My husband and I have been married for almost 4 years, together for 8. Most things in our life seemed perfect- in the process of buying a house, just opened our own business, and of course our perfect 18-month old son we have together. So much going on at one time, but our personal lives were thriving, so it seemed. I have been on the verge of depression, however, due to problems at work. Bad coworkers and bosses, with bad relationships getting worse, and making my life absolutely miserable. I knew that if I found something out like this about my husband, that might be it for me. Then it happened. Sure enough, he had been searching for quick encounters with strangers. Just recently, he searched for someone on craigslist and set up an "appointment" while he was out of town (only an hour away) doing business.
I found the proof yesterday and I'm totally sickened, hurt, depressed, and just destroyed from the inside out. He of course is denying that anything happened, but had to admit to the searching since I found the proof. He will not admit to the actual encounter, which apparently I'll never know the truth. What I do know is that he has been interested in an extra-marital affair, and to me, that's all I need to know. If he wanted it at any point in time, he'll want it again, right? How am I supposed to ever trust him again? The thought of him ever touching me again makes me sick. Last night I cried to him about my feelings, wouldn't let him near me, and we slept separately. Is this how it's going to be? I don't know how to survive this.
Also, something like this has happened before when we were dating, about 5 1/2 years ago. Of course he denied any actual encounter, saying it was "all talk" because once again I had proof of the e-mails between the two. So we've been through this before. I still have not totally recovered from that incident. But hey, I still married him. I trusted him when he cried and promised me nothing actually happened and he'd never do that again. But here we are. Again. And I question, how many other times has this happened that I haven't found out about? We're apart alot mostly because of his jobs. But this man really does act like he loves me more than anything, most of the time. Until these things come out. I don't know what to do or how to forgive him.
Like I noted above, we have a very young son that will be affected by this and that's the HARDEST thing for me to accept. My goal is to not affect him negatively. I don't want him to see anything wrong with us, but do I have a choice? How do I cover it up? Do I act like nothing has happened and keep going for him? I'm dying inside. I'm hurting so bad. I smile for my son but I don't know how long I can act okay for him. With a small child in the situation, in the process of buying a house and running a new business- do I just let this go? He's begging for my forgiveness, but I don't think I could ever forgive him or definitely never forget.
Where do I go from here?
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The goal of this website is to give support to people who are facing problems in their relationship related to cheating, abuse and narcissism. I am living in Europe and English is not my native language, I wish you will excuse me if I make some grammatical errors. I have a background in neuroscience and behavioral sciences and I am currently doing brain research related to these topics in university in my home country. I decided to write in English because I wish to reach as many people as I can around the world. If you wish to read more about me, please visit page Site Overview.
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Dear Friend,
First of all, I wish you will excuse me for all the mistakes in my writing, I am European and English is not my native tongue. If you wish, you can read more about my background from page Site Overview.
Those of you who would like to send your own story to me to get support and advice, please go to page Personal Stories: Cheating and Infidelity Information to get instructions how to contact me and to send your story.
Dear Friend, I really feel for you, I know exactly how painful you are feeling right now. I remember very well that sick feeling in stomach when I was thinking about matters related to cheating of my man. I felt as if the whole world suddenly turned colorless. I felt I was standing at a junction, and no matter which way I chose, I knew I would feel depressed and miserable. If I would stay with him, I would be unhappy because I could never forget certain things he had done and I could never fully trust him again. On the other hand, I knew that if I would leave him, I would be unhappy and depressed because I felt I really loved him very strongly. It was incredibly painful to realize that I no matter what I did, I could not "win". I recommend you read this article of Cheating And Brain, it will help you to put things into perspective and understand why you feel the way you do right now. Understanding the basis of your emotions will speed up your healing.
I did lots of self-analysing and finally realized that if I did not somehow change the way I was thinking, I would end up being not only alone but also bitter due to the disappointments I had faced in my relationship. I decided not to let that happen, and so I started a long process of reshaping my thinking. Let me emphasize this: I DO NOT ACCEPT THIS KIND OF BEHAVIOR FROM MY SPOUSE, and you should not do it either! What he did was WRONG. In following chapters I am describing how you can deal with your emotions, I am NOT saying you should accept his behavior. I did not accept the behavior of my spouse, and I made decision to leave him, but this reshaping of my thinking spared me from bitterness for years to come. I did not have to think there was something wrong with me. There is nothing wrong with you either, always remember this. He did his decisions on his own.
