I had a drunken one-night stand. I feel so ashamed!

[MinimumAstronaut811]

Hello,

I know I will get judged and ridiculed for this, and rightfully so, but I want to share my story and see if anyone can help me figure out how I should tell my husband about what I did. About four months ago, I (F50) was on a trip to beach with my best friend (F50) where we stayed in a beach town for 4 nights. My husband (M48) and daughter (F12) were visiting his mother in a different town, so my girlfriend and I decided to hit the beach during this time. On day 3, we were out at a beachside restaurant with a bar, and we were drinking pretty much the entire day there. Eventually my best friend was extremely tired and returned to our hotel room, leaving me at the bar. This was around 9:00 PM. Soon a group of young guys arrived and one of them (M24) started hitting on me and was relentless. He was very handsome and Ken (like Barbie's Ken) type guy with blond/brown hair and blue eyes and was very fit. He started buying me shots, and I have a real problem with alcohol. At some point during this time, we started making out at the bar and I ended up with him in his room!! I don't remember the encounter, just flashes of it, as I was so drunk, but we had sex all night and I returned to my room (my girlfriend was sleeping) around 7 AM.

I was devasted and ashamed of myself the next morning and I told my girlfriend what had happened. She was very surprised as she knew that my marriage was in a pretty good place. I love my husband as he is the greatest man I have known, amazing dad and a good husband; however, he has let himself go lately and had gained a lot of weight as he is now classified as Obese (over 34% body fat). He was very fit when we met. I ask him to get in shape for his health's sake, as I am in medical industry and see how bad Obesity will destroy your body and I was really afraid he would end up in a wheelchair or worse dead very soon. I had a new boss, and my job was very stressful. I am not making excuses, but I think some of this may have played some role in my heavy drinking and sleeping someone other than my husband.

I don't really know why I slept with this guy. I did find him attractive, alcohol was involved, but getting hit by good looking guys is not a new thing for me. I always brush it off or play it off, but not this time. The guilt is eating me alive, and I know I am a piece of garbage for doing this to my loving husband. I really want to come clean, but I am so afraid that it will break up the family. I know I made a terrible mistake; I don't deserve another chance and probably will not get another chance.

Since I incident I have completely given up alcohol and have been sober since that day. My husband actually commented on this about a week later, as he knows I have struggled with alcohol since my teen age years. He is very supportive of me quitting alcohol and he himself has stopped drinking (he was never an alcoholic but did drink socially).

Can someone give me some guidance on how I should break this news to my husband. I know he will be devastated and will probably hate me, and I deserve it. I don't think I can bear to see the pain in his eyes when I do tell him, but I have to do this. My only hope is that he will see that I am truly sorry and believe that this will never happen. I will also hope he agrees to couples' marriage counseling and hopefully individual counseling for both of us. I don't know, I am so worried about this horrible choice that I made. Please tell me how I should approach this with my husband in breaking this news to him.

Please give me something more than I am a terrible person, a piece of shit, slut etc. etc. I already know this, and I am determined it will never happen again. I am hoping for some constructive feedback on how I can dampen the pain for my husband when I break the news to him. Thanks!

Loving and living after betrayal by stonsy is another book you can read. It will help you understand the emotions he will experience.

I honestly believe if people read these books less people would cheat. It’s abusive behaviour. But as a society it’s romanticised and seen as sexy and then explained as a mistake. 3-5 years to recover. PISD. The time you should be having fun and with your kids will be spent trying to save your marriage or on a divorce. For what? An ego boost from a 24 year old.

I wish you well op and yes I think you should tell him. Read the material I suggested first it may help you do it correctly and you owe him that.

This is exactly what I think too. If my husband had drunken sex with a 20year old, and told one of his friends but didn't tell me, I would be disgusted and furious and devastated.

You absolutely have to tell him, otherwise you're just betraying him again.

You need to tell him, accept the fall out, get therapy for yourself, and if he stays with you I'd think a bit of therapy for him too, as that would suggest crashingly low self esteem.

And give over about his "health". If you've had a drink problem for years, you're in no position to get on your high horse about that, as you well know if you work in medicine. Just be honest and say (to yourself) you don't fancy him because he's fat. You're not coming across as caring and concerned, in your behaviour or your post. You're coming across as sexually frustrated (even desperate), and patronizing about your husband.

