So my wife cheated on me...

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

This isn’t a post designed to solicit sympathy or anything like that. I was told years ago that doing something like this would be cathartic, and now seems like a good time.
I’ve been lurking here long enough to know that my experience pales in comparison to those of some members here, so what follows is just me getting things off my chest.

I first got together with my wife, lets call her Melissa, while we were at school, aged 16. She had had a couple of non-serious boyfriends before, but she was my first girlfriend. We lost our virginity to each other, which may be TMI, but to me at least, it was important.

We were deeply in love, and stayed together despite attending different universities. We bought a house together, and we married a few years later in 2001.

Things were pretty good. A couple of years into the marriage we bought a bigger house with the intention of one day starting a family. But the stress of buying a house started to manifest itself in Melissa in some worrying ways. She was signed off work and placed on very strong anti-depressants by her doctor.

At this point she struck up a mildly concerning online relationship with some stranger. She would go on and on about him to me, but I put up with it because she’s my wife, right? And besides, this guy lives miles away.

I guess I should have seen the warning signs… Her instantly minimising a window on the PC if I suddenly walked into the room etc. It turns out that this guy is a Doctor, and is also off work at the moment with stress.

So Christmas comes and goes, she shows no sign of wanting to get back to work. She disappeared for well over an hour at the New Year party. I found out later that she was on the phone to her boyfriend. I also found out later that she had been phoning him every single day, running up a massive phone bill.

Then she tells me that they have arranged to meet. Their plan is to meet at a huge shopping centre about 100 miles away. She tells me that this is something she “must” do. Like a fool I trust her, and I let her go. January 17th, 2004. I told her not to get in a car with him, or go anywhere other than the shopping centre.

She does exactly the opposite. They get in our car, drive out to the country, and he fucks her in the passenger seat. Of our car. She told me that a couple of motorcyclists drove by, stopped, and came back to watch.

I found all of this out when she confessed the following day.

I knew pretty much straight away that I had to fix things. I made her promise me that she would not contact him ever again. I took her phone away from her, and deleted her email and messaging accounts, then locked the computer down. I fairness to her, she complied and I do believe she never had any contact with him again.

Now the bomb shell, because up until now, this story sounds no worse than most other people’s. The bloke who fucked my wife, was not signed of work with stress, he was suspended by the UK’s General Medical Council because he was a convicted peodophile. He had been found with 77 indecent images of children aged between 4 and 14, some of which included images of penetrative sex. It makes me sick just writing it.
Melissa knew about this before she met him. This is all easily Google-able, and if I were to tell you his name you could find it in a second. Hell, you can probably find it without his name.

So we spend the next year or so in counselling, and mostly due to me, we rebuild our broken marriage. We found help amongst the few friends we told about this, not least from our closest friends, let’s call them Harry and June.
We were lucky enough to have a beautiful baby girl 4 years later. She is now 5 years old - the most beautiful little thing I could ever have hoped to have in my life (whilst still occasionally driving me up the wall!)

Things were never the same again between Melissa and I though. After a period of rebuilding, things were not too bad, but the resentment was always there, the trust never fully recovered.

Fast forward to a year and a half ago. Harry decides to have some kind of breakdown and leaves June for some young tart. June is devastated, obviously. Knowing what I went through was fairly similar, she turns to me for support. Over the period of about a year, we met for drinks 4 times, purely as friends. The 5th time, I took the plunge and kissed her.

I had reached a point where I knew my marriage was over. I didn’t have it within me to rebuild things again. I knew I was deeply in love with June too. Luckily she felt the same about me. This was 5 months ago. We have both found some self respect in each other that had been taken from us. It’s good to start over.

My daughter is very happy. Obviously June is not a stranger to her, which makes things easier. Melissa is dealing with things well… We are still friends, although it is strained at times.

There you have it.
I wanted to get that off my chest. I’m not fishing for sympathy, or anything really, but I’m happy to answer questions… Maybe reading this will help someone else who is going through something similar. I also know that you guys won’t hold back with your opinions, good and bad. So although i hope most of you won’t, feel free to call me a pathetic loser - that’s exactly what I felt like for so long. Until just recently, of course.

tl;dr: Naive bloke who married too young got shafted by his wife when she fucked a convicted peodophile. Things going well nine years later.

