Married 14 years- Just Learned of Cheating in Year 5

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Tulum wasn't even trendy until about 5-6 years ago for rich west coast people, and 2-3 years ago for DC area dorks. Def happened WAY more recently!

Tulum has been popular since the early 2000s. https://magazine.tablethotels.com/en/2020/01/unhidden-gem/

This article is from 2012. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=980DE4D81239F931A15752C0A9649D8B63&pagewanted=all

I live in Old Town and my DH and I went to Tulum in 2000. Stayed at Ana Y Joses oceanfront for $30 a night!

Tulum has been a thing for decades. Sorry you didn't know about it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok this is not ok at all. The amount of deception is crazy - you thought he was somewhere and he was in another country. What if something happened to him on that trip? I would not be able to get over this. I'm sorry OP.

+1. What an asshat.

+1. Go to therapy by yourself and with him.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I call troll because there was no reason for him not to go along and pretend he’d been to that destination prior to the marriage.

NP, but prior to marrying my husband, we knew all the countries to which the other had traveled. OP has been married 14 years. If my DH suddenly remembered a trip to Mexico he’d never told me about in almost two decades together, I’d think it was suspicious.

DP. “What countries have you been to” is not a conversation my DH and I have ever explicitly had. Married 15 years. I know where we have been together but if he—esp as an American—happened to say he’d been to Mexico I would not be surprised. I wouldn’t expect him to be either. It’s right on the continent; you could drive from here to there. And we lived long lives before we met.

Actually since the last time I was in San Diego was about 20 years ago I’m not sure I can swear whether I have been over that border or not—I assume no as it would have been post 9/11 so my passport would have been involved.

OP, though: your husband has been lying about this Every. Single. Day since this started. Mine once tried a related lie, but the attempt messed him up so badly that he couldn’t even keep it up for a full week. It has been hard enough to recover from that. Someone who lies every single day for nine plus years is just not a person you can build anything back with. I am so sorry.

Really? I could tell you the countries my husband has been to. I bet he'd get about 85% right for me, but I've traveled a lot more.

Off-topic but: really! His family traveled internationally when he was a kid; mine didn’t. He also did research in a region of the world where many countries are close together. I am sure he has spent time in/crossed borders between places that we have never had any reason to explicitly discuss. Debriefing the years before we met has never really been our thing, exactly.

OP, how’re you doing?

[Anonymous]

I’m sorry. I would feel our trust was broken. As others have stated, he has probably cheated other times.

I have not experienced this with Dh but I used to be in a serious relationship with a guy and I learned into the relationship that he was still seeing other people in the beginning of our relationship and that even hurt. I lost trust in him. I could never fully trust him and that is probably why we ended up not together.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m so sorry.

+1 Did he tell you, OP, or did you find out some other way? Does he know you know?

He did not tell me. Over the weekend we were at a party that had some of his college friends there. One of them was talking about an upcoming trip to Tulum Mexico. He asked my husband if the area they were going to stay in was the right area. He hemmed and hawed and told him he was confusing him with someone else as he had never been there. It was awkward enough that the guy stopped pressing but I knew something was up. He took her there for a trip when he was supposedly in Miami on work travel. He confessed everything.

Not trying to be a B to you, but I doubt it. My friend thought the current affair partner was the only one since his one indiscretion in year three of their marriage. She later found out there was at least one more woman over the years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m sorry. I would feel our trust was broken. As others have stated, he has probably cheated other times.

I have not experienced this with Dh but I used to be in a serious relationship with a guy and I learned into the relationship that he was still seeing other people in the beginning of our relationship and that even hurt. I lost trust in him. I could never fully trust him and that is probably why we ended up not together.

I don’t get this. If he was seeing other people before you slept together that’s called dating and it’s normal.

[Anonymous]

I was an AP for two years. He communicated with me for an additional 7 years and would definitely have been physical if I had allowed it. I was married myself by then so I didn’t.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A point that nobody has mentioned yet is that the friend (and probably whole friend group) knew and accepted that this behavior was normal and okay. With that kind of group mindset, it is likely that DH and all of his friends think that cheating on your wife is no big deal. That would make me think DH has done this a lot. Agree with PP that if DH has the balls to take a mistress on an international trip and then got away with it, no reason to not keep doing such things.

NP. Thank you, PP. I was reading this thread and was appalled that no one yet had mentioned this exact point. The DH likely runs with a crowd of friends that shrugs off each others' cheating, or possibly even condones or enables it. People's friends really do reflect, and affect, their priorities and values. If the OP is thinking of staying with DH they need plenty of intensive couples' and individual therapy, and he needs to drop friends who are his enablers or encouragers. Maybe this one friend isn't like that but the guy seems to have known DH had been to Mexico which wife didn't....DCUM will lose its little mind at that idea but so what? OP cannot trust that he chooses friends wisely, just as she cannot trust this was the one and only affair.