You must be really unhappy, and I do genuinely mean what I said about therapy, and mean it kindly. But it's despicable to cheat, tell a friend, lie to the person you cheated on, and then come on here, describe the cheating in such colour (sex "all night" with a "Ken" half your age, while your fat husband sits at home oblivious), and kid yourself you've even started to get you head around what you've done and why.

OP, I know about myself that I might possibly cheat given certain circumstances, including alcohol, this is because I have low self esteem and have always felt down on myself and got a (false) sense of approval from external sources. I have cheated in previous relationships. Knowing this, means that I now know my weak spots and do my best to not put myself in positions which would mean that this would play out. The reason I am saying this is because I think we all have “weak spots” and to know them and understand them means we can (better) control them.
if I were you, I would get myself to (good) therapy (psychodynamic with fully trained therapist) in order to understand how and why this happened, ie. You stayed at the bar after your friend left, I would wonder why; what were you looking for? I’m curious about Ken’s age and looks, I wonder what your relationship with ageing is like? I wonder how you really feel about your husband’s looks now - and your own. The challenge is to be really honest with ourselves; to find those more unpleasant parts of ourselves so we can get to know them and make more informed decisions.
I would also go to therapy to think about how/what I would tell my DH, would it be for him or me, etc. and also to think about what the impact would be on your (I think you wrote) daughter…

Thanks so much for your advice. I will be reading the book.

Also, I will not consume alcohol and then blame that for my infidelity.

Its like you’re blaming the DH because OP got drunk and saw something aesthetically more pleasing on offer and went for it.

Imagine the other way round with the DH and a much younger more attractive woman…

I’m not sure the responses would be the same.

Op I suggested two more books on my earlier post. Read them all. And please sack any counsellor who discusses ‘unmet needs’. No one can make another person cheat. Blaming him for your choices would be rubbing salt in his wounds.

Are you American @MinimumAstronaut811 ? Seems like lots of American views on this thread - hopefully now you will get some European even French views!

It seems to me you’re going to throw a bomb into your DD’s and your husband’s lives for the sake of you making a confession.
This is not a planned or long standing duplicitous affair.
It was one night.
Who knows you could have been drugged - certainly you were pissed.
You’ve not picked up an STI.

Don’t tell him. Stop drinking. Get counselling to strengthen your boundaries, work out why you did it and work through your guilt..
Never do it again and make amends through practical ways. Encourage your husband to get fit so he’s not obese and unhealthy for his own sake… .
If you’re confessing through some form of Christian redemption you’re mad - you will upset your family and yourself forever because you made a truly terrible mistake - some may say a human mistake.
Never put yourself in that position again and move on and if I were your husband I would not want to know.

You really are determined to absolve OP from any responsibility for her sordid betrayal of her H aren't you?

If you choose not to tell your DH then the guilt and shame you feel now are your burden to carry alone. There must be no shirking of this, no being snappy with your DH because you are feeling down. This is something you brought on yourself so you deal with it yourself.

If you choose to tell your DH then his anger, his sadness, his own shame and doubts have been caused by you.

If you choose to tell your DH there must be no keeping anything back but at the same time there must be no blaming the drink or claiming you were taken advantage of.

Do not tell him. He does not need to know. If you tell him you will destroy your marriage. You need to work through this with perhaps with the help of a counsellor?

You know the root cause here is alcohol. You have taken steps to change this.

How about starting walking with your husband? Sometimes telling someone they need to change doesn’t work but gradually introducing changes such as exercise and a healthier diet does.

Finaliy don’t beat yourself up. You made a mistake - your human. What’s important is the changes you make to ensure it never happens again.

You seem to have a huge issue with his weight and how concerned you are about the impact on his health, yet drinking is clearly a huge problem that can also have huge implications on your health and you don't seem to acknowledge this.

Also, I get the feeling that if this thread was written by a man who cheated on his wife, people would not be telling him to keep it a secret. They would be telling him to tell his wife the truth so she can decide whether she wants to stay with a cheater or find someone who deserves her.

