Dear ChumpLady,
I just got my husband back after a year long affair he had. And now he doesn’t want to delete the OW from his Facebook and his phone. He doesn’t necessarily want to keep in touch, but he wants to know that she’s doing okay and check on her every now and then.
I find that disrespectful towards me, but he says she was the love of his life, and he still cares about her. She dumped him because he doesn’t want to divorce me, but they are apparently still friends. He returned to his family because he wants to do the “right” thing, and because we have four kids, and because his Christian values are important to him (not because he doesn’t love her).
But I don’t want her in his life! Or should I allow this Facebook friendship (she lives in another state so that’s cool with me) so he doesn’t miss/long for her too much?
The Wife
Dear Wife,
Sometimes I wonder if my mail is a joke. But then I read the advice of the Reconciliation Industrial Complex (RIC) and this “let them grieve the affair partner” malarky is a real thing.
There is only one person here who needs un-friending, and that’s your husband.
Why are you in a “marriage” with someone who a) considers another woman the “love of his life,” b) continues to stay in contact with his mistress, and c) thinks his cowardice makes him a Christian? He was fine cheating on you, but then he got dumped for being a cake eater. Now he finds Jesus?
And why is your entire letter about What He Wants? He wants to know how she is. He still cares about her. She was the love of HIS life. His “values.” He wants to do the right thing (after he got dumped — awesome timing)…
What about YOU? What are your values? What do you want?
You want him to go no contact with the OW. I get that. But Wife, you need to deal with the reality you’ve got — he refuses. So what are YOU going to do about that?
That’s the only person you control here — YOU. Either this relationship is acceptable to you or it’s not. You’re either okay with being Plan B to the twatwaffle or you’re not.
Should you “allow” this Facebook friendship?
You’re not his parent. And as I’m sure he likes to point out, you’re not the boss of him. You don’t “allow” him anything. You need to wake up and look at his CHOICES. He wants to be in touch with her and stay married to you.
He wants CAKE.
Are you going to “allow” yourself to be treated that way? Or are you going to enforce your boundaries and see a lawyer?
You can’t “manage” his affair for him. Oh, I’ll loosen up the leash and then he’ll be a good doggy and not abandon us. Your behavior doesn’t MAKE him do ANYTHING. Be grateful for you. Appreciate you. Stay with you. Find Jesus. Reject Jesus. Fuck the OW. Chase the OW. Friend the OW. Friend new OWs.
There is just who he IS. And what you will tolerate.
I suggest you un-husband him.
“He wants to be in touch with her and stay married to you.”
Wife,
He is still cheating on you emotionally. He needs to decide between you and this other woman. Keeping both cannot be an option. Either end the affair completely by cutting off contact (including unfriending on FB) or expect a divorce. It sounds like he has already decided against ending it; so, it is up to you if you want to give him another chance before filing.
God did not design us to tolerate ongoing, unrepentant infidelity. He divorced Israel over such brazen adulterous behavior (see Jer. 3:8). A third party to a marriage is not godly…even if it is only “emotionally” (and she is DEFINITELY still emotionally there if he is still calling her the love of his life with no shame!).
-DM
“He is still cheating on you emotionally.”
DM, That is the statement I made to my ex when he couldn’t stop contacting his “friends” once I discovered what was going on and it was also the very reason I could no longer stay married to him. It was mental torture for me, he knew it and didn’t care. That is not a healthy marriage.
Same here. When he wanted to come back I asked for two things that were non-negotiable. 1. HE get therapy and 2. The other woman is out of his life including having her fired from her job… gone… NOT in OUR lives. He refused both. I am happily divorced. There was no way that I was going to spend the next few months or years doing the pick me dance and wondering if he was still seeing her. I WAS WORTH MORE THAN THAT. I was worth someone WANTING to be WITH ME. Yes we have children. Yes is I ate a lot of shit sandwiches and continue to do so but I have ME now (and a man in my life who is a better father than he ever was.)
Why would you settle for a man who doesn’t love you. Who is only there because SHE dumped him. He is a COWARD! He doesnt even have the decency to divorce you. He doesn’t have the decency to let you try to find happiness with someone who genuinly cares about you. There is no respect for YOU! Its all about Him AND HIS MISTRESS’ EMOTIONAL WELL BEING. selfish selfish selfish. Where is the concern with what he put YOU through?
You have 2 options…. Stay with a man that doesn’t love you and most likely will leave or have another affair because thats who he is or move on and go through the divorce crap and discover a much better life. It will be the most difficult thing you will ever do. I swear it sucks. But you got to get your shit and self respect together. The marriage is already over! Now do the best thing for yourself and set up a consolation with a few attorneys and start making copies of all the paperwork and stash in secret place.
Warning though…. when you decide or if you decide to divorce expect A LOT of push back from him and friends and the church. Trust that he sucks. Also a lot of your “friends” will suck too.
No, he WILL have another affair. I’ll bet money that The Wife was once “the love of his life”, and now the OW is. He will now get bored with the fruitless chase of OW (and she’ll probably go NC on him) and find a new love of his life. Trust me. His eyes are always open to new victims.
I so agree with JBaby–he WILL cheat again and he won’t unfriend the OW–TRUST ME!! I was almost in the same spot–did the “pick me dance” and he decided to end the 18 month affair and come back to me because we were together for 14 years. Well…….I also gave him the same ultimatum…unfriend, change cell phone number, block emails etc and attend couples therapy. He attend therapy with me and played the game, promised he would do the rest—but never did. He unfriended her in FB so he could show me, BUT he kept emails open at work where I could not check. I was a horrible living with the uncertainty–and then, and I can say this now, he did me a huge favor. He dumped me and went running back to the OW (the love of his life) while I was at work. Left me a letter on the kitchen table so he wouldn’t have to face up to his continued lying and cheating he was still doing behind my back.
GET OUT–it will be painful, but believe me, there is life after living with a cheater. He will NOT give her up no matter what he tells you–he can’t. Narcissist cheaters love the attention. Mine told me–“it wasn’t just the sex, it became a game to him living two lives and it was fun!” That hurt the most! A Game–after 14 years?
Love yourself again….get away from the cheater…you and your kids will all be better for it!
What he told you- It was fun – Truer words were never spoken! At least he came right out and said it!
They sure love the game, and the attention, hey everyone, Look at ME!!! I think they’re all 5, (no offense to the real 5 yr olds).
I got a similar explanation of why my ex couldn’t go NC with other women — it made him feel attractive when they flirted with him. Well, in reality it was much more than simple flirting. It was down and dirty talk about what they wanted to do to each other sexually… He lied when he said he would stop communications. Instead he upped his stealth mode. He misjudged my intelligence and I did find the secret email accounts and his numerous cell phone calls/texts still showed up in the bill records. He was the dumb ass….
Yes. The only “if” is IF this wife finds out about his continued, or next, affair. And that “if” is more likely a “when”.
The true Christian thing for this cheater to do is to leave this woman to find a real husband. It’s breaking Christian marriage vows to commit adultery. This cheater is only out to save his reputation and avoid being alone because the ow dumped him.
The cheater and the ow deserve each other, both liars and selfish people. This wife deserves a divorce and a fresh start!
(*IF she wants another husband, that is! Life without any man is actually pretty great after dealing with such BS from my x! Lol..)
All of your comments are 100% accurate. To the last sentence. Thank you.
Perfect timing for your post. I filed for divorce last week. My ex freaked out when i informed him. Yes out of respect I had told him he would be served papers. Yes respect. My reaction has nothing to do with his actions no matter how awful they were.
Of course he asked to not be served and he will agree to file as joint now. Big ego. I agreed to file jointly next week. It is what i wanted but he had refused to sign. But now i can get closure and see him sign divorce papers in front of me just like he signed our marriage papers.
Brief overview. Together 25 years total. He has a bad spending addiction that put us into financial turmoil. He cheated once after 16 years of marriage. Then had an emotional affair. But his soul mate dumped him.
I truly love my idiot ex. He is a kid that never grew up. I prayed and tried for 2 years after he left us. He never repented though.
When he found out I filed he wanted to talk. How dare i divorce him he said!! He asked what would it take to come back…
My list: No more spending without my ok. If i disagree with mortgaging a new toy you don’t get it. No more woman friends. No playing counselor for them – Create boundaries with other women.
Well I didn’t even finish. He said NO. ” If I can’t spend and buy new stuff I might as well die. I am friendly and I can’t stop taking to woman. It is who I am.” He said why can’t you accept me I’m not trying to change you! Lol i was Ms. Chump of course why would you want to change me lol.
Needless to say he is good with the decision to divorce now. He even said to my face. Fine if we’re divorcing I’m letting you know that I will be pursuing a girl that i had my eye on even though you were my my first choice. How sweet of him. Prefer to not be a choice for my husband. I’m not a happy meal!
Keep me in your thoughts. Going to court to finalize papers next week. Legal papers and support are already done. This is it. Pray to stay strong and not react to his actions for our kids sake.
ToBe – best of luck to you next week. I hope it all goes well, and you can grieve and move on from that man.
You do your thing! I know this is tough but I read this and laughed. He sounds like a right jerk. Mine is a man child too and I loved him till the end. I loved him good and bad. It is like you are his mother and what you really need is a man.
DM I believe he already made his decision. Giving him an ultimatum? To what end? He lost the love of his life?
He didn’t end the relationship. Wife lost the pick me dance when he walked out on his wife and four children for a year. He has no real remorse when we look at his actions. He’s a creep.
I am a big advocate of doing what we need to do to have peace in our hearts–to the best of our ability–when making this tough choices. Some might need to give the ultimatum…some might not.
DM
“He needs to decide between you and the other woman.”
Isn’t this giving him control? I believe she needs to decide whether or not she will continue to tolerate his abuse, lack of shame, remorse and blatant entitlement. It is a process DM however he is calling this woman the love of his life. She needs to know she has the power.
Some of us need the closure of giving the cheater the option to TRULY engage in rebuilding what he/she destroyed before pulling the divorce trigger. I know I did. And I am glad I did it.
The reality is that the husband DOES have power in the scenario where she has any interest in staying married as it takes both buying into the marriage for it to be resurrected.
If she is at the place where she is truly done, then by all means do NOT put the choice before him. I suspect from the letter that is not where she is at…so, I offer an alternative designed to expose the husband one way or another.
DM
I guess I am a little trigger happy these days. I’m so tired of the entitled assholes. Thanks DM
What DM said makes sense. At least it did for me. I had to give my now ex-husband a chance to try to make our marriage work. I gave him lots of suggestions on how he could try to make things right between us and he did them. Unfortunately, he did everything I asked but with a half hearted effort or so effortlessly like he was knocking out a “to do” list. He just didn’t get it, or better yet, just didn’t care enough about me or our children’s intact family to be the man I thought he was. It was the perfect wake-up call for me to divorce his stupid ass! Now he, the OW and her five heathens are living shacked up in my old home, happily ever after not even two months after our divorce! Goes to show how much he really loved me. Good riddance! I hope WIFE gets her wakeup call soon.
Omg get out!!! I let mine stay after a 1 year affair the abuse started in earnest then–huge financial and emotional abuse. GET OUT!
Get out. He will use you to look like a Christian family man. The truth will be that he will humiliate you, use you financially, verbally abuse you and so on. No, sweet wife, the Christian thing for him to do is to repent. You are free to go. He is still living in an adulterous relationship.
^^^THIS!^^^ It is spot on. Just.Get. OUT.
So Divorce Minister, just a question for you. Serial cheater swinger husband says he’s done with the lifestyle and doesn’t want to lose wife after she filed. He is unbeliever and wants to stay in marriage. It says in the Bible that if the unbeliever wants to stay, then stay. Although years of infidelity give wife clear conscience to leave. What would your advice be? Just curious.
I know you asked DM, who has excellent advice. But if it’s ok, I’d like to chime in on that passage you are referring to:
1 Corinthians 7:13, 15 (NIV)
And if a woman has a husband who is not a believer and he is willing to live with her, she must not divorce him….But if the unbeliever leaves, let it be so. The brother or the sister is not bound in such circumstances; God has called us to live in peace.
I think the word “leaves” in this passage, (i.e. the act of “leaving” a faithful spouse) is the key to understanding this. Once the errant spouse “leaves” in some way, such as emotionally and sexually, even if they never physically leave the home, then I believe the faithful spouse is not bound any longer to remain married. God wants us to live in peace! If peace of heart is not possible after a spouse has committed adultery, even if they want to come back (i.e. “willing to live with”), I don’t think the faithful spouse is bound by scripture to take them back. On the contrary, I think the passage gives explicit permission to “let it be so”, i.e. divorce.
Thank you.
Sorry I cant stand Bible bs when it comes to someone sticking your face in shit….and that’s an understatement……..emotional mental abuse is the worst form of abuse….get rid of these losers stop quoting Bible crap……….save yourself …unless we think like Shirley Maclaine…that we’ll be reincarnated another delusional…..this is one performance….live it as well as you can………do what’s right for you to save yourself who gives a shit what bibles say ohhhh stop already …………forgiveness ….some people don’t deserve any forgiveness just a swift kick in the ass out of your life…………..good riddance
The abandonment of an unbelieving spouse (I Cor. 7:15) really isn’t the issue here as I see it. Her husband was committing adultery (more than once) by engaging in the swinging lifestyle. She is completely free to divorce him without shame as a Christian as Christ says sexual immorality–e.g. adultery–makes that permissible (e.g. Mt 19:9).
That said, I would encourage her to search her heart to discover what SHE needs for peace in the matter. It needs to be HER choice as she has to live with its consequences. Does she feel at peace ending it now or does she need to give him another chance to prove his cheating ways are over?
Personally, I would lean towards following through with the divorce. He has already chosen mulitple times–by engaging in a lifestyle of swinging–that fidelity is not really his own personal value. This response is seems more prompted by him realizing he might loose her over this lifestyle than him recognizing it is incompatible with his own values. Plus, lifestyle change is about character change. That doesn’t usually happen overnight (if it does at all). He’s a bad bet….besides if he really has changed, there is nothing preventing him for continuing on in that change after the divorce demonstrating REAL change (People DO remarry after all).
I just found a Facebook page that deals with this topic (Christians and divorce) called http://www.facebook.com/divinelydivorceddiva
Thank you.
Christians, please check out “Cry for Justice”. It’s another amazing web, from christian perspective.
It has helped me understand than when an abuser abuses and cheater cheats, they have broken the marriage covenant. They repeatedly reveal their true nature in their entitlement, arrogance and brazen disregard for you, not only as their spouse, but supposedly sister/brother in Christ. You are not required to stay in the broken covenant. They have effectively ‘left’ and in God’s eyes you are not married. God never stayed in broken covenants. Check the Exodus from Egypt situation plus God’s own divorce is also described in the Bible. Sure, ‘Under the Sun.’ you are still legally married, human law is slow and not necessarily just. But God looks always at the heart. He is not religious neither legalistic. He is Love and Justice. And He calls evil what it is. Evil. And don’t worry, they can run, but they cannot hide. Not from the Living God. Fools. Uff…long way to meh, hihi!
DW, my heart goes out to you. Please remember – cheaters are great at managing down the victim’s expectations — slowly but surely. This is how they get away with their cheating behavior and “clues” they left behind. If you accept your husband’s behavior — openly admitting he still loves OW, openly admitting current Facebook contact, then I’m afraid he’s now successful in managing your expectations DOWN even further, TO ANOTHER LEVEL. This just SETS YOU UP for more devastating abuse in the future. Yes – this is emotional abuse! Please get out, get support. Best to leave NOW, rather than wait for further abuse to ensue (the BEST predictor of husband’s future behavior is past behavior) and have a bigger hole (emotionally an financially) you’ll have to recover from. Cut you losses now. The blessing in this is that he is being HONEST in his intention to continue relationship with other woman and his love for her. LET HIS HONESTY SET YOU FREE. God Bless, and know you are mighty!
Hey DM. Hey Wife,
The cheater wants it both ways, for the status quo to be maintained, and for you to continue to hold out hope. It makes the, central, gives them that little kick they cannot get any other way except by exploitation of your goodwill, even if (especially if, in my case) it is against your consent.
Here is how it played out with Mr Fab: I caught him. He said he wanted to reconcile. I said sure, but condition 1, you tell me exactly what happened and 2. No contact with Schmoopie. So a hellish few weeks go by, I finally ask the right question: “Did you contact xxxx?” “No.” “Did she contact you?” “Yes.” “Did you reply?” “Yes.” “What did she ask you?” “Can we talk?” “What was your answer.” “Not yet.”
Do you see? If she is at any way, shape, or form in the picture, you can bet this is what your life will be like. I never got a straight answer, except when I asked the right question. In NarcLogic, he was abiding by the ‘rules’ we had agreed by not contacting her….and bear in mind, that “right” question is a secret known only to the cheater, and subject to change at whim.
Years later, Mr Fab is shacked up with the Downgrade, I live with our kiddo on another continent. He bled me dry, lied about the duration of his afair….kiddo in therapy I can scarce afford (and he coughs up half the fees, under duress).
Long and short, Wife, cutting off a cheater (bearing in mind they still occupy the space of “husband/father of my kids/life partner” in your heart) is like cutting off a limb. The only way to survive is to hack it off: Lawyer up and get the unhusbanding under way, do it once, and do it for ever. It is the only future you have got.
x-Meh.
Yeah, I tend to agree with you that the room for manipulation is far too great especially dealing with someone who has made cheating a lifestyle.
Only repentant sinners get saved, or deserve it, where the Chump has to judge. I don’t think that word is in many cheaters’ vocabularies, alas. If one has been brought up in a life of sacrifice/service, it is hard to not try to be compassionate, but comes a point where the dog returneth to his own vomit once too often….
Big hugs, DM. And all Chump Nation.
x-Meh
yes I know that verse as well… 🙂
Husband even tells Wife that the OW was the “love of his life”!!! My mouth dropped open. Talk about a blatant eff you. Run, girl.
He admitted she’s the “love of his life.” Why stay with someone who is so blatantly disrespectful?
Disrespectful and full of contempt for his wife. Once the contempt sets in, it’s all over. You have to move on because there is nothing left to save.
Yep. I agree with this pastor.
Asswipe did the same thing. Back to me but friends with her, he still wanted her, loved her but came back to me. Told him no contact with her, he said ok. He didnt stop, she didnt stop and she ramped up her pick me dance and forced his hand. I filed and now hes unfriended. He chased away every friend i ever had re jealous but im supposed to be ok with him being friends with the Whore he left me for! Good friends. Fuck that and him and her! Fucking cake eating bastards and bitches! Listen to traci wife unfriend him!
Here! Here!!!
Dear “The Wife.” You are trying to keep your family intact — but the cost to you is too high. You need to ditch your husband. It will be the most difficult thing you have ever done. But you will be happy again. Now you need to put your brain on lockdown mode and be the toughest mother f-er you have ever been in your life. Think about this: would you ever — in a million years — do what your husband did to you? He has humiliated you in the worst possible way and he is not letting up. He NEVER WILL!!! Wow. I never cease to be appalled at the hubris of our cheaters. Be good to yourself ok??
“You are trying to keep your family intact…”
The “family” you are trying to keep intact is you, your husband, the OW, and your children.
In other words, there are three people sleeping in your bed and you need to move over.
