He's cheating. Now what?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Posts like OP’s always stir up such venom and sanctimony. The suggestion that a cheating spouse can’t love their kids or be a good parent is ridiculous. Another poster hit it right on the head: most cheaters don’t ever think they will get caught, are compartmentalizing and the parenting part of them is often doing just fine. It’s only when they get caught that there’s a problem.

No one knows what’s going on in anyone else’s head, and no one is in any position to judge anyone else’s parenting simply because there’s infidelity in the marriage.

It’s interesting. I follow the college admissions forum and I see a lot more damage being done to children there than the theoretical damage that can be done by a cheating spouse.

It isn't theoretical but very real damage. I'd love to know whether any of the posters who claim kids are not affected negatively by cheating have actually asked children how they feel once they find out. Because most of them will find out. And it will affect them.

Cheating does not affect kids. A bad divorce affects kids. Someone can cheat and you can still managed to have a good divorce if you’re able to put the kids first and then it doesn’t affect them.

You cheater are wildly insane.

Not a cheater. I am a logical person.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Actually I have a pretty well informed view of what single life is like. Here’s what it will be: less money, less time, loss of friends, being treated as less-than by just about everybody, constant unending stress and anxiety about being the breadwinner and only source of everything, no one to help you if you’re tired or sick, inability to travel. Inability to take on extra work, possible need to change career paths to free up more time for kids, an endless parade of freaks and losers with flaws at least as large as her DH’s but people who have zero committment to her children, while her apparently awesome high earning handsome funny non abusive non alcoholic non addicted highly educated service-oriented DH takes up with someone new and possibly goes on to have more kids, shortchanging her own, and providing a stable secure life for some other woman while OP watches from her office window, where she now spends every minute that she isn’t with her kids. It sucks, and is not necessarily better than dealing with the flawed human she married.

I am a divorced 45-year-old woman with kids. What are you describe here is just not true. Stop imagining what divorce is like for people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Actually I have a pretty well informed view of what single life is like. Here’s what it will be: less money, less time, loss of friends, being treated as less-than by just about everybody, constant unending stress and anxiety about being the breadwinner and only source of everything, no one to help you if you’re tired or sick, inability to travel. Inability to take on extra work, possible need to change career paths to free up more time for kids, an endless parade of freaks and losers with flaws at least as large as her DH’s but people who have zero committment to her children, while her apparently awesome high earning handsome funny non abusive non alcoholic non addicted highly educated service-oriented DH takes up with someone new and possibly goes on to have more kids, shortchanging her own, and providing a stable secure life for some other woman while OP watches from her office window, where she now spends every minute that she isn’t with her kids. It sucks, and is not necessarily better than dealing with the flawed human she married.

I am a divorced 45-year-old woman with kids. What are you describe here is just not true. Stop imagining what divorce is like for people.

I don't think PP is saying all divorces are like this. Just if you get divorced from an otherwise great catch. Maybe you married and divorced a loser.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One or my parents cheated, they never told me (but kids know, oh how kids know). They worked it out. I don’t think any less of either of them for cheating or not telling me. I do thank my lucky stars they worked it out. They’re in their late 70s now, very happy together, spending time with the grandkids, traveling, doing some hobbies… To throw it all away for a mid/life crisis or momentary lapse of judgement would have been idiotic.

Humans are very flawed. Once you understand that deeply, everything becomes easier.

Watch out! There’s a poster on here who is going to circle back and tell you that, no, you got it all wrong and if you dig deeper within yourself you’ll realize that your childhood was miserable and you didn’t even know it

Yeah, what the OP describes isn’t a midlife crisis or momentary lapse in judgment. Her DH has been deceiving her for what, years? These situations aren’t equivalent.

Yes they are. Midlife is about coming to terms with flaws and limitations, sometimes deep ones.

When I was a child I spoke as a child
I thought as a child, I reasoned as a child
When I became a man I gave up childish ways
…For now we see but through a glass, darkly,
But then, face to face.

The bold is one of the many stories society tells women in order to convince women to continue to accept abuse. Divorce is alao a way of comjng to terms with flaws and limitations. I gave up my childish notion of marriage above all - of believing that the showone presents to the world is more important than living a healthy life even when it isn’t a fairy tale.

Also valid. But you are basically trying to hold on to idealism in an unideal world.

Agreed. It's important for OP to think about all options and no option comes without its problems.

No option comes without its problems, including staying with a cheating DH that is otherwise awesome.

