Newbie - He Cheated. I Cheated. Now What?

[NoRegrets2017]

I apologize in advance for this being extremely long.

 

My husband and I have been married for almost 7 years and together for 11. We have 3 children - ages 10, 5 and 1.

 

We met when he was 20 and I was 21. We dated for a few months and things were very hot and heavy. Early on I had my suspicions about him, he seemed to be an entirely different person when we weren't together. I had made up my mind that this would be a summer fling because although he was a nice guy, some things weren't adding up. That was the plan until I wound up pregnant just 5 months into our relationship.

 

I wanted to keep the baby and gave him the option to stay or go, and he chose to stay. I'll admit that we were not in love; we liked each other and cared for each other but we were definitely not in love at that point. He stayed throughout the pregnancy, but midway I found out he was still in a relationship with his "ex". Hence why I was feeling suspicious about him from the start. He decided to end that relationship in order to be there for me and the baby so I forgave him and decided to keep it going. After our daughter was born the love definitely came. She changed him and I fell in love. We worked to establish ourselves as a family and I thought everything would work out perfectly....

 

A little over a year after my daughter was born a "friend" of his started calling at weird hours of the night and acting erratic. I let it slide for a bit and then my curiosity got the best of me. I listened to some volatile voice messages in which she was claiming he was the father of her child. I confronted him and he denied being the father but admitted to sleeping with her when I was still in the hospital following my daughter's birth. He claimed that she was doing all of this because he had just gotten a really good job and we had moved into a new home...she was in a bad situation and jealous. He begged for my forgiveness and although it was extremely hard to do, I forgave him and we moved on. He never spoke to that "friend" again and supposedly she went back to her ex who was actually the father of the child.

 

As the years went on so did the instances of betrayal. It seemed like every 3-6 months, like clockwork, I'd find flirty text messages or Facebook messages from women that he claimed were friends. I became a private investigator, constantly digging up information to confront him with and 9 out of 10 times that I'd look, I'd find something. We got into this pattern of me finding something inappropriate, confronting him, having a big blowout in which he'd get incredibly defensive as if this was my fault, then he'd apologize and plead for forgiveness and I'd forgive him and move on. This went on for years and years.

 

We got married 4 years into the relationship. I come from a very dysfunctional broken home and all I ever wanted was the happily ever after. I wanted the family, and the stability that that provides. I loved him and I knew he loved me. He was a great provider, a good listener and my best friend. But he couldn't stop talking to other women. Two days before our wedding I found out he had given some woman at a bar his phone number the weekend before. I texted the number and she was so honest about their encounter, all the flirting he was doing. She apologized profusely but it wasn't her fault. I married him anyway - with questions in my heart, but I still did it. The next year I was pregnant with our 2nd child and the night before we were going on vacation for our wedding anniversary, I find another round of flirty text messages to some long lost childhood friend. I felt like this would never end - marriage definitely wasn't stopping it.

 

No matter how much I tried to get to the core of this behavior, I just wasn't getting anywhere with him. I know he was doing this for attention despite me showering him in it. I did everything I was supposed to do as a wife and still couldn't figure out why he wouldn't stop having inappropriate relationships with other women. I suggested therapy - he went one time and the therapist called him a sex addict so he never went back.

 

Fast forward a few years and here we are. The behavior never stopped and last October, a few days before my birthday, I found the holy grail. Nude photos of other women that were sent to him, and one that he sent to someone else. To add insult to injury, one of the women was a friend of his from childhood that I had known about. This was the first time I ever had visual evidence (pictures) so I confronted him about it immediately. He tried to erase everything as usual, but I had already saved it. He was mad at me, which had become pretty typical when these things happened. But this time something felt very different for me - I didn't really care. I was more upset that I found the stuff on the family iPad than I was about him actually doing it. I knew right then that I was falling (or had already fallen) out of love with him. I was numb to this situation.

