A woman has sought advice after admitting she's afraid of splitting from her husband – despite him confessing to having a two-year affair with their mutual friend.
She told the Mumsnet community they have been married for seven years and share two young children – and explained her husband's infidelity took place between her two pregnancies. "She [the friend]'s also married with 2 DCs [dear children] – we've had dinner at their house numerous times and had them to ours, our children have played together, went to each others birthday parties etc," the woman explained.
"He was meeting her in his lunch break from work and having sex in the back of her car. He shares a mutual hobby with her husband so was often at their house in the evenings. Sometimes he intentionally stayed late and they had sex on the sofa while her DH [dear husband] and DCs were sleeping upstairs."
The woman said she'd had suspicions about the pair's friendship in the past, only to be reassured after her husband let her browse through their "innocent" messages to each other. However, she added: "Turns out they'd been using secret messaging in Messenger and WhatsApp for their more elicit stuff. My head is all over the place, I don't know how I feel. At the moment we're discussing couples counselling and trying to make a go of it for the children."
She went on to say breaking up wouldn't be straightforward as she has "zero family support" and wouldn't be able to raise two children on her income alone. "I'm a (relatively) high earner (but currently on mat pay) so wouldn't be entitled to any benefits but would likely end up spending every penny on rent and childcare.
"My children would grow up in poverty being ferried between 2 houses. My DH is actually a very hands on Dad so I can imagine he'd want 50/50 custody. I grew up poor without a Dad and I don't want that for my DCs. I also can't imagine sharing custody and not seeing them every day, they're my entire world."
However, fellow forum users urged her to leave her husband – despite the financial implications. "I couldn't get past this deceit on both sides," one woman explained. "You have a lot to unpack, take your time, but don't let him do all the right things now. Two years is a long time."
Another agreed: "Don’t rush. Take your time. But I don’t think you can salvage this. From what I have seen on Mumsnet if you forgive him he will quickly assume the role of the victim any time you are unhappy or suspicious. He will never really work to regain your trust and you will be stuck in a trustless marriage."
And a third added: "Please don't waste years of your life staying with him 'for the sake of the children'. You won't be able to trust him and you will be miserable. Children can be happy in an amicable co-parenting relationship. Far better than two unhappy parents trying to make it work and failing."
After digesting the responses, the woman later returned to her post to report that she is considering counselling. "Thanks to everyone for the replies, I can't sleep but it's making me feel less lonely reading these so thank you," she said. "I'm not making any decisions yet, I'm going to do some counselling personally and probably pursue the couples counselling regardless just to help process it all. I'm appreciating the responses though so thank you all."