2

I don’t think you’re a loser.

It looks like things are looking up for you, though, so at least that’s good.

3

Timelines are confusing (it’s early morning here.) She had a fling (not even an affair). You worked it out, you had a child who’s now 5. So the car escapade happened 9 years ago. The betrayal made you lose your pride and discipline as a husband and made you play the field yourself.

Now the thing that confuses me: Melissa still likes you, right? So why leave her? A married couple breaks up only if they fall out of love AT THE SAME TIME.

4

The title of this thread should be So I cheated on my wife…

I don’t judge you, but what you did was worse than what she did, IMHO. How she gets blame for that guy being a pedophile is beyond me. However, I’m sure you were unhappy, and I support ending unhappy marriages. You should just own up to it though, without trying to link it to your (ex)wife’s long ago, very minor infidelity. It makes you look worse to do that, again, IMHO.

5

It was hardly playing the field, and if I’m honest I had had feelings for June for a long time, but I never acted on them and she never realised. But you have the timescales right.

Because I’m not prepared to invest the emotion in rebuilding a broken relationship again. A married couple can stay together if the love is one sided I suppose, but it’s no fun. Things had been pretty bad for a few years. Our daughter had picked up on it. Staying together just for her benefit was not working. I decided to end it while we could still remain friends. It’s working for now, but I’m not deluding myself that it will last. I hope it does.

Thank you

6

You can’t be serious. I’m not going to start rating infidelity, but his wife cheated while their marriage was intact, it was essentially over when he did the same. I can’t see any basis for saying what he did was worse. You could consider them both wrong, but I don’t see the sense of any relative comparison.

7

I’m not blaming her for his deviance, but she did know about it before she did what she did.
You see in my eyes what she did was A Very Big Thing, and I struggled with it every day for 9 years. And I know I should have ended it back then.
I ended my relationship with Melissa before I kissed June, and before I knew how June felt about me. OK, so I know that’s clutching at straws and maybe I’m trying to justify to this to myself by clinging on to that fact, but there you go.

8

Have you actually gotten divorced yet? Because if not, you should probably get on that. :open_mouth: If so, good job.

The only thing I think is stupid about the whole story is that you had a kid with a woman you couldn’t trust, but that’s not a crime.

9

It all sounds very confusing and complicated, and a big old emotional mess, but I think that’s kind of the bottom line here; you did end it with Melissa before you started up with June, and that’s important. I agree that actually getting the divorce is important, but while what you’re doing with June is technically cheating if you’re still married to Melissa (but separated), it isn’t the same as what she did to you. Melissa lied to you and betrayed you; it sounds like Melissa knows exactly what you’re doing with June.

10

I hate to throw cold water at you in the midst of some (looks to be well-deserved) sympathy and esteem-building, but I need to say one thing.

Do you share custody of your daughter with Melissa? If you have primary custody of the child, or if you share custody, be damn sure that June is divorced properly before moving on. You might lose custody of the child if you don’t.

Normally, that wouldn’t be so worrisome, but see, there’s this sad fact - pedophiles tend to remember that their female targets will have kids eventually. If Dr Pedo isn’t in jail for the remainder of his natural life, there’s a not-small chance that he will worm his way back into Melissa’s life, for the sole purpose of FUCKING YOUR DAUGHTER.

Likewise, if Melissa already HAS custody of the girl, make sure to keep your eyes peeled for any HINT of shenanigans.

I am not trying to be a scaremonger, but if you want to keep your kid safe, be DAMN sure to act in ways that won’t let her out of your sight, or into the custody of Melissa, who has already proven that she isn’t fit to keep anyone (let alone a vulnerable child) away from him.

11

She slept with a guy, once while she was terribly depressed and immediately confessed, cut off contact with the other man, and worked to rebuild her marriage.

He* carried on an affair with another woman, for some period of time, and then ended the marriage unilaterally, even though they have a small child.

I think the second scenario is worse, personally. But I also think in the case of a bad marriage the best thing is to end it, which he did. So I’m not judging; marriages are complex things, and I try to avoid judging people in the thick of them. It’s too complicated, and I also reject the idea that there’s a “right” or “harmless” way to end a marriage. Every divorce sucks.

