. That is the devastation of affairs.

All I can say to you is, no matter what you do, this pain is with you. It does not go away. There is only one way through it, and that is through it - and that takes years.

As someone who is divorced, I would say if he is kind, then live with your pain and just process it one day at a time before you do anything drastic. For me, he was so mean (whilst not expecting to lose me) I had to stop the abuse. He moved swiftly on, which shows how little I ever meant. But divorce especially after SAHM etc means smaller house lower pensions and more poverty in old age, so think this through.

Sometimes these things are a big message from the Universe 'now is the time to GROW UP'.

For instance, you sound a tiny bit dependent on him (I was as well). So get into counselling, and focus on making your own life - hobbies, new friends, getting a job, qualifications. Pull away from him a little bit. Chump Lady calls this 'being MIGHTY'.

I could tell you all the unspeakable things he did to me (I sure think about them enough) - but what does that achieve for me? It changes nothing. I can choose to be unhappy, or I can choose to be happy and not allow his behaviour to define me. I went back to university, started exercising and am now developing my own career. Life without him in it is way better than life with walking on eggshells around his miserable self absorbed self, although I will never enjoy being divorced or not lovable enough.

I really hear how devastated you are. Yes intimate betrayal does destroy your innocent trust the way you describe. Sorry you have joined the club nobody wants to join. But in counselling now that the scales have fallen off your eyes, you might see that he is actually quite a selfish guy in lots of ways, and his kindness depends on you running around after him?

That's my advice to you. Join a 12 steps co dependent group, work on putting the focus on to yourself, develop yourself as a separate person and things will unfold the way they are supposed to. You might catch him at it again (what happened to me) and it all becomes very clear what you have to do... or, this might be the start of a new chapter. But that devastating pain that bangs at you every second of every day? You just have to process the new information that you have received that has changed your life. Get a job, start a sport even walking because that is the biggest antidepressant out there. Good luck OP.

Marriages can and do survive this OP. But it will take a lot of hard work. The only hope you have is if he is truly remorseful, prepared to do whatever it takes and 100% honest about every tiny detail from here on in. He needs to answer every single question you have and accept that he owes you the whole truth. Any attempt to lie or minimise will be the nail in the coffin. The lies are more painful than the adultery. You are allowed to be angry and you are allowed to mistrust him until he has restored your faith. He is not allowed to tell you to forget or move on. He needs to acknowledge your pain and take responsibility for it.

I think you should face your dear of being alone/change and have time apart from him, at least a month, and see how it feels to not be worrying about what he is up to. You don't trust him and why should you? I suspect that if you allow yourself a breathing space you will stop feeling as bad as you do now. You need time to connect back to yourself without him.

@ScreamingLadySutch
Thank you for your post, you are very wise.

@Rubicon80 I do like him. Although it's taken a long time. I enjoy spending time with him, I look forward to seeing him. I want a future with him but I'm a stronger person, no longer crippled by self loathing or jealously. I feel better about myself nowadays and I feel like he's lucky to have me. I'll never trust him 100% but I no longer question him or let it worry me. I'm in a better position financially now too and would have no qualms in leaving him if he betrayed me again.

My XH had an affair after 13 years together. I asked him to leave.

One of the things my solicitor said to me during the divorce that's always resonated is sometimes when couples have been together a long time, particularly from a young age (I was a teen when we got together), they don't feel they have an individual adult identity. They see themselves as part/ half of a couple. Before individuals can move forwards with life they need to find who they are.

I don't think you should do anything in a rush but I found it really interesting to start to do some things for myself. So many of the little things I did, without realising it, where because it was what suited him rather than me working out what suited me.

From the really silly he liked ham and hated cheese. We didn't tend to have cheese in. To the more adventurous he hated flying and I love travel, so we tended to go to UK cottages as holidays.

For me this was years ago. I've been remarried for a decade now. However, I will always keep a bit of me back for me. I am a person in my own right as well as mum, wife, daughter etc.

I haven’t read the full thread but I too have been with my husband since school have never been with anyone else and I found out my husband had an affair, I found out the same way you did through his phone.
This happened 12 years ago, but it only went on for a few months.
After I found out about it my husband didn’t know what he wanted and I know he was still seeing OW after I found out, but he kept saying it was to make sure she was okay, but he wasn’t checking on me to see if I was okay!!!!!!