Very astute, CJ!!
This is a great way to put this in perspective!
“I just got my husband back …”
You got something back, alright, but it wasn’t the definition of a husband.
nicely put
Brilliant!!
OMG. Tell him to go love her at her house.
Yep
Yep, go love her at her house. Awesome!
He moved right in with her, when I divorced him. She can barely stand him now, but lets him live in her basement. OMG, what a effing mess. Glad I’m removed from that triangle!
Wait a minute. Calls her the love of his life WHILE married to you, *and* he won’t remove her/her info for good? You are not only eating shit sandwiches, your having shit rubbed in you face! Please, PLEASE do not allow this, yes, allow this… Hey, she is in another state, and it’s only via FB, that’s OK… BULLSHIT, drop the hammer on this cake eating sicko! You are being used by a Jesus cheater, and seemingly taking it. I know how emotionally confused it can be and get, but you must not allow him to do this, and IMO and experience un-husband indeed.
Chances are, you will be seeing him actively cheat again, even under better circumstances, and all but assured as it is now. Again, this scumbag has no respect for you, his children, or even his professed religious values. Please find the courage to dump his sorry, hypocritical still cheating ass… My God, from what he is telling you, can you imagine what this liar is holding back, not telling you? Time to call a good divorce lawyer, and get to a much better life.
My XH has toyed with wanting to come back to me a few times since the divorce. I have no intention of taking him back, but just to prove he isn’t serious about repenting and returning to his family, my answer to him has been the same: “You would have to go 100% no-contact with both [Ho-Worker] and [OWhore].”
And at that, he drops the talk of getting back together, because he has no interest in actually putting those women out of his life.
Never make someone a priority who makes you an option, OP.
It’s amazing that as soon as you set boundaries and conditions they crawl back under their narc rocks… My ex blew his chance by continuing to have contact with other women. When I filed for divorce he feebly attempted to change my mind. However, I wanted nothing more to do with him and told him that I was done, game over. At that he turned nasty and vengeful. I spent 23 years as his wife and I could not be any happier at having escaped that BS circus.
Congratulations wife…. Did he give you a pair of sweatpants with “plan b” on the back, or just the overall treatment of being his second best option to actually keeping you both.
Here’s a thought…. Do you want to be in love and married to a partners who’s best they can offer is “well I can’t have both of you so I guess I’ll stay with you because…. Jesus… Not you. Not all we have had together. Because my soul is at stake otherwise” …. Ugh! He knows you’re so in it for life that he doesn’t even have to pretend you matter? You don’t even make his list of reasons to stay married?
Your 4 kids? You’re showing them exactly how you think men and women should act towards each other. Women don’t matter and men get whatever they want no consequence? Gross. You sound like a smarter parent than that.
Before I read any replies, even CL’s, I’ll just say this:
He’s telling you she’s the love of his life (oh my, I’m fucking swooning over here over the beauty of their love), that you, who gave him four kids, are pretty much just an obligation, and he only came back because she dumped his sorry ass and he knew you were a safe bet and YOU’RE OK WITH THIS?
Wife, he’s treating you like a doormat and you’re saying, ‘Let me shift and accommodate you a bit better so you can REALLY wipe your feet.’
Bloody hell, I’m going to be tough: get a lawyer, get your finances in order, and make plans to move on. No one NO ONE deserves this kind of disrespect.
P.S. You didn’t ‘get your husband back’. You got a loser who knew landing on the doorstep of the wife was a hell of a lot easier than trying to build a life on his own. What an absolute tosspot your husband is. You should be saying, ‘I don’t want HIM in MY life’, and forget about her completely. Divorce him, and see how things work out with the Love of His Life when real life smacks ’em upside the head.
RUN.
And I know from experience, that you can’t get your husband to “see” the errors of his ways nord lists above – because he has clearly demonstrated that he does not or is otherwise incapable of caring about you and truly loving you.
He has disrespected you in an extremely egregious, significant, overt, intentional, damaging, traumatic, destructive manner, and he’s not one bit sorry or concerned about the impact on you. That is your husband in a nutshell. Sorry.
Again, I know this from experience (and I am not projecting – I am just reiterating the facts demonstrated by HIS BEHAVIOR).
Nord is so right! Wife, I have been there, your only viable move is to run now.
If you stay while he treats you like a doormat, it will get worse. You are showing him that he can get away with treating you like a doormat. He will do worse. Wife, I did the same thing as well. He wanted his “friend” and “collegue”. He was so depressed and so alone and suicidal, how could I take a “friend” away from him? It did’nt matter anyway, why could’nt I just get over it? I caved in and guess what? When things were over with this “friend” he got other friends. And that’s something I brought on myself by accepting the unacceptable. I’m divorced now and I can’t believe I accepted that shit! What was I thinking?
You should be SO much more important than a Facebook post if their affair was over… He’s choosing to keep an eye on her from afar over you: it’s wrong! You are asking for something very reasonnable and he makes it look like it’s a whim. It’s not. You should’nt have to aks for it, that’s the real problem here.
“if you stay he treats you like a doormat” – exactly, and this is yet another dynamic that the RIC and the Esther Perels just gloss over and fail to address with any substance, except to say that in order to trust them, you must trust them.
If your spouse treats you badly (cheats/betrays/consumes family resources for activities that destroy the family) and you take them back, they know they got away with it and can get away with it again. Given they are the type that cheated in the first place, they are the type that is only more emboldened now, knowing they absolutely can get away with it.
Originally, when they had everything to lose, they cheated anyways because they felt entitled to do so. So now that they know they don’t have to lose anything, why would they not cheat again given the opportunity? The risk is actually lower now because they really didn’t lose anything.
Unfortunately, the only way to let these types know that it isn’t OK, is to divorce them.
So am I saying reconciliation isn’t possible? Not necessarily, but it would take a truly remorseful, empathetic, non-entitled, non-narcissistic person to reconcile. But how many truly considerate, empathetic, self-less, non-entitled, reciprocal, loving, loyal people who cheat in the first place?
Play his game while you lawyer up. When he is served go no contact. Then you will do what you need to do for you and kids. It will be hell on earth for a while. Finding yourself will help u along the way. Stay with us. Read no contact with children. Learn and read about the process. Come for support. When u start giving support u are well on your way through the process. End this nonsense NOW.
Read all these in the link Wife, your husband is breaking them ALL! And God would want you and your children away from him. It’s your duty as a Mother to leave him from what I understand. He is NO Godly Man!!!! He’s the Opposite of one and therefore BAD for your family.
https://www.openbible.info/topics/husbands_and_wives
Dear Wife,
Establish boundaries STAT. Divorce this loser. Move on with your life. You deserve better.
I recently stumbled across the following (see below) on the internet and I think these are words to live by. I do not know who wrote this but I suggest you print this, hang it up where you will see it and read it to yourself every single day.
Sometimes the more chances you give
The more respect you lose.
Your standards begin to be ignored when you
let people get comfortable in knowing that
Another chance will always exist.
They start to depend on your forgiveness.
That’s why I am no longer a slave to apologies.
Treat me right the first time
Because I can’t guarantee you a next time.
It is impossible to keep me
once you’ve lost my trust.
I’m not saying you have to be afraid to lose me
what I am saying is…
I am not afraid to walk away.
That is excellent, Vegan Chump. Thanks for sharing.
@Lyn,
These are words to live by for sure. When I stumbled across it I had to print it and hang it on my bathroom mirror.
Thanks, VC! Hard-earned words.
I agree with Phoebenix, reading this letter brought back those feelings of helplessness. No matter what you do, how much you try to be “understanding,” they won’t stop being involved with the “love of their lives.” (In my case, even if they’re married to someone else too). It’s sick. It’s humiliating. Reading this letter reminds me of how much respect Iost for myself when I stayed in a relationship like that for so long. The problem is Chumps are sacrificial, they’ll sacrifice themselves on the alter of keeping the family together. That was what I wanted more than anything and I gave away everything I wanted in order to keep us together. It didn’t work. It didn’t work. It didn’t work.
Dear Wife, you deserve more love and compassion from yourself. You deserve more than being someone else’s plan B. You can love yourself more than he ever will. Start taking steps to become more independent now. Build up your social networks, enlist a good counselor, talk to a lawyer. Make a plan.
My first reaction to this was WHAT!!?? You’re putting up with this!? You got your husband back!? No you didn’t. He checked out over a year ago. And my second is that people love to drag Christianity through the mud. His values are obviously NOT Christian. “By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” Obviously he doesn’t love you as a husband should love a wife, Wife. Do what CL said and un-husband him.
Michael, “you got your husband back”, When I read this I thought, oh goodness, throw him back. x told me in one of his tries to get me back, “I’m back”. He was talking about one time when I told him that I wanted my “old x back” not this new and improved x and he told me that the old x would never be back.
So in my case which was it, he “found” himself again or he was feeling like a sad sausage because I wasn’t there to be the hypotenuse in his “love” triangle. You can never get a straight, true answer from these crazy cheaters. But you can be sure that whatever their angle is, it is all in their favor and never a thought to the chump or their feelings.
“I’m back”….just like Jack Nicholson in the Shining
Heeeeeere’s Johnny! LOL
Wife
You won him back by default. He’s greiving the loss of losing the love of his life? What about you and his children?
She dumped him. There must be a basement somewhere, yet he now wants the comforts YOU were providing all along. Fuck that shit. He didn’t find Jesus, he has you to fall back on.
What does he want to be when he grows up? A man?
Get angry, lose the HE, there is no WE in your relationship. Drop the unconditional love. He’s not a child.
Consequences are key. Divorcing him means he will have to pay child support for four children. He will have to spend time with his children and be responsible for their care on the days he has them. He would rather lick his wounds under your roof.
Your better than that. You deserve much more. He’s an abusine asshole who loves only himself.
Wife,
How can you stay in a marriage where you KNOW that the OW is “the love of his life”? You KNOW, that if she hadn’t dumped him, he wouldn’t of ended the affair, and he wouldn’t of come back to you. You KNOW this, and yet you find this acceptable to YOU? Why would you want to say with someone that does not love you?
Look, it’s very very hard leaving your marriage. But isn’t it so much harder to look at your husband knowing he’d rather be elsewhere, to have sex with your husband, to PRETEND that you are a happy couple? And if you have kids, is this the example you want to set for them?
I live a year of hell, because my EX, refused to leave, refused to stop contact with OW (as he would say, he would do that when it’s right for him) whaaat? So I lived in limbo for 1 whole year of HELL. I allowed that behavior, by thinking then, that he needed to decide. No, now I know that I needed to decide what was best for ME, not him. Like CL said, you only control YOU, you can’t control him.
So are you going to accept KNOWING that you are is Plan B? Is that good enough for you?
I suspect that The Wife is a stay-at-home-mom. We’ve had several SAHMs (and a few SAHDs), and they are extremely financially vulnerable. If my assumption is correct, then probably the safest course would be for The Wife to make steps to reenter the workforce and to talk with a lawyer about getting some kind of temporary spousal support in place for a few years.
The Wife, if you’re reading this, you’ll probably need to start putting money away and establish credit under your own name. Pin money is a wonderful thing (go read up on it). Read up on how to establish credit and how to use credit cards without having the cards use you. 😉
Also stock up on $25 gift cards each time you go to the grocery store, as a safety net.
Brilliant idea. Where I live, these cards when purchased at a local supermarket carry points that accumulate for free gasoline. When you get the free gas, the money that would have gone for gas can also go into your savings.
Hitting way to close to home, kb.
WIFE- the guy is a clown who cares nothing for you or for your four children. I got the sob story that asshat and his MOW had to break up to “do the right thing!” Lemme tell you what the Right Thing is: it is putting your wife and children before his penile needs/magic pussy. Always. It is empathy, integrity, honesty and respect lavished on your partner and children.Not flying the Jesus Cheater flag when it suits his image. He’s a lying hypocrite willing to bet your self esteem is ZERO and that you would settle for shit, him that is.
Let him LIVE!LAUGH!LOVE! by filing for divorce. Don’t tell him, just get your ducks in a row and then have that fucker served. Show your kids that this is not how adults treat each other in healthy relationships. That healthy adults make their partners a priority, not their fuckbuddies.
Wanted to add…how does it make you feel when he says he wants to remain in contact with his fuckbuddy because he is so worried about her emotional well being post break up?
Where do you even figure into his hierarchy of people who are important to him? I got the SAME statement. It was pretty clear where I stood when there was zero consideration about the emotional rape he inflicted upon me. We are just things to these assholes. We are not a priority and we are not treated as humans, let alone as the legitimate legal spouses to these cheating assholes.
I’m riled up because this creep has fucked with your head for so long. He has chipped your self worth to nothing. Don’t consider letting this asshole have his cake. You are not his mother. You were his wife and that never mattered to him. He needs to go. You have a much better life ahead of you without someone stealing your joy and giving it to a fuckbuddy.
ANC, ^^^^ this exactly. Where is the consideration for the wife and kids and what your “husband” put you through for an entire year.
It’s the “love of his life” thing that I don’t understand. Is he a twelve year old? You get to make choices about who you let into your life, and who you love. If that’s his mentality, then he’ll never take responsibility for his actions, now or in the future. It’s the, sad sausage I just couldn’t help it because it was bigger than me and meant to be, justification that should never come from a grown man’s mouth. He’s watched one too many romantic comedies. How can she be the “love of his life,” but the woman who HE CHOSE to have four children with is not?
DN yes he is a child. Obviously he doesn’t know what true love is and that’s what stumps a lot of people including myself. That irrational thinking on the cheaters part – the power of being “in-love” is higher than everything (even your family). As ludicrous as it is, that’s what the cheater truly believes – that’s what we were all up against when we attempted reconciliation. That’s why reconciliation barely succeeds. All I can think of is these cheaters have a preconceived notion of that true love is or should be. It must last forever like in the Disney movies and Lifetime channel. These are the same people buying swamp land in Florida, very naïve inept people. I can not untangle that skein.
Yes, buying swampland after hiking the Appalachian Trail.
SureChumpedAlot, hmmmm, the in-love thing. I got the whole spiel about how x was in love with schmoopie and trying to be “in love” with me was just not something that he could do. He told me that love should just come easy, there is no “work on the marriage” for him, there is nothing else but the first blush of “falling in love” and after that there is nothing else to work on, both parties should just be, at all times, loving and in love. Now, if I wasn’t complete NC, I would love to ask him “how’s that no working on love thing” going for him. She dumped his stupid ass 6 months after he left me to be with his twu luv. I’m just bummed because it only took that bitch “6 months” to see that twu luv with the x was just not going to happen. 🙂
Hiya Dee – Yup I heard the same thing from my now ex-wife, “ILYBINILWY” – just the most cruel words especially when the words only come as you just discovered their affair and when you are the most vulnerable. Your ex-turd is in my opinion is one of many people that believes that “love should just come easy” or “there shouldn’t be any work on the marriage”. Just absolutely preposterous and immature! These turds will never change. The people are BROKEN in the dept of knowing what true love is. True love to them is that “feeling” and only that feeling. Us mature folks knows that feeling, “in-love” is a wonderful feeling but it can’t last every moment of every day. Biologically impossible. These bottom feeders are also broken in the department of knowing how to transition from “in-love” into a loving relationship which is much deeper. A loving marriage is when a deeper love takes place from the shallow “in-love”. That deeper love to me is treating someone on how it makes them feel and not how it makes me feel. Cheaters will never get this plus all of them have serious character flaws!
Funny analogy for you… Lets say you and (at the time) your husband decided that you were both going to plant seeds in 2 separate garden beds in order to gain the most beautiful, fragrant, gorgeous and colorful roses ever (kind of like marriage).
DeeL: You decide to plant them in the bed in the part of the backyard that has the most and longest daily sunshine. You sow, you add fertilizer and gently place the seeds in the dirt. You water them daily until one day you see that the roses are starting to come up. You continue to water them. Before you know it, whallah your roses are getting big and gorgeous, they smell so beautiful and you are ecstatic. You sit back and enjoy but you keep watering and feeding them. Next day to stimulate growth you decide to prune them. Takes a little time to prune and you get pricked a couple of times but your roses are ready to continue to grow. A week or so comes and wow!!! you have twice as many roses that are blooming plus some additional colors of roses because of your pruning efforts. You are now on cloud nine.Then one day a terrible very windy storm is coming so you decide to go in your backyard and to protect your most gorgeous roses you wrap them with thin burlap until the storm subsides. The following day, worried, you take off the burlap and to your thrill your roses survived and they still look fantastic. So what is Dee doing now… she continues to water and feed the roses. Dee you are probably one of those people that can have a rose bush forever!
x-Turd- Do I really need to get into on telling you how a cheater would grow a rose bush? LOL
I agree with you, only 6 months – should of been much more! Stay No Contact, stay mighty and only give your love to people like your wonderful self!
OMFG! This is EXACTLY my idiot STBX. He works hard at work why should he have to work in a relationship. When you are in a relationship it should all just happen. It’s because we have different love languages that it didn’t work out for us. So since the whoremat’s love language is open my legs for any guy that pays one iota of attention to me then that means it’s real, real, real, true, true, true WUV! And I even said to him “this is all an infatuation! It’s not LOVE!” “It’s NOT and infatuation!” Uh, you’ve known her for 5 months. Its INFATUATION you ass! LOVE is being in a marriage, putting up with the person you picked’s shit and at the end of the day still wanting to be with them because you love them. He is SURE arhat this is going to work out with the OW because infatuation can turn INTO love. Well yeah it can. But not when your relationship is based on lies and fantasyland with two extremely damaged people! ???
Wait…what?? He tells you SHE’s the “love of his life” AND “he needs to stay in contact with her to make sure SHE’s ok” ? Oh. Hell. No.
EXACTLY what I thought when I read Wife’s post. SMH.
Oh the hell no is right. What an arrogant, selfish cheater, and definstely not concerned for you or your feelings. He came back because he was dumped period. Are you willing to live with this?
You’re doing the best you can right now but this situation is hurting you (and your kids) more than kicking him out will. And it’s okay to change your mind about him even if you just spent time “fighting” for him.
They are not doing the “right” thing – and making this “okay” is not helping.
Kick him to the curb
YES yes yes!!!!! it is okay to change your mind! This really cannot be overstated. No matter how long it takes, no matter what you went thru on the way, no matter how committed you were to working it out at some point, once you decide this really isn’t ok with you, you can say “No more! I want out!” You are allowed to release yourself from a commitment that he already trampled. In fact, that is the healthy, responsible, honorable thing to do!
Exactly what Arlo said, Wife, you can change your mind about taking him and his less than stellar return at any time. You have to start to think what is best for you and your children. Please read this blog thoroughly, you will find so many stories on here that will speak to you and you will find that you are dealing with a garden variety fuckwit, that has no thoughts on what he has put you or your children through.
Once upon a time, my husband said he was only friends with the OW. Nothing had REALLY happened. A kiss on the cheek, despite her “drunken email about what she was HOPING would be true one day.” It was nothing… they could be friends. See how the other was doing.
I had 3 children, 2 years, 1 year, and a newborn. I had just given Cheater a job *I’d* been offered, to hopefully give himself confidence enough to not need those kinds of friends to tell sob stories to anymore.
It continued for another year and a half, at least, which I didn’t find out about until 9 years later. I didn’t find out just how much they were NOT “just friends” until 9 years later.
