I have done something unforgivable

[Sweetprimrose1]

Name changed due to the nature of this post. Me and DP are having a baby. I’m very happy about this, but it’s bought up a load of stuff from the past for me that’s making me feel totally sick. We met at unibersity and during the first few months of our relationship I slept with a couple of other people whilst completely wasted on nights out. I’m 28 now and he’s 29 and have never done anything like it since, nor have I ever wanted to. However I am having these flashbacks. How can I be a good mother and partner when I am harbouring secrets like this? I feel as though I am meant to be one thing but am secretly a dirty cheat. I keep bursting into tears and realise it may be due partly to hormones but I think objectively this is also completely a shit situation. I cannot bear this level of anxiety that this is causing me. Please can someone help as I can’t tell anyone in real life - please be kind, though I know what I hVe done is so so wrong

Sweetprimrose if your sex life at university was “dirty” mine must have been verging on criminal! But I remember it with a smile. We were all young and silly, and I didn’t hurt anyone.

Just forget it, let go of it. It was long ago when you and dp hardly knew each other. You were so drunk, you might easily have forgotten by the next day anyway. I’m pretty sure I did, a few times.

Focus on your wonderful life now, the man you love, the new baby you’re welcoming, the happy future you’re working towards with your family.

forgive yourself, forget it and move on. Things are different now and you're a different person and you can be a perfectly wonderful mother and partner.

Believe it or not, I still cringe and am embarrassed by things I did 50 years ago. The pill had just become freely available and I, and most of my friends, made hay while the sun shone. Then, of course, along came HIV.

Please try not to beat yourself up about what you did. In a strange way, it made you who you are today - probably with much greater insight and empathy when your child grows up and does stupid things. Certainly the only thing that would have disturbed me about my children's behaviour would have been if they had joined a nunnery or monastery.

All the best for your new family: and let bygones be bygones. We cannot change the past but we can learn from it.

It was a long time ago when you were a different person and your relationship was in a very different place. It won’t do any good to tell him and you need to forgive yourself for it.

I'm another one who cheated on my husband in the early years of our relationship, before we were married. I have never told him and never would because it would only hurt him and possibly destroy our relationship which is wonderful.

In my case I had a break down in my early 20''s due to multiple stressful events in my life all piling in on me. Its not an excuse but I behaved very out of character for a few months and one thing was that I became attracted to a man who also had mental health issues I think because I felt he could understand or help me in some way. We didn't actually have sex but we did have sexual contact which was very degreading to me and in retrospect I can see was coerced by him at a time when I was very unwell.

I was mortified it ever happened. I've kept the whole thing a secret for many, many years now. Unfortunately the man involved lives locally to me and I still have to see him several times a year which is horrible and I do worry he might say something one day but I think he also knows that he did coerce me and knows its for the best for him if he doesn't say anything. However you look at it its really horrible and probably my darkest time.

Having said all that I don't think about it every day, when i do I cringe but then try to put it out of my mind. The experiance I had led me to eventually seek help for the acute distress I was in and start to recover as opposed to suffering in silence and trying to self medicate in extreme ways.

When I do think about it I cringe and sometimes I have a wee cry but mostly I am able to just put it in perspetive and out of my mind. It was a bad thing that I did and that happened to me but I was very young, I was unwell and I was just trying to figure things out however poorly at a time I had very few resources. It isn't a defining event for me though, it doesn't mean I'm a bad or broken person and your past actions don't make you bad or dirty either.

Don't beat yourself up for this, realise that we all do things we regret especially when young but we just don't talk about it. Quite possibly you husband has a few of his own, nobody is perfect. I don't think you should tell him either, you are pregnant and vulnerable at the moment and perhaps in need of some support from a therapist or doctor?

In an ideal world we would be able to be honest with our partners fully about everything but emotions are so unpredictable its not worth the risk to you family to tell him.

As others have said, seek help if you need it.

If it helps almost every couple I know that met at university were shagging around a bit in first year. It's never mentioned and they've mostly been married 20 years. Nothing to feel guilty bout, also not a good idea to tell him.

No don't tell him.
The first few months of a new relationship at university are a completely different kettle of fish to your current situation.
When I was at university "everything went" as it were. People were doing it with all kinds of other people, whether they were in relationships or not and a lot of it was fuelled by alcohol.
I did stupid things at university too but I was young and just testing out my new found freedom.

You've never done anything like this since, nor have you wanted to. I think the pregnancy hormones could be playing havoc a bit and making you generally tearful and you're sort of fixating on this.
Try to forgive yourself for it.

Kind of depends I guess. How would you feel knowing your partner did the same thing? If he had cheated on you several times, all one night stands, at the beginning of your relationship, could you forgive him now for that? Knowing that you're stuck with him forever now as you have a child together?

Don’t tell him. You told us, we’re listening. There can be nothing god come out of telling him.

Good, it god!

Oh ffs NOT GOD!!!

I honestly was expecting this to be something so much worse, from the title. I'm not minimising your feelings about it, far from it, but describing yourself as a dirty cheat is very unfair on yourself, and far from true, from what you have described.

You have clearly been faithful since you have become serious and since you have been living together. Please don't tell him what happened in those early days, but do get some RL help and support. Having flashbacks about this is not good. It could well be the pregnancy hormones playing a part, and also the fact that you are moving on to a new stage in your life, and about to become a mother. Who knows what has triggered this, and why but it needs dealing with. I do wonder if there is infidelity in your family that has impacted on you? Regardless, seek some counselling or therapy, and find a safe space you can explore all your current feelings. Be kind to yourself.

