Just found out husband has been having an affair - my son is 19 months old

[victoria7oaks]

I found out on Sunday that my husband of 2 and a half years has been having an affair for nearly a year and started when my lovely boy was only 8 months old. Apparently, he started losing interest in me when I was pregnant! But I got pregnant 8 weeks after our honeymoon. He was crying with love and joy for me on our wedding day. I had to finish his speech. It looks like he won't try to reconcile and hasn't the will to make our marriage work. How am I going to get through each day with no partner at the end of it? How will I get through the lonely weekends? I will have nothing to look forward to. I feel desolate. I don't know how it could have happened. He says he still loves me, but not in the same way. I thought we were having difficulties because he was abused as a child by his half-brother and it was coming back to haunt him. I've been begging him to go to the doctor for antidepressants but he wouldn't. He agreed to see a counsellor but he must have been talking about his affair. I'm so low. My baby is keeping me alive. xxx

Oh goodness I dont know what to say but please dont blame yourself for this. Hopefully there will be lots of people along that can help you better deal with this. xx

So sorry to hear this, it must be an awful shock! has he admitted all this? Does he want to be with the OW? Focus on your child, keeping things safe and happy for him, get friends and family to rally round, you may need to mope, cry, scream etc, make sure you do it! Try and be straight and level headed with your DH, don't let him see you weeping and wailing so he can fly into the open arms of OW. Sit him down straight and ask him to choose, tell him you will pick up the pieces and move on (which you will ) if he wants to be with her, make him think about it practically where will he live? how much money will he send to support your child? What if OW wants his children? (that should scare him) basically he sounds like a little boy who chases the excitement of a new relationship and wants to jump ship when domesticity sets in! It happens a lot thats why we see so many older blokes with younger women, who then want babies and the blokes do the whole baby thing again! Hold on to your dignity, stay strong, good luck!

Victoria, I'm so so sorry. That is such a terrible and heart-breaking position to be in. Do you have family and friends close by to talk to and get some comfort from? I don't know where you can go from here... If it was just a one-off, one might be able to forgive and move on, but for your husband to deceive you for a whole year through your pregnancy, childbirth and early days, weeks, months of motherhood ... when you must have needed him most. I wouldn't be able to forgive. I'm having problems with DH as well, you can look up my post of today, but my problems seem now pale in comparison with yours. I do feel for you, Victoria. I do hope you find enought strength in yourself to get you and your baby through this. XXX

Oh Victoria, poor you.
You will get through this, for yourself and for your lovely son.
Has your husband left the home?
As other have said have you family/friends close by?

I am so sorry

Tell people. It is an awful time but you will find the most unexpected help and support - that includes here.

The other thing you must do is be kind to yourself (now this is truly do as I say not as I do!). If you start thinking of yourself as unable to cope it will happen; trust me I know.

You are in shock right now and that piece of advice will appear impossible I know but please return to it from time to time.

Get some support now, make sure you have friends around to share a bottle of wine with, tell your GP if he is supportive, get a sibling to come and stay at the weekend to share the load, make a plan for next week, even if it is just taking your son to a new park. AND DO IT. Tip... make sure it is little enough to do! This hurts it hurts so much but look at your baby. He makes it all worthwhile.

Some advice from a friend/acquaintance.

*Never let them see you cry
*Never beg for anything
*Let them believe you are doing just fine
*Don't try to involve them in deep discussions about your relationship
*Don't ask questions that you are afraid of what answers will come back
*Don't tell them to leave the house unless you really want them to leave
*Take very good care of yourself, treat yourself with respect
*Be true to yourself

One more thing, (again this is me learning from my mistakes) try and not contact him, cry at him etc. There is something called 'detachment', I did not master this at all and I think I would be so much stronger now if I had.

www.livestrong.com/article/14712-developing-detachment/

xxxxx

You will get through whatever faces you.

Please, please do not blame yourself. He has treated you shockingly badly.

What a shock for you.

I agree with everythgin gonnabehappy said.

Every day will get easier.

You don't need a partner to make you happy or to get you through each day. You don't need a partner in order to not have lonely weekends. There are loads of single people out there living full fulfilling happy lives. Having a partner is not the be-all and end-all.

Victoria - i really feel your pain and i am so sorry you are suffering.
I too found out this weekend that my husband of 23 years has been having an affair and he wishes to separate and to start a new life with her.
Like you i am numb, devastated, hurt, angry - there are just so many emotions going on in my head that it is impossible to think straight. I am sure you understand all too well those feelings.
I knew our marriage was going through a rocky patch but to say i am now floored is a HUGE understatement.
Personally i disagree with much of the advice you have been given and, if it is of any help to you, i'll tell you how i am dealing with this bombshell.
I am trying to stay calm and rational. Sure, i have cried buckets, but i am trying not to cry too much in his presence. This is not a time for trying to make him feel any more guilty than he is already. What i am trying to do is talk to him. Find out where we went wrong and see if there is any chance we can fix things. At this moment in time i do not want our marriage to end and i have said that i want to do all within my power to rescue the marriage. Perhaps that sounds like the words of a desperate woman (and perhaps i am), but i am under no illusions. I don't know if, once the dust settles, i might not want him back. I do know that it was good once (as you said yours was, citing the wedding day speech as an example)and that we as a couple owe it to ourselves, and to our children to see if there is at least a glimmer of hope to get things back on track.
I reccommend you talk to him as calmly and as rationally as you can. Be tender towards him, accept that you are in part to blame, even if it is he that has had the affair, perhaps your actions or behaviour in some way forced him in to it. Do your best to persuade him to have counselling. Tell him you have nothing to lose and in the worse case scenario you will be back to where you started. And finally, ask yourselves if you are prepared to look your son in the eye in years to come and assure him that you did everything possible to try to stay together.
I wish you the very best of luck - send me a private email if you wish to chat some more.
Hugs to you xoxoxoxo

