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Newest Member: HoldenOn

Just Found Out :
Isolated in a conservative community

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 Starant (original poster new member #87015) posted at 11:33 AM on Saturday, February 7th, 2026

Just really want to share my story because no one other then me and my WS know the full extent of everything and it’s eating me up.

I come from a conservative community and while I know i will have everyones support in this situation, i haven’t told anyone exactly what i know of the affair because it makes me sick to my stomach and i know how shocking it will be to people in my community. I just cant bring myself to talk about it even though i wish someone knew. Im sure one day i will share my story.

I was married for 8 years and its been 6 weeks since finding out about my husband’s 6 month his affair with a colleague. We have a daughter who is almost 4.

He lied to the other person and told them he was engaged and having issues in his relationship and it was ending. He took her interstate and slept with her. He told me he was going to watch a sports match. During this trip he called me and said he missed me and our daughter. He asked me to pick him up from the airport and got into my car and acted like everything was fine. How can someone do that?

As their affair progressed he told the other person that he was living at his mums and we were separating. This was not true. We were very much together and even had sex. He met the other womens mum and apparently told her there was no feelings for me and we were over. At home he was acting like everything was fine and even made plans for the future.

When i found out, he was trying to cover up the full extent of the affair. He said it was just emotional but I knew something more was there. I took her number from his phone without him realising and called her. She told me they had sex countless times and even sent me the screenshots. He admitted himself that he slept with her 7 times. Some of those times was after work. When i would call him to ask where he was, he would say with friends. It makes me sick that someone can do that to their family on multiple occasions.

When everything came out about the affair, he told me the most messed up things. He said after a while he started to get sick of her, but he kept her around because he liked the validation. He told me that during sex, he felt like he could disrespect her and it didnt matter. He said he felt like he could try things out he saw in porn when he was younger, but didnt feel like he could disrespect me like that. Ill take that as the only compliment in this situation.

I saw that he emailed her soon after i found out and said im he used her and wanted to work on his marriage.

For 4 weeks he was remorseful but then i saw a shift. He started blaming me for failing in our marriage when i know he was the biggest failure in it.

I feel so physically sick that this was the person i was married to, that i have a child with. I feel affraid of them. I am so confused about how i was married to him and that he is capable of treating people like this.

posts: 4   ·   registered: Feb. 3rd, 2026   ·   location: Australia
id 8888857
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Pogre ( member #86173) posted at 2:33 PM on Saturday, February 7th, 2026

My wife can't drive because she has epilepsy and has seizures with just enough frequency, 3 or 4 a year, that it's not safe for her to drive. So I'm her chauffeur. On d day, I had given her a ride to her friend's house to hang out, but it was really so she could meet with her AP at his place, which was within walking distance from her friend's house.

In short, she had me give her a ride so she could sleep with someone else. So unbeknownst to me, I delivered her to him that night. Who does something like that? People who are so wrapped up in their selfish delusional relationship that they'll lie and deceive to get what they want.

When I figured out what was going on I was faced with minimizing and partial truths to try and cover it up, too. It's what they do. It's so cliche and common that we say there must be a mythical "cheaters handbook" that they all follow.

ETA: I haven't talked to anyone about it either, because it's just so devastating and shameful for me. I know it's not my fault, but I just can't bring myself to talk to my friends and family about it. These forums have given me a place to vent and I'm so thankful for that. Stick around, keep posting, and use us to vent to if you need it. It's helped me a lot to just get feedback and validation of my feelings. Just typing it out is sometimes cathartic.