But even though he wasn’t seeing HER anymore, that didn’t stop him from starting up other affairs. I thought I had a unicorn for 6 years. But I’d already shown him just how gullible I was, the first time. He knew he could. My staying with him showed him he could. And rather than be GRATEFUL for another chance, he exploited it.
Because he wanted to.
Cheaters WANT to cheat. They don’t think of the consequences… and it’s only up to you to show him what they are. And never look back. He IS who he WANTS to be. You cannot change that.
Cheaters want to cheat.
You bet your ass.
That’s it. Perfectly summed up.
“I just got my husband BACK after a year long affair he had” Ummm, no. you. didn’t. Please take the longest view and teach your children that this arrangement is unacceptable to you.
Read this book, I Don”t Love You Anymore by David Clarke,PH. D. It will show you how your husband is full of shit. What he is trying to do is NOT in line with Christian values.Maintaining contact on any level is unacceptable.
Can’t comment now. Beating my head into my desk.
Oh, me too. Just sitting here stunned that she thinks “getting him back” was a good thing.
My first thought when I read “I just got my husband back” was:
No, you don’t ‘get your husband back’ from anyone. You get things like your dry cleaning ‘back’ or a book that you have loaned; not your husband…..
although, if we flesh out the analogy, you can return your library book, or throw out a shirt that just came back from the cleaner’s. I’d recommend doing the same with the hubby who “returned.”
Exactly.
Oh shit Rumblekitty!!! I just LOVE your perspective on these dilemmas!!!! I almost spit coffee all over my screen!!!! I cannot stop LAUGHING!!!
Truly Wife! LEAVE HIS CHEATING ASS IN THE WIND! Go live your life free of the insanity you call husband!
Ditto.
What would happen if you let him ? Hmmm… Let’s see what happened to me after I forgave what I thought was a crush abroad with a woman who was going to stay abroad…
– He lives with his phone glued to his body
– He gets up at night to check his phone, goes to another room and texts
– When we go on vacation, there is this strange impression that someone else is with us at all times
– Sex becomes complicated and mechanical
– He says cruel things with a smirk, with a “nothing to lose” attitude
– Being with him is never natural any more, I am like an actress
– I discover new data about his affair, he was planning to marry her, he saw her more than I had thought
– If a woman hikes too close to us, I get unexplainable anger attack
– I am never relaxed, I am worried about my makeup, my clothes, even if it’s only to walk the dogs
– He starts a relationship with another woman
– He invites the other woman to show her the area and suggests I go with them so I can verify that “nothing happens”
Now consider a princess in a fairy tale. Would Prince charming sound right if he said to the pretty blonde character what your husband says to you ? In my case, not.
No love there. Time to leave.
I had a similar experience.
Wife, please know that it is extremely difficult to get past the first infidelity. You can try your best but in time it doesn’t get better….it gets worse. My EX got craftier, the lies continued and the worst part — the gaslighting — ramped up.
You are not judged because you didn’t forgive him. He is judged by betraying you.
You deserve better.
Damn that was the best description of my life during ‘reconciliation’ that I have ever seen. Yikes, I have goosebumps now
Wow! What a great post re what it feels like living thru false reconciliation.
About a year after agreeing to NC with “the love of his life”, my ex was spending a lot of time in the bathroom with his laptop. Finding out he was still in contact with her (and probably spanking his monkey to the endless selfie shots she took of herself) was the final straw for me.
It’s who they are, Wife, it’s who they are.
And the sorry truth is that you have already been discarded. You just haven’t realized it yet.
Start building your new cheater free life.
We’ll have your back.
ChmpfromF, what you describe is exactly the sort of suffering I went through. I will never, ever expose myself to that level of pain and demoralisation again.
Wife, you did not get your husband back. He’s gone, and he is not coming back.
And think about your children. You are teaching them that it’s OK for men to cheat, and that the correct response is for a woman to shove all the hurt and pain and anger down into a little ball so that she can focus all your energies on Winning the Pick Me Dance.
“Look, girls! Look how well Mommy is doing with unconditional love! Look how unhappy that can make you! And the more unhappy you are, the prettier you have to dance!”
“Look, boys! Daddy got to check out of his marriage for a year, and then Mommy took him back again with zero consequences! And he gets to stay in touch with the pretty lady who he really loves, but gets Mommy to do his laundry and cook his meals! Now boys, you make sure that when you get married, you pick a lady just like Mommy, because she will do anything you want!”
7 years ago, my H had a “friend” in a “war college” course. He was a senior officer in the Army. At graduation, the “friend” called me from a cell phone of his that he said he had lost, just so I would know. When the course was over, he expressed a great deal of anger at ME. I accepted the story of a friendship. He seemed to calm down for a couple of years, but then he became keen to leave the military. After a few months, he announced that he was taking a job overseas.
Before he left, he:
Started another affair with a woman in another country.
Was glued to the computer.
Gave me list of things to do so I would leave the house, freeing him to be on the computer.
I was working. All he contributed for a time was a pension. He set up eBay business, sold my things and began sending OW#2 the money by PayPal.
Began supporting OW#2’s kids and spending Xmas with her and her kids, claiming he could not get leave to come home.
Freely showed up in her town and acted like her boyfriend.
Told people overseas that we were separated or divorced.
When this came out, he was still nostalgic for his “friend” from years before. He told me that they were “like Forrest and Jenny, like peas and carrots.”
He told me OW#2 was a “neat person” and he “got lost.”
He would not give me a divorce. I am having to fight for it every step of the way. (Ours is a fault state; it takes longer.)
I was a confident woman. Very highly educated. People told me I was smart, beautiful and funny. I allowed myself to be treated with vicious disrespect and abuse, like I was not even human.
Wife, you are doing the same. Your kids know this. Do not continue to allow them to see you be treated with disrespect. Divorce him. It will be excruciatingly painful, like a rebirth. But you will die if you don’t.
Should you “allow” him to keep her on his FB?
He’s a grown ass man, you’re not his mother. Its not a question of allowing anything.
The question is does he have enough respect for you and your marriage to cut off contact with the whorebag? I think you already know the answer to that. I say you “allow” him to remain in contact with the whore bag.
And you allow yourself the dignity and self respect to walk away from this loser.
Exactly. And Amen.
Perfect summary and course of action gepster!
Wife, I am so sorry that you were put in this situation, there are no good options unfortunately, just a whole lot of pain and grief. TRUST THAT HE SUCKS, but beyond anything, trust that you can build a better future for yourself and your kids by leaving him.
You have rights as his wife and mother of his kids. Start therapy for yourself with a therapist specialized in abusive/controlling spouses. Don’t have sex with your husband any more, tell him that you need to rebuild trust with him first. Any sexual contact after you have learned about his affair can be deemed as the fact that you have forgiven him.
Go about your family logistics as usual, but while he is at work, gather your evidence, get copies of all financials and all correspondence, get a lawyer as well as build a nest egg and grocery gift cards as much as you can.
When you have all your ducks lined up and your support team in place, don’t tell your husband anything, file, stay safe, and move forward based on your lawyer’s advice.
Keep coming here for support, we have your back!
(((Wife)))
Wife,
Your husband has only one love of his life, and that’s himself. Christian values say that a man must love his wife as Christ loved the church and gave Himself for it. Your husband’s idea of sacrificial love is a joke, but is not funny at ALL.
It’s a matter of time before he reunites with her.
Reunites?
He never left.
In Biblical times, there wasn’t Facebook but there are multiple passages on how adultery in a mortal sin. In fact it’s the only marital offense that’s included in the 10 Commandments. How do you wrap your head around that?
He returned to you because he doesn’t want to lose face, at least half his money, and because the Love of His Life has no interest in taking on 4 children, even if it’s just every other weekend. It’s not because he cares about you or the Baby Jesus.
If you’re content with being his room mate, brood mare and cleaning lady, then by all means, accept this friendship. But if you expect to be loved by your husband as Christ loves his Church, you’re with the wrong man.
Lulu, your reference to a wife being loved by her husband like Christ loved the Church really resonated like a big, big bell in my head. Christ suffered deeply for the future Church, and for his relationship with God. Jesus cheaters in particular really get my ire up, probably because of the false, swanning piety they love to drape over their hypocrisy and lies. Jesus cheaters love to throw that same false piety like pebbles into the deep gaping holes of betrayal they leave behind them and then gaslight you for the rage you feel for such a contemptuous gesture. I feel sorry for the “love of his life” (mistress) and for you. Your husband is not capable of love. He is simply an empty man who threw away his marriage and his family for a mirage.
@Wife. This is a pretty blatant and pathetic play for cake. Online connections are like cockroaches, see one, know there are ten to hundred more hidden. My ex hid a number of his EAs online for months, and when I found out about a tiny part of it, I knew how much more was hidden. I was so hurt by the betrayal I didn’t even bother to verify. My trust had already been broken and there was no reason to continue onward. I put pieces together, listened to my gut, and prepared to GTFO. Commitment stands up of its own accord, deletes all those online connections, accounts, and presents itself to you with open transparency. You should never have to ask it of YOUR HUSBAND.
For what its worth, your husband is on the worthy/sexy playing field of cake. You, wife, are the “worthy” partner who does the heavy lifting of domesticity: (cleaning lady, cook, maid, errands, accountant) and of motherhood. HIs mistress provides the sparkle and sexy, and its always easy to call anyone “the love of your life” when you are in limerance. Affairs are not grounded in daily reality, which is why they are always in a state of limerance, and why they so frequently fall apart once affair partners live together.
The problem is in your cheating husband’s head. Until he heals that worthy/sexy rift, until he reaches emotional maturity capable of adult love (probably 20 years from now), and until he understands that his entitlement will founder any relationship (children, employment, friends, and obviously the great psychological undertaking called marriage), he is no candidate for reconciliation. He sucks. And in all reality, he gives crumbs to all his relationships. You know, turd dust from his great, stinking, glittery, stench.
You are worth more than the turd dust falling from him. Go find a happy life, sans sparkly turd.
You make some interesting points. However, the fact that the Cheater is trying to maintain both his marriage and hold onto his affair partner (whether as an emotional affair or more likely a full-blown affair) suggests that he won’t change in 20 years or 200 years. He doesn’t care about anyone but himself. There’s no remorse for hurting his family. He’s back because it serves HIM. He has, based on her letter, all the hallmarks of someone pretty far out on the narcissist spectrum.
Yeah, I doubt he is going to change any time soon. I guess my 20 years came from a rhetorical standpoint of “who wants to wait 20 years?” Leave now, don’t wait 20 years and have this cycle keep repeating!!
And yes, you’re absolutely right. Its just one of the usual strategies to maintain narcissistic supply from the AP while manipulating his wife. He is just playing for time while he lines up more supply. I was trying to say to this woman, “Hey, don’t end up as a wife appliance!” Narcissists always know what is of value to them. Spouse appliances are always very valuable. They don’t want to lose their nice spouse appliance.
I have a dream of a great future in which AI creates spousal appliances marketed to the fucktards of Earth. Domestic humanoid robots, in which narcissists can purchase spouse robots, sex robots, maids, etc. Then they can just stay out of the gene pool, and be occupied by their robots. This would leave the dating pool so much cleaner for normal people. And in a sequel, after humans find love among one another, the narcissists are destroyed by a revolt of their robots.
My ex liked to throw The Bible at me as well when it suited his purposes, particularly Old Testament passages regarding wifely obedience. He claims that he never cheated physically (just chatted online and texted).
To that I responded: “But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” (Matthew 5:28) @TheWife, maybe your husband needs a reminder of this.
A lot of people mis-interpret that passage to mean that it’s offensive to find other people physically attractive, but in context, it means that if you’re focusing your sexual and romantic energies on a person who isn’t your spouse (regardless of whether you actually have sex), you’re committing adultery.
I think that’s the best Biblical explanation I have ever seen regarding emotional affairs and emotional fidelity. I am really sorry to hear about your pontificating ogre of a husband.
+1
I am sad for you because I tried to acknowledge his grief and his loss every single time I MADE him stop contacting the fuckbitchwhore. I “managed” his affair for him by even encouraging him to make sure she was OK. Want to know what happened…in the end HE left ME because I was “hard to live with.” Trust that he sucks, and trust that this is not how you want to live your life. I know how gut wrenching it is to walk away from the hope. But I pray you have the courage to take care of you. Affair or not, he is actively choosing not to honor you.
Thank you, zmichelle, for sharing your experience. I am still in limbo, and what you’re describing is truly how I see my life playing out. Even IF I give the Serial Cheater in my marriage every benefit of the doubt about his current intentions and level of commitment (which logic, by the way, tells me I should not) I do not feel safe or comfortable, and continuing to live with him feels like taking a big sloppy bite of the shit sandwich each and every day. I’m sad, angry, resentful, insecure — just dark.
And what I anticipate is that when the timing is right for HIM — say, in 8-10 years when I’m menopausal and he won’t need child care or have to pay child support and he has attained full vestment in his retirement, and he’s the “distinguished older gentleman” to my “wrinkly, bitter hag” — he’ll just HAVE to leave me because I never forgave and I’m too difficult. Yeah, he’ll leave me. I know (thought don’t want to accept) that he will.
I’m sorry for your pain, zmichelle. I don’t want to listen to your cautionary tale, but I should.
And, Wife from this thread, you deserve better. I’m sorry for your intense pain, too.
Chumpadilly, So sorry you are in limbo. But how acutely intelligent you are to have figured out where you situation is taking you. I hope you consider writing a different story with your life. You may feel trapped for some reason (the kids, money, etc.). But you don’t have to wait until starting over is harder, until he has figured out how to keep his pension for himself, until the kids are gone and you are left to start over alone.
That doesn’t mean you have to leave today. But if you make a plan, set a deadline, and get your ducks in a row, you can figure out how to have a life that doesn’t mean living with someone you can trust. That’s not marriage. That’s prison.
Go back and read the mightiness posts from Friday. You can live on a sailboat, adopt a dog or cat, climb a mountain, get a degree, change jobs, downsize to an apartment, start painting watercolors. We get one life. Just one. Don’t wait it living in a shell of a marriage with a man you don’t trust. Of course, leaving will be hard. The kids won’t like it. Money may be tight. You might have to live in a smaller house. But you won’t be living a lie. Your post shows how bright and caring you are. You deserve better.
Oh dear Chumpadilly, you foresee a future that I never did. You are EXACTLY right. For 6 years I fought their emotional affair and waited for him to find clarity, compassion and a conscience. Instead, he waited until our youngest was graduating high school, until I had an established career, and when I started getting busy with state board positions. He even admitted he “waited and waited” for things to get better or for when he knew the time was right to leave me for her. And he blamed me on his way out the door.
OR, what I saw as my future was that my cheating husband (now ex) had no intention of ever changing his ways nor did he want to end our marriage. He liked the security of having me around AND the thrills derived by his serial cheating. I saw my “golden years” as just a continuance of being stuck in that hellish limbo. I decided that I would be far better off living alone without him than living alone with him…
Chumpadilly, “And what I anticipate is that when the timing is right for HIM — say, in 8-10 years when I’m menopausal and he won’t need child care or have to pay child support and he has attained full vestment in his retirement, and he’s the “distinguished older gentleman” to my “wrinkly, bitter hag” — he’ll just HAVE to leave me because I never forgave and I’m too difficult. Yeah, he’ll leave me. I know (thought don’t want to accept) that he will.”
I’m sorry for your pain, zmichelle. I don’t want to listen to your cautionary tale, but I should.”
You’ve told my story. Please plan and plan some more so that you will not have to suffer anymore pain than you already have. Please save yourself. x took 7 years of my life, maybe I should say I let him take 7 years of wreckonciliation after d-day 1, and that is no damn way to live. He was a fuckwit then and he continued to be an emotionally abusive fuckwit for years. I deserve and deserved better, I stayed for the kids and guess what, the kids did not appreciate not one damn bit of my effort. It’s heartbreaking all the way through but it is what it is and now I am free. I went so long, without so much that I am having a hard time forgiving my stupidity and making a new life for myself. I think that I will eventually get to a good place, but I wish that I had started out 10 years ago instead.
Tracy, I so wish you were around after DD#1 for me. It is just such good advice.
Wife, I have to be honest here. I just can’t get beyond: “she was the love of his life, and he still cares about her”. What in the world does that make you? Why are you accepting ‘sloppy seconds’?
I just do not understand the reason for not getting a divorce. Sure it sucks but he will be a father to your 4 kids, In fact, your husband can even have full custody of them. You still have a full life. You still can be a good Christian. Your kids are not broken. You did not fail. It means that you don’t agree to behavior that is abusive and frankly non-Christian.
it really sucks but you can get through this. Find a good counselor to help you.
Excellent advice from everyone here–although I know you won’t want to hear it, Wife.
I know. I’ve been there.
I believed my ex and the MOW when they said there was nothing like “that” between them.
6 years later…Yes. SIX!! He left me for her.
The long-distance star-crossed lover routine is powerful with these kinds of people and the more they “have” to be apart, the more they will want to be together. In my case, yeah…he was back with me physically but really never emotionally, although he put on a VERY CONVINCING act. They went underground and their affair was stronger than ever.
I didn’t find out until after he left what had gone on for those 6 years. There was a lot of her dumping him…and him chasing her. Lots of game playing. Lots of lying. Lots of “excitement of the chase.”
Sick. All of it.
I beg you…DO NOT BE ME!
You need to come to grips with the fact that the man you THOUGHT you knew is NOT that man.
This is one of the most difficult aspects of all of this.
You need to get him as far away from you as possible. RIGHT NOW!
Also, find a counselor who will work through this with you. You need a mental health professional who can help you see that someone who does this has a personality disorder or mental illness and it is not someone you would want to be married to–short term or long term!
If he can play these games–and lie to you, the family, the OW–he is capable of all sorts of things.
Believe me on this.
Jesus, what is so wrong with this woman that she’s willing to settle for a steady diet of such a huge festering shit sandwich? She ‘just got him back?’ Like she just won some kind of freakin’ PRIZE or something? What makes a person lower themselves to to the point where they want to keep a piece of crud like this around? Is it having ZERO expectations? Desperation? No other options? Fear of being alone? Financial dependence on this piece of crap? I’m just floored at how some women will just continue to swallow every single ounce of their pride.
ChumpLadyFan: It’s probably all of those things. She is, like all of us are, survivors of abuse. Go easy on her – this place is supposed to be a safe place of support.
Wife: Your letter conjured an image in my mind. That every night, when you go to bed alongside your husband, he is next to you cuddling with her. That’s a terribly lonely place for you. Please heed the advice here before he wipes you out financially and does even more damage to your self-esteem.
It’s not just women who put up with this, male chumps have done it too.
Also, we try to lift other chumps up, even though sometimes it really is frustrating . . . I had a friend doing the same kind of thing with her boyfriend. I just want to shake her.
Agreed RumbleKitty. I’m standing proof as a male who has done it also. Very humiliating as we all know. I guess that makes me a male dancer. LOL
Hot! 🙂
ChumpLadyFan
“What is wrong with this woman” isn’t exactly a 2×4. It’s putting the blame on the victim. I personally found your post hurtful and judgemental. I took it very personally because as many chumps we stayed and had to come to terms with the devastation that comes when our lives are blown apart by the person we reproduced with,forgave, and trusted. While there were many reasons I stayed I believe conquering our fears through kindness, love and support is HOW I gained the strength to leave.