If you wish to read more about the recovery process after cheating, please visit page Healing after Cheating. I am describing these things in more detail elsewhere on this website, but for now I will address one important point. When I was processing my pain, it was helpful for me to stop thinking about my own misery for a moment and instead think about situation from his point of view. I sort of detached myself from situation and looked at it as an outsider. That reduced my pain. I tried to put myself in his shoes and understand what was going on in his mind when he did what he did, lied and got romantic with other women. Did he love me or care for me at all, when he was capable of cheating?
I think the answer was "yes", he must have cared for me in some way since he chose to spend majority of his time with me (he decided to live with me instead of someone else). If he could not stand me or would prefer to be with someone else, he would not have "sacrificed" so much time and effort to build a life with me. But the problem was this: his love and caring feelings towards me were of very different kind than my love and caring feelings towards him. He simply did not care for me enough to put me as a priority, because he was capable to cheat and lie. When I realized this, it helped a little. I realized that I was not to blame, there was nothing wrong with me, that he would have most likely behaved like that with anyone (as a matter of fact he has lied and cheated in all his previous relationships, but he swore to me he had changed and I believed him). His mind and personality were built in such a way that even tho he loved me in the way which was possible to him, he did not put me as his first priority, which made cheating possible for him.
There are people who put their beloved one as priority and that is why they do not even think about doing things that they know would hurt their beloved one (such as cheating or lying). Then there are people, who simply cannot put their partner as number one. They can feel love towards their partner, but they will always love themselves a bit more and so they can cheat and lie. That is a fundamental difference which decides wether someone is capable of cheating or not. For example those with narcissistic personality often tends to belong to the latter category and are capable of cheating, lying and betraying. In my case I simply could not imagine living with someone like that for the rest of my life, it would have been too painful for me to only wait when cheating would occur next time.
The problem was that my man wanted to have bigger piece of a pie, he wanted to keep meeting other women, but in the same time he wanted to be with me. He wanted to live like a single man, even tho he was in a relationship with me. He took his new lady friends to dinners and bars when I was out of town and paid for everything. If that is not dating, then I do not know what is. He brainwashed himself to believe that it was completely alright, that he had right to have female friends. I agree that we all have right to have friends, but if he really loved me and put me as priority, he would not have done those things when he could clearly see how much it hurt me. But he put himself as a priority, and did what he wanted, not what he knew I wished for. This showed to me that his love towards me was very different than my love towards him. I know I could never have done such things for him.
If you can accept it as a fact that the love of your husband towards you is different kind than your love towards him, it will make it easier for you to cope with current situation. This does NOT mean you should stay with him. It simply helps you not to feel so miserable thinking that there was something wrong with you because he cheated. There was nothing you did wrong, nothing you could have done better. Sad fact is that some men simply are like that. There are some men who can dedicate themselves completely to their relationship, and then there are men who cannot do it and who end up cheating at some point. In some way this is not the "fault" of a man himself; he happens to have a blue eyes, he happens to be tall, he happens to have "wondering eye", he happens to be fascinated about extramarital relationships, he happens to be of cheating type. These are personality traits which cannot be changed easily. Even if a man would never cheat or lie, if he has these personality traits, he will be thinking about those things, even if he does not actually cheat.
Do men like that deserve to be loved? I think, in the end... yes. In a same way as dark-skinned and fair-skinned people both deserve to be loved, so do those people who have some "flaws" in their personality or some other kind of disorder or sickness. Nobody is perfect, and lots of unfair things happen in this world all the time. The key thing is this: it requires a certain kind of a woman to be able to be in a relationship with a man like that, just as it requires a certain kind of a woman to be in a relationship with a man who has permanent illness. It is very though and not everyone can do it. I personally am not that kind of a woman, I could never accept cheating. Some other woman perhaps could. You must ask yourself are YOU that kind of woman, can you live with a man like your partner who is capable of cheating? Are you strong enough to face the reality that he can never love you exactly the same way as you love him (he has shown this with his behavior)? Most of us cannot, since most of us have normal human feelings and we need to feel we are truly loved, not only half-way, and cheating would break our hearts.