[This message edited by Pogre at 2:38 PM, Saturday, February 7th]

Where am I going... and why am I in this handbasket?

posts: 476   ·   registered: May. 18th, 2025   ·   location: Arizona
id 8888867
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BondJaneBond ( member #82665) posted at 3:39 PM on Saturday, February 7th, 2026

Starant - do you have at least one close family member you can confide in? a good friend? a counselor? even if you journal, it might help to get your feelings out and your ideas down. And you have us too, there are so many people here, with different perspectives. We may say different things but we all do care and we want to help, each in our own way. I don't think it will ever be enough with what you're going through. The mindfuck (I hope you don't mind but I do swear occasionally) your husband is putting you through is something that makes you want to shout it out to the world just to assert and reclaim your sanity. This man is driving you crazy. I don't know, of course, what he was like before this affair but since this started, he's a nut. Like so many, if not most of them in affairs, they say and do things that don't make sense because they want impossible things. They want the safety and security of the marriage, they want to be with the spouse and children - but they also want the excitement and newness of the affair and the feelings that bring and the experiences.....BUT YOU CAN'T HAVE BOTH. You can't have safety and excitement at the same time. We have to make choices in life. If he refuses to make choices, then you have to make them for your own safety and security, for your own peace of mind. Even if you didn't have a child, you'd need to do this FOR YOURSELF. NO ONE has the right to treat you like this for any reason. You are a precious person with your own strengths, and goals, and feelings and value and no one should be allowed to shit all over you for his own selfish desires, whatever they may be. That is an ABSOLUTE.

He says shit to you, but I wonder what she would say if she heard how he views HER....as something to use sordid porn techniques on like a blow up doll. That's disgusting. I don't know what started this in him, I think modern porn is very very malignant and puts some really bad ideas and desires into people's minds. It's not "normal" sex anymore. A lot of it is violent, coercive and degrades people particularly women. Someone can't watch a steady diet of this crap without having their mind and soul twisted.

So he thinks he can have both at this point, this is called "cake eating". It's like having your cake and eating it too, which no one can do. And then he is erratic because he wants both so he goes back and forth. He says mean and cruel things to you because he wants to rewrite the marriage history and cast you as the villain as that means HE doesn't have to be the villain - you deserve all this! - and he's also trying to break up the relationship by being mean and rotten. And of course, he lies to protect himself and to create the image of himself he wants to have and project to the world.

You can't live with this, it drives people insane. There's a great old movie I often recommend from the 1940s called..."Gaslight"....it's where the term is from and it's the classic example of how a husband drives his wife mad, even though he may love her in some way because there's something else he wants more and he can't have both. He would destroy her to get the other thing he wants more.

What your husband is doing is crazy making and I'm not sure you need a lot of people to talk to right now, what you probably need to do is make up your mind and move forward with divorce if you haven't already. This isn't going to get any better, he will drive you more and more crazy and you will get weaker and more unhappy and sicker. The best way to end it is to end it - nobody wants to but you have to save yourself - both for you and for your child. Mama can't be driven crazy like this. Your child needs a sane YOU - Dad is inherently unreliable.
I think once you find a good lawyer, if you haven't already, and actually file for divorce and start putting formal, legal limits on how he acts with you and your child, you will start getting your power back and feeling better. The only way to end it is to take action. And recognize that it is NOT YOU who is crazy, or defective or wrong in this situation. THIS IS TOTALLY ON HIM BECAUSE HE CREATED THIS AND HE'S USING IT TO MAKE HIMSELF FEEL BETTER ABOUT HIS CHOICES. He's immature and apparently NOT marriage material. Don't go along with this.

Once you file try to have as little contact with him as possible, you can work out a schedule of child visitation, my guess is he won't stick to it anyway, but try to cut down your involvement to text messages, emails or a scheduling app - the lawyer can tell you about this. Don't do recon or counseling with him - only yourself, don't visit social media, don't have him at the house or have phone calls. Try to keep everything as cut and dried as possible as if you were dealing with a stranger who might back stab you. Because this guy is a stranger now. Divorce, as hard as it seems, is not only the best solution at this point, it's the only one, especially if you want to save you and your child. Time to toss the man baby out of the life raft! Life will get better for you after you file and you will regain control over your life and your emotions. You need stability and security and right now only you can give that to yourself. Cut him out as much as you practically can and don't listen to any of his bullshit and whining.

What doesn't kill us, makes us stronger. Use anger as a tool and mercy as a balm.

posts: 253   ·   registered: Jan. 3rd, 2023   ·   location: Massachusetts
id 8888874
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