What I can’t believe is how you framed your post to further insult a victim who has endured the gut wrenching pain of infidelity. When in pain-blame, comes straight from cheaters playbook.
Are you a chump or a cheater?
Agree, Donna.
I think sometimes, in finding the dark humor necessary for Chump survival of ClusterfuckB tendencies, we can forget there is a human on the end of these questions, and a hurting one at that.
We have all experienced, and are still living through the emotional, financial, sexual and physical effects of infidelity. Which can include some serious brainwashing. Stockholm syndrome, or at least enough cognitive dissonance to power Texas. If it were as easy (or simple) as some CN comments (including my own) make it out to be, then we wouldn’t be here, and there would be no need for this community.
So how about we let they who have one foot in the land of Meh cast the first 2×4?
Remembering that no one who visits these pages regularly is entirely at “Meh”, least of all someone writing to Chump Lady for the first time.
x-Meh.
“He returned to his family because he wants to do the “right” thing, and because we have four kids, and because his Christian values are important to him (not because he doesn’t love her).”
Umm…exactly WHAT “Christian values” is he talking about?! What page in ANY Christian does it say, “Thou shall stay married and keep thy affair partner as a ‘friend'”????
Did he skip over the part that said, “Thou shall *NOT* commit adultery?” How about, “Thou shall *NOT* covet thy neighbor’s wife”? And “Thou shall *NOT* covet they neighbor’s goods”? Or Thou shall *NOT* bear false witness?
Y’know, a lot of people (including cheaters) have quoted the Bible as saying, “God hates divorce”. But they don’t read the preceding verses that I’ll quote here for you:
“Another thing you do: You flood the LORD’s altar with tears. You weep and wail because he no longer looks with favor on your offerings or accepts them with pleasure from your hands.You ask, “Why?” It is because the LORD is the witness between you and the wife of your youth. You have been unfaithful to her, though she is your partner, the wife of your marriage covenant.Has not the one God made you? You belong to him in body and spirit. And what does the one God seek? Godly offspring. So be on your guard, and do not be unfaithful to the wife of your youth.”
I do believe that Jesus allows divorce in the case of infidelity Your husband is STILL being unfaithful to you, and I can almost guarantee you that they will probably get back together again at some point.
Please leave all of the drama behind. For your own sanity.
Was going to add this in addition to my earlier post, but my ‘reply’ button isn’t cooperating!
What about the Christian value of DO UNTO OTHERS.
Do you think for a moment that he would like it if YOU were the one who cheated, came back to him and wanted to keep YOUR affair partner as a “friend”????
Amen Gypsy. Thank you…
Oh I was once This Wife. The management of the OW- how exhausting. All that pleading to unfriend her, not contact her. It was part of the pick me dance of death rather than any faux reconciliation although I was under the horrible influence of Anne Bercht’s book ‘My husband’s affair became the best thing that ever happened to me.’ Breaking contact with the affair partner is seen as the golden key to reconciliation. So I just hammered away at the break contact mantra. It didn’t occur to me that there was any way out of the affair nightmare but through the Recon revolving door.
Reconciliation really suits Brian Bercht- “Lucky for me my wife refused to give up on our marriage. We are now closer and more committed than ever.” Yes I definitely saw it through Lucky Brian’s eyes. When somebody asked me the same question as CL here- “What about you? What do you want”. I really didn’t know. I was the rabbit caught in the headlights, worrying about the welfare of the manic driver heading my way.
Eventually I realised that he was choosing OW and not me and however unfair it seemed I had to accept that and get out of the marriage. As I like to say, he made a choice and I made a decision. Yes, my husband’s affair became the best thing that ever happened to me. I got divorced.
I’ve always hated that book.
Where I got hung up? If Brian is such an awesome husband, why did he need an affair to become that way? Or worse, why does Anne believe that the affair was the only way for their marriage to get better. Deludinoids!
Yeah, I tore my copy up and threw it in the bin. And I never destroy books usually. Did not want to give it away and contaminate some other poor chump.
“As I like to say, he made a choice and I made a decision.”
Ooh I like that A LOT. I’m going to remember that.
Her brainwashed look on their website convinced me to hightail it out of Dodge after D-day; no way I was going to end up broken or a Stepford Wife. Buh bye, cheater.
In pitching my own book to agents/publishers, I had to mention the other best sellers in infidelity lit, and of course, I added that title.
People didn’t believe me. As recently as a BBC producer who got in touch after the AM hack — NO, SERIOUSLY? There is a book titled THAT? And it SELLS?
Yeah, not only does it sell, but that is the predominant advice out there. The Affair Will Make Your Marriage Stronger.
Unless you’ve been through the meat grinder of infidelity, you won’t understand. But to people who haven’t experienced it — it seems ridiculous.
It IS ridiculous. I think that organization/book is completely whackadoodle.
Yeah I had to check my Amazon account to make sure I’d remembered the title correctly. It’s hard to believe I could even contemplate such a ludicrous book. What’s worse, Amazon kindly reminded me ” You purchased this item 1 September 2013″ which is three months after D-Day. Three months of mind fuck and this seemed the best option. You can’t get your new book on the market ( Amazon!) quick enough!
The Blechs who are responsible for that POS book are not so whakadoodle Chumplady… As I recall (yep bought the book , read it …AND WANT MY MONEY BACK) Bwyan BLECH was having job troubles big time and Anne’s venture into authoring that garbage gave him a job !!! Interviews on Oprah, big sales from book, overseas travel to host RIC camp weekend workshops for chumps and BAN chapters all over the world inciting chumps to STAND for their marriage YUCK So if Brian is entertaining thoughts of more cheating he’d better make sure he’s not going to be exposed as a whole RIC empire in $$$$ is at stake ! Yuck to the lot of them!
The title of that book has irritated me all day. You want to claim that your spouse’s affair resulted in the marriage becoming stronger? Okay, I don’t fully buy it, but maybe that’s true. But “the best thing that ever happened to me”? Do the Berchts have children? His boinking a 3rd person was better than their births? Better than the wedding day, full of promise? Better than the best meal she’s ever had? What folly. Seriously, it makes me want to kidnap Anne and put her through counter-brainwashing camp + a spine replacement.
Tempest- If you think she’s brainwashed, go to an RIC forum and tell everyone there that the book is crap. You’ll be glad that you are online saying it because the way the hopium addicts come after you just for uttering those words, you’d think you just murdered someone! There would most definitely be a group flogging if you were to ever run into them in person!
It’s really quite sad actually. Just goes to show the power the RIC has over chumps who want so badly to believe they have the unicorn. Even in my biggest hopium smoking days, i never for one moment believed that drivel. I say I hate the book but I’ve never actually read it. I don’t have to. The title says everything. I knew from my own experience that “my husband’s affair was the worst thing that ever happened to our marriage.”
It was however the best thing that happened to me as Mikky said. (Because I divorced the asshat!)
Perhaps one day when I have spare time (rarely) and am feeling feisty (most days), I’ll head over there and stir up some trouble ; )
I read that book, and thought, “if this is what reconciliation looks like I don’t want it.”
Actually I would like to defend Brian Bercht. I read the book, and saw that my narcissist PD ex did not do ANY of the things he did. BB had the balls to see the fantasy, realise that he loved his wife, commit to her and do the work. He also gives men a hard time in his counselling.
So I think he is a genuine unicorn.
I agree with everything everyone else has said. Mine came back, used me for a while to get himself in good health and then left for her. It doesn’t matter that the OW dumped your husband, he’s tied to her emotionally and not willing to leave that space. Even if he does unfriend her on all social media and erase her number, you will never know for sure that he isn’t in contact with her. He has erased all trust you have in him. Get yourself positioned well and file for divorce.
When a man tells you that someone else is “the love of his life”, he is saying that YOU ARENT. This is not acceptable. You should be his priority, not her.
I needed to read this. I was sitting on the couch crying, thinking about my kids losing an intact family. Wishing I tried harder so that they’d have a better life (I know, I know) when this article, like the 2×4 that I needed, slapped me. For a while now I knew I’d be ok without my husband. But not sure about my girls. Reading this though, made me examine my husband’s behavior. I didnt get a sparkly cheater, my friends. I got a surly one that I thought I could help, make his life a better place (cause I’m special dontcha know??). And after all he’s a good guy. (He’d never cheat!!) I think I got the silent treatment for 13 years. Maree, it sounds like our husbands may be friends. The cold silent treatment that I got is a TERRIBLE example to my girls. This example that your husband is setting, wife, is terrible for your kids.The LAST thing I want is for my two girls to think how my STBX treats me, is what they need in a man. Thanks chump lady and Wife, wherever you are. ? I don’t know how many times a day I come here but it’s a lot. I love you guys❤️
You are a great example to your girls, Kay. You are mighty!
Same here 13 years of barely any emotion, never touching me, never saying I love you until I told him I wanted out. Then it was love bombing and I would think it was just all me. Then the silent treatment would start again! That went on for 13 years and 1 year of wreckincilation. I recently came to my senses, lined up my ducks and filed for divorce. I don’t want to model that dysfunction to my teenagers any longer. I’m presently dodging his flying monkeys (family)…..can’t wait to be free. I keep telling myself that “I’m leaving a cheater and gaining a life”.
Hang on and stay strong, Strong Woman. Good for you that you are getting free and seeing your way out of the crazy!
You keep going, strong woman! It’s rough and its thankless. And your kids might not be all in for it, but in the bitter end you will save your kids and yourself from so much more pain that your fuckwit will and can do to you. Keep STRONG and go on. You got this!!!!! Prayers!!!!!
Kay–Well-done! Children learn more from modeling than from hours and hours of lectures and lessons from us. Model self-respect, and they will learn self-respect. You can do this!!
Dear Wife
Not blaming you . That could have been me but please step outside the situation for a moment and try to see what others see. I didn’t see it until I was out of it. I didn’t learn until after I left what you know now. You deserve a life too. You might think this life with a person who doesn’t really care about you is better than being alone but think about your kids. Do you want them to have any respect for you ever? If you don’t respect yourself they won’t. Nor will anyone else. Yes it’s scary but you can do it. Take the best of what you are now and build on it. Find support in friends and/or family and fly free. Yes, your family will be different but it will be better. It is just a matter of time before he won’t be able to hold up the pretense, such as it is, any longer. You have the advantage now. Prepare and take pre-emptive action. Save $ and get a lawyer – not necessarily in that order. Good Luck. We’re all with you!
Here’s what is just as important as whether kids respect the chumped parent: whether they learn to respect themselves and insist on what my therapist calls “normal, decent, treatment” from their partners or spouses (or anyone else, for that matter).
Even if he deletes her on the Facebook account you know about, and deletes her name from his phone, there’s still no guarantee that he’s not in contact with her. Indeed, if he still cares enough to want to know how she’s doing, he’s still in contact. This is just a hopeless situation. My advice, as someone who went through something similar (pre-social media days), and then slogged through 18 years of reconciliation, only to have him do the same damn thing again, is to get a divorce, pronto.
Good point Carol, just because he doesn’t have her as a friend and doesn’t have her number in his phone doesn’t mean they aren’t in contact. And there you will be sitting and wondering, always wondering. It’s exhausting.
My CH told the OW that I had found their texts and he was deleting her number from his phone but he would still keep in touch. Well, she sent me that message! Brilliant! I guess he wasn’t too smart. He had given her my phone number!
Fuck that whore. Fuck your husband. Today, “friends” are just cover for “affair partners”. And a way to try to shift the blame on to the spouse by making it look like they are jealous or insecure of “friends. “. Fuck that noise. Ditch his cheating ass. This pisses me off even reading it…
Anita, amen……was thinking the same thing. FUCK HIM! She was the love of his life? Then go be with twatwaffle! The OW dumped him as a ploy to get him to divorce you! As soon as she shows interest in him, he’ll dump you like a hot potato. Take care of yourself and your children first. Do what YOU need to do to protect yourself! My prayers are with you!
The first thing I noticed is that you called yourself The Wife. You need to find your identity outside being his property. I’ve been in reconciliation for over 3 years now. Number 1, Facebook was and will always be out! Number 2, how can you hear him say, she is the love of his life and stay? It sounds like you are doing all the compromising, and carrying all your pain inside. Get mad! See if he stays at your side when you show him the pain he caused. Number 3, Is this reconciliation really making you happy or you’re staying out of fear? You’re not just The Wife. Find your strength and who you are . Keep telling yourself your not his second choice. Youre a beautiful, special woman who got betrayed by the one person you thought you could trust the most. He needs to be doing a lot of sucking up to you , if not its just another form of deception.
“He came back because he didn’t want to divorce me”. This is priceless coming from a lying cheating asshole. Always in control aren’t they?
He wasn’t afraid YOU would divorce HIM. He knew you were waiting and he’s justifying keeping his relationship with her because he is controlling the narrative and you wife. Yet he strung you along for a YEAR. DUMP HIM.
As I learned, if your “remorseful” cheater insists on maintaining contact with the AP, then the affair isn’t over. In fact, it likely never stopped.
And even if it did, why did I want to be with someone who respected me so little as to insist on maintaining contact with her AP?
Once I re-grew a backbone and insisted on common decency from my spouse, and realized she wasn’t going to provide it, I knew it was time for me to leave.
Wife, u should do the same.
JC, “regrew a back bone and expected common decency”. We get so worn down that we don’t even expect “common decency”. Seriously, the majority of the chumps on this blog are “older” than mid-20’s. Do we really need to put up with the “baby” dating of this age???? Did we, most of us anyway, not say vows when we got married????? VOWS!!!! not the usual dating, emotional vomit that 20 somethings go through now. There were promises made before God and man, and a bunch of family and friend “witnesses” with these fuckwits and what???!! now we are supposed to just forget that and go on with the “maybe” dating of these times, to find twu luv, outside of our primary relationships? Because the chump was too “mean” and didn’t “allow” our SO’s to “run free and find easy and uncomplicated love with schmoopie”?
It’s all craziness that you should run from. @Wife. Just get out of your situation as fast and as far as you can. This “husband” of yours is your enemy. He is not thinking of your best interests at all. He is plotting your downfall and he is using you to further his wants and desires. If the man told you that “she” is the love of his life, that gives nothing to you, there is nothing of “him” left for you or for your kids. At this point in your relationship, those four kids that you and he had together, become YOUR kids alone. He may have contributed sperm, but they are YOUR kids and you have to become a mama bear and protect them, even from their own “father”.
Yes, DeeL.
Regarding being in your 20s…I was “only” 30 when I got married. My wife made it to 34 before she starting cheating (that I know of).
But I agree — age does play a factor. To change is easier when you’re younger. When you’re a kid, the world is open to you, and you can be anything. Studies have proven that unused synapses get pared back during teenage years. And then our 20s are the time to try on new identities, become Bohemians, etc…before we eventually end up as a mix of those who raised us plus whatever outside influences we picked up along the way.
My point is that…by the time we’re 30…we are who we are. VERY few people can change after 30. Yes, we can all work around the edges, and some of us (if we put in the hard work) are capable of amazing transformations.
But what cheater do you know who is willing to put in the hard work to undertake an amazing transformation? 1 in 100? 1 in 1,000? In one million? And why are we chumps so stupid as to think that OUR cheater is that one in one million?!?
People don’t change. They evolve. But they don’t change. Evolution takes time. Waiting for a cheater to evolve into someone who won’t cheat is like watching paint dry over the course of two decades. Frankly, I don’t have the time for that, and I have better things to do with the limited time I have here.
JC, this is so true: “People don’t change. They evolve. But they don’t change. Evolution takes time. Waiting for a cheater to evolve into someone who won’t cheat is like watching paint dry over the course of two decades.”
It must be the same for us. I’m at least glad I’m not dealing with the same issues as STBX. It would really suck to know you were a total piece of shit in so many really important ways. And that everyone knows it.
I would rather still be reading up on ‘narcissism and sex addiction’ four months out, stuck in settlement hell, living in my brother’s basement, feeling moody and pre-occupied (STILL!) than be a fat, middle-aged, alcoholic, porn-induced-ED-suffering, buffoon jerking off to teenage sex workers…in other words, I’d rather be stuck in recovery than living in his hell.
Maybe that’s empathy. So, we’re normal. If normal feels this bad, imagine what ABnormal is living with?!
That was an amazing comment. I often wonder if the chaos manufacturing that Cluster Bs create is a way to escape the misery of the hell that exists between their own two ears, even for just a few moments.
Uh, what “LivingMyLife” said. Also, “deal with the reality you’ve got.” Enough said. There are lots of things we would *wish* to happen in these situations. Lots of ways we wish it would change. Lots of fantasies that we make room for, to the detriment of our real lives. But the thing is, the fantasy is…not going to happen. That’s why we’re chumps. That’s why we’re here. You can sleep at night because you know in your heart that you bent over backwards to save your marriage. It didn’t work, and you can’t force it to work–all you can do is give the chance and have an open heart. You did that already. He pushed it away. Now what are you going to do with the rest of your time on this earth? Get mighty and get rid of him so you can get on to the next great thing God has planned for you.
Hon, you need to dump his sorry ass and get done professional help pronto! I’m at a loss for words. He does not love you! He loves her! His “faith” and values are bogus! He’s a slick cheater who has counted on you be the good and forgiving wifey! If you believe he will be faithful I’ve got some great swampland to sell you!
You have much more worth than he could ever deserve!
Wife,
It’s obvious that you do not want a broken family. I empathize with you. That is one of the reasons why you are attempting reconciling. He has no empathy and to prove it, it’s all in HIS words – “she was the love of his life”. What more do you need? Your feelings mean nothing to him!
You have to TRUST CL/CN on this. He is still continuing to cheat on you, emotionally. It’s not going to get any better, I guarantee it will only get worse. I have lived the same scenario. You have to protect yourself and your kids and to do so, you must get out, better yet you must kick him out!
Remember he set the bed, he now has to lay in it. Let him be with the “love of his life”. I am sure he won’t feel that same way once that infatuation wears off, but when it does – it will be too late.Your cheating husband is living in a delusional world of really understanding what true love really is. He is still “under the influence” of a whore. Sorry to say but it’s who he is, he has very bad character.
Ugh! Just reading everyone’s replies reminds me how awful that time was for me. It is a hard road to freedom but I am soooo much happier now that I don’t worry where he is, who he is emailing, take his poor treatment because he knew he could get away with it. I was keeping it together for the kids. That’s what I told myself. I’m such a better person for my kids now. My marriage counselor said that we couldn’t begin marriage counseling while there was another person involved. That’s because a marriage doesn’t include three people. You need to be angry with this guy.
You deserve better. You deserve better. You deserve better.
Wife– Sending Jedi hugs your way.
A few things to keep in mind:
Families come in all sorts and sizes. Do not stay to “keep the family intact.” Kids need love, support, and good role models, and they can get that from non relatives. Some societies do not have the institution of marriage, kdis are raised by the mother’s family; some have one wife and multiple husbands, some are monogamous, etc.
Your husband does not respect you, nor care about you. Better to be alone than to be taken advantage of, and to be mistreated.
