My friend's dp is having an affair and I'm fast losing sympathy for her

[Exjasper]

I know that sounds awful of me but I genuinely think now that she's being ridiculous for hanging on in her terrible relationship.

She found out last year her dp had an affair lasting for about 2 years. She was completely devastated and we spent hours talking. He told her that the affair had meant nothing to him, it was just sex, just an escape from life's mundanity etc. He bent over backwards to convince her how sorry he was, how much he loved her and their dc, how he would never do it again and how he would never have anything more to do with the ow.

About six weeks later she caught him with a second phone about to ring the same woman again. He swore it was the first time he'd spoken to ow since my friend discovered the phone (yeah, right), and just wanted to check she was ok as had heard rumours that she was struggling.

For most of last year, her dp tried hard to convince her of his regret, he took her on weekends away, they went on holiday, tried to do more as a couple etc.

At the beginning of this year, she happened to see a text on his phone from the ow. Her dp claimed it was a one off and had just been about some legal issues the ow was having (her dp is a solicitor).

In April this year she found a couple more texts - again her dp talked his way out of it.

In May, she - yes you've guessed it - found yet more texts. On that occasion, her dp had been drinking and fell asleep before deleting the texts between him and the ow. At this point, my friend got hold of an itemised phone bill which showed hours of phone conversations between her dp and the ow, and thousands of texts.

They have done nothing in the last 18 months but argue, on about 6 occasions she's told him to leave but either she's backed down or he's talked her round.

They are both unhappy, she doesn't trust him at all, and I cannot see how they can continue like this for the rest of their lives. I've spent hours and hours listening to her, trying to give her my opinion, dragged her away for a couple of weekends to give her some space away from him, I've tried everything I can think of including telling her that I think she's wrong to stick with him, including saying nothing at all, including asking her to confide in other friends to see what their opinions are (they all think she should get rid of him too).

I cannot think of what else to do or how else to help her, and I'm embarrassed to say that I'm starting to lose patience with her. I just cannot get my head around how she thinks this will work out. It's a horrible situation where she checks his phone constantly, rings him numerous times a day, has a tracker app on his phone, is permanently angry or upset, has lost loads of weight etc. What do I do? I hate seeing her like this and seeing her wasting her life on this piece of garbage :(.

Sounds like your friend has invested her life into her partner, she now needs to invest in herself. I know it’s difficult with lockdown, but perhaps if you both find an activity/ hobby that gets her out, meeting people she may begin to realise that she can have a life without him?

I have a neighbour, random stranger with no family or friends, turned up on my doorstep distressed one day. She has been through a really rough time and several years on she is now almost out of the relationship, he's moved out but finances etc are not getting sorted.

She has significant mental health issues so I've had to tread carefully and get mental health services involved. I did however, get really frustrated with the same conversation on loop.

Eventually, I said that we needed to move on from that conversation. Now when he gets mentioned I don't let it dominate the conversation. I say thats enough of him now, I'm not interested in him. I want to hear about you and your plans for....

Over time, when we're together, our conversations have become far more positive and outwards looking rather than in a cycle of never ending reflections on he did, he said, he might, its not fair.

I think forcing conversation onto thinking about other things and forcing interest and thought on other topics has helped her see beyond him. She is much happier and more in control of her own life.

“Sounds like your friend has invested her life into her partner, she now needs to invest in herself. I know it’s difficult with lockdown, but perhaps if you both find an activity/ hobby that gets her out, meeting people she may begin to realise that she can have a life without him?”

This. Sounds like she has merged her identity with him and defines herself more or less entirely by reference to him. She needs to be led back to herself again. You mention her DC seem to be suffering from a lack of attention so this is impacting on her parenting (as it would). Is she aware of that? Without guilt-tripping her, might that be a way of helping her realise the damage being caused by this current situation.

OP, you are allowed to do things for yourself. You are allowed to chose not to put up with being used by her as a sounding board. It's not selfish. I think you should tell her straight. Maybe put it in writing.

Her self esteem must be non existent. Shes probably in a worst place mentally than you realise. Think about it. What type of person with any kind of self belief or self respect would tolerate and put up with such shitty behaviour for so long and repeatedly?

That said, I totally get that for you it must be so fucking draining and frustrating. All you can do check out of discussing it until she's ready to move on. Gently tell her what you think she should do and shy. Gently tell her how you thinknits impacting hervlids. Tell her you do care but it's effectively, when nothing changes. Tell her you'll go with het/hold her hand to get legal advice on moving her life forward and support her if she wants to move forward with things but that if nothing changes, you need a break from hearing all about it because it hurts you to see her letting herself be a bit more destroyed over and over and over when it foes not hsve yo be that way.

Sometimes ehen you're do d.tiknslly wrapped up in your he'll, judt taking the smallest basic step to changing it seems terrifying. Just taking one simple step like finding out her legal position/rights etc might actually encourage the next step.

Its Tough on both of you.

I think as soon as the conversation (rant) started again I’d say ‘I’m sorry, I can’t do this again. It’s the same every time and unless you’re ready to talk about leaving him I don’t want to know’.

I had a friend of 15 years who had a terribly tumultuous relationship. Five years of drama, tears and anger. On repeat.

She would dump it all on me, cry have long calls where she picked apart the relationship in every minute detail. She said she wanted to change, leave do X,Y or Z but she never did.

