I found out just today that they both cheated on each other and it's just a lot to process while being sworn into secrecy about the whole thing.
I think I would like details on how to handle it and how it's affected any of you as a person.
Sorry! I know you guys don't like trash accounts but I'm new to hubski and this shouldn't be the first thing you know about me. Also, you're not going to like what I have to say and I don't want it held against me later. I have a son with my husband and I am thinking about cheating. I'm not here for your support or your moral objections, but to shed light on your question from my standpoint as the parent. My son is 5 and I have been married for 10 years. My marriage is not full of hate, but it isn't full of love anymore either. My husband and I have drifted apart for the last few years for no good reason other than that he is not fulfilled with his career and though he won't say it I think he resents me for it. He has followed my career as I make more money and so we have moved a lot. That got in the way of him finishing school, though he could have if he really wanted to. He waited tables and bartended a few places, but honestly I don't have a problem with him not working in the same way I do. I like it, but I understand why many others wouldn't like my work. When I had our son, I took maternity leave for a month and then went back to work. He stayed home with our son and has been an excellent father to him. He plays with him during the day and takes him places. He teaches him things and though there are some days where I come home and nothing has been done around the house and they've just been watching TV all day, those days are few enough that I really respect how he runs the house when I'm gone. But getting him into bed is hard. I don't know if he feels emasculated by me because of our financial relationship, but I'm not dominating in our relationship, even in the bedroom. I honestly think that I just need sex in a way that he doesn't and it's a huge mismatch between us. It didn't used to be that way even years into our marriage, but now I just need some passion and the spark is gone with us. I miss getting hit on and bought drinks and being treated like something that was worth chasing. Now it's completely a physical thing and I don't feel wanted anymore. How much of my life and I supposed to spend sexless? I'm going to cheat on him because it will be exciting. I won't tell him, and he won't find out. The rest of our marriage is great, but there is a huge fault in sex department. For those of you that ask why don't I just leave? I don't want to lose my son, and I don't want to pay alimony and child support. I have looked into it and if I divorce my husband, I will pay him to live off of me for the rest of my life. I will also pay him to raise my son away from me. I work more than he does and our son has a better relationship with him. He will get primary custody. I'm not a bad mom though I'm sure some of you will think I'm being selfish. I just don't want to spend the rest of my life unhappy in a huge part of being human. Maybe I'll get it out of my system. Maybe I'll do it forever. I don't know, but I know that I'm hot and worth being wanted. I wanted him first but he doesn't reciprocate and so I'm going elsewhere.
I know many women who are in marriages where the husband eventually stopped putting out. I know a few men who's wives stopped sleeping with them after the baby. It seems like an upsetting and frustrating place to be in. I'm not at all critical of your decision, but sounds like you are readying yourself to spend the rest of your life together, maybe go see a relationship councilor and see if you can rekindle that spark, otherwise it's going to be hard to do that time.
Have you talked to your husband about the mismatch in your libidos? Mismatched libidos are not uncommon, nor are they easy to solve, but they can be worked through if both parties are willing to do so. It sounds like a relationship or sexual therapist might be very useful for you both, if you're able to get one. EDIT: You might find this Reddit comment worth reading.
I wasn't expecting to say this when I started reading your post, but go for it. Life is complicated and sometimes we have to do things we wouldn't normally do/don't morally condone because some situations are genuinely complicated and the alternative is worse than what you plan on doing. So good luck, and don't get caught because that will just cause a huge mess of things.
I did. It was excellent. Thanks for your encouragement.
Before this whole ordeal I was very black and white about how cheating is wrong and one should just leave if he or she intended to cheat. After hearing the reason my father cheated (he was angry about finding out he at the time was the other man and my mom had a boyfriend in a different country) I realized some people just have to do it. It doesn't make the action any better, but it makes it a lot more understandable and I see where you're coming from.
A few questions come to mind. None is a judgement; I'm genuinely curious. Do you think that things could have turned out differently if you would have communicated more fully, or in a different way? Do you think it could get better going forward if each of you expressed yourselves better? How do you think you would react if you found out he was sleeping with someone else?
I don't know how much better everything could be expressed. We can't just pretend that every marriage is fixable to be some dreamy life partnership where everyone gets exactly what they want. Some of them are just mistakes that you couldn't have seen coming. Sometimes you just end up with someone who you don't get everything you need from and I don't think it's fair that we expect marriages to function like that. I don't want an affair. I just want to go get laid. I already get the emotional support that I need from my marriage. I don't get other things. I want those other things. If he was sleeping with someone else I would be so angry, but it wouldn't be because he slept with someone else. It would be because he slept with someone else instead of sleeping with me. It's not like he has this exceptionally huge sexual appetite that I'm not satisfying. So if he cheated on me, I would be mad at him for denying me sex while giving it to himself. I don't think he will cheat though aside from the inherent lack of sexual appetite. If I'm thinking about our kid and divorce, I know that he is, and he wouldn't want to weaken his case for the lion's share of custody by cheating and getting caught.