I am one of the many who had more than one DDay– first time I was gaslighted into believing nothing happened (no real evidence on my part); when he acted the same way 10 yrs later, I confronted, but was gaslighted AGAIN (because gee, he did not cheat before, so the same behavior just means time to work on the marriage again…) Then the third time he simply announced ILYINILWY (I love you but I am not in love with you…). I refused to give up after 18 years of marriage, so eventually in MC he admitted to the affairS with a capital S.
Silly me, I still wanted to at least try to rebuild the relationship by trying another 6 months. So very glad that did not happen.
It will take time, but face the fact that your husband is not the person he portrays himself to be.
A family should be composed of people who love & respect each other. That doesn’t require a mommy and a daddy if either one is an entitled jerk who has his/her foot on the throat of the other. Better the kids see the chump stand up.
This!
A BIG +2
HUH??? Surely you are being punked CL???
It’s so funny how they all use the same cheater playbook and we all keep falling for this. Mine had “the love of his life” too and lied to me when we were in therapy. He was supposed to break contact, said he did, but instead set up a secret facebook account and started using video chat to hide it from me.
Get out while you can, the lies won’t stop, he doesn’t love you, you are just convenient at the moment. He will eventually leave when he finds something better. It took me four years to get out of the mess, but believe me, it’s much better on the other side. No more lies.
The Wife, despite what the marriage counselor may say about how it’s “hard” for your husband to just cut off the OW, it’s bullshit. He is still having an affair. He doesn’t want a divorce, he just wants to keep having both of you. Saddam did that, wants to be single and married. Don’t let him disrespect you this way. He’s seeing what you will do, he’s testing you. If you stay with him when he refuses to do the one thing that YOU need to feel safe then he’ll keep doing it. He’ll find another love of his life – that isn’t you if the current one won’t reciprocate. I’ll bet he’s also told you how he “doesn’t want to hurt her”….he doesn’t give a shit if he hurts you though does he? Leave him, he’s not a unicorn, hes an asshole.
Jedi Hugs!
Staying with your husband here is NOT In the best interest of the kids. You are modeling dysfunction for them and grooming them to be chumps (or abusive narcissists). You are probably afraid of leaving him because you are afraid of being alone, which is understandable. But you will healthier psychologically without him in your life and thereby a better mother for your kids. BTDT.
Young
She was alone for a year with four children while he was with the OW. This to me is about power and control. And why didn’t he file? He was keeping her I for plan B
Not that I’m so much healthier here but my h is hanging around because he knows how serious I am that if he leaves this house he is NEVER coming back. Ever. He is dead to me. We have no kids no reason to stay in contact. He knows I’m the best GD thing to happen to him. He knows I’m better than he is he KNOWS he can’t find something better. WTF is wrong with these people?! I know who I am and what I want from life. How can you want excitement over a life with your person?! It makes me mad. That’s what’s helping me through this. I’m MAD! And I know he’s going to leave and regret it but it doesn’t change anything. It doesn’t make my life while again. It doesn’t get back all the time and effort I put into our marriage and saving for a condo and the ability to go do things together. It hurts me that he doesn’t want me enough to say no because of some whoremat that has sucked him in. But I can’t fix him. I can only do what’s good for me at this point. ☹️
Stay good and mad for awhile. It helps alot!
Un-husband him ASAP! You will never be happy with this idiot! So humiliating…don´t stay with him a second longer after you get a lawyer and your finances in order. After my first Dday I told my husband that I wanted for him to stop being friends with the OW, but he kept on communicating with her do to “work” they shared. And after she left the country, she would visit him in our home when I was travelling! He always told me that I was crazy to be jealous and suspicious because their affair meant “nothing.”
But in your case the OW is the “love of his life”…even worse! Eight years later on DDay 2 I realized I had made such a big mistake thinking that he would change for fear of losing his family. All I did was the delay the process and waste eight years more of my precious life, for the children!! Don´t do the same thing! Get out now! It is terrifying but CN has your back and you can do it and have hopes of a better life. With this guy you will never, ever be happy!
Wife, it will probably be the hardest, most gut-wrenching thing you ever do, but you have to leave. Fake it until you make it, even if you still love him. I’m 6 months from D-day and nearing a divorce settlement but I’m still faking it. It’s 2 steps forward one step back but ultimately I’m on the right path and I’ll get to where I need to be someday soon.
If you can’t do it for yourself, do it for your kids until you learn to love yourself enough. What would you advise one of your kids or a friend if they were in the same situation? You know the answer. It just sucks so much. We all know the pain. Hugs.
You love him because of who you are. You want the marriage and family you thought you both agreed to. A man with Christian values to raise your children with. He created this life with you. But he ‘acted’ and pretended. He has you. Now the abuse sets in. He knows you are loyal, loving, Christian, commited.
That’s what makes him know he can take advantage. He let his manipulation of you serve him. No matter what live you want with him or how bad you want it, it will never be so. The gig is up for him. He’s no longer even pretending your amazing. He has you so caught up in his sad sausage woes, there’s no talk of you.
I know he’s got you so low you don’t even think of yourself. You are trying to keep your family and marriage together. But men of principle do not trick women into marriage, pro create 4 beautiful children, then invite other women to suck his dick and be his ow disciple… Wtf?
You may not feel you have the strength, but maybe you should understand that you’ve lost your self worth, no woman deserves to live a lie. Ask yourself if there will ever be a single day that you don’t worry again. That you don’t think of Her and him. You already are on your own. The second he revealed he was an narcissist. The truth is there. You just need to accept it.
Please surround yourself with people who value you at this time and make the break. It won’t feel good now, but one day, when you have separation you will see he would leave you again for next ow. This way you leave with some dignity. Xo hang tough!
Dear The Wife:
As you know, Chump Nation is not pro-reconciliation. This is because reconciliation asks the betrayed spouse to eat the shit sandwich of the betrayal in the belief that the cheater will see the light and realize that he (or she) was temporarily insane enough to be unfaithful to the one true love of his (or her) life. If you go read Chump Lady’s posts on Reconciliation and Entitlement as well as Real Remorse or Genuine Imitation Naugahyde Remorse, you can see what real remorse looks like. If you see real remorse, then maybe–just maybe–eating the shit sandwich is worth it.
In your case, you don’t have real remorse, and you know it. He’s already told you that OW is the love of his life.
Do you believe you deserve to be Plan B?
While you’re figuring out what you want out of your marriage, rather than trying to figure out what you need to do to make him realize that you’re the real love of his life (and if you have to try to MAKE someone love you or APPEASE them enough to love you, you know they do NOT love you), I recommend you do the following.
1. Gather up your financials. You say your husband was in a year-long affair with his Schmoopie, and he’s still in touch with her. Access every piece of financial information you have. If he has direct deposit to the joint account, see if it matches up with his paycheck. Is he diverting funds to a secret account? Check the payments to make sure you recognize each and every one of them. If you don’t, then he’s keeping another secret. If he does have a secret, DO NOT CONFRONT!!! He’ll only go deeper underground. Your goal here is just to find out where you are financially.
2. Lawyer up. You don’t need to file for divorce. Just go interview lawyers who have experience dealing with people in your income bracket. Chump Nation argues for a pit bull lawyer, one who’ll protect your rights and not fold under pressure. Find out the divorce laws in your state and what you can expect. Talk about enforceable post-nuptial agreements. See if you can insert an infidelity clause. Please note that if you do have such a clause, you will likely need to hire a Private Investigator to prove it, as evidence that you find yourself is probably not admissible. Do not tell your husband you have retained an attorney.
3. Raise the topic of a post-nuptial agreement with your husband. Let him know you want one, and let him know you want one with an infidelity clause. If he tries to gaslight you and explain that you really don’t need one, then you know that he is not remorseful. Truly remorseful people will sign a post-nupt. Do not confront him with this fact. Instead, start lining up your divorce ducks.
4. Seek individual counseling with someone who sees infidelity as a kind of trauma. You need to work out why you are more worried about what your husband wants than what you want.
Good luck.
P.s he will never love her more or anyone. He lives in his world. Words are what he uses to get off on. Leave him. Let him go to her. The second she’s in as deep as you, he will find another ‘love of his life’. He feels entitled to break rules, your children’s hearts, you. He gets off on it.
Next time you look at him. Remember that. He gets off on how whipped you are. How he can look at you and say your not special enough to love but I’ll stay because of Jesus.
He is a special snowflake who is just following Jesus. Jesus didn’t say in the bible: men marry women and lie to them while you get as much pussy as you desire. Lie to your children, your wife, your church, because your dick is deserving of as many ‘true luvs’ as he desires.
Leaving will be the absolute hardest thing you do. But living a life of worthlessness is not living. Teaching your children you are worthless is not ok! Please find the courage to leave!
When I discovered the ex was cheating, he said to me that we could stay married as long as I allowed him to continue to have “close relationships” with other women.
We are now separated. Don’t disrespect yourself just because someone else does.
O hai, Blogdramedy! My ex said he’d been polyamorous all along so he had to now be true to himself and have relationships with other women. Since I’d never prevented him from having female friends in the past, I said this must be all about having sex with other women. He said it wasn’t. I asked if he could be close with other women without having sex with them. He said he couldn’t. So it is all about sex, I said. He said, no it isn’t. It was like falling down the rabbit hole.
I hear that. The ex (I’ve started to say “the” instead of “my” because eww) kept saying I wouldn’t allow him to be friends with women. This was news to me. I’d never said any such thing. Friends don’t sleep with each other, share intimate details about their marriage with each other that they won’t share with their partners. I once asked him if there was anything about himself he wished were different or that he would change. He said no. That’s when I knew it was time to move on.
You are right on the use of “my.” I’m going to break myself of that habit.
In the meantime, I’ll just leave this here.
http://thehardtimes.net/2015/12/29/polyamorous-guy-brought-ukulele-party-explains-feminism-young-women/
That article was hilarious! Nothing like appropriating the language of liberation to cloak the world’s oldest con game of being a player… a “Poly Player”. He probably goes to yoga class as his liberated meat market instead of just being an average Joe player at the bar. And he’s going to help them align their chakras with his “magic flute” and extensive study of Tantra (skimmed a book by David Dieda, ew).
Oi, the “poly player”. Cheating and polyamory exist in different universes.
Dude just wants to make his fucking around sound evolved (impression management). What he wants is to be the heliocentric universe of a harem of women at his beck and call, and call it polyamory. How….narcissistic of him…..
Actions speak the truth more than words do.
Un-husband him. Show your children that you do not want to be repeatedly hurt by anyone. Teach your kids that honesty is appreciated, ALL OF THE TIME, not after you have been caught eating cake.
Eat, sleep, exercise. Lawyer up, get your ducks in a row. Find some support in friends in family. Get the sad sausage out of your life. Read chumplady everyday. If that days article doesn’t help, find an old one to re-read, it will allow you some clarity in a screwed up situation.
My situation is similar to this one except for two major exceptions:
First, it was my wife who broke things off with her OM because she was afraid that I might either take full custody of our young child or possibly inflict great physical harm on the OM if I were to ever find out.
Second, I didn’t learn about her affair until 18 years after it ended which happened to also be 4 years after the OM died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Now, two years post D-day, I am finally past the initial trauma stage and she says that she wants to be my wife but she wants me to accept her affair partner and acknowledge her affair as a legitimate romance. She honestly tells me that she considers herself a “bigamist” with two soulmates: Her lowly mortal husband (me) and her angel from heaven that leaves pennies around the house to bring her comfort and encouragement. It is like she has erected a bronze statue of this guy in her heart and then expects me to bow down to it.
Before D-day, she rarely spoke about him. (He was once a college buddy of mine and I introduced her to him one day on a campus visit.) Now she mentions him constantly as if her were part of our daily lives and cries about him regularly — taking “grieving the AP” to a whole new level. I tell her that she has to choose to either be my wife or to be his widow but then she says, “Both.” I am left feeling totally out of my fucking mind bat-shit crazy!
I tell her that she has to choose to either be my wife or to be his widow but then she says, “Both.” I am left feeling totally out of my fucking mind bat-shit crazy!
Friend, it’s you who has to choose. She already has.
Yes, it is that sticky-ass compassion trap that’s got hold of my foot. Maybe it is more about pity? Anyhow, I can always come up with all sorts of excuses for staying. Perhaps it has something to do with my hitting my hopium bong? “Wow Man, I can like totally see a double rainbow with an angel riding unicorn on top of it…”
Compassion for what? Her batshit crazy delusional behavior? Her total lack of concern for you?
LovedaJackass,
Yes, I guess? I do get angry sometimes, but then I just feel sad and wish we could be as we were before all the bullshit occurred. I am not innocent completely — oh, I never screwed around on her, but I was no Prince Charming riding a trusty steed in shining armor either. Although I think that I am a good husband and father now, I was really immature and not good relationship material 20 years ago. Sometimes I feel as though I deserved to be dumped by my wife back then. She claims that she was having an “exit affair” but then stayed out of fear that I would either harm/kill the OM or somehow take custody of our child. I surely would NOT have killed the OM, but I likely would have pushed for full custody in light of her extra-marital affair. At that time and place, I would have had legal-standing to do so. I also would have had standing to sue the OM in civil court as well as he was a millionaire trust-fund brat. It is possible that things could have ended nicely for this chump. Not so much for me now.
!!!!! : O
Cuckedoff–how is this acceptable to you? What a brazen hussy, both because of the affair, and because of her insistence that you accept it as a lovely part of her life narrative. I divorced my husband solely on the basis of an affair he’d had 8 years prior, even though he came did dump the grad-whore to stay in the marriage (unbeknownst to me until 8 years afterwards). You can, too. [And, your case is probably like mine–there were subsequent affairs after that that I didn’t find out about until the divorce decree was final. I doubt that one affair is your wife’s only rodeo.]
I hear you… I divorced my exPOS simply because she had “feelings” for someone else. Yep, even though I was 99.999% sure she was sexing around, she would never admit it, and used it to gaslight the hell out of me in front of my daughter. Sorry bitch, having feelings for someone else, then saying you won’t stop seeing POS at work even w/o sex = fast track to go be with the married scumbag all schmoopie style as a single slut. She did not admit to any sexual goings on, until 5 months after I filed on her ass, and as far as she would go to confirm any sex was:
“The judge hears about this (adultery) all day long, and won’t care”
Yeah, real sweetheart there, and not even a chance to have enough guts to admit what you did. I fully agree; taking back your power with righteous anger, and no prisoners taken attitude about the divorce will get you the hell out of the mess, and faster on the way to a beautiful life.
Cuckedoff, for the love of all things good, please get rid of psycho bitch. She is getting off on all of this, and her utter disrespect toward you is staggering!!! Lady Bat Guano needs to go off by herself, build a shrine for her lost love, light some candles, then GO FUCK HERSELF!
5jumpchump–you can’t take the word of a consummate liar on anything mundane (grass is green), much less information that makes them look bad. I finally found out my X had had an additional affair–with an undergrad, got him to admit it on the phone, and he still goes around declaring to my children “there was no undergrad!” and to our friends that his 8-year ago affair was the only one. (Thankfully, I have snapshots of his Ashley Madison profile which I show to those friends so they know he is full of bullshit.)
Your strength is an inspiration to me Tempest!
She doesn’t need to build a shrine because he has a memorial FaceBook page with hundreds of followers all singing his praises. What a guy? If people knew the extreme pain and turmoil this so-called friend had caused me, they would be sick. I sure know I am!
“God, if only I knew that she had a second affair, then I would leave her.”
WHY the hell do I keep saying this kind of stuff to myself?
I suppose this is why I had to start taking antidepressant medication and seeing a therapist after D-day.
Not to brag, but I make a really great Chump. Really, I have a natural talent for it. In fact, if being a chump were a profession, I would make the cover of a magazine!
I have a friend holding me accountable, because I am so certain that he will try to sugar wash the whole thing and gaslight me to the edge of lunacy that I won’t believe my own evidence. You’re not alone. We have all been there or are there.
Thank you so much for your understanding. I wish I had better friends to support me. Most of mine are the Swiss variety.
I’m so sorry. That’s terrible. Because that basically means they aren’t on your side. They will back away before they back you. Time to join a bowling league and find some new friends bud! We are all here, check out everyone’s blogs too, those are helpful for advice and situational relating… But I know it’s nice to have face to face support. Is there any stuff in your town you can reach out to?
It took me so long to even come to the point where I can even speak of it. I felt so humiliated l, being a man whose wife felt compelled to seek out another man’s sex. I seriously wanted to die. Two years later I am now able to talk about it to a larger circle of friends. Chump-Nation has been really terrific in helping me find my courage.
It’s no wonder you are depressed…you are living in an emotionally abusive situation, with no end in sight. She committed adultery in the past. Now that you know about it, your wife’s thought process certainly sounds unstable, delusional and grossly unrepentant. It sounds like you’re are married to a woman of poor quality, who is expecting you to prop her up while she abuses you. How will you ever find peace of mind and happiness with an odd person like this? I don’t see where you can have any joy in her companionship at this point. I’m sorry for what you are going through. A loving adult relationship includes equality, compassion and respect. And rational behavior. Not looking for mystical pennies from the Ghost of Affairs Past.
What can I say? I am haunted by many ghosts or at least a few candarian demons. I agree that my marriage is dead and has been for a long time…maybe it was never real at all, but only a couple high school aged kids playing house? In any case, this really sucks for me now!
You bet it sucks *now*… But your fate is not sealed. Dammit, Find your righteous anger, let it drive you, push you forward out of the fear, out of the limbo, out of this soul killing situation. Pledge today that shit sandwiches are officially off of the menu, and get busy finding the best lawyer you can muster, to beat the enemy. Yep, I said enemy, and mean it.
I know you are right and I really am trying to find my inner tiger. I want to hear “ROAR”, but I mostly get “meow”. That’s why I need you guys in Chump Nation so much. Thank you!
The OW/OM does not even have to be dead to be a “ghost”. My Ex never stopped pining away for his Ex wife the whole ten years we were married. BUT yet, he cheated on her left and right all through their 20 year marriage. So, if she were so special, then why the cheating on her?? After their divorce, every chance he got he’d ask about her and was eager to see pictures of her or video’s when he was with his adult children from that marriage. Then, come to find out, those were always the same days he’d come home and want sex with me…probably juxtaposing both of us in his fantasies….thinking about her while using my body to “finish”. There ALWAYS felt like there was a third person in the room. I think SOME people only want what they cannot have. Now he cant have ME…
Is it just me, or is it a bit odd that there has not been a single peep from the “Wife”? Usually, the Author of a letter like this would at least make a comment when given so much advice, understanding and love. Maybe she does not know that her letter was actually put out on the table for us to respond to??
cuckedoff, you want an “easy” way to get your “wife” to be pissed off????? go to the bank and get many, many rolls of pennies. Get a roll daily and throw those things around your yard first, especially your main walkway into your house for about a week, then get another bunch of penny rolls and throw the pennies around your living room, then the dining room, then the hallway, the kitchen and then the bathroom. Let’s see how long she lasts “picking up those pennies” from heaven. I really often wonder how God puts up with some of the things that us “people” do without shocking our stupid asses with thunderbolts.
Get out of the “CRAZY” now, while you have some of your wits with you please.