I also wouldn't tell him. It was a different life, anyone who has been to Uni can tell you that. Our rule was if it was a different postcode it didn't count. Obviously that absurd but it's now it was. When I started seeing my now husband long distance, I kissed at least three other guys and a fumble with one. It was the end of uni, I was drunk stupid, and I have never ever cheated or done anything like it again. Likewise, I suspect he was chatting up women on t internet in the very early days to keep his options open . Married 15 years now. Treat him completely. Student life is a different world. He won't want to know and you may not want to know what similar secrets he holds from those days.

DO NOT tell him. Your future with your baby could be in jeopardy.
Nothing can change what happened, you are a different person now.
Do not let it change the future.

I've been in a similar position to you. Just before my wedding I had what was bordering on invasive thoughts that I should tell my partner about my entire history as I thought it would mean a clean slate for me to be this fantastic squeaky clean virginal wife. So I told him. Big mistake.

We did still get married, and luckily it's been dealt with but the only difference it made was taking the load of my mind, and putting it onto his. You were young, you have learnt a valuable lesson from your actions (that you don't ever want to hurt your partner, it doesn't feel good!) Please move on, this worrying will be no good for you, and in turn the baby!
Speak to a counselor if it proves to much to handle alone, they are trained in helping you sort out why you are feeling like this and how to cope.

Ask yourself honestly about whether you are really in love with your DP and totally committed. If the answer is 'yes', then you need to reframe what happened in the past in your mind - try to view your old self as a different, young person, who is separate from you and not who you are now.

You need to forget about it. Something amazing is about to happen to you, so don't let the past ruin it.

Because a lot of people have been cheated on (and it was horrible from them), cheating is spoken about in a taboo way in society. But I believe the reality is that lots more people have cheated than would admit it. I cheated on past partners when I was young, knew relationships were coming to an end and I was unhappy. It wasn't the right thing to do, but sometimes it happens.

Perhaps you feel better now about your current DP and it's time to learn from past mistakes, and put past actions to bed.

Hi OP, you are suffering from anxiety and catastrophising - please talk to your midwife or GP and get referred for counselling. PM me if you need to chat. I work in this area. Take deep breaths and remember that anxiety comes in waves like the ocean so let it wash over you.

It seems to me that the issue is that you have to forgive yourself.

He wouldn't benefit from the information now, and in the first few months did you have a committed relationship, where you were clearly being exclusive?
It's possible he had a few encounters at that time too.

Would you forgive him? If so, you should forgive yourself too.

Do seek help if it's overwhelming.

What matters the most is

You could tell him and he may just shrug.

It's not like you've been at it with your boss and you're now pregnant.

I wouldn't say anything as their is no telling how he might react. In my experiance men handle news of infidelity worse than women.

Many relationships have secrets. You need to find a way of putting these in the past and drawing a line under them, making a new start, and whatever it was that signalled the start of your commitment to him (getting pg, for example) can mark that start. Yes, you deceived him, but that happened before this new start, when you stopped deceiving him, and you aren't going to again. Seriously, the further in time that you get away from these ONS, the more they will fade into obscurity. Do not tell him! Concentrate on your baby and your new life with your DP and they will fade. Congratulations on your baby

That is far from unforgiveable. Whether you choose to tell him or not, I hope you manage to resolve it with yourself and move on to happiness with your family.

I know you won't believe this but what you did is irrelevant. It was 10 years ago, when you were young and at the start of a relationship and university life. It is what often happens at university. You have gone on to build a happy, strong, successful relationship and never behaved that way again. You are an adult now, you were a child then.

Let it go. Just let it go. Shrug it off when it comes into your mind.Take control of it. Do not allow yourself to think about it. Say to yourself 'It doesn't matter. I was a child. I grew up, I am a good person and have built a happy relationship and that is what matters.' It will become your mindset.

You will make nothing better by telling your DP. It won't change what you did. It won't make you or him feel better. It is pointless.

My granny used to say 'What is past help should be past grief' and it is so true.

I certainly did things as a teenager and student that I would never do again and am quite ashamed of but it doesn't stop me being a decent person and a good mother to my DC and partner to DH. Pregnancy hormones have very odd effects on us emotionally.

Let it go- you can't change it and it really doesn't matter. What matters is now and your future with your partner and baby. Concentrate your energy and that. You will be a fantastic mum.

It's part of the rich tapestry that is life. You're in a great place now: try and focus on the present if you can.

Please don't beat yourself up, OP.

DW was living in a commune when we met and ended up getting pregnant a couple of months later, when we were already an item, albeit long distance at that time (different countries).

She had an abortion, not least because she was on medication at the time which would likely have caused problems for her pregnancy. 'Back street' procedure it was because abortion in her very Catholic country was highly illegal at the time.

A drunken mistake - she didn't tell me about it until we'd just started living together. She wanted to be honest, you see. Her mum had advised her not to tell me.

Personally I'd rather not have known. It didn't split us up and frankly I'd have cared for that child as my own. We are still together 25 years later. I do wonder though, sometimes, what her son/daughter would have been like in their early 20s, as does she.

TLDR: Don't tell. It's not necessary.