I know the feeling. I had an ex whom I wasn't always faithful to for similar reasons. She always told me she didn't know what was wrong, but that she just wasn't that interested. You can imagine how pissed I was when I found out she was banging everyone but me! Can't say I've ever been that mad about anything. In the end, I think everyone is interested in sex, but not everyone is interested in sex with you. It's personal, no matter what the other person says. My situation was a lot simpler, because it's easy to kick someone out when you're not married and lack children. Yours is much more complex. Best of luck.
In short: maybe. My grandmother gave me an old family Bible about a year ago. Like most old family Bibles, it has notes about genealogy in it, going back to the early 1800s, and contuniuing to the '90s, although the Bible itself is only from the early twentieth century. Included in the family history was a marriage of my mom to a man I had never heard of. Based on stories from my parents, the only way I could make the chronology work is if my mom cheated on her first husband with my dad for a while. My parents broke up for about a year, and then it seems when she separates from husband number one, they got back together. It was another nine years before I was born, so no doubt about my parentage, but I suppose it is remotely possible I have an older half-sibling. What really amazes me is the length the family has gone to to hide husband number one. I have never heard him mentioned by anyone, and I'm not sure my dad even knows about him. As far as how this has affected me, it helps that it wasn't like most other cheating stories. But I do see my mom differently for sure, and I'm much more cautious about my extended family knowing they've kept a whole marriage a secret for so long. If I found out my dad knew, and for sure that my mom was cheating, I would definitely have to re-evakuate my moral upbringing, and it would likey drive a wedge between my parents and me.
If your family's reasons for hiding the whole event are similar to my dad's, it'd be to preserve the harmony between your familial unit. It's a lot easier to think Mom and Dad have just been the perfect match since day 1 instead of the rocky beginning they took time into covering up.
I'm not entirely sure, but I have a strong feeling that my dad cheated on my mom with his now fiancée/common law wife. They had been coworkers for years and while they didn't make their relationship public until after he divorced my mom and she divorced her husband, there were strong hints things were going on for longer. As for dealing with it, it was years before it finally clicked in my head, so that kind of helped me. I love my dad and mom and I know that even if he didn't cheat, their marriage probably would have ended around the same time, give or take a few years. For your specific situation you've gotten a shock that happens to everyone: your parents are just people, not the superhuman beings they always seem like. It's okay to be upset with them and to mourn this and possibly the end of their marriage, but remember that this has nothing to do with you.
My mom cheated on my dad and got pregnant with another guy's kid. It caused a really messy divorce including all the components of nasty divorces. I'm okay with it now. It was hard having my life so drastically and suddenly changed. OP just accept that your parents are complex people who are not even close to perfect. But they are still the people who did all the good things for you that they did and made sacrifices for you. Try not to be too harsh with your judgment.
Mom doesn't know I know she cheated, and dad told me everything including how he cheated. He doesn't want me to say a thing because it could unravel decades of a marriage that's been built on regained trust, and I completely understand that. Hubski's a good outlet for this.
Yeah and it sucked. I handled it by looking at what they've both done for me throughout my life, how they treat me, and recognizing that my mom cheating (with my father and my first stepdad, as well as stealing $90k from my father's mom) is between her and my father, her and my stepdad, her and my grandma. It really made our flawed nature hit home for me, but my relationships with them have not outwardly changed much. I haven't really dated since. I had a hard enough time trusting people before and I think this amplified it. My sister, on the other hand, blew up our family. She no longer speaks to my mother and has serious issues with my father's new wife, to the point where she can't even be in the same room with him. I believe it affected her much harder than it did me because she personalized our parents drama. Do whatever you can to not let that be you.
Thank you. I'm definitely trying to detach myself from the situation since they've still raised me lovingly from day 1 despite all the drama. Still my parents at the end of the day. That's the biggest thing I'm telling myself.
No, my biological mother and father were very loyal and loved each other. However, growing up, I've come to realize that my mom was probably a HUGE hippie back in the day. She was always so laid back, it wouldn't surprise me if she had a little pipe hidden somewhere in our old house. That's not to say she was a bad person, my mom was fucking amazing (may she rest in peace), she could pick up any non-percussion musical instrument and play it damn well within a week, and she worked from home so she'd always beat my video games before I did (despite my insistence not to spoil anything!) I know this doesn't exactly answer the question, but I guess I have a pretty wide concept of the word "cheated", i.e. my mom was probably an occasional smoker, and my dad served 7 years in the US Coast Guard, so he isn't exactly a huge fan of recreational substance use.
No, and I doubt they have. They come off as very staid people, but you never know for sure I suppose.
I also didn't believe they could do it. It's really shattered the whole image I had of them and everything they tried to teach me about marriage and faith.