Until recently, my marriage was the thing in my life (apart from my children) that I was most proud of. Married almost 20 yrs to someone I love and trusted implicitly.
we have suffered a huge amount of stress in recent years, and especially in the past year. Most of it, if not all of it, financial.
it’s been tough. Still is. Our sex life has been non existent as I just am too stressed, exhausted and perimenopausal to want it.
Recently my normally loving husband has not been so loving. He has been downright mean at times. I don’t know what made me ask, but last Thursday I saw him on his phone again, and told him, ‘show me your phone.’ He refused and got angry.
He told me he had been slagging me off in his WhatsApp friends group and it was vile.
we were at my parents house and had our son with us so had to drive home silently and angrily. Later that night I asked him again- he point blank refused to show me.
we slept in separate rooms. At 5am I crept into the room he was sleeping in and grabbed his phone.
he woke up and a tussle ensued. I got the phone but couldn’t open it.
At this point our son was up for school and witnessed this argument. Eventually I got the passcode but he had deleted everything on his phone. Photos the lot. I saw one message at 4am to an unknown number. It said I love you.
I made him take our son to school, and I waited.
on his return I asked him to explain.
Lie after lie tumbled out, in order to try and minimise it.
Eventuwlly, I dragged the truth out of him.
He had gone on a work trip 2 months ago and got blind drunk. He had met some woman in the pub and ended up going back to his room with her and had sex.
He says he had had 7 pints before the meal and several whiskies after and was absolutely blind drunk. He didn’t remember anything much except that something has happened.
After a day or so, he got a LinkedIn request from the woman. Now, he knew her name. She had had to do some detective work to find him on linked in based on geographical location and company name.
He refused the request. Then a few days later he contacted her via LinkedIn and asked her what had happened. She filled him in with the details.
He told her he was married and had been drunk and it shouldn’t have happened.
She then started ‘checking in’ with him. ‘Hi, are you ok?’ Etc etc. She suggested moving to WhatsApp and swapping numbers. Then she asked him, ‘what are you into’ and the conversations became sexual. Over the past two months she said that it wasn’t going anywhere so they should stop messaging. He says it was then he started to tell her he was going to leave me, he loved her etc, because he enjoyed rhe messaging. It was an ego boost etc etc.
I rang the woman. I suspected he had coached her on what to say. She said it was a drunken dalliance, nothing more.
I told her to stop contacting him. She agreed.
He blocked her number.
Later that night, I took his phone and unblocked her number. Within 15 minutes. She messaged him. Are you ok?
I pretended to be him.
Youve been online half an hour and didn’t message me? Why? She asked.
’She rang me- I said what we agreed’
I replied- my son is distraught and wife is devastated- it’s been hard here today.
she replied, ‘It’s been awful for me too- because of HER! (Me)
At that point, she got suspicious. I rang her and told her again- stop.
He says he contacted her and told her I would likely call her and to please not say anything that might hurt me more.
So he was STILL lying and attempting to minimise that very morning.
He had arranged to meet her again in the next few weeks at a works do, but told me he had no intention of doing so- he was stringing her along to keep the messages going.
He has been remorseful and upset and our children said they would never forgive him. Our parents and my best friend know and all said that of everybody in the world, he was the least likely to cheat and they cannot believe it.
He has quit his job as I said I would never trust him again on work trips.
we spent four days agreeing to salvage our marriage. He said he absolutely didn’t want this other person who he could barely remember. He is sorry blah blah blah. He has booked counselling. My parents think he has had some sort of breakdown.
We spent four days having sex and trying to carry on as normal. But this made me feel like he is being rewarded in some way for his behaviour. I love him very much but he has totally shattered my heart, my trust, my entire world. We are now back in separate rooms and I just don’t know how to carry on. Any advice really gratefully received.