Or, because it's been 9 years, husband could have also told friend he was in Tulum with OP which is why he thought nothing of mentioning it and DH got nervous because he was caught in a lie with both.

An idiot…

+1

If the friend knew, the friend is just as much an a-hole, if not more, for "encouraging". It is a form of aiding and abetting.

If the friend did not know OP did not go on that trip, the DH's friend is off the hook.

Either way, the DH handled it ALL wrong, and should have been up front with you, years ago, to give you more options, OP. Your DH sucks for limiting your options.

I say this because I know people who have been to online prostitutes and they are still married. Happily? Probably not, but the wife absolutely knew. I also know people whose "friend" hired a prostitute for the groom-to-be, and well, let's just say the groom-to-be has nothing to do with that loser.

The issue here is that your DH knew the AP intimately, and planned and executed a trip with the AP, while you were home with the kids, and DH was spending marital money doing so. That is hard to overlook, because there was no innocence or excuse to the situation. Not that you would want one. It is all about plausible deniability, with your DH. Is that who you want to live with, for the rest of your life? Someone that looks for excuses to their unpredictable and terrible behaviors? That reminds me of something FIL would do - and FIL did NOT set a good example for DH and his siblings - at all re: women. DH's parents were completely miserable, and it could not end soon enough. What is your DH's parents marriage like? Not that it matters, but it plays a part.

You need to help yourself get out of this situation, one way or another.

[Anonymous]

Also wondering if you are close to the friend? Should they have not told you?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Tulum wasn't even trendy until about 5-6 years ago for rich west coast people, and 2-3 years ago for DC area dorks. Def happened WAY more recently!

Tulum has been popular since the early 2000s. https://magazine.tablethotels.com/en/2020/01/unhidden-gem/

This article is from 2012. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=980DE4D81239F931A15752C0A9649D8B63&pagewanted=all

I live in Old Town and my DH and I went to Tulum in 2000. Stayed at Ana Y Joses oceanfront for $30 a night!

Tulum has been a thing for decades. Sorry you didn't know about it.

Maybe re-read the post you responded to? The person you just snarked at is aware Tulum has been a hot destination for 24 years, given they vacationed there in 2000…

[Anonymous]

I’ve never heard of Tulum. Is it near Cancun?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m so sorry.

+1 Did he tell you, OP, or did you find out some other way? Does he know you know?

He did not tell me. Over the weekend we were at a party that had some of his college friends there. One of them was talking about an upcoming trip to Tulum Mexico. He asked my husband if the area they were going to stay in was the right area. He hemmed and hawed and told him he was confusing him with someone else as he had never been there. It was awkward enough that the guy stopped pressing but I knew something was up. He took her there for a trip when he was supposedly in Miami on work travel. He confessed everything.

Wow. The degree of deception here is creepy. I would be totally repulsed by the elaborate web of lies he had to tell (and maintain for 9 years!) to pull this off. Thats even more appalling the cheating itself.

[Anonymous]

Cheaters only admit to what they think they can get away with. If he said that they met every other week for six months, double or triple that. He's probably still in contact with the AP, sexting or even possibly meeting up when they can. You simply will never know. He has successfully hid this from you for SO LONG.

Being married to an exceptional liar is not a flex. You need to divorce this guy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It was 9 years ago. I understand you feel a lack of trust and violation of your marriage but unless it happened multiple times, it's water under the bridge.

Your reading comprehension sucks. "every other week for 6 months"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Cheaters only admit to what they think they can get away with. If he said that they met every other week for six months, double or triple that. He's probably still in contact with the AP, sexting or even possibly meeting up when they can. You simply will never know. He has successfully hid this from you for SO LONG.

Being married to an exceptional liar is not a flex. You need to divorce this guy.

+1. Not a flex - it’s creepy, predatory behavior. Your DH may be “trickle truthing” you - telling you what he thinks you already know and he can get away with, hoping you will either be satisfied or so horrified that you will not ask further Qs. By now he’s had a chance to cover tracks, but you should still examine all records - cell phone especially and reverse search #s, check all bank and credit card records, computer history (particularly locations, log ins and search history), email accounts (including draft, trash and spam folders). His cell phone should be open to at all times to you to look at anything you want for as long as you want.

People will say that a relationship/life where you have to play detective like the above isn’t worth it, but it also isn’t worth it to blindly trust someone who has proven your trust was misplaced. Getting the real 411 is the lesser of two evils.