missus has had an affair for three weeks.fairly tame-just kissing and that but still repeted lied to me and hid it.he called it off in the end and she was "gutted".she didnt want it to stop and would have ran off with him if he would have done the same.she was in tears for days because he is gone.
if i break up with her im totally screwed.i have two kids and id be renting and living on £100 a week.bike would be the first thing to go.
i really cant decide if i could forgive her and to be frank she hasnt once begged me to do so.our relationship was rocky before and we both didnt really make the effort.
we could try again but im woried it will just eat away at me over the years.everytime we get down to it, how do i know shes not thinking about him?
this is the very last thing i ever expected.
so have you been here? can you get over the hurt and ever truly forgive and forget? (especially forget)
please dont tell me to mtfu.i feel like sh@t right now.i need some serious advise and peoples experiences….

The Punctuation Police are gonna be all over this like a rash.

that sounds shite mate and I feel for you.

what's your gut feeling on it? generally its the right course of action even though it might be the hardest.

have you got any mates who can put you up for a bit? parents or other family?

If she ain't been making the beast with two backs it will be easier.

this

our relationship was rocky before and we both didnt really make the effort.

says to me that the "affair" was a symptom of what has gone wrong – not the cause

One for professional counselling if and only if you both want it to work again

Would she have done this if things had not been already rocky?

Congratulations on the use of a phrase from the 1500's, TJ!

I don't think you ever could forget. Whether you could forgive only you can really know the answer to that.

If it was me I know I couldn't forgive so I think I would have to walk away no matter how hard it might be financially.

Is she likely to do the same thing again?

Maybe it's worth using this as a trigger to get your relationship back on track; if that happens then great, otherwise may be time to call it a day.

TJ makes sense, though in my view however good it is afterwards, you can never undo what has been done – it's how you both decide to go forwards that makes the difference.

Time to sit down and be frank with each other. But not in front of the children. It's sh*t when you're a kid and your parents are in a mess, so sort it between you (either way) before hand.

You need to be reasonable now – get to the root of where it's been going wrong and either decide how to work out what's best for both of you or, better, consider professional advice on how to work through it.

Remember, the people most hurt will be your kids. Make sure both of you look after them above all else.

Good luck.

just kissing and that

How do you know this?

This:

missus has had an affair for three weeks

.

doesn't tie up with, this:

would have ran off with him if he would have done the same.she was in tears for days because he is gone.

My cynical side is saying she told you the least she thought she could get away with. I reckon I would always have questions/doubts and would have to bin it.
Not got kids or anything though, so not sure if that would change my view.

TJ gives the best advise – counselling, but it might be tough to get over. I'm sorry for you mate. If it was me I'd kick her out.

fairly tame-just kissing

Your definition of fairly tame differs greatly from mine

if she thought about shagging him, thats just the same as actually doing it.

and she very likely did, but is too spineless to tell you, not that you actually want to know………

You became her ex when she had the affair that she didn't want to finish. The bloke who cleared off is now, in her eyes, her most recent ex. I wouldn't believe for a second the idea that they didn't shag, though it's possible in some parallel universe I haven't visited. Time to sort the CDs out and move on, or forgive her and wait for the next affair. Sorry.

If it were just to two of ye then I'd show her the door – not worth the heartache of trying to winch the relationship up out of the mineshaft it currently resides in.
With a family, though, it's just so much more complicated. Most of us are going to put up with a lot to try and keep things together for the kids. How old are they? If you're both on the same page with putting the bairns first then I'd roll the sleeves up and start picking up the pieces. If she's baldly pining after another fella, though, it doesn't sound good.

How does divorce work in this situation – can you f_ck her right off out of it and keep the kids, because of her infidelity? [probably not :(]

i'd walk away, take the hit

i really cant decide if i could forgive her and to be frank she hasnt once begged me to do so.

Some real remorse on her part would be the only way I could comprehend working at it IMO.

I'll tell you to MTFU whether you like it or not.

Neither have been making the effort? OK, why have YOU not been making the effort? Relationships are a two way street. If you had made more effort would your wife have reciprocated accordlingly? Have you been negelctful? Be honest with yourself before sitting down with her.

She says she would have run off with him had the opportunity arisen but would she? 2 children involved. I doubt she would have dumped them.

As TJ said, it's one for the professionals but you both need to be fully honest with each other.

Oh, and good luck.

Walk away..She's probably thinking of him right now as she flicks the bean

Time to move on fella. When you've reached this point there really is no going back. Literally

I did about 18 months ago. Its been really really hard. Unbearable at times. But you have to take a long term view. No matter how much that hurts in the short term. Just concentrate on looking forward.