It would be funny if it weren’t so sad…wait, it is sort of funny. LOL
I don’t mean to be hurtful or unfeeling. But cheaters constantly do and say things that are ridiculous. Get your ducks in a row and get yourself out of this situation. Hugs.
cuckedoff-are you positive your wife actually HAD the affair with the OM in question? Sounds as if she has created quite the fantasy love affair and who is going to verify that it actually happened since the OM is no longer among the living? This is so bizarre all around.
The weird thing about having a traumatic discovery years after the fact is that your brain has the ability to transport you back in time. Things that were long forgotten suddenly became fresh as if they happened yesterday.
Remember, the OM was a “friend” of mine whom I visited time to time and he was also gaslighting me as well. I was able to vividly recall some conversations I had with him when my wife was not present and also conversations I had with my wife when he was not present. All of a sudden, in light of the discovery, everything fit into place. It suddenly made complete sense to me. Gifts on his desk, flowers on hers, strange phone calls, voices in the hallway, strange smells, new jewelry, his knowing about my car accident before I told him about it…EVERYTHING fit right into place.
When something like this happens, you feel sooo damn stupid that you begin to wonder if you didn’t really deserve to get chumped.
No one deserves to be treated the way all of us have been cuckedoff.
We aren’t stupid, we trusted that they loved us and took their vows seriously…why wouldn’t we? I can’t imagine making such a decision – to love someone for the rest of my life, take care of them forever on this earth – so lightly. They just aren’t that deep. They just try to get their needs met, whatever they are – cook, maid, breadwinner, fuck buddy…whatever.
And when the cheaters should be good spouses and show care, attention and support in times of strife, they don’t, make everyone else’s life worse including their own. So when the going gets tough the cheaters get going off into lala land with their new skanks. Oh course whore juice can devote all her time and attention to him, I already did all the hard work for thirty years. He know gets to exert all control over her as she bows down to his fucking majesty…. And indulges his every whim. But shes a good person, ya know, not a lowlife who sleeps with married men. She will get hers hes cheating on her now, has been and will continue. He was never that way with me and he despised ass kissers with no backbone. Guess he is now. But the whore wears the pants cause she got the money! Pieces of shit both of them. But he wants to be my friend!
We are lucky to be free of them kar marie 😀
I just heard a song I’ve never heard before and it just cracked me up! …even though it sounded like something I could have written to satan…my sister asked me if I had written it after she read it…lol!!!
Check it out kar marie – google ‘Gernade’ by Bruno Mars. Enjoy the chuckle!!!
Will do jeep. And i will get back to you on it! Thanks!
God Bless you Honey. Hang in there!
This is a guy she broke it off with 18 years ago? And mentally she’s his widow? I think she’s having a midlife breakdown. Get her some counseling and then if it doesn’t stop, I wouldn’t subject myself to it anymore.
I actually get this, it reminds me of my own situation. My ex “came back to me” after six months of separation, wanting to reconcile. He did NOT say it was because he loved me, he did NOT say that he didn’t love the OW or had never loved her, he did NOT say it was because he really wanted to be with me and was willing to do whatever it took to make things right. No, he said he wanted to reconcile because he watched that Christian movie “Fireproof,” and he didn’t want to be like the cheater in the film.
I took him back, idiot that I was. The emotional abuse started almost immediately, and quickly ramped up. Mine was at least smart enough to pretend to stop contact with the OW, unlike the letter writer’s husband here, but he never actually stopped contact with her, and I no longer believe he stopped cheating at all.
His entire goal was to get out of paying support, and to have me financially support him. Also, staying married to me gave him a respectable veneer of “Good Christian man who decided to do what’s right” and boy, did he play that up.
To the Wife who wrote the letter: I’d say there is an excellent chance that your scum bucket of a husband — because he is certainly no real Christian man, and he is still cheating on you — is only “back” because he has seen the financial writing on the wall, and doesn’t want to pay alimony plus support for four children. In fact, I’d pretty much GUARANTEE this is the reason he is settling for you, instead of the “love of his life.” Please talk to a lawyer as soon as possible. Your sorry excuse for a husband is still cheating, and he is going to dump you eventually, even if he’s waiting around for your kids to get older. Don’t settle for being a doormat.
Stories like this reflect the values of a society that cares more about how things look than how they are. The RI industry concentrates on a spouse doing everything to try to save a relationship — except what is truly best for the spouse who is doing all the work. The “wandering” spouse just gets to wander around being “confused” and never has to feel the consequences of the choices he or she makes. They “look” like an intact family — quick, post a picture of that wonderful relationship on Fakebook, and be sure to hide all the details of The Wanderer’s infidelities. Assure the children that everything is ok. Live a lie. Things will be so much better if you fake it — that wanderer will surely “come to his senses.” Surely.
Reminds me of the Beatles song, Nowhere Man — “He’s as blind as he can be, Just sees what he wants to see. Nowhere Man, can you see me at all? . . . Isn’t he a bit like you and me?”
When we accept this type of behavior and live this type of lie, we lose our sight, too. This poor woman only believes she got her husband back. He may resemble the man she thought she married, and he may appear to be present — but mentally he is far away. He is a mirage, resting while he refreshes his resources, and then he will wander off again.
Hopefully “the wife” will stop seeing herself as a character in this dysfunctional marriage, and will be able to call herself by her own name, and live her life with authentic purpose. Yes, there are many hardships involved when you choose reality over fantasy. It is hard to accept that regardless of what you do, you cannot “fix” another person, or a relationship, by yourself. But it is much easier to have a future in the real world than live with the constant disappointment of the fantasy world.
And Lucinda wrote:
I don’t want you anymore
Cause you took my joy
I don’t want you anymore
You took my joy
You took my joy
I want it back
You took my joy
I want it back
Thank you so much for your comment about reality vs. fantasy. That helps me a lot. I saved it as a note on my phone so I can reread it daily!!
Portia, “The “wandering” spouse just gets to wander around being “confused” and never has to feel the consequences of the choices he or she makes.”
Portia, unfortunately, I found this so funny. This does not help “wife” in any way, shape or form. But dammit how much crap do we as chumps have to put up with. “Wandering”, “confused”!!!???? when you finally get out of the “chumpfog” you just start to see it for the complete manipulation that it is. These f*cks are all about themselves and how to get over on their chumps. They are not wandering and they sure as hell are not confused, they just want to “win”, to get over on their chumps and to get the “prize” of the moment that they want. I see that I am so jaded at times, but dammmit I’m tired of this, I’m tired of those f*cks getting to do what they want, of getting to be who they want and of them needing “someone”, anyone to base camp on.
Well, I’m going to go in a totally different direction. You don’t allow “the love of your life” to get away. To hell with him coming back to “be” the husband to your “the wife”. You better start watching your finances and any other assets you have. My best guess is he has seen a lawyer and gotten the skinny on getting his affairs in order. I’m willing to bet the farm that he is doing to you what we are telling you to do. He is preparing to walk away with all the marbles. And how good will he look to a judge that he came back to work things out. Honey, run, don’t walk to a great divorce attorney. While you are trying to police his online activities he is off doing what you should have done the day he left you the first time. Stop wasting your life with this loser. He isn’t any more a husband to you than you are a wife to him. Lawyer up!
Some really good points by AW, here. Aren’t there several laws about assets and abandonment, etc, that she could say he left a year ago and then Wife gets the marital home, etc? Not only that, now that he’s back in the home, he can monitor what she spends money on, etc and use that in court against her. This definitely smells like a ploy on his part that he’s setting up Wife and/or getting his ducks in a row to fire the final financial bullet and for him to leave. I mean, he’s not even TRYING to lie or fake it, he’s just come out and said OW is “love of his life”!
She dumped him for not divorcing you?
…and who told you that? Him?
Come on.
She’s “the love of his life” (you’re his WIFE he’s saying this to) he “still cares” about her, he wants to make sure she’s ok…bullshit.
This affair never ended. It’s still going. He is quite full of his own shit.
Leave him. If she’s the love of his life, he’ll be fine.
Please listen to this TED Talk…. 7 minutes in he talks about marriage
http://www.ted.com/talks/robert_waldinger_what_makes_a_good_life_lessons_from_the_longest_study_on_happiness#t-452589
Here’s a question for you Wife – what would you want your daughter to do if she were the one in this situation? Certainly you would not expect your daughter to allow someone to treat her the way you are allowing yourself to be treated. And your son? Would you want him to treat a woman the way you are being treated? Heck no. Now it’s time to step up and show them what to do.
I scrolled down to the end to make this emergency comment. Call 911 of the garbage industry and toss this POS to the curb so they can pick him up. You were fired from being the caring wife.
Step outside of yourself and be your own best friend. What would your best friend be saying to you? That being said, we all have to go on our own journey and arrive at the conclusion in our own time. Reaching out for feedback and doing research and getting counseling can hopefully speed up that process. As chumps, we were victims of emotional abuse. It’s a monumental mind fuck. It’s a process, and can be quite scary, to take back your power. But once you do, life is amazing. Hang in there.
This: I just got my husband back after a year long affair he had.
And this: (she lives in another state so that’s cool with me)
Make it hard for me to muster a lot of sympathy for this one. Maybe it was a joke. I hope so.
Wow, just wow. I know I was a pathetic mess when DDay happened and BEGGED my ex to stay and work on it. … But your husband flat out states that she’s the love of his life and he’s only staying married in order to do ‘the right thing’ by his ‘faith’ and you don’t know what to do?
You’re choosing the APPEARANCE of a good marriage/intact healthy family over a ‘broken home/marriage’ that gives you distance from his shittiness, some self respect and a HEALTHY environment for your kids.
I know your pain makes it hard to see the obvious answer. Reaching out to chump lady, at least, is a step in the right direction.
Drop that loser like a hot rock, grab your kids and hightail it to a lawyer’s office.
Just like traci said. Not what they say but what they do. Asswipes whore threw him out on his doing nothing to divorce me, he came back begging forgiveness faked of course, i believe him like the asshole i am, found they never broke contact and i filed divorced him and she danced her ass off to get him back and she did. Now she wants him to have absolutely no contact wih me, we do but only because of the house. When thats done no contact ever again. He still has feelings for me and wants to be friends, whores comment, absolutely not! You asswipe will have no contact with your ex ever! Because he still has feelings for me. She can be friends with her ex who is remarried and still in love with her sits across the table from her ex smugly knowing that she and everyone else including my ex is aware of this and she gloats about it. What a c!!t bitch! They are both getting exactly what they deserve, she knows hes a cheater and he knows shes a cheater. There you go! Match made in heaven.
Ok . . . here goes . . .
I’m not religious. But what exact offshoot of Christianity are you all practicing that makes it OK for a man to bang another broad for a year and still be allowed to come back to you in the kids, KNOWING that you are NOT the love of his life?
Asking Chump Lady, if you should suck it up and allow them to be Facebook friends tells me you haven’t read near enough on this site. What concerns me is you are more anxious with the fact that he is still Facebook friends with her and might be longing for her, than you are about the fact you are allowing him to treat you like a boobie prize. And this is playing out for your kids.
You are not doing them any favors keeping him because “Christian values are important to him”. Holy tap dancing Jesus! Your husband gives less than fuck about Christian values or you or the kids. He cares about himself.
If I were you, I’d play the game for awhile and plan. Get a lawyer. Get the financial aspect squared away. And this is hugely important, get a therapist that can help you understand why you are willing to accept this.
“What you allow is what will continue.” And trust me when I tell you, once he gets done pining for her, if he ever does, there will be others. There always is.
And may I add: 1) “The Wife” should do a credit check with 2 of the 3 major credit bureaus, using both their names, and update every 6 months. 2) She should ask for a post-nuptial agreement that will protect her and the kids financially in the event of another affair. And along with that, she should make sure that she is putting away cash and cash equivalents in order to have as many resources as possible, should he decamp again. 3) She should get STD testing, now. 4) She should insist on biweekly financial reviews for as long as she lives with a lying douchebag.
I haven’t read all the comments yet, but Oh Wife, I’m so sorry this is happening to you.
Your husband’s Christian values didn’t stop him from committing adultery for a year, or from leading a double life for a year, or from lying to you for at least a year, or from lying to his children for at least a year, or from lying to his community for at least a year. Nor did those same values stop him from dis-honouring his Christian marriage vows to love and honour you. Suddenly he’s got Christian values aplenty when it comes to getting a divorce? Oh – he’s one of those false-fronted Christians – only concerned with his ‘Christian values’ appearance. I think spiritual hypocrites are the most detestable people.
Wife – his thinking must have gone like this: ‘That OW is attractive. Think I’ll have an affair’. ‘Oh OW wants me to divorce, but then I won’t look like a fine, upstanding Christian, and I value that’s how people see me, so I’m not getting a divorce – shame, she’s ‘the love of my life’ but I love my reputation much more, so I’m not caving to her dealbreaker, I’m just going to go back to Wife and I’ll cyber-stalk OW on FB until I get the vibe from her that she’s changed her mind, then I’ll go back to the affair with OW’. (This is assuming, of course, that OW dumped him because he wouldn’t divorce you – Cheating husband has proven himself a liar and a manipulator – lesson number one; you can’t trust one word that comes from his mouth. He’s shown you that – his marriage vows to you were a lie, for a start)!
‘Yeah, I’ll just tell Wife I’m back, tell her she won a pick me dance – of sorts, and tell her I’m in love with someone else who I want to keep tabs on. Wife will be alright with that – after all, I’m doing ‘the Christian thing’, I’m staying with her aren’t I’?
Did you notice, at no point does he even consider what you would want in all this. The one thing you’ve asked him for – NC with OW – and he states it like it’s his ‘right’ to ignore your feelings and wants, and keep his connection to this OW!. You say you feel it is disrespectful. Wife, it’s massively disrespectful!
DM is absolutely correct, he wants to maintain his affair, albeit just emotionally (for now). The OW might have lost that particular round of pick-me dancing, but if she hasn’t blocked him on FB – she’s just as up for continuing the cheating as he is. They both want to ‘leave the door open’.
Wife, you really don’t have to live like that. Waiting for the other shoe to drop. Not able to believe your life partner loves and wants to be with you, will always have your back, won’t devastate your life and financial security the moment OW changes her mind, or he finds another OW to be ‘The Love of His Life’. He really is despicable. Not just because he’s a low-life, scum bag, cheater – but because he has not once smidgeon of empathy for you, not one! Not after the four children and all the good memories you’ve shared with him.
Divorce isn’t easy, I won’t lie. But it has got to be easier than living the rest of your life feeling second best and terrified by the next act of betrayal (you can’t trust him – and if you can’t trust him you might as well go get yourself a wild and pissed-off tiger to prowl your living-room).
Please know you are worthy of love and you are worthy of respect – you deserve much, much better than this contempt he is showing you.
Wishing you strength, peace and true love xxx
I went to the recommended reading site on Amazon for infidelity. The titles had me reconsidering my deeply held belief against burning books, “Winning your husband back,” “One more try,” and my personal favorite, “How one of you can bring the two of you together.” Wife, think about what title you would give your own book should you write it. Would you be proud to have others read it? CL wrote my book for me, “Leave a Cheater, Gain a Life,” and I plan on reading it soon.
I suggest you un-husband him as well. Why be with someone who’s is staying because he wants to “do the right thing”? That’s a big fat lie – he’s with you because she dumped him.
The husband is “back” because he realized that with FOUR children, and a wife who is likely a SAHM, it is much cheaper to stick around, pretend to be Mr Christian, and continue his affair(s) as usual. My guess is Mr Christian spoke with a lawyer, heard how much $$$$$$$ he was going to be paying in child support, and figured he’d better get back home ASAP.
Never underestimate how much money plays a part in a cheater’s desire to reconcile, especially when there are several children involved. Taking them back simply gives them more time to work out the finances to their advantage, because they sure as hell aren’t stopping the adultery.
Sobering reality right there, Glad. You nailed it.
Bingo.
And never underestimate the cheater spouse, who loves money and the OW so much. Sometimes they think of alternatives to cheaper to keep her. ?
I am Exhibit A in GIO’s description of a malevolent cheater discarding his/her spouse. It looks as though the kids and I will be financially wiped out soon. The more I tried to keep my family together the worse my STBX treated (abused) me. Now he abuses my extended family, the family who bent over backwards for him, even forgiving him for repeatedly doing terrible, illegal acts to me, our children, and others. These cheaters’ motto is ‘Let no good turn go unpunished.’
RUN don’t walk to the closest divorce lawyer
The Wife,
You are not defined by him or by his actions. The moment you start to define yourself on your own terms and mentally separate yourself from this abusive jackass is the moment that you will start to see your life start to come back into focus. A person who treats another person the way “The Jackass” has treated you is poison. Get him out of your system as soon as possible, and start recognizing yourself as a worthy human being. You are worth more than this. Start repeating this to yourself until you believe it.
Value yourself. I promise that there is a better life out there for you — one in which you are treated with the respect you deserve. You don’t need to be The Wife. You can be The Kick-butt Mom or The Rock Goddess or whatever title suits you. You’re stronger than you think.
Best of luck,
LilyBart
Know that all the comments here come from a place of love abd concern for you. My cheater was allowed to stay for another 5 years and the abuse escalated, to the point that I needed 4 months of therapy to see it as abuse I was so conditioned to accept it. It’s not your fault, it’s his. You have to love yourself and your children enough to realize you have to get out. Hugs…
At first I thought this letter was a joke. Wife, you are Plan B. And I’m sorry for that. I’m sorry you’re here. I’m sorry you’re a part of the club no one wants to be a member of.
He ‘wants to do the right thing’? PUHHLLEEEZE. That ship has sailed. It sailed the minute he had emo or sexual contact with the OW. How does it feel to be second fiddle to the ‘love of his life’? Barf. Why aren’t you mad? Why aren’t you offended? Why on God’s green earth did you take him back? If it’s for the kids, please don’t. They would be better off w/out a cheater for a father. What a poor role model he is.
Have you exposed their affair?
Go see a divorce lawyer TODAY. Get your ducks in a row and leave him. In the meantime, I hope you aren’t having sex with him. He didn’t stop with the OW. They just took it underground. Get STD tested immediately. They haven’t stopped talking to each other or seeing each other. You know this, right?
I don’t see a lick of remorse coming from him.
Important question here-how did you find out about his infidelity? Did he confess voluntarily, or did you find out on your own? IMO, that makes a huge difference with reconciliation.
You must find your self-esteem and pride and anger and LEAVE.
I’m sitting here imagining what it would be like sleeping beside a man who is still Facebook friends with the woman he cheated with for a year. Who still has her phone number in his phone. Who says she is the love of his life. Who wants to check on her to make sure he’s all right.
When clearly he doesn’t care if his wife is all right. Or heartbroken. Or becoming a doormat that is so worn out you can see the porch through it. It would be the most humiliating kind of pick-me dance to even brush my teeth in front of this guy, let alone close my eyes beside him in bed. I think marriage can be a beautiful thing, although I was never very good at it, mostly due to a faulty picker and no role models for having a healthy marriage. But it took me way to long to figure out that my first job as a human is to live an authentic life, and to love myself as I love others. That’s what the Golden Rule is all about: love your neighbor as you love yourself. Religion pre-supposes that we love and care for our own lives, even when we must legitimately sacrifice for others–taking care of kids, elderly parents, a faithful spouse who is ill. But nowhere does religion teach that we should devalue ourselves in order to “keep” or “get back” a spouse who would in truth prefer to chase after his “true love” affair partner.
