Think I've destroyed my marriage and family because of a lie I told 14 years ago! HELP!!

[ithinkiveruinedmymarriage]

This is a long one so apologies in advance!! My DH and I have been together for 14 happy years, the last 7 of those married. He’s the most incredible and amazing person I’ve ever met and we have had the best fun and loving relationship I could have wished for plus now our amazing little family on top of all that. But, I think something I did 14 years ago may have just completely destroyed it all…..

3 months into our relationship (almost 14 years ago) I received an email from my ex containing friendly chat and asking me to design him a tattoo. I replied with equally friendly chat and said I’d design the tattoo. My memory is failing me with some of the details surrounding the event as it’s so long ago but my DH (bf at the time) was massively unimpressed when he found out I’d emailed him back – I said I’d replied with friendly chat and told my DH that moving forward I wouldn’t design the tattoo and wouldn’t reply to my ex again, and I stuck to my word. However, and this is the hazy area but a key point, I did tell my DH that I’d mentioned him to my ex in the email and said how amazing he was. DH seemed okay. Case dropped. We moved on continuing to be loved up and happy.

Fast forward 14 years…..still loved up and happy but….DH and I have a heated conversation, jealousy kicking in over my past and previous relationships (this has happened on and off over the past 14 years but not been a real issue, just normal jealousy needing some reassurance). Said email mentioned above comes into the conversation and he’s saying how can I believe you, how do I know you didn’t reply again blah blah blah. I said I’ll see if I can find the email and show it to you because I wanted to prove to him and make him feel better. Well what a can of worms that has opened up…….we found the email trail containing the friendly chat and showing no further follow-up, but no mention of me telling my ex about my DH, in fact no mention of him at all. My DH has absolutely flipped saying that I’ve lied to him and betrayed him and been completely dishonest which I think he’s within his rights to say and that I chose my ex over him as should never have emailed in the first place. But he’s also saying that I must have still had feelings for my ex, must have wanted to re-kindle something with him, the content was far too personal and friendly. He simply will not believe that this wasn’t the case however much I try to reassure him. And let me tell you, that absolutely was not the case – my ex was controlling to the extreme and made life hellish the majority of the time however the breakup, when I finally plucked up courage to leave him, was amicable and we did exchange sporadic messages as friends on and off in the following months. My DH is interpreting it completely wrong and the daft thing is that I feel like I only replied to my ex in the first place because of my own insecurities/jealousy over my DH’s past. It just all feels like such a mess over something that isn’t significant at all in my mind (although obviously the consequences are) but is HUGE in my DH’s mind and nothing I seem to say or do is fixing it. I have honestly believed for the last 14 years (as has he) that I said that in the email but it’s clearly not there in writing – I either bare face lied or it’s in some other correspondence that I have zero trace of…?! And the thing is, I don’t know which is true and will never know now!!!

Now is also probably a good point to mentioned the other issue I’ve caused, and there is a link – that I lied to my DH when we first got together – I was intimidated by his past and felt threatened by it which led to feeling insecure and jealous. So for some ridiculous reason I bigged up my past sex life up to something fairly extreme, stupid I know, but that’s all come back to bite recently too. I have now been completely honest with him about that and explained why I felt the need to glorify things but again, and again unsurprisingly, he doesn’t believe me and can’t take my word as the truth. Understandably he’s saying I’ve lied to him over the last 14 years and what else is a lie, how can he trust me etc. etc. The problem with telling him the “honest” bit here is that the past basically boils down to sex with the ex in the email above so DH is thinking I had some amazing sex life with my ex that I was trying to rekindle in the email. Aaaarghhh!!!!

I feel so ashamed and embarrassed that I’ve done this, I can’t sleep and it’s making me feel ill. How can I ever put this right if my DH won’t believe me when I explain my feelings for him and how amazing he is and how happy and in love I am with him. I don’t want this to destroy my marriage and my family who are all perfect in every way!! What have I done!!!

Your dh is a bloody weirdo. If 14 years of happy marriage isn’t enough for him, he needs psychiatric help.

