My wife cheated and I’m having trouble deciding what to do.
A little back story,
We got married young at 23. We have 4 children: 15, 12, 11 and 6. We will be 15 years married this year.
We had our first child right away, and I can honestly say I was not ready. I was so immature and self centered. Embarrassed by alot of my actions. I was not a good helping partner, I did not help much at all with my first daughter in the beginning. As long as I was ok, that’s all that mattered to me because I was working and she was a stay at home mom so I thought that was enough.
Throughout the years we have had our ups and downs feels like it’s always been a roller coaster or good and bad moments. We had had our bickering and arguing.
A little over a year ago was probably when we were just not happy. We were not communicating effectively and letting our emotions and temper run the conversations.
I know I have come a long way, especially with helping with the children. I do all the drop off and pick ups with schools (3 different schools). I make dinner everyday and do house chores of course. I would say I’m a really involved father to be honest. I can honestly say I know I was feeling under appreciated and she was feeling neglected. Especially looking back now I can own what I did wrong and learn and grow from it.
There was a moment she just wanted to talk about work and I was focused on something I was doing and once she finished talking I said: ok are you done so I can get back to what I was doing. Instead of being genuinely interested in what she wanted to share. Which I regret.
There was a moment that she asked if we could go to married counseling. I told her no, that I didn’t want to go talk to someone about our problems. Which honestly looking back now was probably a cry for help and attempt to help our marriage.
After that last moment, we started getting into our ups. Camping, family events and activities, fishing. There was one night that I woke up in the middle of the night, put my phone on the charger and I had this weird gut feeling that told me to check her phone. I’ve never been a jealous or not trusting type so this feeling was just weird to me but I listening. I browsed through her phone and in her deleted messages I found lots of text messages with her co worker.
I confronted her and she denied it. Until I showed her what I found and she told me the truth.
That she had emotionally detached from me and she was contemplating leaving me to be with him. I know it was more emotional than physical but she did tell me they kissed a few times and would hug and hold each other. They never had sex and I can honestly say I do believe her on that.
It went on for about 3 months and by the time I looked through her phone and found out she told me she had broke it all off a week prior. That’s why his number was no longer saved in her phone. She mentioned she told him that she couldn’t do this and that I didn’t deserve any of this so she wanted to stop and focus on her marriage. That it for some reason it really didn’t work out that maybe then they can reconnect.
I know in my marriage what I have done and put her through. She stuck by my side, especially in the beginning when she could have left. It makes me want to give her grace. Also the flags/cry for help for wanting counseling and me just shutting it down. I can honestly see how she could detach from me.
But part of me is just not sure, the level of trust that was broken hurts. It’s been 8-9 months since i found out and we have been working on us. Things have been good. I can honestly say we are in a spot that I wish we had been the entire time. Communication is great. I can tell she is emotionally and physically attached to me. We have fun together and it’s back to like how we dated.
The thing is, I know and I’m taking ownership for what I have done and it allows me to give her grace and try to stick it out with her but it’s hard. I constantly have moments where I’m second guessing myself. Sometimes I feel like just an idiot for staying when she was planing on leaving me and starting a life with someone else.
I’m not sure if what I’m doing is right or I should be doing something else. I still love her, I don’t know if it’s too late. I also don’t want to mess up my children, I grew up with divorced parents and I know first hand what trauma it can cause.
tl;dr
I hope someone can provide some wisdom or insight. M
Thank you