Oh you poor girl, how horrible. But please don't waste any time or effort trying to win him back: draw a line under this couple-relationship immediately and start concentrating on yourself and your baby. By all means cry and vent to your friends (and on MN) but in dealings with him be calm and polite and detached. He wants to be with someone else, well, off he should go then, and for the meantime you would prefer all contact to be conducted via a third party, and you don't want to hear from him unless it's to do with access to DC or sorting out the finances of your separation.
He's been having this other relationship for nearly a year; this is not a 'moment of madness' he is either not monogamous or he doesn't love you. Neither of these things are due to any fault in you but what is important is that he is not and cannot be a monogamous life partner to you, because he doesn't want to be, and trying to make him do that will exhaust you and make you miserable. It is not possible to make someone love you.No matter how much it hurts, treating him with amicable indifference is the only way forward, fake it till you make it and you will heal more quickly.

This is so awful. It sounds like he is completely immature, wholly wrapped up in himself and without moral stamina.

He sounds so immature that if you do separate, and you show great signs of moving on, and he feels "tied down" again with this other woman (which he will do) then he will come running with his tail between his legs. It really sounds like that to me. He really sounds the type, sorry I know he's your husband but he does.

He probably doesn't love the other woman either, it's all based on attention. He's certainly missing some kind of emotional solidity if he can be weeping with happiness at your wedding and within six months carrying on like this.

This is all about him, not about her. You poor girl. SGB's advice v good. I don't think this a lot, but he is really not worth the headroom.

I agree with solid in this case too and sorry but i dont agree with gonna on this one.

Until and unless he wants to make it up to you, it is pointless even thinking there is a marriage to repair.

Dont worry about crying - just let it all out.

Get friends to rally around and think about you and your ds now.

Your mind will be frantic at the moment trying to figure it all out but until he is willing to accept he is totally wrong you will just drive yourself mad.

Dont worry about asking him to leave either - if it is going to work he will have to come begging back anyway and this will be easier to see if he is away from the home - otherwise you will be left wondering if he has just taken the easy option.

All decisions for the near future must be about what you and your son want and is best for them - and dont worry if you feel that is different each day either.

There are no rules - it will be awful but you will slowly get through this and i promise you will be stronger for it.

Thinking of you.

Has he given you any explaination as to why he has allowed this to happen?

Nothng he says is going to make you feel better but knowing his justification may help in the long term.

This is gonna be different advice to most of the other posters. Do you want him back? Before you answer that, please think carefully, yes you have a young child (same age as mine, and I've just had my third wedding ann), and your first instinct is say you want him back. But once you have gotten over the hurt of how it happened would you wish you were still together? If the answer is yes then you should try and get your marriage back on track. begging and crying won;t do it, although don't be afraid to cry if you need too. once you kow why he has done this you can see how to put things right.

If you can't forgive and forget, eventually, then there isn't any point in trying.

At the moment you are grieving for your lost life, seeing pfb grow up, having more children, growing old together.

You can be happy without him.

He has made his choice, now you need to make yours, you still ahve choices.

My XH did something similar when DS was 18 months old. found himself a younger fitter model with no responsibilities.

I think a lot of men don't appreciate from the off how hard domestic life is gonna be.

Anyhow, my advise is to surround yourself with as many friends and family as you can, what ever you feel right now is normal. get to the doctors if you can as well - I didn't until 4 months later, and put on a brave fact, 6 months after that was when I admitted defeat and got some anti D's.

anyhow at the time I felt like you - DS is the reason i'm here now I firmly believe that, without him I would never have survived the dark days.

You can do this thou, and you'll find an inner strength you never knew was there.

I personally found that I had to detach from XH - moved out for 5 weeks and barely spoke to him while I got my head in order. changed totally in every sence of the word, and developed an inner confidence as well.

It's hard work, I won't lie, but it's so worth it now when I look at DS and think you're fantastic and it's my hard work, or like this w.e just gone look at XH and think you're totally pathetic.

fwiw if it helps we're 2 years down the line, OW decided 5 months ago she didn't want to be around him any more and he's been desperately trying to salvage something - tried it back on again with me, something that is NEVER gonna happen, but I really do think that 90% of men do these things and hten see how well we cope and realise exactly what they've done and want it back.

Anyhow bit of advice I was given...... Be like a swan - elegant and beautiful on the surface but paddling like hell under teh water to keep afloat. You are a beautiful swan never forget that. xx

also think if it wasnt for ds would you be able to walk away. It is harder with childern and whilst i dont think the reason men do this is because of the children - they do feel a sense of safety - you will find it harder to walk away from him and will in some way have to still have him in your life - i think a lot of men sub-conciously know this too. iyswim.

your self esteem will be lowered now - but inside there is still a strong woman who will surprise herself with what she can achieve.