[Anonymous]

Since you don’t think you want to divorce, or you’re not sure, don’t do anything yet except get tested for STIs. Then just sit with it for a while and see how you feel. I think it would be awfully tough not to resent him and go crazy with distrust whenever he is out of the house, but you’ll have to see how you feel. You should probably also seek out individual therapy to talk this through. Just give it some time. Right now you are in terrible shock and you are not thinking clearly. It’s okay to take it slowly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Actually I have a pretty well informed view of what single life is like. Here’s what it will be: less money, less time, loss of friends, being treated as less-than by just about everybody, constant unending stress and anxiety about being the breadwinner and only source of everything, no one to help you if you’re tired or sick, inability to travel. Inability to take on extra work, possible need to change career paths to free up more time for kids, an endless parade of freaks and losers with flaws at least as large as her DH’s but people who have zero committment to her children, while her apparently awesome high earning handsome funny non abusive non alcoholic non addicted highly educated service-oriented DH takes up with someone new and possibly goes on to have more kids, shortchanging her own, and providing a stable secure life for some other woman while OP watches from her office window, where she now spends every minute that she isn’t with her kids. It sucks, and is not necessarily better than dealing with the flawed human she married.

I am a divorced 45-year-old woman with kids. What are you describe here is just not true. Stop imagining what divorce is like for people.

I don't think PP is saying all divorces are like this. Just if you get divorced from an otherwise great catch. Maybe you married and divorced a loser.

My ex is an attorney. He is not a loser. (But is a jerk). Regardless, almost nothing you describe is my reality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Actually I have a pretty well informed view of what single life is like. Here’s what it will be: less money, less time, loss of friends, being treated as less-than by just about everybody, constant unending stress and anxiety about being the breadwinner and only source of everything, no one to help you if you’re tired or sick, inability to travel. Inability to take on extra work, possible need to change career paths to free up more time for kids, an endless parade of freaks and losers with flaws at least as large as her DH’s but people who have zero committment to her children, while her apparently awesome high earning handsome funny non abusive non alcoholic non addicted highly educated service-oriented DH takes up with someone new and possibly goes on to have more kids, shortchanging her own, and providing a stable secure life for some other woman while OP watches from her office window, where she now spends every minute that she isn’t with her kids. It sucks, and is not necessarily better than dealing with the flawed human she married.

I am a divorced 45-year-old woman with kids. What are you describe here is just not true. Stop imagining what divorce is like for people.

I don't think PP is saying all divorces are like this. Just if you get divorced from an otherwise great catch. Maybe you married and divorced a loser.

My ex is an attorney. He is not a loser. (But is a jerk). Regardless, almost nothing you describe is my reality.

I'm a NP and what she described is basically my reality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Actually I have a pretty well informed view of what single life is like. Here’s what it will be: less money, less time, loss of friends, being treated as less-than by just about everybody, constant unending stress and anxiety about being the breadwinner and only source of everything, no one to help you if you’re tired or sick, inability to travel. Inability to take on extra work, possible need to change career paths to free up more time for kids, an endless parade of freaks and losers with flaws at least as large as her DH’s but people who have zero committment to her children, while her apparently awesome high earning handsome funny non abusive non alcoholic non addicted highly educated service-oriented DH takes up with someone new and possibly goes on to have more kids, shortchanging her own, and providing a stable secure life for some other woman while OP watches from her office window, where she now spends every minute that she isn’t with her kids. It sucks, and is not necessarily better than dealing with the flawed human she married.

I am a divorced 45-year-old woman with kids. What are you describe here is just not true. Stop imagining what divorce is like for people.

She’s writing and Indy film not a response to
OP.

[Anonymous]

Op. I am now long divorced from a serial cheater. A couple of things I wish I had done differently:

1) confrontation - I wish I had not confronted immediately. I should have sat longer - collected more evidence of the cheating, gotten a lawyer immediately, and gotten an individual therapist immediately. There was a lot I should have worked out in therapy first about the kind of marriage I wanted (and were still options in the present circumstances), and what was good for ME and the stability of my kids (and there is a lot work through about the impact of cheating on the victim spouse and kids as well as divorce). I would still have decided to divorce, but I could have probably cut much of the confrontation and therapy cycle short because it was immediately obvious that DH was not honest after being confronted. That should have been the dealbreaker for me and I should have been prepared to move immediately to divorce.(Instead I went through a cycle of confrontation, therapy, and then catching him again. I could have saved 2 years of my life, and a good therapist would have supported my instinct about his reaction to confrontation and manipulation of me.)

2) post - nuptial - at the time I was going through this - I was told these were unenforceable. Nonetheless, it would have had some psychological value.

