cheating husband

I'm 29 weeks preggo and caught my husband in bed with some girl last week... The story that I have gotten out of him is long and doesn't make much sense to me. Where do I go from here? We have a 16 month old son together and now this while I'm preg. I work nights, so have no choice but to leave him alone at night. It's eatting me up inside, it's all I think about, especially when I'm alone at work. I've been really sick lately and haven't been there for him, not that I'm excusing what he did... But I don't want to end up divorced. How do we work past this and how can I ever trust him again? I feel like I make all of the sacrifices for our family and this is how he repays me... I work nights so our son doesn't have to go to daycare, I go to school to get me nursing degree that I don't even really want to do, I feel like I give and give to him and this is the thanks I get. He seems like he is really sorry, but how do I believe anything that he has to say? I also had the unfortunate luck of meeting the tramp that he was with... I know that when she came over that she had the intention of doing this and wanted him to get caught.... she knew damn good and well that I was preg and sick and worked nights... What should I do?

was ur son home during all of this??? honeslty i dont think u will ever get over this.... has he ever cheated before????

Yeah my son was home in bed. I work nights, so he has all night long to do whatever. I've never even thought he would cheat on me. He swears this is the only time, but how do I believe anything he has to say anymore? The funny thing is that he was supposed to meet me at work so he could get to work on time. I tried to call him like five times to make sure he was up and he never answered his phone. It's not like he didn't have plenty of opportunity to get her out of the house before I got there, hell I even got home late!

Thats a tough situation to be in, I am not sure that I could ever get over something like that.. I would tell my hubby to hit the road. He obviously has no respect for you or what you are doing, other wise he would not be cheating on you.. I know that I could never trust my hubby again with that.. Once a cheater, always a cheater. It's up to you on how you want to handle this.. good luck

Heather

of course he seems sorry! you caught him cheating. what's he supposed to do, rub it in your face?

being sorry isn't enough. it'll never be enough.

the logistics of your problem are preventing me from telling you to leave him, b/c you do need someone there supporting you and watching your son while you go to school and work.

not wanting divorce is also a bad reason to stay.

i guess the question you have to ask yourself is: can i forgive him and believe that he'll never do this again?

i mean, you call the woman he was with a tramp-- right? well, what does this say about him? she's not the one who wronged you-- HE is. he's the one that promised to love you and only you when he married you... not her.

you sound like you have too much to take care of right now, much less deal w/ infidelity and your feelings about it. my heart goes out to you.

i really don't know what the correct solution is-- based on the fact you're preggers, in the middle of getting a nursing degree (which would be a huge help if you end up single), and have a baby at home.

i think if i were you, i'd sit down and try to work out my own feelings for the relationship and my partner, try to talk to him about it, and see if the pain doesn't start to subside. i don't think now is the time to throw him out-- despite the fact i'd like to just thinking about what you're going through.

this may sound terribly utilitarian, but you need his support right now, if you're ever going to be secure in the future (w/ or w/out him). so i suppose you should try and make the best out of this but do it w/ a zero tolerance policy.

as far as right now: if you've got family who'd help w/ the kids, maybe you could take some time away from him now... to reflect on your marriage and his role in your life and get away from the emotional confusion of being around someone that's just betrayed you.

at the very least, try to make this ugly situation into a challenge which you can learn from so that you'll never have to be in this position again... and which allows you to raise your kids to never be the sort of person who would do this to someone they love.

i hope this helps a little bit.

I really do appreciate your point of view. I feel like I am stuck, he makes most of the money in the house and like you said I need someone there for my kids while I am at work/school. On that same note I don't want my kids around that type of behavior.

I feel that she is just as responsible as he is for what happened, she knew good and well that he was married with children. I understand that she didn't take vows to me, but they are both equally responsible.

I have no family to turn to, they turned their backs on me when I married him. I honestly at this point don't know if I will ever be able to move past this. I hate myself for loving him. It would be so much easier for me to walk away from this whole situation if I didn't care about him.

I think at this point that we have grown too distant from each other to make this work. We had a long talk tonight and he told me that he "doesn't think it's fair to keep me because of the pain he's caused me" then he cried and told me I deserve better.

I've lost my best friend and now I just feel lost. I've gone from angry to sad to empty. I am so exhausted from this whole ordeal that all I want to do is sleep. He was my entire support system and now I am really alone. I don't have family to turn to and am too embarassed to discuss this with any of my friends. I don't really have any close friends anyway, I'm too busy with work and school to have much of a social life. It's hard because the one person I would usually turn to for help and support is the person who betrayed me. I do love him, but don't know what to do anymore... Every minute that I am at work I obsess and agonize over whether or not he is alone tonight or if she is there...