I realised that the friendship, which used to be so incredibly fun, intrestings and lively, narrowed to a one dimensional aspect. She didn't really want to talk about anything else or do anything but talk about her situation. I realised that in her mind I was the friend for that 'job'

When I very tactfully said that as she was not looking to change the situation let's not discuss relationships but we could look to discuss other things. At first i dont think she understood and called up to chat but each time she started to discuss the relationship i would stop her and say didn't we agree we were not going to talk relationships?

She stopped calling.

I think she thought she was punishing me for being a 'bad friend' and not supporting her in the way she needed.

The friendship had become so one dimensional it wasn't much of a loss in the end despite it being over 15 years.

I’ve been the person on the other side of this. Although a different scenario. I couldn’t leave an abusive relationship. It took me 7 years. And I without a doubt went on and on and round in circles endlessly.
I was aware a bit that I was boring people. But my head the conversations about him happened literally 24 hours a day.

My only advice would just be to gently change the conversation to something positive, so she doesn’t feel like she’s a failure as a friend as well as a failure as a wife. That’s what some friends did, just very gently, and then it was actually nice to have a break from talking about it over and over.

Other friends let me go on and on, and I appreciate how frustrating that was for them, but they still did it.

And some people just dropped me.

It’s all well and good saying that the friend needs to act, make a plan, do things differently etc. OP the only person/response you can change here is yours. If you’re frustrated and drained by your friend unloading this on you all the time, what are YOU going to do? You might not like the options - tell her to stop it, put up with it or withdraw from the friendship - but presumably your friend doesn’t like the options she has either. You can’t control her choice but you certainly can control yours and that’s what you need to do.

Ps if it was my friend I’d say I was finding this draining and wasn’t prepared to talk about it any more, but that I cared very much about her.

My dsis does this her partner isnt cheating but they have alot of rows hes quite controlling- but she wont do anything about it says she cant afford to leave which right now is prob true but this has been going on for a couple of years

its really draining

Oh god. My parents marriage was like this. You need to back off as the cracked record will just repeat ad museum. Do her kids a favour and tell her she needs therapy before you withdraw though, however frustrated you may feel, imagine what it's like for the kids growing up in that toxic mess.

nauseum not museum!!

I think what's more interesting here is your role in all this. Your boundaries have been so eroded that they are almost porous. Look at how much you know about their relationship.

Sometimes we're just enabling people OP and from what you say, she has no consideration for your feelings at all. How much time have you spent listening to her drama? What could you have done in that time?

She needs a therapist in order to discuss this in a safe boundaried space. Her therapist can hopefully, ask the right questions so she can reflect on what she's doing and make healthier decisions for herself.

In the meantime, I would have a think about how you got yourself into this situation and how you can get yourself out of it. It's very unhealthy.

Thank you all very much for your considered and helpful replies. Have read them all but can't reply properly just now as I'm at work. Lots of food for thought.

I think it is terribly difficult for her if he is the only man she has ever known, to finish this R/L TBH. I understand how draining it must be for you .You sound like a good friend ,but she probably takes all your ideas on board ,then gets home and thinks she can start again with DH! Can they try Counselling do you think.have they DC together as well? If he is still in contact with OW, then he is having his cake and eating it over and over again! OW probably thinks if she hangs on long enough he will leave DW for her! He will probably hang on so he can get his bit on the side and have all the comfort of home as well! These silly women cant see whats under their nose! You can only support her so far ,If you can say to her you are willing to help ,and only if she takes action.Being a Solicitor himself he may decide he doesnt want to lose his home and cash assets for a "fling" and hopefully come to his senses!

Are you her friend or her therapist?
I appreciate that occasionally the two overlap but this is now normal for her to dump on you like this and its very hard on you.
Be careful with putting in a boundary as soon as you can. You can do it with kindness, such as " I am finding this very hard seeing you so unhappy and I feel powerless to carry on when its not improving, so I need to ask you to not discuss this with me anymore after today"
I am also concerned that this situation of you and her could go on for years like groundhog day, only for her marriage to finally end. However as you are such a reminder of the pain, she may well cut you loose, reinvent herself and find new friends to have fun with. After all you would have served your purpose then?
Tell her you not talking about this anymore over a coffee, if she brings it back to him, get up and go, and mean it.
Plan fun things for the pair of you to do.
That is still supporting her. If it fades, well then you can see the 'role' that she wanted. Self absorbed people only worry about what they need. A true friend will say "oh no I am going on about it again, sorry, tell me about your holiday/ new job etc.
Don't let your empathy for her allow her to use you as a fixer. 💐

PP's are right, tell her to see her GP and/or a therapist. You're not getting anywhere and can't actually do what she needs, as you're not in a professional relationship with her. x

I totally get you OP. I had a friend whose husband has financially abused her for their whole marriage of nearly 30 years (I’ve known her about 20). I’d spend hours and hours listening to her moaning about how she paid for everything, he gave the DC nothing, she didn’t know how much he earned, she wore second hand while he swanned around in a top of the range beamer ( nothing wrong with 2nd hand but she was earning good money and was not doing it out of choice but rather because he contributed very little to house). Anyway,she was always saying she was going to leave him but ever did. Eventually I had to say to her that I loved her but simply could not talk about it anymore. She’s still with him and still unhappy . But unless she comes to me actually wanting to do something about it, I’m out as far as it goes. I’d have ended up not seeing her as it was so frustrating and draining it was depressing me!