Turning a blind eye to repeated cheating

[JamSandwich0]

Does anyone ignore partner indescretions for a happy peaceful life?

Pretending you don't know what's going on and enjoying your life together regardless.

@JamSandwich0
Knowing your dh is having an affair do you still have a sexual relationship with him?

What I'm curious about is why you made the post. You say you're happy and you're obviously not bothered by people's opinions so what were you hoping for by posting?

@MrJollyLivesNextDoor

If he was filthy millionaire type rich I would.

Crack on, I'll be at the spa or in the Bahamas with the girls or whatever 😀

^ yup, me too

I'm not saying this OP to be mean or come at you but what will you say when enivetably one of your children find out what daddy does for shits and giggles? Will you encourage them when they are adults to allow their partner to shit all over them for some fun between the sheets. You may not want to lose those things that are what you love from the pretense you have, but they were lost in reality when he dropped his trousers to someone else. Realise you are more than he give you credit for and you deserve to have the real relationship and have someone who even when temped, chooses you.

@SouperNoodle

What I'm curious about is why you made the post. You say you're happy and you're obviously not bothered by people's opinions so what were you hoping for by posting?

Wondering if there were others in a similar situation I suppose.

My day to day life I am happy but of course when I wake up at 2am and he isn't in the house it's a stab in the heart.

His behaviour is totally disrespectful to you and rather than confront it you choose to be complicit in it!

Are you so desperate to hang on to that illusion of a perfectly happy marriage when quite clearly it isn't the same for him?

I think everybody has their own boundaries. If your husband sleeping with other women doesnt make you feel particularly jealous then what reason is there for trying harder to feel jealous or leaving the relationship when you dont actually want to?

Some people find it quite hot that their partner sleeps with others. Its more common than you might think to have cuck fantasies.
I dont find OPs point of view difficult to understand at all.

No, a dose of the clap tends to focus your mind a bit.

People tend to assume that the cheated-on spouse gives two hoots about the cheater. Often not the case. Marriage is first and foremost a legally binding agreement that comes with responsibilities and rewards. Love doesn't last very long and is replaced with friendship at best, mostly tolerance and contempt at worst. Also, very often both parties have their own jollies so there's no need to rock the boat. Why lose half of what you have?
I fully expect to get shot down for this view, however, it's prevalent in the circles I move.

I kinda understood where you were coming from, mainly because you were adamant that it worked for you, until you mentioned the ‘stab in your heart’.

Regardless of your choice to purposely ignore the truth, it clearly hurts you when he chooses to be with other women instead of at home, in bed with you. If it didn’t, you wouldn’t care at all.

That’s what would mean I couldn’t do it, the conscious choice my DH made to spend his time, albeit fleeting emotional energy, physical energy and care on a woman who wasn’t me. The layers of lies and secrets that he so easily could tell me (even without confrontation) would hurt. Relationships are built on trust and whether you want to see it or not, he’s breaking it every time he has sex with someone else. Makes me really sad to think about actually.

As long as you were happy and ok to have lovers yourself then fine. Otherwise, hell no

Although I completely respect that for a lot of people it would be devastating, for me it wouldn't be a deal breaker and I'd be prepared to work through it. Again not a popular opinion but cheating is not, in my opinion, the worst that can happen in a relationship. Emotional abuse, contempt, being ignored, chronic selfishness and just general nasty unpleasantness, controlling behaviour are worse.

I also don't think a lot of humans are suited to life long monogamy, love doesn't last, partners don't meet our often unrealistic expectations, people get bored, it's natural to have sexual attraction to other people, and people change markedly through the life span, there person you get together with in your 20s can be almost unrecognisable in their 50s. And minor irritations can grow to become deal breakers.

@valerianaofficiana, I suspect this would be even more the case for people who ‘settled’ iyswim.

There are many advantages to stay in a relationship that might not be that fulfilling but where you are not at each other’s throat.

However, it starts with the principle that each partner just doesn’t care about the other as such.
And I’d say it’s not the case for @JamSandwich0.

@JamSandwich0 if you have a feeling that you’ve been stabbed in your heart when he isn’t back at 2.00am, then you DO care. You are not content and happy with that status quo.
If you were that happy with not really knowing (but actually knowing even though you didn’t know the details iyswim) you wouldn’t care he isn’t back at 2.00am.

I think you need to review what is and isn’t working for you.
I’d actually say to go and have some counselling around that (on your own!!) to see what exactly is stopping you from leaving. Because just now you are not happy. And I don’t think that spending lots of time trying to convince yourself you are is going to help.

[quote TravellingFrom]@valerianaofficiana, I suspect this would be even more the case for people who ‘settled’ iyswim.

There are many advantages to stay in a relationship that might not be that fulfilling but where you are not at each other’s throat.

However, it starts with the principle that each partner just doesn’t care about the other as such.
And I’d say it’s not the case for @JamSandwich0.

@JamSandwich0 if you have a feeling that you’ve been stabbed in your heart when he isn’t back at 2.00am, then you DO care. You are not content and happy with that status quo.
If you were that happy with not really knowing (but actually knowing even though you didn’t know the details iyswim) you wouldn’t care he isn’t back at 2.00am.

I think you need to review what is and isn’t working for you.
I’d actually say to go and have some counselling around that (on your own!!) to see what exactly is stopping you from leaving. Because just now you are not happy. And I don’t think that spending lots of time trying to convince yourself you are is going to help.[/quote]
Thank you for this. Counselling is something I will definitely consider.