Thanks for your thoughts

i'm usually the first one to tell someone to get OUT of their relationship, b/c i believe it's better to be alone and struggling financially than emotionally ill and financially stable, and maybe this still applies to you... but you're in a very tough spot right now.

from what you've said this far and putting myself in your shoes as much as possible (but w/out the mental and emotional exhaustion), i'd probably start to mentally strengthen myself by thinking about what i'm still doing right... and this means getting ready to be stronger than i've ever been before.

you should be proud of what you're doing-- how much you're working to have a better future for you and your children... as long as YOU continue investing positive energy into you and your children's lives, you will move past this to a better place and be rewarded for your efforts.

don't let his behavior eat at your self worth... the fact is he's the one who's failed (and yes, i agree the woman also wronged you, but she's not the one who's betraying you).

you don't deserve dishonesty and you certainly don't deserve to be betrayed-- these are his failings and you need to at least know that you aren't to blame in any way whatsoever for his ugly careless actions. don't let him have your self-esteem... it's not worth it on top of losing that trust and security. you are the one who's got the moral conviction in this situation-- you've not failed, you've simply been handed a crappy deck of cards that hurts like hell.

if he's doing the "you deserve someone better line" it may be because he feels truly inferior or it may be a b.s. line he's feeding you to alleviate his own sense of guilt. either way, it looks to me like you have your work cut out for you.

i'd try to make the best of what you can for your emotional health during your pregnancy: weigh your options and whether it's truly worth your pride not to open up to someone near you if you feel yourself cracking under the emotional and mental pressure of handling so many things at once.

try try try to find a bit of time for yourself to write the pain out and be alone w/ your mind... actually, sometimes this forum can be good for that. sometimes, it needs to be more private than that.

this is a situation you can recover from fully and come out on the other side stronger and more able-- you're young, capable, and taking steps in the right direction already... this is just one of those times where everything seems to hurt like hell, but it's also intense training in real-life that will leave you better equipped to handle whatever comes your way.

it's not always easy, but if you're strong, honest w/ yourself and those you love, and take the right actions to demonstrate you care about yourself and your kids, it will get better.

Just to let you in on a secret since everyone is saying what they WOULD do and not that they have been in the situation while pregnant... Here is a little tidbit of information and you can find it anywhere

75% of marriages that are still together, have been involved in infadelity
72% of them being men

you are not in the boat all by yourself. My husband cheated on me when I was pregnant with my first child and we managed to stay together. It took a lot of counseling and a lot of time. The wound is not forgotten there is still a scar, but it is better.

This in general means, that 75% of the marriages out there made it too.

I know that everybody has a lot to say about what they would do if they were in my shoes. The thing is: they're not in my shoes, and leaving is a lot easier said than done.

What did you do to help you heal? I think that is just the hardest part is not knowing what to do to make things better for myself. We've each started indivual counseling and we go in for our first couple appointment monday. I have a really hard time seeing this getting any better, I just can't seem to get my mind past what he should have done instead of what he did do...

Anything that helped would be great!

Thanks!!!

I don't know what i would do...Sorry hun..

All i can say is do whats best for you and your kids.

I don't know if i would ever be able to trust him again. I hate loosing that feeling. sorry you had to go through that.. yuck men suck and so do snotty tramps.      

healing...

i don't know if you CAN heal what he's done to your relationship... what i went on and on about w/ the emotional strength stuff in my previous post, was said in the hopes you make sure to heal yourself, b/c THAT is possible.

you can try to heal what he's done-- but he will have to prove himself worthy of your forgiveness and only you will know when he's done that and IF he's capable... if there's to be any healing of the relationship. he will have to work his ass off to prove his worth to the relationship, and i reckon, most men who cheat like he has, don't even have the capacity to heal what they've so mindlessly destroyed.

i think betrayal of the sort you've experienced usually ultimately kills the love, b/c the trust is so severely damaged by his actions ... and trust is such a huge part of what makes love work.

i don't want to be too bleak on this, and that's why i say, he CAN if he wants and is willing to re-work the damage he's done to your trust, but it will be a major major effort on his part... if he even really wants to keep you that is.

i'm really more concerned about you, than about the relationship... b/c you haven't done anything to deserve what you're going through-- and in the long run, i believe you can come out of this stronger if you don't get bogged down by the emotional agony that comes w/ betrayal. also, the relationship may ultimately, not be worth saving... even if you need it right now to get by as you attempt to line up your future.

time will heal your pain if you let it. if you don't get too caught up in obsessing about him and what he's done to you... for a time, you will need to obsess and hurt and feel the seemingly bottomless pit of pain... but if you continue to carry yourself through your day and try to focus on other things, much like a physical wound, your brain will start to distance itself from that hurt and the wound will leave a scar, but years from now-- however the relationship ends up, you'll know you've healed...

it'll take a few months to even feel sane ... and a few more to feel happy, but it will happen if you don't let this be the trigger for a downward spiral of pain and obsession w/ the betrayal.

also, try to avoid being the person who wears their wounds like a badge. i knew a woman once who liked to let people know she'd been raped when she was younger... and she had so fully identified herself w/ the trauma she never recovered and was more than a little horrible to her kids when she became angry b/c she felt the need to continue living out the anger she had towards her own pain...in a very unhealthy way.

keep thinking about what you and your kids need to be well, focus on that as much as possible... and if your husband wants to be a part of it, he will have to earn his way back into your "circle of trust" that he has so horribly damaged.

