Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Original poster

Can infidelity ever save a marriage?

105 replies

OnACloud · 18/07/2023 11:48

This could be controversial and I’m absolutely not trying to make light of infidelity, I’m currently struggling through the aftermath myself.

Ive been in a faithful, mostly happy marriage for 27 years. Up until now. I discovered a few months ago that my DH was having an affair. I was devastated. Now he is out the other side and working hard to repair our marriage he is also devastated and totally ashamed.

I’m not going to go into the whys and wherefores of our situation except to say that our relationship had become mundane. We were bimbling along without giving each other much attention. The causes of his infidelity are deep rooted, however, I am fully aware that he is fully responsible and he made the wrong choices.

Coming to terms with everything is tough and I’m struggling but there are times when I wonder what would have happened if we hadn’t have hit absolute crisis point (his affair). Would we have continued drifting apart? If he’d have told me he thought we weren’t in love anymore (which I know he should have done) would it have been enough of an awakening to save our marriage? I’m not sure.

Anyone else understand what I’m trying to say here?

OP posts:
Nkya · 21/07/2023 20:40

My friends daughter broke up with her boyfriend and she confessed that it was her fault for walking away this time, the first time for her to walk away was her boyfriend. The girl has come to realise that her ex boyfriend was her true love, tried to apologise to the boyfriend for what had happened but the boy keeps telling the girl you will walk away again. In the meantime the boy picked up a girl who is slightly older than him in a night club who he got intimate with and he has brought her in the flat he bought with his ex. The boy tells her ex everything they have been up to when he brings the new girl in the flat. On other hand the boy keeps telling the ex how much he loves her and wants to marry her, but her ex thinks it all false promise and hopes because he still sees the other girl. She is really hurt she doesn’t know what to do. What do you think the ex girlfriend (my friend’s daughter)should do?

PimpMyFridge · 22/07/2023 06:39

Think you need to start your own thread @Nkya

ThatFraggle · 22/07/2023 07:04

Trickle truthing.

Most affairs seem to be 'we just kissed' until there's a positive pregnancy test, or STD, then, 'It was just the one time.'

OP, your DP knows confessing to sex will open a new level of rage. There is evidence that they were together. Alone. You can't prove anything else happened, so it 'didn't'.

Part of the reason affairs are considered to be abuse is the lying and gaslighting perpetrated on the person who didn't cheat.

TurnerP · 22/07/2023 17:40

OnACloud · 20/07/2023 12:15

I don’t think so, unless I’ve said she was awful and that I blame her further up thread, you have chosen to add that. I just stated a fact. She is a serial adulterer who came chasing him again after he clearly told her it was over. Fact.

However, yes, I do think she is awful. She has young children, works full time and still found time to spend hours a day messaging and phoning my husband and before this going to some other man’s house for regular sex, and a different man before that. Where are her poor children? That is my opinion of her.
It doesn’t mean I don’t fully blame my DH for his actions.

Show quote history

How do you know this about the OW? Is that what your DH has told you about her, that she has different married men on the go? It sounds suspect and a typical lie men say to drag down the OW when caught. Have you tried reaching out to her yourself for answers? Does her husband know, maybe they have an arrangement. At the end of the day your DH is the one married to you, not her, he betrayed you

TurnerP · 22/07/2023 17:52

OnACloud · 20/07/2023 12:45

I get that. Just because I have a low opinion of the OW (and why shouldn’t I) it doesn’t mean I don’t blame my DH for his actions. He is entirely responsible, he knows he is fully to blame and so do I.
He doesn’t know I will take him back, I’m. It a walk over. He is doing everything he can to help fix this marriage, he knows it’s not a done deal.

I know he should have communicated before but he is communicating now. It may or may not work out but to me it’s a worth a try.

I’ll get shot down for this because I’ve already stated the OW is awful, maybe I should have said he’d behaviour is awful. But, my DH is not a terrible person, but his behaviour has been despicable. That is not who he truly is. He screwed up.

It's amazing what men will say and do to keep their investments/finances intact than risk losing half through divorce

New posts on this thread. Refresh page
Swipe left for the next trending thread