He sounds like a plank OP, it’s not a surprise you’re struggling to find someone who sees it from his side. Three months into your relationship!!! Three months!

The fact you couldn’t even remember what you’d said is indicative of the fact you are/were not bothered about your ex. Why should you mention an amazing new partner to him, especially after three months?!

Why is he giving you hell over this, he must be an insecure little weasel.

You didn't do anything, your husband is being incredibly embarrassing with this.

He sounds very controlling and jealous; it’s not normal jealousy op- it’s toxic

You seem to have a type ,when it comes to men …….
your not the problem here ,at all ,in any way or shape .
hope u find the strength to do what’s right for u

Omg just read your updates op. This is so so abusive please believe me when I say that. Right now you are thinking that we don’t know him, we don’t know what he is usually like etc. It doesn’t matter. He is still abusive! The fact he is trying to hurt you everyday and bring up this absolute crap to make you feel bad is abusive!! If he loved you he would not be making you feel like shit!!! You are 100 percent in an abusive relationship- you are in denial.

And stop blaming his controlling behaviour on his abandonment issues. He’s absolute nonsense. No person would make someone feel bad about this- he is a abusive!!!

This is honestly one of the saddest threads I’ve read on here. Op can’t even see how abusive her husband is 😢

its been cast up over 14 years this wasn’t found out recently but cast up repeatedly

My Uncle and Aunt broke up for similar reasons. My Uncle "discovered" that my Aunt had been "disloyal" right at the beginning of their relationship. They had been married for a similar amount of time, he was the sole earner , my Aunt was at home with their three kids. Because my Uncle has the emotional intelligence of a boulder he started divorce proceedings because he just couldn't deal with the "heartbreak". It was all nonsense, he was feeling suffocated and was looking for a way out - he was too much of a weasel to be honest so he blew some stupid nothing sequence of events out of proportion and used it as his get out of jail free card. He no longer speaks to his daughters and he has a toxic relationship with his son.

Be careful OP. Their story could be yours. There's more going on with your H than he is letting on.

From 14 years ago seriously!!

I just noticed this - “he’s only ever physically abusive to the walls”.

OP, I grew up in a house where there were holes in the walls. Doors hanging off the hinges. Cups of tea splattered up the ceiling. These things are not normal and they are not OK. Children are way WAY more perceptive than you could ever realise if you haven’t had this kind of childhood. Your children deserve better than to share their home with an aggressive man who has their mother walking on eggshells, even if “only” some of the time. Is this really the relationship you want to model to them? Would you be pleased if your sons treated their future partners this way? If your daughters were on the receiving end of this from their husbands? I sincerely hope the answers are no and no. In which case you need to stop showing them this is normal and acceptable.

Haven't RTFT but have read the OPs replies.

My love, this is so far away from a normal level of jealousy. Your Husband sounds completely unhinged.

A miscommunication or a meaningless white lie FOURTEEN YEARS AGO is not, cannot be, more important than those 14 years together and everything within them.

If it had come out that you'd slept with your ex while you were seeing your now Husband I could maybe begin to see his perspective a little, but just not telling him something is nothing. It's literally nothing. An absolute non-event.

I know you said you want to fix things, but I genuinely wonder if that's possible with a partner so insanely, wildly, unrealistically jealous as yours.

Fuck me. Your dh has issues. Does he have adhd? My adhd husband get fixated on shit like that. We went to marriage counselling and it really helped.

This is your definition of incredible and amazing?

You said you felt bad about this, felt guilty. It’s very important that you realise you have nothing to feel guilty about. Otherwise you’re just sucked in to your DH’s twisted perspective.

You were free to respond to your ex as you saw fit, your DH had no business at the time asking what you had said or expecting to control it. As for whether you mentioned your DH, it is pathetic that he cared about that and totally inconsequential that you misremembered such a minor detail. Maybe you said it , maybe you were thinking it but never got around to saying it. Heck, maybe you just lied to calm you jealous new BF down. Either way, it was not remotely relevant or significant even back then. You did not need to praise him to your ex. Whatever you told him was not a test of your loyalty back then, it was a minor thing. And it certainly should seem completely irrelevant now after years together, marriage and kids. What is more real to your DH…years of life as a couple or a incredibly trivial detail from when you’d recently met. As for embellishing your sexual history when you met, again…it’s nothing.