Always someone or something else's fault (weight gain, alcohol). You state that you're husband is a good man, good father etc. That's a nice way to appreciate him. Sleep with someone else.

Telling him is more to appease your guilt than coming clean to him so that way you're sharing the mental and emotional load with him. Basically crapping in front of him amd then saying, 'here you go , what are you going to do now?'

You said your friend knows...will she keep it a secret. If not and on that basis only would I be telling your husband cause the last thing he needs is to hear it from a third party.

Utterly agree with every word @FairyMaclary writes. I always return to human right to personal agency and knowledge of informed sexual consent. Both of which you owe your husband.

Keeping this from your husband is removing both of those things from him and that is not ok. Cheating is a form of abuse.

Your posts for me scream of finding excuses, it was the alcohol, it was his weight gain, but you’re not digging deep enough into why you made such a self destructive move, it wasn’t a ‘mistake’, it was an act that can blow up your family. Digging deeper takes individual counselling and deep introspection. I’d probably start there.

But I would tell him. I’d read ‘how to help my spouse heal from my affair’ to understand the trauma he will experience and I’d tell him.

If my husband had a one night stand in similar circumstances I wouldn’t want to know.

I wouldn’t .. if a man had a drunken one night stand and was full of remorse and it was the only time… I’d tell him to sort himself out and not blow up his family.
if he was having an emotional affair, seeing someone else repeatedly then yes - I would say leave,
sometimes mistakes are just human - we aren’t perfect - read the books, give up alcohol, make amends but don’t blow up your family for something you massively regret.

You’re 50. You were drinking all day to the point of memory loss. And you stayed up all night having sex until 7am? Either this is complete bullshit or you’ve missed the bit where you passed out and slipped in and out of consciousness.

Wow the double standards... a man would be ripped apart on here for this....

Tell your husband so he can decide if you deserve a second chance or not.

So, what should I do. I realized I made a terrible choice. How do you suggest I move forward. I never blamed alcohol but said it was a factor. I know if I took that away, I would be much more inclined to maintain boundaries. I know I made a choice. I never said the weight actually made me cheat, but maybe it was something subconscious. I don't know the answer. I do worry about his health, as I worried about mine all this time. Unfortunately, it took such an event for me to finally give up alcohol.

The double standards on here are wild. If this was the other way round the pitch forks would be rattling to a chorus of LTB and get your ducks in a row

The guilt will eat you up, and you can never be sure that the friend won’t tell, so you need to be the one to tell him.

Yep !! Fucking joke

I didn't say I stayed up all night, but I know I spent the entire night with him in his room. I don't remember having sex if full detail, but a few flashes during the night in his room.

I can't believe the amount of "don't tell him" posts

He deserves to know so that he can make an informed decision of what he does next.

I'd want to know if my husband got pissed and had sex with a "fit" girl

The husband deserves to decide if he wants to stay and work things through with op, or if he wants the relationship to end.

Genuinely shocked at the responses, if a bloke had posted and said a good looking girl bought him shots, whilst his fat wife (which he only mentions out of concern for her health) was at home, and then he started kissing said fit girl, went back and had sex with her, people would be screaming to tell his poor wife so she could ltb.

You made a mistake. This does not make you a bad person, it makes you human, I would not tell your husband, but may be some relationship counselling might help? If you tell him it will probably end your marriage

I completely agree and OP you are not going to have a hard time from me. OP you did not sign up to sharing your life with a man who was obese. Some weight gain and changes to appearance should be expected as we age but someone gaining so much weight that they could need a wheelchair? I would be repulsed by a partner who became that size and would consider ending things. Anecdotally from my experience, many people seem to entirely let themselves go and become overweight after getting married/having kids. It lulls them into a false sense of security that they no longer have to bother.

A great positive has come out of this, a kick up the arse to give up the booze you were struggling with so much. If your friend is a true friend, she will never utter a word to your husband; your std results are clear. We have all done stupid things when drunk, you are not the first person who has done this, won't be the last and quite frankly I understand why you did it. Cheating is not black and white as some of the sanctimonious holier than thou Mumsnetters would proclaim.

I recommend couple's counselling, a gym membership and an ultimatum about his weight. A trip to see the GP is also in order. He must be snoring like crazy at that size which must be unpleasant for you.