 

I had told him a few months prior to this that my feelings towards him had changed because of the repeated issues. I loved him and cared for him, but I wasn't in love with him anymore. I honestly don't know if that is what I really felt or if I was just mad as hell at the time. But that experience in October solidified that I was definitely in new territory with him. We've been best friends for years and I started to wonder if that and the kids were the only thing keeping this going. Obviously he was missing something in me to be going out this many times, and the effects of that behavior eventually took its toll on my feelings toward him. I tried to get the truth out of him about why this kept happening but he chalks it all up to our sex life and him wanting more sex. I think this is the ultimate cop out because even when I was having sex with him as much as he wanted, he'd still do these things. Sex just seems like the convenient excuse.

 

A month after I found the pictures, I felt the urge to connect with people from my past. I reached out to my ex, who happens to be a woman. Her and I were together for three years prior to me meeting my husband. I loved her deeply and honestly still had buried feelings for her after we broke up. I Facebook stalked her over the past decade but never reached out because she was in a committed relationship and I was a married woman. I don't know what came over me in November, but when I saw that she was single I couldn't help myself. I reached out and we connected. We talked and talked and talked. We had major communication issues when we were together before, but we both have grown and now the communication just flows. We easily went from talking, to seeing each other to sleeping together in a matter of weeks. All of those feelings came rushing back in for the both of us. I wasn't expecting to fall so fast and hard, especially since I never imagined myself betraying my husband. But being with her felt right, I felt more comfortable, more open, more true to myself then I've felt in a really long time.

 

It didn't take long for my husband to get suspicious and I decided to be honest. I told him we had slept together and I had an emotional connection with her. He lost his mind. He demanded I end it but every time I tried, I couldn't. He was devastated and started to act like the 10+ years of betrayal on his part were null and void because of what I was doing. In a moment of honesty he also admitted to sleeping with one of the women he text messaged, but I know in my heart that it's more than one.

 

The past 6 months have been a whirlwind of love and joy with her and pain and confusion at home. She wants to be with me, we've talked about marriage and kids and everything - she was the first person I was engaged to. She's amazing but I know I'd have to adjust to her baggage/issues just like she'd have to adjust to mine. I know that it was killing her to see me going through this and still not leave, so we've decided to stop communicating until I figure out my next steps.

 

My husband has made it clear that he still wants this relationship despite my betrayal. He started therapy a few months ago and thinks he's better now - I beg to differ since he still refuses to confront the behaviors that led to my emotionally shutting down on him in the first place. He wants to work on this and I am honestly not feeling the same. We aren't intimate and every time he touches me my stomach turns to knots. I still do love him and care for him but in a very platonic way. The only reason I would stay right now would be for the kids, or if by some miracle I could find a silver lining and begin to fall in love with him again. My heart is somewhere else right now and I know that needs to die down before anything is possible...if its possible.

 

I'm so confused right now and just need another opinion on this matter...I want to do what is right for my family but I also want to be happy in the long run. Can two people even come back from something like this?

[Mrs. John Adams]

Your husbands actions all these years that he does not want you. He wants you now because he doesn't want to lose you to another woman. How can he compete with that? He can't. So for him this is a conquest for his ego.

 

Let him go and get on with it.

 

He has had many years to prove to you he loves you and wants you... you have given him chance after chance. He threw you away.

 

No affair is right ... even under the worst circumstances.. and you should not have gotten involved with someone else.

 

But you don't have a marriage worth saving... and if your heart is with another.. you may as well divorce. Even if you stay with your husband... he has proven to you he will cheat again. He has never been faithful.

 

Best of luck to you.

[Confused48]

Very interesting post.

 

I don't think you have much/any hope with your H. He is likely never going to change and you have finally had enough. You know you can do better and deserve better. Good for you!

 

You seem intelligent enough to know that you will still have a good relationship with your children if you divorce. Your children will likely benefit from having the example of a mother who eventually put an end to a relationship with a serial cheater. Staying in that relationship has only modeled dysfunction for them. Don't think they don't know what is going on.

 

Starting a new relationship, as a cheater, with a cheater, that's not good for you or your children.

 

If it gave you the strength to leave the serial cheating H, well I guess, that is a silver lining to a very dark cloud.