But, nonetheless, I think it strains credulity to link the two situations, and I think he would come across better if he just admitted his wrongdoing, tried to do better with this new woman, and moved on. Frankly, I find it a bit silly that he’s still (supposedly) mad about such a minor infidelity that occurred almost a decade ago, especially considering he stayed married and decided to have a child with this woman. I think he’s drawing a false equivalence to assuage his own guilt. But that’s a terribly human thing to do, and I don’t hold it against him. Much.

*if I’m reading this right; the OP gets pretty vague when it comes to his own wrongdoing

12

Sounds like OP is using the affair from 5 years ago to justify cheating on her now…Title says it all.

13

Well now I understand what you’re trying to say. I read the story as him having an affair after there was no substance left to his marriage. But I don’t see anything that suffices as an excuse for his wife’s behavior, or his. Both were dishonest and betrayed their partner. I wouldn’t rate either as better or worse than the other based on the information here.

14

Definitely not a loser, a sucker maybe for letting it go to the point of her meeting pedo-man alone though. But no worries there is a sucker born every minute :wink: Especially when it comes to women. Good luck in the future, sounds like you and June have some common ground to build on.

15

Huge Red Flag.

You say you wife knew Pedo-man was a Pedo BEFORE she had the fling with him?

If so, that puts a massive question mark over what sort of standards she has, and whether you could live with her.

Look, people make mistakes in their marriages all the time - and they are generally treated as mistakes and put down to the passage of time and changes in how people grow. Marriages need work.

But if your wife Knew all about Pedo-man and still thought he was an appropriate guy to have a fling with (and it sounds like it wasn’t a ‘get drunk one night and hook up with distant acquaintance’ type of fling) - I don’t think I could spend much time with that person.

16

Or let her near my child.

I was with you till you went and kissed June. You should have divorced Melissa soon. Taking away her phone? What are you her dad? That doesn’t work.

I hope you have a new car by now.

17

This is my opinion, and not meant as a personal attack on anyone.

It is a mistake to marry young, as the young are ignorant of life.
It is a mistake to marry someone that has never had a real relationship with someone else, as how do they know if their first partner is THE ONE.
It is more important to be friends than “in love”. Sexual love never lasts. Friendship can.
Courting doesn’t stop after the wedding. It is a lifetime of work to be married, and it is rather hard.
Both partners have to understand what the needs of their other are, and deal with them.
Communication is the most important thing in a marriage.
If one has an affair, they should never confess. Confession is for themselves to assuage their guilt, not to benefit their partner.

The next one is probably more than most will accept. IMO, if you REALLY, UNCONDITIONALLY “love” your partner, you can accept that they can have an affair, and still “love” them. If you can’t, it’s because you think that your partner is your property, and not an individual.
If your partner has an affair ( unless they are psychologically disturbed ), it is because you are not providing everything that they need. With men it’s usually because their wife is not giving them enough/ any sex.

18

Some interesting responses here. Obviously the issue raised by Lasciel is one that I have thought about, and lost sleep over. I’ve talked to Melissa about it. I’m not overly concerned.

The divorce is in progress. I’m not contesting it and we are not involving any solicitors. I don’t see any point in lining their pockets. We have agreed how to split the assets and how to handle custody of our daughter. It’s important to me that we remain friends as it means I can see my daughter every day.

miss_elizabeth, I obviously don’t see things the same way as you do. I suppose technically I am cheating as I am legally still married, but as others seem to realise, my marriage had ended long ago, and I told Melissa it was over before I made any move on June. I feel absolutely no guilt over that whatsoever.

I’m kind of surprised how easily some members say they could forgive a transgression like that. I guess I thought I could, but no.

And, yes, I have a new car, although that one stayed far longer than it should have.

19

“I’m kind of surprised how easily some members say they could forgive a transgression like that.”
Nothing easy about it.
It’s just that if I married someone and couldn’t fulfill their life to the point that they didn’t need to seek something elsewhere, I wouldn’t blame them for playing away. A spontaneous “it just happened” type incident wouldn’t be enough for me to ditch an entire marriage over.
However, I certainly wouldn’t want to know about it from her- I’m only human, and I would be jealous.

20

Confession may be good for the soul but it’s hell on the conscience.