If these aren’t trivial details to your DH that pale into utter insignificance, then the problem is completely his. The only correct answer to his current attacks is to tell him to stop hassling you about his feelings when you have done nothing wrong and the problem is 100% his to deal with. Is it actually wise to say that or confront him, I don’t know. To be honest he sounds nasty and dangerous.

How did your chat with your husband go this evening, OP?

My friends and family love him

This means nothing. My friends and family loved my violent, abusive ex.

Many people loved the Yorkshire Ripper.

He genuinely believes I've done something heinous with that email (and "lie") so it's hard for me not to question whether I am actually in the wrong or not if that makes sense.

There's only one of him and loads of us @ithinkiveruinedmymarriage and we almost all think how he's going on is bollox.

If he genuinely believes you’ve “done something heinous” he needs serious therapy because that’s crazy.

If he makes a habit out of putting you in the wrong and making you grovel for his forgiveness but knows it’s not true, he’s a nasty piece of work and manipulative with it.

You could be talking about my ex, even down to the hitting of the walls. It is all a form of abuse. Hitting walls in front of you is domestic violence. The obsession with your past is domestic abuse.

my ex was controlling to the extreme and made life hellish

Your partner is the same. Do try and think about escaping him.

OP I have been in your situation with a man who had been cheated on before and abandoned in childhood, now convinced I was cheating on him. Please understand that this is mental illness, and it's not something you can fix, no matter how faithful, compliant and true to your word you are. This is not about knocking your DH. You can have compassion for him if you do choose. But this a psychiatric illness which can only be addressed in in one of two ways:

1. You leave him
2. He seeks treatment for a mental illness.

Those are the only options. Nothing you do or don't do will ever make a difference, no matter how 'good' a partner you are. A therapist I was seeing at the time said 'you must understand that for the person suffering the delusion it's like having two jobs.' Your DH is a good man who is suffering, but unless and until he recognises that and seeks treatment he will continue to suffer. And so will you.

Best of luck to you. You're in a very hard situation.

@ithinkiveruinedmymarriage You seem willing to excuse, overlook and forgive 14 years of jealous, controlling and aggressive behaviour from your husband. He isn't willing to excuse, overlook or forgive an innocent mistake / white lie you told him when you'd been dating for 3 months.

Even if your lie was about something shocking, can you see how unfair this is?
But your lie (to your new bf) was nothing shocking. And you made it because he was already being controlling. After only 3 months, he insisted you couldn't be in touch with your ex. He had no right to do that. Especially as your contact was very innocent. But because he reacted in such a jealous, controlling way, you told him a lie - you said that you'd told the ex how wonderful he was. Yes, lying is wrong of course. But you did it because you wanted to placate your bf of 3 months who was already telling you who you should speak to.

He had issues from day 1. He's exercised control ever since. You are trying to excuse his actions (blaming his childhood, your lie, his insecurity) but he and he alone is responsible for how he acts.

If he has issues from a bad childhood, then it's up to him to seek help and to manage the effects so that he doesn't pass on the abuse. He has chosen not to seek any help but to pass on the abuse to you (and this will also impact your children).

You have done nothing wrong. At worst, you told a small lie 14 years ago to a new bf who was being controlling.

He however has spent 14 years controlling you and making you miserable. You described your marriage as very happy, but your posts tell us of someone who is happy when they 'behaving'. You can't go all the places you want to go, see all the people you want to see, share news with your husband if it might make him upset. He gets angry, he accuses you of things, he doesn't trust you, he punches walls.

This is far from a loving 'perfect' marriage. Your family and friends might think it is, but if they knew the truth they would want you to get away from him.

@ithinkiveruinedmymarriage - how did the chat go yesterday evening?

It sounds like your marriage is only happy so long as you don't 'upset' him.