[NTV]

Doing the right thing isn't always easy. Stopping your relationship with both will be double hard. But divorce for you sounds like it equals freedom. And I hope your children can learn to be able to do the right thing by at least one parent.

[Mr. Lucky]

Can two people even come back from something like this?

 

Would you be willing to invest the next 20 years into the 1 in 20 chance (or less ) that the two of you will find the marital high ground needed to end this craziness? Not what I'd bet my future on but you might feel differently.

 

What path would give your daughter the best opportunity to grow up in a healthy, happy home? Seems like the question you should be asking now...

 

Mr. Lucky

[LoriCroit]

My heart goes out to you. I can understand why you are confused by all this, it’s a paradox of emotions and actions that have taken years to manifest. And, there is no easy answer to your situation. It’s taken years to get to this point, and it may take a long time to get through it all.

 

I would agree that your children are your most important concern. Knowing that, you may need to seek some professional advice through counseling to be able to make the right decisions for yourself and your children. There are many places online and off that you could research for this.

 

In my past experience with falling in and out of love in relationships and my own marriage, I sought the help of God. I learned to pray and be in relationship with Him, and He was able to help me through my situations of infidelity. I would not be able to talk about all this today, if I had not learned to lean on God, trust Him, and listen to His guidance.

 

I hope this helps. I wish you the best possible outcome for you and your family. I will be praying for you.

[NoRegrets2017]

Thank you all for responding. I've spent the last couple days just going through all of this in my head and trying to come to some type of conclusion.

 

You're absolutely right, my children are my top priority and if this was happening to my daughter I would have told her to run for the hills years ago! If someone has NEVER been faithful to you, there's no guarantee that they will start now.

 

I'm just so torn because he seems like he really wants to make this work, but as said above, this could all be ego. He doesn't want to see me leave, especially with another woman, so he's going to try hard to get me back. What I do know is that he's historically non-consistent. He will change his ways for a short time and then revert right back when we are in a settled place. Who's to know that when he feels she is no longer a threat and things between us are back to normal, he won't start this up again. There's a huge chance.

 

I have so many things to consider but I thank you all for your input.

[Sloppyseconds]

You've both cheated, so nobody in this situation is really better than the other, however, knowing his long standing history, I would really hope that you've gotten some STI testing before you hooked up with your ex. I mean, fine if you don't wanna look after yourself, but you have to think of others, and you've no idea what weird and wonderful things your husband may be carrying. Next, i beg you to get out of one situation before getting into another. Get your head on your shoulders first. See what is best and not what is convenient. Think of any children involved first. This is not a time to be selfish. Give yourself a little breathing room. Be single (completely) for a little while and figure out who you are/want to be and what you need, then allow yourself a relationship that gets you to that place. Even if it is not with your ex. If you've agreed to no contact until decisions are made, there's no way to tell if she will wait. She is human. You need to realize that years of anger and resentment toward your husband for doing this do not validate your actions in beginning the same pattern, even if just with one person.

[DKT3]

A question....you seem to believe that this other woman has changed to the point that a new relationship is possible, yet you don't believe that your husband can change?

 

I think it's all a matter of perspective, you've had two failed/failing relationship yet you believe one has a brighter future, it's because of where you place your enegry. Right now it's with this other woman. The very same questions you ask about your husband could be asked about this other woman....how do you know she won't go back to how she was when the relationship ended?

 

She isn't the answer, you seem to think you options are bad and bad, but there is yet a third option, that is dust them both and focus on what's best for your kids. Take the opportunity to show your daughter how a strong independent woman can handle this type of situation. Usually it's best to choose you, not one of two evils.

[wmacbride]

I apologize in advance for this being extremely long.

 

My husband and I have been married for almost 7 years and together for 11. We have 3 children - ages 10, 5 and 1.

 

We met when he was 20 and I was 21. We dated for a few months and things were very hot and heavy. Early on I had my suspicions about him, he seemed to be an entirely different person when we weren't together. I had made up my mind that this would be a summer fling because although he was a nice guy, some things weren't adding up. That was the plan until I wound up pregnant just 5 months into our relationship.