I’m still with my husband but I still think about it every day even after all this time and honestly, I wish I had left him, I wish I hadn’t stayed. I never found out 100% how far his affair went, he says it was only a kiss, she meant nothing to him (that’s a cliche, I bet OW was told different), but I have my doubts.

I hate myself because I feel like I was a door mat and I wasn’t good enough for my Husband to give me the full truth and I feel over 10 years later it’s too late to leave him because of that, but I certainly don’t feel the same about my husband. I do have a good life though, I throw myself into my children and my friends. I guess I’m a bit scared to be without my husband because he is all I’ve ever known.

Sending my hugs to you, I hope you will find some sort of peace soon.

It's never too late to leave. I left someone after 30 years, and was scary at first, but 3 years on I'm happy.

I have skimmed the thread as I have to go to work, but I have read all op posts.
Like you, Dh and I have been married almost 40 years. If I were to find out that he'd had an affair, whilst I could forgive him, because I love him, I could never forget. And because I wouldn't be able to forget, I'd have to end the marriage. I would always be picturing home with the OW, I would never be able to trust him again and that would be the biggest problem - this man, who I would have trusted with my life, would have destroyed all that. But, that is me. If you feel you can work together together through this, and if that's what you want, then go for it.
Best wishes.

I'm pretty black and white on these things.
But only you can look deep inside yourself and know what you can forgive. And that does mean forgive enough to let it go in a drawer in your mind labelled...foget as much as you can. Just for your own sanity.

I couldn't do it. But its an individual choice.

What @83PL and @RippleEffects say.

Focus on yourself, and everything else will pan out the way it is supposed to.

@sippingteaquietly I think you need to accept that they were having sex. As Chump Lady says, adults don't get together in secret to hold hands and read bible stories.

Affairs are an addiction and people in an affair behave like addicts. The brain of a cheater lights up with the same rewards as an addict with a fix. To get access to their fix? They become the worst, meanest, liars cheaters manipulators, blamers and justifiers.

But is this really them? That is the 64,000 dollar question. We have to re-evaluate our assumptions (about how connected or selfish they really are), and how much we sacrifice ourselves.

It doesn't necessarily have to be the end of the marriage, but it can be a re adjustment - and not one they might like! @83PL says it brilliantly.

Here is the difference: he was never unkind to you and never treated you differently. ScreamingLadySutch - really ? He was never UNKIND to her when he was thinking about another woman , having sex with her . laughing with her - what planet are you on ?

Oh yes it's the Planet of Stay in the Big House and for the Money FFS!

From my own experience and those of several friends these men are very apologetic at the time and for a while after . (Mind you they are often sorry - sorry that they got caught out as opposed to being sorry that it happened.) The pattern seems to be that the wife is expected to carry on as if nothing has happened , expected to move on and get over it within a short period of time . It is NEVER the same again . I have a friend who didn't leave because of the age of her children and perceived lack of money at the time and she tells me EVERY DAY she wonders why she is with him ! Why would you live like that ? Someone said here you go through every single event in the past and question it - why did he do that , why did he say that ? It is mental torture . Then there are the men who will do it over and over and over again .

OP - you asked what would we do so I don't know why someone is saying stop giving opinions . You are actually in a good position for a new life - children off your hands . You could have your own house and your share of the assets and if you wanted maybe meet someone new who will appreciate you and not cheat on you . That is exactly the position I am in now . My life is so much better now. Happiness instead of misery.

Yes you can have a better life
Different circumstances but I walked out of a marriage of over 30 years and NEVER looked back.
Also the best prediction of the future is the past.
I wish you ALL the luck in the world.
Oh I would tell the children the truth.
You have nothing to hide.

Listen to people who have been in your shoes and who stayed on their marriages but think about their husband's infidelity every single day and say the pain never goes away. Your marriage isn't what you thought it was and your OH isn't who you thought he was. He is NOT kind. There were clearly massive issues with your relationship for him to enter into a long relationship with someone else, even if it was 'only' sex. Why don't you take some time out by yourself? If you are meant, in the end, to stay with him, that is what you will do, but you are not sure, otherwise you wouldn't be posting on here 10 months down the line. Have counselling by yourself. Focus on yourself. Tell your children about their father's infidelity- make it real and stop covering it up. Face the painful truth that throughout a whole annual cycle of family life he was fucking another woman and clearly enjoying it or he would have stopped doing it. Ask him to move out. Work through howawful that is going to feel, with the help of counselling, and find out who you are without him. Fell in love with yourself, grow your own confidence and then see if you still want him back. I am 61 and have lived through a rich and amazing life that included splitting up in my 50s and I know life is very precious and I would not put up with your feelings, I would let go of him and work through the present painful uncertainty to clear new waters. Courage OP!