3) sex - I’m just going warn you that continuing to have sex with someone who has betrayed you in this way can have real traumatic impact. I was firmly committed to monogamy and had explicit discussions about this while dating. My requirement for monogamy had nothing to do with morality but was about wanting a safe environment which would enhance my own sexual pleasure). I underestimated the betrayal trauma I experienced. I felt like I had to keep having sex with him if I wanted to “save” the marriage, but the truth is I felt like it was a form of rape by fraud. He continued to lie to me about his sexual behavior while having/demanding sex with me. It was gross and I did myself a lot of psychological damage by believing that I somehow had to accede to those demands in order to stay married (because I also didn’t want to have a sexless life and I didn’t want to take a lover outside of marriage.) I honestly wish I had told him at confrontation that our sexual relationship was over, that I considered myself free to have sex outside marriage without any constraints or disclosure and that whether we ever had sex together again now had to be mutually renegotiated.

YMMV, or course.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One or my parents cheated, they never told me (but kids know, oh how kids know). They worked it out. I don’t think any less of either of them for cheating or not telling me. I do thank my lucky stars they worked it out. They’re in their late 70s now, very happy together, spending time with the grandkids, traveling, doing some hobbies… To throw it all away for a mid/life crisis or momentary lapse of judgement would have been idiotic.

Humans are very flawed. Once you understand that deeply, everything becomes easier.

Watch out! There’s a poster on here who is going to circle back and tell you that, no, you got it all wrong and if you dig deeper within yourself you’ll realize that your childhood was miserable and you didn’t even know it

Yeah, what the OP describes isn’t a midlife crisis or momentary lapse in judgment. Her DH has been deceiving her for what, years? These situations aren’t equivalent.

Yes they are. Midlife is about coming to terms with flaws and limitations, sometimes deep ones.

When I was a child I spoke as a child
I thought as a child, I reasoned as a child
When I became a man I gave up childish ways
…For now we see but through a glass, darkly,
But then, face to face.

The bold is one of the many stories society tells women in order to convince women to continue to accept abuse. Divorce is alao a way of comjng to terms with flaws and limitations. I gave up my childish notion of marriage above all - of believing that the showone presents to the world is more important than living a healthy life even when it isn’t a fairy tale.

Also valid. But you are basically trying to hold on to idealism in an unideal world.

Agreed. It's important for OP to think about all options and no option comes without its problems.

No option comes without its problems, including staying with a cheating DH that is otherwise awesome.

Good lord, the bar is on the floor.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One or my parents cheated, they never told me (but kids know, oh how kids know). They worked it out. I don’t think any less of either of them for cheating or not telling me. I do thank my lucky stars they worked it out. They’re in their late 70s now, very happy together, spending time with the grandkids, traveling, doing some hobbies… To throw it all away for a mid/life crisis or momentary lapse of judgement would have been idiotic.

Humans are very flawed. Once you understand that deeply, everything becomes easier.

Watch out! There’s a poster on here who is going to circle back and tell you that, no, you got it all wrong and if you dig deeper within yourself you’ll realize that your childhood was miserable and you didn’t even know it

Yeah, what the OP describes isn’t a midlife crisis or momentary lapse in judgment. Her DH has been deceiving her for what, years? These situations aren’t equivalent.

Yes they are. Midlife is about coming to terms with flaws and limitations, sometimes deep ones.

When I was a child I spoke as a child
I thought as a child, I reasoned as a child
When I became a man I gave up childish ways
…For now we see but through a glass, darkly,
But then, face to face.

The bold is one of the many stories society tells women in order to convince women to continue to accept abuse. Divorce is alao a way of comjng to terms with flaws and limitations. I gave up my childish notion of marriage above all - of believing that the showone presents to the world is more important than living a healthy life even when it isn’t a fairy tale.

Also valid. But you are basically trying to hold on to idealism in an unideal world.

Agreed. It's important for OP to think about all options and no option comes without its problems.

No option comes without its problems, including staying with a cheating DH that is otherwise awesome.

Good lord, the bar is on the floor.

If you saw some of these ow, ha, it's definitely on the floor!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op. I am now long divorced from a serial cheater. A couple of things I wish I had done differently:

1) confrontation - I wish I had not confronted immediately. I should have sat longer - collected more evidence of the cheating, gotten a lawyer immediately, and gotten an individual therapist immediately. There was a lot I should have worked out in therapy first about the kind of marriage I wanted (and were still options in the present circumstances), and what was good for ME and the stability of my kids (and there is a lot work through about the impact of cheating on the victim spouse and kids as well as divorce). I would still have decided to divorce, but I could have probably cut much of the confrontation and therapy cycle short because it was immediately obvious that DH was not honest after being confronted. That should have been the dealbreaker for me and I should have been prepared to move immediately to divorce.(Instead I went through a cycle of confrontation, therapy, and then catching him again. I could have saved 2 years of my life, and a good therapist would have supported my instinct about his reaction to confrontation and manipulation of me.)

