Hello
I found out about a year ago that my DP had a long term affair with a woman at work. She was based in another office and when he'd been there for long periods it had started up. It lasted six months until the woman called me to tell me.
He massively underplayed the whole thing initially as a friendship that got out of hand when drunk a few times. Turned out it was her more or less sleeping in his bed every night when he was over there over several months. If I had known that initially I never would have agreed to try and reconcile, but the complete shit lied to me completely to stop me walking out.
In hindsight, all the lies he told me when he was shagging her paled in comparison to the ones he told me when he saw me sobbing on the floor, throwing up. I look back on that and the fact he didn't come fully clean makes me genuinely sick.
Anyway. He said the whole thing was a massive mistake that had gotten out of hand, and he was very convincing. I agreed to work on things but asked him to find a new job as his current job involved him still travelling the the other office where she was and he agreed.
Initially he was doing really well with resolving things and making all the right noises, counselling and so on and I felt we would be okay. We agreed a lot of boundaries to re-build trust and he readily agreed. An email was sent to the woman saying the affair was over, he loved me and that was that.
The times he had to travel to the office where she was, I was a basket case. He had to work with her closely and there was also social occasions at times where both of them could go. Complete turmoil for me and I hated every minute of it. On a few occasions she showed up drunk at the flat asking him to sleep with her. Not fun for me on any level.
As part of the healing and rebuilding trust, he gave me his IPhone codes and social media passwords so I could make sure nothing was going on and also read all their past messages which took a while to do. He never messaged her, but she carried on messaging him for months, telling him they belonged together and he came up with every excuse under the sun why he wouldn't block her ("let her let off steam it's harmless, she will get the message soon").
When I read their messages, It didn't seem to include him being in love with her, which perversely was some sort of comfort to me. There was no sexting or flirting. It seemed she was providing him with emotional fulfillment and generally treating him like the sun shone out of his backside. She was seemingly in love with him (or thought she was). I saw messages where she was declaring her undying love and asking him to leave me for her. He kept saying no.
He wasn't whispering sweet words to her or anything, it was more like he was using her as a therapist or something. He was certainly a lot nicer to me than he was to her in the messages, which again, perversely made me feel better :(. I know this sounds sad, but it made me feel like maybe he preferred me, and I was so battered by this it seemed like a mercy to my self-esteem or my belief that our relationship was special or sacred.
It also appeared to be very tumultuous between them. They'd been friends but as soon as he started shagging her she was quite a handful. There were lots of text tantrums and dozens of missed calls and her texting "you don't need me, it's her you love!" and so on. This sounds like a 19 year old girl but she was late 40s.
I read all the stuff between them over six months and it was lots of all night text marathons with him ignoring her and her texting "I am outside let me in" and him saying "no, please leave, I am tired". It was generally by the looks of it quite horrible rather than nice. I was expecting it to be romantic and it wasn't. It was just odd, like really dysfunctional siblings or something.
I read lots of apologies from her for her behavior - it seemed she was getting drunk and screaming / shouting / hitting him / smashing his things and then apologising the next day. Really, nothing like our relationship which was calm, happy, full of great sex and romance and so on so I have no idea whey he did it or wanted to do it.
Maybe he was enjoying the intensity of that or something? I know the first thought is "the sex was hot", and it probably was; but it sounded from the messages like that wasn't a focal thing. Six months and not one even remotely sexy message. It was just really hard to grasp what the lure was or even the point.
It took me a very long time to admit to myself was the real reason he would not block her is that he wanted her messages to continue. This went on for months, and sometimes her messages would say things like "if you really have no feelings for me, why did you say hello to me today in the coffee room" and I would be shouting at him "why the bloody hell did you say hello to her?" and he'd be saying he was just being polite and he was so sorry.
Quite a few times over this period I had to deal with this woman drunkenly calling the house, being quite abusive to me. She was drunk all the time, seems to have a drink problem, and once she kept me awake all night calling and crying and telling me to leave him.
After a while I started getting angry that there was no progress on the job front, or with blocking her, as I just wanted this woman out of our lives for good, but he just made excuses about the job market being bad due to Brexit and Covid and so on. I didn't see any real effort to find a job at all.
Then three months into our reconciliation, after saying he absolutely did not miss her and never wanted anything to do with her again, he started admitting he missed the affair partner as she had made him feel "nice" and from there it was just a spiral of hell. He was basically pining over her in front of my eyes but gaslighting me with nonsense like "I don't miss her, or the affair, I just miss the way things used to be when she and I had coffee at work". It was just really awful.