So well stated LAJ
I can’t read the whole thread here from work, but here’s an idea: if you decide to try this with him after reading the thread, and if trying with him includes sexual intercourse, please protect yourself from illnesses he could give you.
Here’s my suggestion. Go to a divorce lawyer, get your ducks in a row, and then go to church with your husband. Stand up in front of the congregation and tell them that your husband was an Adulterer, that he has decided to stay with you even though he still loves the other woman, and the Bible gives you the right to divorce him. Then say that you renounce him in church, you Biblically divorce him, and then hand him the divorce papers. After that you might want to change your seat.
Dear Wife,
I am a practicing unicorn who learned of her husband’s infidelity 30 years after it occurred. I learned that I had a high risk HPV in a gynecologist’s office in 2014. I thought that he’d had the affair (and that it was short)when I had asked him to leave our home 6 months after our child was born. What I never knew was that even after he refused to leave at that time, claiming he loved us AND went to counseling sessions, he had a year long affair with a work whore right under my nose. I confirmed this by calling her myself 30 years later. She spoke with me, I believe, because the man she finally married (after trying to get my husband to leave me) is a public figure and she feared public disgrace. She confirmed everything he said.
Why am I telling you this? Because even now I struggle with the hole that was shot through the reality of my life and relationship with this man. And my self esteem. We are both in therapy.
***Yet, I can tell you the thing he has repeated over and over, even on his knees . (and he’s a CEO of a pretty big company. ). He says “You are the love of my life, and I’ve never seen or wanted to see her again”. Even with this, I still question my sanity in staying with him. We’ve been together over 40 yrs.****
WHY oh WHY would you live with a man who would claim that another woman was the love of his life? Why would you let him be around your children with this perverted view of religion or ethics? I have had to look deep into myself and make serious changes in both myself and my husband which, I know, are HARD, but trust me, if you don’t get control of your self esteem now and dump his ersatz religious ass you are not only dooming yourself to some horrible “good domestic ” status, you are dooming your children into believing that living a lie and denigrating a decent human on a daily basis is an acceptable value system . This man isn’t even pretending that you mean shit to him. My husband has admitted his disgusting behavior to our now adult child, and although the father is forgiven, he is viewed in a different light. Granted, our child is happy that we remain together , but doesn’t think the situation was cool AT ALL. Just tragic. We all had to learn lessons because Daddy was a Big Asshole back then. He admits this openly.
Please, if you husband has the unmitigated gall to say to YOU that this woman gets the big “love of my life” declaration AND wants to keep contact with her in any way, he’s fucking with you big time. He knows of your insecurities and fears, and is using your faith to keep you desperate, trapped and at his feet. Do you want to make a decision for him? Forget Facebook. Open the door, push him out, change the locks, and find somebody who is willing to claim that YOU are the love of his life. Or find nobody if you choose. Either way, it’s SOOOO much better than being marginalized. I’m sorry; that’s what is happening to you. It happened to me without me really knowing, and the effects are still being felt. .Make him go. You will have self respect. Your children will grow up respecting you. Be the love of your own life. That’s the hard part, wife. But I’m getting there. It feels good. Get it now. Don’t wait.
The Wife-
One more heart-felt message for you. Your husband is broken in the department of knowing what love is. He is fixating and worried about something that he thinks that he is missing from his life – that something is what HE thinks love is. Love to HIM is that feeling of being “in-love”. I’m sure you know that this feeling doesn’t endure the test of time but he sure doesn’t. He is one of those people that can’t transition from the “in-love feeling (in the beginning) into a deeper love, a love that endures the test of time. The kind of love that you give him. That’s why it hurts so much. I’m sure you have been living a noble life and you were always grateful that you had the family, the man, the kids and you realized that this is enough. People like your husband will NEVER get this. He is also broken in the department of understanding what gratefulness and nobility brings to a marriage, it brings true love.
I hope within time you will realize that these exemplary qualities that you offer should be in the heart of someone who is deserving of them. IMO your husband clearly doesn’t have the heart for this.
– Please remember that you are loved by someone higher than us all. Please be mighty for you and your children.
I’m off topic here, but can someone please explain what ‘2×4’ is please? I’ve only come across it since reading this blog and it’s been bugging me and I can’t figure it out.
2 in. x 4 in. x 8 ft. Construction Lumber… 🙂
Is this a cultural difference thing? I still don’t get it. I’m not from the US.
A 2 x 4 is a piece of lumber, suitable for smacking someone in the head to knock some sense into them.
It all finally becomes clear! Thank you Rumblekitty!
I’ve mainly seen this used to mean that the only thing a bully or otherwise selfish narcissistic person understands is serious, meaningful consequences for their action, e.g a meaningful fight or flight.
e.g.:
“The only thing a bully understands is a 2×4 to the forehead”
Or in the context of infidelity:
“The only thing a cheater understands is being served divorce papers”
Anything less, and the bully will just shrug any consequences that lack substance.
Its an idiom to express the idea that somebody needs to be faced forcefully with evidence in order to see the truth. Sometimes also phrased as being hit with a “clue x 4”.
Hello The Wife, I was in the same boat as you. Well almost, my X was an agnostic, so not throwing the ‘loving Jesus’ idea around, with his loving the OW idea, but otherwise very similar guy. He was oh so concerned about his affair partner, at the same time he was asking me to forgive, and forget, and stick around to re-build our relationship. Hmmm – explain to me again where the AP fits in? He couldn’t, except he just knew she was a fragile little flower whose feelings were so hurt!
You know what I did? I left him. I did not want to hear one more thing about how he was sad, and she got hurt! What about me? I was just expected to be stoic, and take care of myself. I felt like- why was I even married? Wasn’t he supposed to be caring for my feelings? That’s how I figured out that our marriage was disfunctional, and if I stayed, I would slowly fade away.
Think about it, The Wife. You’re more than that, you have an identity, and you’re not just there to serve him, as a good little appliance, and you certainly don’t need to hear about the OW!
Listen to ChumpLady’s points, she knows what she’s talkin about!
“I find that disrespectful towards me, but he says she was the love of his life, and he still cares about her.”
WOW! Just WOW! Why is God’s name would you want to be with someone who just told you another woman was the love of his life? Trust me the “was” is really “is” and once she decides to call him back to her he’ll be gone.
As for his “christian values”, he doesn’t have any. If he did there never would have been an affair.
You deserve so much more; your children deserve so much more. Why are you settling for a man who has told you how little you really mean to him. You need to show him the door.
The one thing that comes to mind, is that cheating hubby might be doing what cheater ex did. (I’m NOT saying my cheater ex because no way am I claiming that POS.) He was such a coward, and he didn’t want to be seen as the bad guy, that he made sure to make the situation so unlivable, that I would do the divorcing and he would come out smelling like a rose. The mean old wife just was so unreasonable……she divorced ME. After all I’ve done for her……..
It wasn’t until much later, after I had gotten out, that I realize that I put up with shit that was unbelievable , simply because I was so stressed at the time that I didn’t realize I was being abused. I also had to do a lot of work on my family of origin issues.
All in all, it came down to cheater ex as being such a lazy SOB that he was all for letting me do all the work in the divorce too. Boy,was he pissed when I made him file. I told him I could not afford it right then.
Wife, Honey, time to pull up your big girl panties and face the fact that he is not your friend. He has shown you that over and over. Time to take steps to protect yourself and your babies. Yes, see that pit bull lawyer. Make sure they are well versed in high conflict divorces. Run that credit check. Get up to date copies of all your important financial accounts with current balances. Make copies of all your important documents and papers and store them all in a safe place, away from your home. Put aside money and gift cards. Spirit away valued momentos, pictures, items and store them somewhere safe he does not have access to. Get checked for STDs. If you are still having sex with him, make him wear a condom. Tell trusted friends and family the whole story. Make sure they are trustworthy. Do NOT tell cheater hubby what you are doing. In short, trust that he sucks, and that the only person that you and your four babies have to count on is YOU. Set yourself up to leave with as many resources as you can.
You are going to discover strength you never knew you had. Don’t believe his version of you. You can do this Honey. I’m rooting for you.
What an interesting grab bag of moral standards this gentleman possesses. He’s a true pillar of virtue. Let me see if I have this straight. It is a violation of his moral code to divorce his wife for the OW (God wouldn’t like that), but it’s not a violation to fuck the OW in the first place (I’m sure I read somewhere that God frowns on that too), and he’s doing the “right” thing and adhering to those closely held and sacred Christian principles by sacrificing the love of his life to stay with his family (I’m almost moved to tears at his nobility), but he still wants to stay in touch with the OW (well, shit, he’s not still fucking her, so what’s the problem?). My, my, my.
The only thing that really needs to be figured out is what happened to this poor woman to cause her to think so little of herself that she would EVER entertain staying and raising a family with such a man. The solution to that riddle will found long before anyone can make sense her husband’s moral code.
^^^^^This!!!!!!
I’ve been trying and trying to figure out his “moral code” too. I’m not sure that this “man” has any known moral “values” at all! But of course, I shouldn’t be mean and I should actually be thinking more in the lines as maybe, just maybe there is a “secret”, “morality” chapter in the cheater handbook that we chumps are not aware of??????
Dear Wife,
I am from the future and this doesn’t work out well.
Seriously, I have been there. I did the reconciliation route for three years and I wanted to believe I had a unicorn but I didn’t.
I got a Slight variation of the same treatment you got but it ultimately meant the same thing. When I “got my husband” back he “had to break it up with the OW in person. ” I was a nervous wreck all day but he made me feel better when he told me they cried together and he thanked her for saving his marriage” Not kidding; wish I was. I stayed.
I helped him clean his office at work and watched him stare longingly at her picture but I stayed.
I went to a going away party held for him in which she attended and I watched them text eachother all night. I stayed.
She continued to contact him and I was the only person who objected. I stayed.
I stayed and was treated like a doormat. The only reason he came back was that he didn’t want to lose his “stuff.” He didn’t want to give up half his 401K.
All of the things he did weren’t that much different than your husband telling you that “the OW was the love of his life.” They are designed to keep the chump in line. The underlying message is “dance prettier, stop complaining or I will leave.”
I’m sorry this is happening to you, wife. I truly understand your heartache but the hisband you have “won” is showing you who he is. It’s time for you to believe him.
Isn’t it amazing how we can deceive ourselves and tolerate such abysmal treatment even after they show us who they really are? After I got out and took time to do some honest reflecting, I was amazed almost as much at my willingness to try and stay in the marriage as I was at finding out about her years and years of serial cheating. Amazing as it seems now, I can see how it happens. Glad you’re out.
It’s also amazing to me how many times I used the word “amazing” in my previous post. I apparently need to expand my library of adjectives:)
“flabbergasting” is my latest!
“he thanked her for saving his marriage” <– I got that one too…
Last night and today I noticed two new things that seem very common:
1- thanking the person who has taken a big part in the breakup with the AP "you have saved my marriage"
2- gaslighting the spouse by showing that the AP wanted to buy a present
I got both of them, and naive me thought that 1) was a good sign that he valued what we had, and naive me felt guilt with 2).
‘Wife’,
See a lawyer, do a credit check, get your ducks in a row, see a therapist, make sure you have some family or friends who are on your side and leave him / kick him out.
You don’t want to be the consolation prize – trust me I know. He’s already devalued you in his mind (if he ever really valued you). He’s staying out of “Christian virtues” and cause the other woman dumped him. Not because he acknowledges he made a big mistake and wants to be with you. He also calls her the love of his life in front of you. That is extremely degrading – don’t expose yourself to this toxic person!
I had a similar experience. While I suspected, I got brutal confirmation of my ex’s long term affair after the AP had dumped her (cause he’d found his wife was cheating on him and so wanted to date again rather than just have a side dish fuck with my crazy ex). While she didn’t say it to my face as such I found evidence in emails and on support forums that she was in love with the AP and I was just a convenient front. She deleted his numbers etc but I later found out she was still in touch with him and trying to get back with him via work email and a secret mobile she had.
I kicked her out after I busted her again. She was never going to change and neither will your husband. They feel entitled to stay in touch with the OW / OM and keep their options open. Don’t stand for this. Remove their options. Walk away and give yourself a chance of a life free of abuse, full of doing what you want and hopefully finding someone better (and the world is full people better than your cheating husband).
Look after yourself and your children
He’s staying cause Ow dumped him. period. x found out he “needed” me 6 months after he abandons me, guess why. I was the third side of the triangle that kept their twu luv going. Sick f*cks.
It’s amazingly that they all play by same rule book and say the same stuff. Mine gave be the same line, called her his “best friend”. Took out a second phone so he could keep the communication going. When I found out that he ever stopped his affair, I put him out the door, literally in the middle of the night. He was such a coward, he STILL cannot say that he left me for her. OW you are welcome to my sloppy seconds, to a man who when caught prefers to eat cake rather than leave for you. Fighting through a difficult divorce and praying the end is near.
Wife, you didn’t get your husband back, you got a cheating lying POS who most likely realized its “Cheaper to keep her”. Considering you’ll be playing marriage police for the rest of your days and sleeping with one eye open, it’s so not worth it. Lawyer up and move on. Please listen to everyone here. A man (or woman) who abandons their family for a piece on the side is not worth taking back. They have no respect for you, find someone who does. The only regret I have is I didn’t file sooner.
Wife,
Do you love him? Do you need him? Do you want him? You don’t have to answer me, of course. I’m just wondering what, exactly, he brings to your life, that you even WANT him back at all.
Ann Landers (Dear Abby’s late sister) used to bring it down to “Are you happier with him, or without him?”
She also said (as they all do, and they’re right) “Why should he make any changes as long as he has everything the way he likes it (or words to that effect)?”
Your husband doesn’t love you, and disrespects you, and doesn’t want to change what he’s doing. What did you just get back that you really want back?
Oh yeah, your question. IMO, no of course you shouldn’t allow it. The problem is I don’t think he cares if you allow it or not.
Punt his ass back to the love of his life. And don’t put too much stock in his Christian values.
I can only offer my experience. My Ex returned to me many times and told me “it’s over!” Then my adult children found the Facebook page that he created using the nicknames they had for each other! It was devastating, but educational at the same time. He denied all along that he knew anything about it, but HE had actually created it to keep in touch with the OW and his creepy “friends” who thought their love affair was sooooo cute! The OW then suggested they get cell phones so they could sext and take pics when they were together. Then came the “secret” email account he created! Trust me, the day he told me he was “in love” with his Facebook f-buddy (just hours after sleeping with her on a fake business trip) I was in total shock! One hot mess. I felt I was going to pass out on the floor and this numb nuts says to me, ” I’m worried about Puta!” I lost it! He played this game to the day I divorced him. Let go of this one, go find someone who values you and truly loves you. Let them have each other. The reality will soon hit them and the shiny veneer will wear off of their “true love” right along the time they realize how much they are shelling out each month for you and your children. OW’S just hate it when their isn’t enough money for fancy dinners, romantic trips and luxury hotels. They also feel a little bit different when they find out that they have to financially support Mr. Wonderful! Go see a lawyer. Find out what your divorce laws say about child support, alimony and his obligation to health insurance and housing for you and your kids! I really believe you deserve a better life than just some cheater sad sack hanging around to polish his so-called Christian image. Just my humble opinion! My heart goes out to you. I have been there, done that. Mine came back after the divorce was final 8 months. Schmoopie was tired of his broke ass! Boo hoo!
I haven’t read through the comments yet, so forgive me if this has all been covered, but this asshole has basically said “I dont love you, I don’t respect you enough to go no contact with OW, I don’t care about your pain, and if I could still fuck her and play married with you, I would.” What would you tell your best friend if she told you her husband had said that to her? Be your own best friend and get out.
And on a side note–It really burns my lady balls when a cheater thinks they made such a huge sacrifice for you/the kids by ending the affair. Or that the AP was the ‘love of their life.’ They get to hold on to that delusion and never experience the excitement wearing off or reality setting in. Better they should end up with the AP and get cheated on or get caught cheating on them. Their pipe dreams are far better than what they deserve.
And btw, “The Wife” is a trigger for me. Its how owhore referred to me. It trivialized me like I was just an annoying chore in his life or a foot note, or a hurdle to be cleared for their happiness. You know what–I’m the goddamned Queen of the Universe, you fucking side piece of shit Slunt.
When I busted my STBX and read his disgusting gooey we’re soulmates SHIT with the whoremat and found out he was calling me wifey that pissed me the fuck off. Like I was some sort of idiot housewife just doing his bidding. I agree! I’m a fucking goddess and he doesn’t deserve me. She is a whore that opens her legs to literally anyone that she tells “I love you!” I am a goddamn dessert buffet of delicious goodness and she is a stale old Twinkie!”
You know – here is the thing. It’s. too. easy. to. lie. I have a STBX who has a ho-worker and I have asked for no contact several times. I saw the gazillion text messages, I’m sure the switched to some sort of texting app. I said no going to her place, I’m sure he parks his car somewhere and takes an Uber (or she picks him up or something). I said cut off all contact outside of work… and it dawned on me that suddenly this child he is all mixed up with, who is constantly on social media, has not commented on his FB page in months, because I’m sure he has another secret FB page that I just can’t quite seem to find (I haven’t tried that hard to be honest). Hell – I got in his car and could smell her cheap ass perfume on the seat belt and when I challenged him he said “well we still go to lunch”… like I was the crazy one for not realizing this.
If he doesn’t want no contact, he will find a way to make contact. Burner phone, texting apps, secret FB page or snapchat account, skype to numbers that are “for work”… and so on. Eventually they will hatch up a plan to meet up in between with him making up some excuse and leaving you home to deal with 4 kids while he goes and fucks his lady friend.
I mean in this case, count yourself lucky. You said “no contact”, he said “I am still going to have contact.” … I give him credit for being so narcissistic that he didn’t even pretend that he was going to do what you wanted. He dismissed your request outright and made it clear that your needs don’t matter. And he will lie and be inventive about the truth (like someone said she will always contact him first so he doesn’t contact her or some nonsense technical bullshit).
I am not going to tell you to dump him. I am going to tell you accept that he is going lie to your face, without any thought or recognition on his part that there is a person who is hurt by those lies and decide if that is what you want in a partner.
+1
Dear Wife,
Read all of Chump Lady’s posts, and comments by Chump Nation! You will find that; yes you do need to “Unfriend” your husband as silly as it sounds. I’m divorced and still trying to unfriend me ex wife… It would be a lot easier if we didn’t have kids…. Trust they lie! you will also see many posts here were we CHUMPS took back these “asshats” only to find that they found a new soul mate.
Good Luck and trust you gut!
I cant get over the fact that he told you–his WIFE–that SHE is the love of his life. That was unnecessary. And cruel.
Really cruel. Why inflict such pain? That’s reason enough to leave him.
Chump lady I do find it a bit weird that your ads are telling me to click to find out the #1 thing
To keep my man and not kill his attraction… I love you, I think your ads have some ironic twosted sense of humour.
I don’t control my ads. BlogHer network does. I can opt out of some areas, like dating. Which I have. But part of what runs are things inspired by what you’ve googled or bought in the past. Like I bought my husband a shirt from LL Bean, so now LL Bean shows up here or on Facebook. No idea what voodoo makes online ads do that, but my site is no different that way. Sorry, please ignore. But folks, the ads are what keeps this place running. I spend around $200/month to host this site (that’s not including my time, just the outlay). The ads offset that.