 

I wanted to keep the baby and gave him the option to stay or go, and he chose to stay. I'll admit that we were not in love; we liked each other and cared for each other but we were definitely not in love at that point. He stayed throughout the pregnancy, but midway I found out he was still in a relationship with his "ex". Hence why I was feeling suspicious about him from the start. He decided to end that relationship in order to be there for me and the baby so I forgave him and decided to keep it going. After our daughter was born the love definitely came. She changed him and I fell in love. We worked to establish ourselves as a family and I thought everything would work out perfectly....

 

A little over a year after my daughter was born a "friend" of his started calling at weird hours of the night and acting erratic. I let it slide for a bit and then my curiosity got the best of me. I listened to some volatile voice messages in which she was claiming he was the father of her child. I confronted him and he denied being the father but admitted to sleeping with her when I was still in the hospital following my daughter's birth. He claimed that she was doing all of this because he had just gotten a really good job and we had moved into a new home...she was in a bad situation and jealous. He begged for my forgiveness and although it was extremely hard to do, I forgave him and we moved on. He never spoke to that "friend" again and supposedly she went back to her ex who was actually the father of the child.

 

As the years went on so did the instances of betrayal. It seemed like every 3-6 months, like clockwork, I'd find flirty text messages or Facebook messages from women that he claimed were friends. I became a private investigator, constantly digging up information to confront him with and 9 out of 10 times that I'd look, I'd find something. We got into this pattern of me finding something inappropriate, confronting him, having a big blowout in which he'd get incredibly defensive as if this was my fault, then he'd apologize and plead for forgiveness and I'd forgive him and move on. This went on for years and years.

 

We got married 4 years into the relationship. I come from a very dysfunctional broken home and all I ever wanted was the happily ever after. I wanted the family, and the stability that that provides. I loved him and I knew he loved me. He was a great provider, a good listener and my best friend. But he couldn't stop talking to other women. Two days before our wedding I found out he had given some woman at a bar his phone number the weekend before. I texted the number and she was so honest about their encounter, all the flirting he was doing. She apologized profusely but it wasn't her fault. I married him anyway - with questions in my heart, but I still did it. The next year I was pregnant with our 2nd child and the night before we were going on vacation for our wedding anniversary, I find another round of flirty text messages to some long lost childhood friend. I felt like this would never end - marriage definitely wasn't stopping it.

 

No matter how much I tried to get to the core of this behavior, I just wasn't getting anywhere with him. I know he was doing this for attention despite me showering him in it. I did everything I was supposed to do as a wife and still couldn't figure out why he wouldn't stop having inappropriate relationships with other women. I suggested therapy - he went one time and the therapist called him a sex addict so he never went back.

 

Fast forward a few years and here we are. The behavior never stopped and last October, a few days before my birthday, I found the holy grail. Nude photos of other women that were sent to him, and one that he sent to someone else. To add insult to injury, one of the women was a friend of his from childhood that I had known about. This was the first time I ever had visual evidence (pictures) so I confronted him about it immediately. He tried to erase everything as usual, but I had already saved it. He was mad at me, which had become pretty typical when these things happened. But this time something felt very different for me - I didn't really care. I was more upset that I found the stuff on the family iPad than I was about him actually doing it. I knew right then that I was falling (or had already fallen) out of love with him. I was numb to this situation.

 

I had told him a few months prior to this that my feelings towards him had changed because of the repeated issues. I loved him and cared for him, but I wasn't in love with him anymore. I honestly don't know if that is what I really felt or if I was just mad as hell at the time. But that experience in October solidified that I was definitely in new territory with him. We've been best friends for years and I started to wonder if that and the kids were the only thing keeping this going. Obviously he was missing something in me to be going out this many times, and the effects of that behavior eventually took its toll on my feelings toward him. I tried to get the truth out of him about why this kept happening but he chalks it all up to our sex life and him wanting more sex. I think this is the ultimate cop out because even when I was having sex with him as much as he wanted, he'd still do these things. Sex just seems like the convenient excuse.