2) post - nuptial - at the time I was going through this - I was told these were unenforceable. Nonetheless, it would have had some psychological value.

3) sex - I’m just going warn you that continuing to have sex with someone who has betrayed you in this way can have real traumatic impact. I was firmly committed to monogamy and had explicit discussions about this while dating. My requirement for monogamy had nothing to do with morality but was about wanting a safe environment which would enhance my own sexual pleasure). I underestimated the betrayal trauma I experienced. I felt like I had to keep having sex with him if I wanted to “save” the marriage, but the truth is I felt like it was a form of rape by fraud. He continued to lie to me about his sexual behavior while having/demanding sex with me. It was gross and I did myself a lot of psychological damage by believing that I somehow had to accede to those demands in order to stay married (because I also didn’t want to have a sexless life and I didn’t want to take a lover outside of marriage.) I honestly wish I had told him at confrontation that our sexual relationship was over, that I considered myself free to have sex outside marriage without any constraints or disclosure and that whether we ever had sex together again now had to be mutually renegotiated.

YMMV, or course.

This is the best advice! I hope OP, reads and understand this. Thank you dear poster.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Posts like OP’s always stir up such venom and sanctimony. The suggestion that a cheating spouse can’t love their kids or be a good parent is ridiculous. Another poster hit it right on the head: most cheaters don’t ever think they will get caught, are compartmentalizing and the parenting part of them is often doing just fine. It’s only when they get caught that there’s a problem.

No one knows what’s going on in anyone else’s head, and no one is in any position to judge anyone else’s parenting simply because there’s infidelity in the marriage.

It’s interesting. I follow the college admissions forum and I see a lot more damage being done to children there than the theoretical damage that can be done by a cheating spouse.

It isn't theoretical but very real damage. I'd love to know whether any of the posters who claim kids are not affected negatively by cheating have actually asked children how they feel once they find out. Because most of them will find out. And it will affect them.

Cheating does not affect kids. A bad divorce affects kids. Someone can cheat and you can still managed to have a good divorce if you’re able to put the kids first and then it doesn’t affect them.

I love the people who exercise this kind of wishful thinking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I never told my kids about the cheating, not even now that they are in college and grad school. I found out and kicked now exDH out 15+ years ago, so they were so little, of course I wouldn’t have said anything to them.

But, TBH, telling them at some point in middle school in a neutral way (Daddy wanted to see other women while we were married and I didn’t agree with that so we separated) would have been a lot better than keeping his secret. Kids have questions and when they don’t get honest answers, they make up answers - often incorrect ones. My kids made a lot of assumptions about their Dad, how loveable they were and, also, about me and why we were divorced. Some of those mistaken assumptions sort of self-corrected along the way as the children grew older but not before causing a lot of damage to their self-esteem and their concepts about interpersonal relationships.

They still have an incorrect understanding of why we divorced, and TBH, it is really effing up their view of what a healthy relationship is and the value and risks of marriage and having kids.

The whole assumption that kids should or will never know about the cheating is very flawed, IME.

This x 1,000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Posts like OP’s always stir up such venom and sanctimony. The suggestion that a cheating spouse can’t love their kids or be a good parent is ridiculous. Another poster hit it right on the head: most cheaters don’t ever think they will get caught, are compartmentalizing and the parenting part of them is often doing just fine. It’s only when they get caught that there’s a problem.

No one knows what’s going on in anyone else’s head, and no one is in any position to judge anyone else’s parenting simply because there’s infidelity in the marriage.

It’s interesting. I follow the college admissions forum and I see a lot more damage being done to children there than the theoretical damage that can be done by a cheating spouse.

It isn't theoretical but very real damage. I'd love to know whether any of the posters who claim kids are not affected negatively by cheating have actually asked children how they feel once they find out. Because most of them will find out. And it will affect them.

Cheating does not affect kids. A bad divorce affects kids. Someone can cheat and you can still managed to have a good divorce if you’re able to put the kids first and then it doesn’t affect them.

I love the people who exercise this kind of wishful thinking.

Lol right?
Aren't kids part of the family? Because cheating breaks up families, there is no avoiding this.