I am not sure if this makes sense, but that was actually worse than the affair. Because after the affair, he said doing what he did made him really realise what he had almost lost and now he was 100% committed to doing whatever it took to fix things. And he had put in so much work and effort and I actually felt like we were closer and happier than ever before.
So having him then saying he missed this affair partner who he insisted meant nothing to him, after us going through months of re-committing and discussing marriage and so on, made me strangely feel worse than the affair itself. Not sure if that makes sense to anyone but validation would be great as I feel so broken by being hurt like that again after I gave him my trust.
This went on for ages with him telling me he loved me, wanted only me but then admitting he still missed "hanging out with her" and this just escalated and escalated to him admitting she "made him feel loved" - because apparently I wasn't sufficiently doing that :( So one minute she is a friend who means nothing, next minute she makes him feel loved in a way he can't get past :(
After a couple of weeks of that, I split up with him because I wasn't going to stick around while he pined over his affair, and pretty much immediately when I dumped him, after swearing he never wanted to lay eyes on her again, he started sleeping with her again :( I was absolutely devastated as it confirmed my worst fears.
He broke things off with her again after a week of them being "back on". He said he had run to her only because I rejected him and she felt like a source of comfort and he hated himself and regretted it more than anything in the world. He told me / her (I read the messages) that he loved me and not her and that they could never have a relationship.
They went back and forth for a few weeks with her begging and hashing out the relationship. Basically I was witnessing my DP having a difficult break up with someone else!!! I mean, with hindsight that is what occurred. It was honestly psychological torture. I have no idea why I kept reading the messages, but I had the logins and felt a compulsion.
He and I were separated so he was free to be with her if he wanted to be, but apparently he didn't want to be and he stuck with that and never went back to her. He quit his job to prove to me he wanted me and only me (although he has a notice period). Months passed and he never went back to her even though we remained split.
He kept trying to win me back over many months, saying I love you, I do not love her and never have. I just missed hanging out with her. What even is that?!!! He kept telling me how happy he had felt with her. Again, what even is that??!!! I remain, and will always remain, utterly confused over why he wanted her if nothing was missing with me, why he kept going after her attention or missing her if he had me. It seems like he basically wanted us both and to just keep on having his mad affair.
So the final straw where I completely stopped talking to him was when he deliberately extended his end date at his job for a few months. Saying he needed to finish a project. I spoke to someone in his office and they told me this was total bull crap and he could leave whenever he wants. So obviously he wanted to stay working with her for longer. Deliberately. After all I had been through. Obviously still not wanting to close the door fully on her.
The whole thing has just been a complete nightmare, and although I left a long while ago, we were talking and I was back and forth on whether to take him back. it's been so hard unravelling it all in my head. Especially due to the lies and confusing messages. I have focused all this time on whether he loves her or not, but then finally realised the main point being he obviously doesn't really love me.
I just want to know from people who have been through this and left, how do you make sense of your past, once you realise the person you knew so well, loved so much and felt you had such a wonderful relationship with was actually a piece of crap? How do you make sense of your past? Are all your memories gone?
I can cope with being alone or meeting someone new. I am not deeply damaged in my self-esteem (I just think he was a twat). Thankfully no kids, no marriage, we don't own property together so a clean break, even after six years will be simple really. I don't miss him really (I did at first but to be honest I lost feelings for him as soon as he started pining for his affair partner and felt the need to tell me.
What i feel mostly is just so confused over how I make sense of my reality. What I observed was a really good, loving relationship with two people who were still really in love. We couldn't keep our hands off each other, we were kind, we supported each other. I was happy! I don't know how to understand what he did, why he did it, or how this makes my past. All our memories are tainted now, because he is not who I thought he was.
I also wanted to know once the anger is gone, what is left? Do you look back on the person in a new light? I have already had so much pain over the past year with all these. I feel I have cried every possible tear and at times I really didn't want to exist anymore. I know now I have raised my head from my wailing and started to see the sunshine again.
I can now function again (before I was a basket case). I have stopped crying constantly. Stopped throwing up. Started showering and putting on makeup again. Started being able to concentrate. So I am healing. I just don't understand how I put this to bed in my head. Can those who were in loving, happy relationships where they felt completely shocked and betrayed tell me how the story goes next?