That is what this is all about. This is the reason for your pain: you want to be loved by your spouse (we all want that!) and you would give anything if you could make yourself believe that your husband loved only you, despite all that has happened. But because you are a reasonable, smart woman, you can no longer fool yourself: he cheated once, then he cheated again, that means that he does not love you in same manner as you love him. This, however does not mean that he does not love you at all. I am sure he does love you in his way. He loves you the best he can, as much as person like him can. But it is different kind of love than your love towards him. I know you are struggling and hoping you could find some way to continue relationship and forget the cheating. But you must ask yourself, is his half-love enough for you, can you live with someone like him who can cheat you again, or do you wish to be with someone who is capable of loving you back the same way as you love your partner, without ever worrying of cheating?
There are some women, who can live with men who are occasionally cheating or there is a strong possibility that they would cheat. Perhaps those women themselves have similar personality than those men, perhaps they too could cheat and so they can better cope with the situation. It can be that woman wants to maintain certain life style, which she would otherwise have to give up if she left the man. Perhaps mere companionship is enough for some women and cheating is not such a big deal for them. Reasons why women choose to stay in a relationship with cheating man can be many. Most important thing is that you must have a feeling that it is YOU who has made a conscious decision to be with your man, not that you are in a situation in which you would not want to be and which makes you feel bad. As I said, only very few of us can accept cheating, lying and betrayal.
If you are not that kind of woman who would feel comfortable living in a relationship with a man who is capable of cheating and not fully dedicated to put your happiness as a priority in a relationship and to refrain from doing things which he knows will hurt you, I do not want to encourage you to try to stay with your man, because I believe it will only lead to depression and heartache. There is a strong possibility that he will be cheating again. Please read about four phases of recovery after cheating from article How to Get Over Cheating. Your husband already cheated once before, he must have known it hurts you if he cheats again, but he chose to do it anyways. It is hard to heal after the first cheating , lying and betrayal. It is many times harder to heal after second time cheating occurs. It can even be that healing is not possible after second cheating and betrayal. You alone know exactly how you feel in your heart, and therefore you alone can make the decision if it is worth it to try to stay and try to heal your relationship.
The most important question you must answer is this: can you live with your husband knowing that there is a danger that he might be cheating again? Of course the fact is that in this world we can never be certain of anything. We can lose people we love anytime. We or someone close to us can die or get sick. Our friends may leave us. We may lose our job or health. We may get into any kind of accident. Our spouse can betray us, cheat on us or leave us. All these things are possible, and yet we manage to live our life without worrying about them too much. This is the key thing. If we can live so that we take it into account that there is a possibility that our spouse may one day cheat on us, betray or leave us, but we do not worry about it too much before cheating actually happens, then we are able to live happily.
Unfortunately in your case you must do a bit more mental work than this, because you are past the point of wondering "could my man cheat on me and betray my trust". He has already been cheating at list two times (perhaps even more, but even if not, cheating two times is bad enough), so it is no longer a question of wether he is capable of cheating or not. He is. The question that remains is will he be cheating again. This is second time he cheated (to your knowledge), so it is logical to think there is strong possibility that he might cheat third time. If you stay with him, you might end up always being on your guard and you might become very suspicious and bitter over the years, if you live like that.
As I have said, I believe your man loves you in his own way. So you do get his love (or half-love) if you stay with him. But if you stay, you must accept the fact that he may be cheating you, despite his feelings towards you. It is very hard to live like that, personally I could not do it. As I said, some men simply are like this, cheating is easy for them. It is nothing personal, there is nothing wrong with you. It has absolutely nothing to do with you or the way you are. He would most likely be cheating no matter with whom he is in a relationship with, because cheating is in his personality. You on the other hand could not cheat him. That is the way your personality is.