My day to day life I am happy but of course when I wake up at 2am and he isn't in the house it's a stab in the hear

In that case, I retract everything I have said, as nobody needs a stab in the heart. I think you do need to find out exactly what's going on, OP, and then decide what to do. This is very different from turning a blind eye.

I put up with 2 unfaithful husbands , I'm still with no. 2! 29 years of insecurity and hell, he even had a child with one woman, mine was always my suspicion and intuition, but of course he'd make me feel I was paranoid, mad etc, I did catch him once in an embrace, he basically shagged himself out over a decade ago,probably 14yrs ago, when finally I had enough brain cells left and very little self confidence to tell him to fuck off and I meant it, I went out with a few men and lived it up a bit, I realised in that time I was better looking than him, the relentless keeping in shape for him finally paid off, except it was for me and not for him. To cut a long story short we ended up back together and he's been a living Saint ever since. I'm 55 now and we are happy enough but honestly if I could turn the clocks back and not go through all the heartache, laying awake wishing he was in a hospital bed rather than in bed with another woman I would, it was torture. The last year or so I wanted to find out why I'm so emotionally weak and had always been this way, other stuff had happened as well, it turned out I have PTSD and an emotionally unstable personality disorder, which I believe is the new label for border line personalty disorder, I was groomed from 14 to 17 by an older violent man, I'd grownup in a violent religious home, I'd been told to forgive and sadly that's exactly what I did do to my own cost. I'd advise anyone to move on from an unfaithful partner, they don't know how to make anyone happy but themselves

Hell No! I am worth so much more than that! Why on earth would I

I don’t want to admit that he has another world away from us.

I see destruction both above and below the surface: Alcoholism, Infidelity, Dishonesty and Denial

JamSandwich, you recently posted about your H’s alcohol abuse that has been going on for
12 years. When he drove drunk a few months ago, you gave him an ultimatum. He stayed off alcohol for some weeks, but then was planning to go out and said he might drink. You feared the cycle was about to repeat: going out, drinking too much at home, ruining events, culminating in ‘mayhem’ once a year.

As for the effect of H’s infidelity/disloyalty on your dignity and children, do you value honesty? Do you teach your children to value honesty? Your H is a liar. Behind his smile is deception. As others know about his blatant cheating, you and your girls are now the objects of pity and gossip. Some of his OWs have already contacted you. One day your children will hear about their dad’s promiscuity and that, paired with being raised in an alcoholic home, will destabilize them and put them at high risk for future life/relationship problems.

You are sharing your H with other women, so your health is in jeopardy. Your babies could have been harmed in utero. Condoms don’t protect against syphilis, genital warts, or genital herpes. Ostriching won’t work if your children are suddenly faced with a half-sibling, or if H leaves you for one of his girlfriends.

So much toxicity has been normalized. Tolerating H’s alcoholic behavior and swallowing his infidelity will corrode your emotional health and set a dysfunctional example for your girls. Individual counseling can help you examine your feelings, clarify your thoughts, and formulate strategies for change.

Ah op. But you know. Deep down you know. When he’s not there he’s with another woman, naked, intimate,that he is lying to you, that it’s all a facade.

And deep down you can’t be happy with that. Not really. You can pretend. Act it out. Try to push it out your mind. But every time he leaves deep down you suspect he’s off with another woman.

And you will get older. And they won’t. And one day he will meet someone and she will stick.

Yeah my neighbour did because she didn't want to give up her 'lifestyle'. 20 years on she is a unhappy raging alcoholic who screams at her husband most nights about events from years ago. I doubt it was worth it.

Oh god op, do all his friends, colleagues etc know? They must do.

Not sure why but your username sounded familiar OP so after reading your post I did a quick search on MN. You posted about his alcohol problems and a serious case of drink driving back in January and didn't sound at all happy with him then, even threatening divorce.

IMO you really don't sound very happy OP and I'm wondering why on earth you're still with him?

when my friend’s father died it was discovered that he had secret affairs. When she later married, the discovery made her paranoid that her husband would have affairs. Always checking his every movement to extent of smelling his shirts for hints of purfume and even checking his mileage on his car. Think how it’ll affect your children in years to come when they get married, perhaps their father will put them off the idea.

So true who said.. move away from cheaters because they don’t know how to make anyone happy except themselves. I have first hand experience.

And op, that stab in the heart. Doesn’t that tell you how destructive this is ?

@JamSandwich0 you have asked about similar situations. I know someone who is genuinely happy doing this. You are not. That's the problem.

My friend loves her husband as her friend and they don't have kids. She doesn't need to think about them or hate that he is choosing to put the attention into OW instead of the kids. In her case, if she met someone and wanted to sleep with them, she absolutely would.

She isn't you. You clearly aren't happy, ehixh is why this is a bad idea. The fact that he cheats, but wouldn't be ok with you doing the same says everything about how he views you. You aren't his equal. He doesn't respect you. And if pp is correct this isn't the only issue. It really doesn't matter if some people decide they can be happy in a marriage like this.

This isn't good for you and its not good for your kids. @Packit makes a good point. My parents own marriage took a nose dive when mum's dad, was discovered to be having an affair. In mums head, if he could do it. Anyone could.

@JamSandwich0

Ok, my logic is a little like this.

I am happy enough in my marriage, If any of you found out your husband cheated you would be devastated correct?

So why would I try to find out? I'm choosing happiness.

I personally wouldn't care much. And no he's not rich, I just don't want to spilt the kids and do all that step parent bollocks. A few one offs is pretty normal I think, especially if your other half goes away with work. Starting new relationships is a bit different. I think a lot of women get over invested when it's a one night stand time situation ( I do when single) and that's prob why they text as they feel rejected.