 

A month after I found the pictures, I felt the urge to connect with people from my past. I reached out to my ex, who happens to be a woman. Her and I were together for three years prior to me meeting my husband. I loved her deeply and honestly still had buried feelings for her after we broke up. I Facebook stalked her over the past decade but never reached out because she was in a committed relationship and I was a married woman. I don't know what came over me in November, but when I saw that she was single I couldn't help myself. I reached out and we connected. We talked and talked and talked. We had major communication issues when we were together before, but we both have grown and now the communication just flows. We easily went from talking, to seeing each other to sleeping together in a matter of weeks. All of those feelings came rushing back in for the both of us. I wasn't expecting to fall so fast and hard, especially since I never imagined myself betraying my husband. But being with her felt right, I felt more comfortable, more open, more true to myself then I've felt in a really long time.

 

It didn't take long for my husband to get suspicious and I decided to be honest. I told him we had slept together and I had an emotional connection with her. He lost his mind. He demanded I end it but every time I tried, I couldn't. He was devastated and started to act like the 10+ years of betrayal on his part were null and void because of what I was doing. In a moment of honesty he also admitted to sleeping with one of the women he text messaged, but I know in my heart that it's more than one.

 

The past 6 months have been a whirlwind of love and joy with her and pain and confusion at home. She wants to be with me, we've talked about marriage and kids and everything - she was the first person I was engaged to. She's amazing but I know I'd have to adjust to her baggage/issues just like she'd have to adjust to mine. I know that it was killing her to see me going through this and still not leave, so we've decided to stop communicating until I figure out my next steps.

 

My husband has made it clear that he still wants this relationship despite my betrayal. He started therapy a few months ago and thinks he's better now - I beg to differ since he still refuses to confront the behaviors that led to my emotionally shutting down on him in the first place. He wants to work on this and I am honestly not feeling the same. We aren't intimate and every time he touches me my stomach turns to knots. I still do love him and care for him but in a very platonic way. The only reason I would stay right now would be for the kids, or if by some miracle I could find a silver lining and begin to fall in love with him again. My heart is somewhere else right now and I know that needs to die down before anything is possible...if its possible.

 

I'm so confused right now and just need another opinion on this matter...I want to do what is right for my family but I also want to be happy in the long run. Can two people even come back from something like this?

 

I'm not trying to be rude, but your situation is one huge mess.

 

I would suggest to you that you and your husband separate and that the fmaily, as a whole, gets some therapy.

 

I say this gently, but you yourself say your own family ( you, your parents, siblings, etc.) has some issues, and I would suggest to you that you work through the effects of this on you before you consider getting married again to your former girlfriend who you are seeing again.

 

That doesn't mean that you and she should give up on each other forever, just that you need to sort through the mess of your marriage before you should be asking anyone else in.

 

I'm not saying this just for you, but for any future relationships you might have. If you and your ow are going to survive for the long haul, don't you owe it to her to figure everything out first, and then (should you end up marrying her) you will do so from the best possible space, mentally and emotionally?

 

I'm not trying to make you feel bad, but you married, had three kids with and stayed all these years with a serial cheater. What was it that allowed you to put up with that sort of abuse for so long? Didn't you deserve to have a spouse who wasn't the equivalent of the town bicycle? This is why, I can't, in good conscience, give you advice about reconciling. I don't think you should stay with him, as he has some deep seated issues that I don't think he can change. he is a serial cheater, and men like that, in my experience, are what they are. they will say and do whatever it takes to keep their bs, but behind his or her back, they will be sleeping with anyone who will have them, likely lying the whole time to both their bs and the ow/om.

 

Also, and even more important is your children. They are watching and learning form all of this, even if you don't realize it. Your husband is showing them that a husband or wife can treat you badly, and that's okay. Is that really what you want them to learn?

 

Ending your marriage doesn't mean the end of you, him and your children being a family, but it would end you having to worry about what ( and who) he's doing, and what you children will be exposed to.

Edited April 28, 2017 by wmacbride

[sandylee1]

I say divorce is a better option. Whether you end up with your Ex isn't the issue but you've tolerated his crap behaviour your entire relationship.