What you should do now is to give yourself a bit of time to think in peace. Do not try to make any decision right now. You are still in a state of shock because of cheating. Let things calm down a bit and in time it will be very clear to you what you must do. You must also think what is best for you child. If you feel there is a danger that you might become seriously depressed because of this if you stay with him, that you simply cannot forget and forgive his cheating, then please leave now when you still have your health and you are able to take care of your child and enjoy your life with him. Believe me, if you stay in a relationship in which you are not feeling well for years, you will eventually change as a person, you will become unhappy, withdrawn and bitter. I have seen this happen to people and it almost happened to me. Please do not let that happen to you, you are too precious of a human being to let your life go because of cheating of your husband.
You are facing some though questions and you must take time and think about everything carefully. Trust your inner feeling. It will tell you what is the best way to go from here. In my case, what helped me to get over my pain due to cheating, betrayal and lying was that I concentrated my energy elsewhere. I knew I could not do anything to change the past, and I could not "mold" my man to be the way I wanted. He would always have those traits which caused me not to trust him fully. More than once a cheater, always a cheater, this is often true. I realized that if I would only dwell in my grief I would become a bitter, depressed and unhappy person. Instead of dwelling in pain due to cheating, after I made decision to separate I decided to train my mind to deal better with situations like that, so that if I would ever face cheating again in future, I would be stronger and my mind would not get so messed up.
There will be all sorts of losses in our lives: We will eventually lose some of our relatives, friends and beloved ones to death or they might get some disease, they might travel to other countries, they might just simply abandon us or we might abandon them... these things happen in life time to time, we cannot escape them. I decided to put all my energy into learning a new way of thinking, which would help me to accept and deal with these things (losses) faster when they occur, instead of trying to mentally fight them which will always result in greater pain. I am going to add to this website couple articles dealing with this matter of training the mind to this new kind of thinking. Please feel free to visit here time to check for the updates.
Thank you for your email, I send big warm hug for you! You WILL get through this.
- Maria
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Stories - Cheating 
We have a good relationship now because I have learned to forgive her for the act of infidelity (or at least put it away) but I will deep down never be able to forget that feeling that I had when I'd learned my own mother had lied to me for my whole life. True that it was not my relationship to know about but when a child sees her mother upset and lonely all the time and hears untruths about the reasons why it does undermine the relationship I had with her. It is forever changed between her and I. We still love each other, but once bitten by a parents deceit it is difficult to recover.
My advice (not that its worth much)is that unless you can truly and completely forgive your spouce, do not lie to yourself and continue in something you know to be dead. You are only delaying the inevitable and eating away at your own self confidence over the years. You may be sad now, imagine what it will be like ten years from now? You feel alone - imagine how alone you will be in ten years when your spouse's repetitive acts of betrayal eat away at you. In staying with the partner that is a destructive force in your life you are inviting that person to be a further destructive force in your child's life. By hiding the truth, you are acting in the same manner as your betraying spouse. Do not fall to their level, but bring them to yours if they want to go.
You can lead a horse but you can not make it drink. The betrayer needs to prove to you absolutely that they are a changed person, otherwise you are defacto endorsing the behavior by "forgiving" it (or pretending to). What motivation then do they have to actually change the behavior? You've just shown them that you are not prepared to do something about it which will remove the consequence from their actions and only increase the chance they do it again.
Unless they are changed and have shown you that they've changed (words, they've demonstrated are worth nothing from them, only action at this point will suffice) and have gone through trails where they have worked through their demons (its a long road, the 12 step program is not 2 steps so they will need to show their dedication to their own healing for a long time so you will require patience), only then are they committed to changing their ways and committing to your relationship with them. Settling out of fear doesn't get you anywhere but where you dread to be at the moment only its a longer road and you'll wear out your shoes in the process. You will have to know in your heart of hearts that they are changed in order to trust them, the only way they are going to convince you of that is through action and time.
A true liar may be able to talk their way through anything but if they are forced to show you through action - they tire easily and likely move on to easier pray. If he tires - then you have saved yourself from further pain (positive). If they do not tire, but show endless energy for the relationship they love through small and consistent acts of kindness and understanding... you will build new memories to replace the old ones and have a healthy foundation to start from (positive). In this way, by looking at it in this way, it IS a win win situation. Words are nothing if not supported through action.
I wish you the best and send you my strength to do what is best.