@83PL @Rubicon80 I do like him. Although it's taken a long time. I enjoy spending time with him, I look forward to seeing him. I want a future with him but I'm a stronger person, no longer crippled by self loathing or jealously. I feel better about myself nowadays and I feel like he's lucky to have me. I'll never trust him 100% but I no longer question him or let it worry me. I'm in a better position financially now too and would have no qualms in leaving him if he betrayed me again.

Thanks for replying - contrary to what another poster seemed to think, my question to you was totally genuine.

My dad was serially unfaithful to my mum and it made for a pretty miserable childhood for me. I desperately wanted them to divorce when I was in my teens/twenties.

But they are now retired and are pretty happy together in their 70s. So it's really, really difficult for me to say whether or not she made the right decision to stay with him.

I do know that, because of what I went through with my parents, it is an absolute, instant deal-breaker for me personally. But I understand that everyone is different.

One of the problems I have with my parents staying together is that I don't think, ultimately, that my dad does realise how lucky he was that my mum kept the family together and continued/continues to support him. I think by staying with him, it made him think it wasn't that bad, what he did.

Your husband is extremely lucky to still have you and I hope that he recognises that.

One thing I will say is with posters saying he doesn’t love you. I don’t think this is always the case at all. I think plenty of people do love their partners, but get caught up in the excitement and secrecy of a ‘fresh buzz’ especially when real life gets a bit Groundhog Day. The problem I think is after discovering this shit, the person realises my god I screwed up badly, but it’s often too late , the betrayed one no longer feels quite the same about them.

I say this because I have been on both sides, I was an idiot in my mid 20s.

@user1479305498 One thing I will say is with posters saying he doesn’t love you. I don’t think this is always the case at all. I think plenty of people do love their partners, but get caught up in the excitement and secrecy of a ‘fresh buzz’ especially when real life gets a bit Groundhog Day.

What love means is that your partner is more important to you than 'getting caught up in excitement'.

If the thrill of 'secrecy' or a 'fresh buzz' is enough to make you betray and destroy your relationship, then you don't love your partner enough.

so sad, similar happened to a relative of mine & she forgave him, it destroyed the family, the kids all hated him at the time & I think always will and they have lost all respect for their mum as she forgave him.

Personally I could never forgive that & the hell I would go through during break up is short lived to the hell I would go through every day with the mistrust but, it is your relationship not mine

I can’t abide cheats and I am fiercely loyal even through dreadful periods in my relationship as most marriages or relationships have there ups and downs. My husband knows there is no second chances when it comes to me, my father was a serial cheat and I have zero tolerance. I can’t even begin to imagine trying to forgive and dealing with the constant feeling of not being able to trust him and feeling in a heightened state of anxiety. Good luck with what you decide to do

I feel so sad for you OP. I wish I could give you a hug.

Fifties is still young, if you did decide you couldn't stay. You don't owe him anything, regardless of how much he's trying now.

I personally would leave. You are still young enough to enjoy life and deserve better. You mightn't think it but as your kids are grown up you are in a good place to start again.

My heart goes out to you, it really does. It is soul destroying to find out someone you trust without doubt can betray you in such a way. As previous posters have said, 16 months is a very long time to continually lie and cheat. Did you notice any behaviour change during this time when you look back? If you had never found those text messages, do you honestly think he would ever have ended the affair or admitted to it. This is a devastating thing to come to terms with and you will feel as if your whole world doesn't make sense anymore. Every marriage is unique and only you know the way forward. However, life is short and you have precious years ahead. You are worth so much more than living a life in constant doubt or fear that this is happening or will happen again.

You also need to make sure he considers very carefully what he wants to do. Anger and hurt could cloud best judgement on your part, but so could guilt and remorse on his part. Would he look outside the marriage again? Why or why not? Will the life you can have together from here on be better than, say, living apart but staying close friends?