For sure- I admire their tenacity of sending me that click bait
“I just got my husband back after a year long affair he had. And now he doesn’t want to delete the OW from his Facebook and his phone. He doesn’t necessarily want to keep in touch, but he wants to know that she’s doing okay and check on her every now and then.”
I wondered if this letter was written by the cheating husband.
If not, then I’m speechless.
TIme to go, WIfe. Enough. Your “husband” is a piece of shit and doesn’t deserve you. Jump ship NOW.
God did NOT put you on this earth so that you could be used and abused by anyone. None of us were.
Dear Wife,
I am sorry you are in this situation.
From what you say it seems to me that you have been systematically abused emotionally and psychologically by your husband, to such a point that your self-esteem in in the gutter and you feel powerless. You are NOT powerless.
You’ve reached out to Chumplady which is good, and now you need to keep moving forward.
I would engage a solicitor/lawyer and find out what your entitlements are if you divorce.
I would also get some therapy to help build your self-esteem.
Tell yourself that you deserve better then this, and then set about making that a reality.
And please stop thinking of yourself as “wife” – you are a person in your own right, not just an appendage of a man.
“You have 2 pairs of shoes. They’re both comfortable. One is for church, one is for play. They both serve a purpose, so how do you choose which one you want to wear for the rest of your life?”
This is one of the many things ex mentioned to me while he was trying to decide if he’d let her go?
I fell for all of his tactics. You’re falling too.
I’ve been down the road you’re on…we all have. If I’m just a little more patient? If I this?. .. If I that? .. Am I being too jealous because I want this boundary? Am I must possessive, & selfish? Am I asking to much? He told me I’m insecure! I’m intruding into his personal business! He tells me he “only” cares about her so how can I be angry over THAT? I mean come on, it shows everyone that he’s a good person. He’s not leaving her in pain! She doesn’t deserve that. I can’t even go over everything I thought, seen or heard. But, Oh my gawd looking back I see the insanity!!!
I consider myself to be fairly intelligent & yet I could NOT see how desperate I was by trying to stick with him. He didn’t care about me & his children’s pain. At all.
I realize that I can’t trust him ever again.
He was being soooo disrespectful, & so is your lying, cheating, backstabbing, narc of an asshole jerk! They’re the ones that are selfish.
A church leader whom knows the both of us told me “Your husband knows the right thing to do. He just won’t do it. (Go no contact with secretary) There’s no gray area here. He wants both of you.”
The leader flat out told me that it sounds like husband’s not going to choose. Husband said he wanted his family. But was trying to convince everyone that she’s an outstanding secretary. Why can’t they just be friends? Why does she have to be fired. They’re soul mates. They work together so well. She’s helping to take our company to the next level. She has 4 kids that need her to work there. Her dad wants her to work there. He promises that HE can keep it professional. He just needs to help her! Blah, blah, blah! The delusion goes on & on.
They will say or do anything to keep that door open.
People that tell you what you want to hear are dangerous. Continuing contact can only end in destruction. And sh!t, your husband isn’t even trying to tell you what you want to hear. I can’t stand to think of the pain that you’re in. It’s sick!
Indecision with time, IS a decision. Please, please, please don’t be a doormat. Either he gets rid of her, or you get rid of him.
This is the hardest thing I’ve ever done… to divorce, but now I finally see what I’M worth. Getting rid of my husband brought me a miracle. I realize that I deserve better than him.
And guess what? So do you.
P.S. Surprise! Their affair WAS continuing THE ENTIRE TIME that he said it wasn’t. Big shocker right? They just get better at hiding it. They’re together. OW is happy that I finally caved. I truly think he strung me along until the divorce was “my idea” so that I’d be more fair & be able to tell everyone that he tried making it work & I walked away from him. Hidden assets anyone? Affair partner “laying low” & helping him the entire time anyone?
I understand that right now you’re in the dark. Come into the clear. It’s much brighter where we are.
Being on your own with children is hard. My ex never has them. A meal once a week, if lucky.The odd last minute holiday. I think the decision to leave is dependant on the ages of the children.
Wait until they are all over 10 if you can. Collect info and re-train. Be savvy.
Don’t ever expect him to stop cheating but work quietly to expand your own life and be ready to jump when everything is in place.
I don’t think anyone should minimise the hell of 4 children on your own. You cannot assume he will have anything to do with them. Cheats don’t like responsibility. Courts cannot make them, I know.
There is a huge difference between leaving a marriage with 1 child and a job and career, and no career and 4 children. Its all very well to rightly say ” emotionally you will be so much better “. Correct. However practically and financially it could be hell for years. Minimise those years if you can.
Until the fuckwit beats you to the punch and makes the decision for you, then you’re properfucked.
‘Seriously?’ indeed.
Hi, poor devastated wife, I struggled to keep my family together in wreckonciliation for 5, awful, humiliating years, in which his DISRESPECT and emotional abuse got worse. I found him with OW again, and a voice in my head said ‘if you continue, you are now actively participating in your own abuse. I filed. Guess what? He had already hooked up by email with an old flame, and moved on quite rapidly to her. They are ‘deeply in love’. He kept this relationship secret all the time we were negotiating, and has just sprung it on his kids. On their Christmas holiday. Producing her.
You cannot ‘make’ them love you. Love yourself. Don’t sign up for deeply humiliating discard. You can’t love them or understand them better.
It hurts like hell. There are no words to describe to other people with steady, ordinary husbands, how painful this it. But staying? Having no boundaries? No self-care? Makes it much worse. Put your foot down, accept your marriage is over, and get him to move out. File.
‘When you are going through hell, keep on going!’ – Winston Churchill.
There is a fabulous Christian book on this by Dr David Clarke. http://www.davidclarkeseminars.com/apps/articles/default.asp?blogid=0&view=post&articleid=I-DONT-LOVE-YOU-ANYMORE&fldKeywords=&fldAuthor=&fldTopic=0
PLEASE TAKE NOTE: “He’s not kidding. He’s not trying to get your attention. He has decided to get out of the marriage. Period. In a high percentage of cases, he also has found someone else he’d rather be
with.
As I explain the tough-as-nails approach they must take in response to an unloving husband,
many of my female clients say, “But if I’m too tough, I’ll scare him off!” My response is always
the same: “You can’t scare him off because he’s already gone.” These clients desperately want
to believe he’s teetering on the fence. He’s not. He jumped off the fence and is five
neighborhoods away.
Oh, he may act confused and all torn up inside. Don’t buy it. A lot of these husbands ought to
receive Oscars for their “this really hurts me” performances. The pain you see is either fake, or
just the last few gasps of guilt for what he’s going to do. The guilt won’t stop him. All he’s
worried about now is how to get away from you with the least amount of damage to his
reputation and bank account. “
Time for the clue-by-4…
She dumped him, yet they are still ‘apparently’ friends and he’s all sad-sausage about ‘how she feels’ due to the end of their fuckfest. Right-o. Complete and utter bullshit. This tells me that they are still fucking each other even now. Sorry.
The ONLY reason he is staying is because he doesn’t want to lose half his shit that he feels entitled to 100% of – its certainly not out of love for you.
Also, the ONLY dialogue about this situation which should be happening is this: “I am not asking you – I am TELLING you that you will end contact with this whore of yours. And believe me – I will know if you are hiding contact via other means.To do otherwise tells me exactly all I need to know – that you are a worthless piece of shit”. There is NO EXCUSE for this sort of behaviour. None. Ditto if he offered some bullshit excuse as to why he can’t give up contact, why he refuses a pre-nup, and so on.
In fact – don’t even bother with the above – just slap him in the face mentally by taking the prick to the cleaners for what you (and your kids) are rightfully entitled to. He was a prick towards you by saying some whore is ‘the love of my life’ instead of the wife of his fucking 4 children – he thus deserves no mercy.
If you still want to stay with this worthless piece of shit – you are a participant in your own abuse. I’m pretty damn sure you don’t want to die from a fucked up disease that his slut has given you, right?
This is painful and embarrassing reading for me – I know that it is easy to be wise in hindsight and we all like to think that we are the exception to the rule.
This story will not end well and we all know it. It is impossible to control the behaviour and decisions of another adult and trying to is humiliating and futile.
At best this marriage will limp on with the implications of his affair unresolved. He will probably continue contact with the OW and, if she is willing, resume the affair. If she is unwilling then a new OW will manifest.
If she is the love of his life then why does he resist divorcing you? How secure can you feel in such an unstable position.
My ex also resisted divorce but “still cared” for her and needed to know how she was doing. He made a half hearted attempt to end the affair which resulted in her storming my house and the police being called.
He dithered for another 6 months while I believe that she set the rules and I was retained as a weak back up plan.
He returned to her and the very thing I had feared happened anyway – plus months of crazy making pick me dancing and a gradual lessening of any guilt or loyalty to me.
Clinging on to this wreckage is wasting precious time and energy that would be better spent in swimming towards the shore.
She won’t go away unless she wants to. He won’t break contact unless he wants to. The lies will go on. Only you can save you.
Wise words. You should have shot her when she invaded your house. Perfectly legal to do so in most states and if you couldn’t get away, legal in all states.
OMG! That would be my dream! The whoremat in my situation has an alcoholic abusive ex. Maybe he will bust in once my STBX moves into her house and take out all three of them at once! ??
You came here for advice and you got it. 278 chumps responses at the time of my post. Please pay attention to all those here that have gone through this before you. I’ve been reading this blog for over 2 yrs. and the one thing I have learned is that Cheaters are all the same.
There comes a time when you need to pay attention to the facts and listen to what your head is trying to tell you and no longer follow what you think your heart wants. Your heart wants the person you thought he was. That person is gone. Look at the facts. He cheated on you, He doesn’t love you the way a wife should be loved. He won’t break contact with his adultery partner. etc.
Your heart has been broken and I don’t see him as the one who will repair it. We can’t make you decide what to do we can only tell you what you will most likely expect by staying and divorcing. One thing for sure is that it will suck either way. But the divorce route is temporary, staying with him will most likely only continue the mental and emotional abuse.
Please consider changing your name from “The Wife” to “The Mother”. Show your kids that this type of dysfunctional behavior from their father is not acceptable at all. Be the mother you need to be by showing them how marriage should not be. Be the sane parent. They need that from you.
“Friends”, huh?
I hope nobody minds, but I really want to stick a rusty butcher knife into the whole “friends” thing. I find it completely offensive, and anyone who has ever had an actual friend — a real proper, authentic friend — should too.
For clarity’s sake. Fuckbuddies aren’t “friends” to anyone at all. Neither are APs, bondage partners, prostitutes or hook-ups. They already have a label that describes exactly who and what they are: fuckbuddies, APs, bondagers, pros, alleyway hook-ups. They don’t get to change their labels to something softer and nicer and socially acceptable just because they’re uncomfortable with the truth of the nature of their activity together. They don’t get to graduate to being a “friend” as soon as the wet patch has dried.
Similar thing for ex-spouses and ‘proper’ ex-boyfriends and ex-girlfriends. They’re not “friends”, they’re “exes”. If we’re on good terms, we can ‘BE’ friends with an ex-spouse, but he or she is still an ex-spouse first and foremost, that’s their label, that’s how we relate to each other.
These people who insist on everyone calling them a “friend” once the penis has left the vagina for the final time are sinister creeps who feel entitled to hang around flirting, hoping, waiting, seeking attention, looking cool, doing a few subtle Pick Me Dance moves (a bit of Pick Me Shim Sham) — or keeping their former ‘whatever’ hooked on the line — once they think they have permission granted to sail under a new flag of convenience, the “Friend” flag. It’s all a classic triangulation CON designed to CON the current spouse/boyfriend/girlfriend into giving a hungry old vampire a backstage pass to their relationship.
I totally agree HopeAndGloria. the whole time I’m reading this ‘friends’ crap I’m thinking:
Friend to the wife? nope, enemy
Friend to the children? nope, enemy
Friend to the marriage? nope, enemy
Friend to the husband? according to him
= Husband is the Friend to the enemy of his wife, children, marriage? ergo husband = enemy
The question which still has me baffled is this: How can you have an ex-boy/girlfriend/husband/wife and still be ‘friends’ with them? If you were friends with them, wouldn’t you still be together?
I sincerely believe they wish toremain friends
Image control see my ex wife still likes me!
They want to feel better about themselves ex doesnt have to feel so bad.
It impresses the ow/m
And it justifies the cheating was not wrong. It was a good thing!
Im playing the of course we will be friends game while asswipe is refinancing the house then its adios forever motherfucker!
With few differences, I was this gal 7 years ago…thinking that “MY husband” had “come back to me”
and like Mary said above, it is humiliating to see the clarity of it now. My cheater didnt even have to ask to come home (or what the terms were) all he had to say was “Im coming home” because the knew the welcome mat was out front and few demands would be made.
I did tell him that he was not to have any more contact with OW and he claimed to have complied with it. Things I found after his death suggest otherwise.
I would have argued (for years) that we WERE different, we were the Unicorn because he didn’t have another affair after her, I didn’t know he had plenty BEFORE her or that he maintained a Fort Knox sized fortress of old lies in his mind that he would never ever admit to that caused him to act toxic and resentful to me over until he died.
All the people just above here are right…they arent friends, they are co-conspirators.
I dont know how much longer I would have stayed if he had lived, but it would have been “too long” – I wish I had had the courage that we are trying to instill in the gal who wrote CL.
Just reading this post now, so sorry if I’m repeating what others more than likely already posted. I would say that “husband” got dumped by OW not because he refused to divorce his wife, more than likely OW just tired of him or found someone else. He has nowhere to go, so he uses his Christian values to grandstand and use as an excuse to come home. if other woman snaps her fingers he’ll come running. Not to be negative nancy, but this poster needs intensive therapy her self esteem is virtually non existent.
I totally agree with you KB22…those were my thoughts about her scumbag all along. He is grandstanding behind his Christian values to make himself look noble (“see, I’m giving up the love of my life for Jesus)…He got royally dumped but is still stalking her in the hopes that she will miss him and have a change of heart…going back to his wife “might” eventually make the OW jealous. Wife is just the convenient appliance that he uses to do it and to keep some cake meanwhile…and to get his ducks in a row for when he dumps Wife. He WILL reconnect with the Slunt the moment she snaps the rubber band on her wrist, or find someone else in due time.
“Love of their Life” = fuck of their life, until the next. IMHO, life is more than the next piece of strange. I say we are all better than that.bit is what Cheaters value though. Not honesty, God, or family.
Wife. The last three years of my 20 year marriage were spent dissipating assets, by my POS Cheating husband. So not only did he get a second job at the family court a county over but he was spending lots of money (new truck at 33k, guns, vacations), giving some of it away (scholarships, anyone?), dumping savings (our children’s college funds as well as money in “his” 401k, this went into his retirement and would have disappeared if I had not pointed it out to the court) and I was clueless. Working, running the kids around, and losing patience with a sad sausage who was really a soulless disengaged jerk. My entire marriage (and sex with him) felt “off” but I attributed it to many issues, long hours at work, stress, and life challenges, and just worked harder. We were according to those who knew us “the perfect family.” We had everything: good health, three beautiful healthy children, a dream home we’d saved and worked hard for, on twenty acres, good jobs, and I was sure ONE DAY he would recognize and value what he had. Not a chance. I would have done anything to save my marriage, right up until his little I want a divorce speech. When I finally realized I had been played and that he had been fucking someone else (duh! Slapping myself upside the head!) I knew that instant that I no longer had the power to make it well. Even Chumpy kick-ass me. The last few years of Insanity were a result of his “secret” Affair(s), his crap double life, his inability to cope, not because I was a crap wife. Thing is these monsters have CHOICES and they make them every second, minute, hour of their days. You and I are an inconvenience to them. We stand in the way of greatness (snark here). Who wants to be a responsible person when there is a smorgasbord of sex out there?!?! POS cheaters set up their lives the way they want and to hell with everything else. Loving spouse. Children. A good life. Nope. The disordered will ruin.that. every. chance. they. get. Had I never stumbled on the sure knowledge of the OW I would have thought he’d just gone insane. He gave me that ILYBINILWY speech too. 28 years together. What the FUCK!?!? I worked hard on our relationship every day, was supportive of his career/hobbies, and raised three beautiful children. The best thing he ever did was fuck somebody who gave him an ultimatum. (Tell her or I will.) Cheating is a dealbreaker. Someone here said it best, “Your one chance was our marriage.” Staying with him will NEVER guarantee “Happily Ever After.” Now kick that bum out, lawyer up, protect your finances, model to your four children what love really means, and get busy living. Life can’t get worse than living with a cheating spouse.
I agree 100% KB22! My Ex slithered back after four months of shacking up with OW after I divorced him. He said he dumped her, but I expect it was the opposite. There he sat in HER condo one state away, had quit his job and was unemployed, got very, very sick and she had to deal with his surgeries and Dr. appointments as my adult children refused to put up with her whiny phone calls and such. He was leaching what little assets he had left to pay alimony to me and that irritated her to no end as her Ex had remarried and lost his job and claimed he could not manage her alimony. However he managed to visit some pretty high priced resorts and vacations non-stop with his new spouse! Once the OW snooped through his personal papers and found out he still had me as beneficiary on what little he had left, she was out of her mind! She couldn’t control him anymore and he was a liability! So out the door he went! His version, of course, is that he finally came out of the “fog”, but it’s BS! These cheaters are nothing if not good liars! I say, kick them to the curb! They made their poor choice the minute they rolled in the sack with their “love of their lives”! Yuck!
I’m betting OW dumped your ex as well. At least you have witnessed karma or the universe wreaking havoc on both your ex and OW’s lives. Good for you!! OW’s ex remarried and I’m betting he & his new wife did the math, decided that he “lose” his job so now he does not have to pay her a dime. OW will soon (if not already) latch on to some other sap. Let your ex go live in a dingy one room boarding house or something as he is not your problem.
Roberta, please tell me you didn’t take him back!
Leave him now. My STBX unfriended, un-LinkedIn, deleted her phone number from his phone…4 years later after being the marriage police so diligently and wasting so much energy and life…not to mention money…he never stopped being with her…I filed…six months later she divorced her husband….they have been having a relationship almost half the time I believed we were building a life. He is now more successful than ever spending all of it on her while I wait 2 years after filing for divorce and he hides his money. A cheater doesn’t change…ever. Go through it now rather than we’re you’re older, more broke, and more defeated. It’s SO hard but you owe it to yourself. You absolutely owe it to yourself; respect yourself.
Being abandoned and lied to is fucked up at any age, but to be in your late 50s or older and looking forward to retirement and spending the golden years with the person you loved, trusted and spent building a lifetime with. I got laid off my job, lost my health insurance cashed in my small ira for bills expecting my spouse to have my back he walks out 15 days after i lost my job to start a new life for some whore with money who worships the ground he walks on. Silly me. Never gain. There is a extra special place in hell for cheaters and those they cheat with. May everything fall down around them and may they get exactly what is coming to them.
Trust me….i’ve been through this….he is just looking to “keep the door open” with her. This is not over yet. If he’s looking to keep tabs on her he’s still emotionally involved. This is a smoldering fire that will re-ignite one day….soon.