I know that healing is going to be a long painful process. The hard part right now is getting past all of the lying he has done. The more I dig the more lies I uncover. They are not necessarily related to this specific even but they are lies that are pushing me that much farther away from him. My goal at this point is to get myself financially secure to the point where I don't need his income. If I can do that then I can make a responsible decision about my future and my children's futures. He has put us in a horrible place financially by drinking behind my back and not paying bills. So now I am going to work on damage control to get us ahead so that if I do choose to leave I can do so with a sense of security for my children's sake. I am taking away all of his access to any money that comes into our household as well as access to credit cards. This way I know where our money is going and can budget to fix what he has broke. It's just one more thing I will have to deal with right now. Anything that I can do to secure my children's future is worth the effort!

After I fix the finances then I can start taking a rational view of our relationship and then I will decide if I still love him and if I will ever be able to trust and move on. I can say for certain that this is not going to become part of my identity either way. It happened, now is the time for healing and moving on with or without him. I don't care to share my situation with friends, hence the online support I am looking for... Hopefully if nothing else I am able to emerge from this situation a stronger, wiser woman and can teach my children better values than those that their dad is presenting.

B

aidensmom wrote: I know that healing is going to be a long painful process. The hard part right now is getting past all of the lying he has done. The more I dig the more lies I uncover. They are not necessarily related to this specific even but they are lies that are pushing me that much farther away from him. My goal at this point is to get myself financially secure to the point where I don't need his income. If I can do that then I can make a responsible decision about my future and my children's futures. He has put us in a horrible place financially by drinking behind my back and not paying bills. So now I am going to work on damage control to get us ahead so that if I do choose to leave I can do so with a sense of security for my children's sake. I am taking away all of his access to any money that comes into our household as well as access to credit cards. This way I know where our money is going and can budget to fix what he has broke. It's just one more thing I will have to deal with right now. Anything that I can do to secure my children's future is worth the effort!

After I fix the finances then I can start taking a rational view of our relationship and then I will decide if I still love him and if I will ever be able to trust and move on. I can say for certain that this is not going to become part of my identity either way. It happened, now is the time for healing and moving on with or without him. I don't care to share my situation with friends, hence the online support I am looking for... Hopefully if nothing else I am able to emerge from this situation a stronger, wiser woman and can teach my children better values than those that their dad is presenting.

B

*claps admiringly.

you've got my respect woman.

Thank you!!! It's good to hear that from someone after the year of disrespect I've endured from my husband!

There is neve an excuse for cheating! NEVER!

But its also hard to sit here and tell you do this do that because yes, were not on your shoes and no, we dont have the slight idea of what you must be going through!

The though of findging my husband in bed with antoher woman makes me want to puke and puts me in an irritating mood. But all I can say to you is what Im sure everyone here has been telling you, Be strong, Focus on your children, and be realistic!

What i mean about being realistic is you should start doing the following to protect yourself and your children who should be the most importan thing to you( you and your kids)

1. Open a separate bank account and start slowly despositing money into this account of yours which he wont know you have. Start with 100 bucks a week or every to weeks, yes it not much but youd be suprise how much that is in a year.

2. Start saving every penny he gives you. Start making out a plan for yourself. Examply: some schools have free child care while your in school, you jsut have to search the web to find those schools.

3. Start paying off your bills, NOT HIS! F*** his bills!!!
4. I know you prbably dont want to hear this but we need to leave the PRIDE aside and start asking for help when needed, exam, food stamps, resources for single mothers etc.

All im simply saying is have a plan. I love my husband but at the same time i have my own account he dosent know about and my own plan he dosent even think I have in the event i was to find a sitatuion similar to yours.

Ladies We must be realistic strong women and always have plan B!
Honey i would be as sad and depressed as you are and all I can do is pray for you and your kids and hope that everything works out, butI do hope that you at least start saving every freekin penny you have and you start planning plan B in your life
If you decide to stay with him then my respects for you because we are not here to judge on what decisions you make but to support you and tell you that although none oof us here know you we all understand your situation and we all do truly wish you well.
I know it sounds redunctant to say things will get better with tim and every cut will heel no matter how big the scar is.
Please never feel pitty for him, theres just no excuce for cheating period that goes for man and women

I wish you the best and I will pray for you and your little ones. And I pray that your cheating husband didnt catch anything and asks you for fogiveness.

Best of luck to you
A-
San Diego