Staying together for the sake of the kids is the most profoundly stupid decision that anyone could ever make. This much I know. Nobody benefits. If you do, then neither of you will be happy.

If your citing finances etc as a reason for staying then that pretty desperate. The only thing that's important is your mental health. The rest will follow. Put up with the initial hit and move on with your life

Walk away..She's probably thinking of him right now as she flicks the bean

😆

leaving aside the punctuation, the only thing you've listed as a positive reason for staying together is financial – doesn't seem like a robust basis for an intimate relationship.

I'm surprised that you're surprised – if your relationship was rocky, and neither of you is making an effort to improve it, then it was probably only a matter of time before one of you started playing away.

I think Dear Deidre has a leaflet about this.

My opinion, if it was rocky before, it's over now.

yep we have two kids.
my gut feeling is to forgive.i consoled her first when she told me.it took twenty mins or more for it to sink in and then i broke down.
i found an email that is to a friend stating what happened and he got cold feet before it became sex.
we have previously been to relate and sexual counceling to try and improve the relationship.relate helped a little bit.
she says she felt an amazing spark with this guy that we never have had.i think that it would always be exciting as its breaking the rules and the spark would go in time.she thinks he was "the one"
it could trigger something good to come out of this.im going to change my behaviour and be a bigger better man from now on regardless of where i end up..

Why was it rocky before? Why were neither of you attempting to improve things?

I think you need to see this dalliance as a symptom of what has gone wrong in the relationship. You need to man up and accept some blame for what has gone wrong in the marriage. It takes two to tango.

How opld are you? She might be so upset because she thinks her last chance at happiness has gone and / or she has fecked up the marriage and not got anything out of it.

edit

this

it could trigger something good to come out of this.im going to change my behaviour and be a bigger better man from now on regardless of where i end up..

gives me hope for the future for you

Of course you can make it work – whatever it was that brought you together in the first place can be rekindled. Me and t'missus have had our difficulties and indeed separated for a year but got back together. 20 yrs later we are still together ( 30 yrs in total)

I am very much in favour of counselling. Its a good way of cutting thru the crap.

"Neither have been making the effort? OK, why have YOU not been making the effort? Relationships are a two way street. If you had made more effort would your wife have reciprocated accordlingly? Have you been negelctful? Be honest with yourself before sitting down with her."

chers coyote, you pretty right there man.

we have had the most honest,baring your soul chats about this.i fact all we do is talk non stop about it.calmly as well which is really weird..

Even on an issue like this people on STW still take the pi55 time and a place people.
As other says really your decision.
I suspect she is not telling you everything re affair. Willing to leave but only kissed does not add up to me.
No remorse make me think it will be harder for you to forgive and move on as she is not asking you to!
Seems a symptom of a poor relationship overall but above has not helped.
Try relate or walk away.

Walk away. I tried to work through a big betrayal once (not an infidelity though) and it WILL rear it's ugly head sometime in the future, then you'll wish you'd just walked away when you had the chance.

The kids make this very hard, but I don't think you'll ever get over this.

Best of luck mate, hope you work things out and don't lose too much…

:o(

Shocking punctuation junkyard 🙄

OP – Follow TJ's advice. Financial reasons aren't enough and will likely just mean it drags out to the same conculsion but over more time.

Staying together for the kids is a lousy idea. I was so happy when my dad (=serial adulterer) finally moved out & put an end to the constant arguements between him and my mother.

From what you have said I think you deserve better than her. If she was genuinely remorseful and wanted it to work with you it may be a different story but it sounds, on face value, that she did what she did and is expecting you to accept it simply because she admitted it to you.

Why did she tell you after he had called it off anyway?

i have to say im with you TJ. im 34 and shes 36.we have been together for 11 years but we have always been turbulent.we fought violently to star with got over that after a year and it got better but we have always bikkered and sniped.i never want to go back to bikkereing.that is a deff no. our sex life has been mediocre for some years and we have been taking each other for granted for years to.the kids and little money made it really crap at times(she also has three older kids who live with us so we botha re carrying five in total)
it could be a huge kick up the bum.but it could keep hurting.i also think give it a go again.whats the worst that could happen..id be on my own…thats about to happen anyway.maybe one last go at it after we both have had the shock of our lives…?

she thinks he was "the one"

Seems to suggest to me that in her eyes your not.

Im afraid to say if it was me i'd be thinking 'Eject, eject, eject'

we have had the most honest,baring your soul chats about this.i fact all we do is talk non stop about it.calmly as well which is really weird..

It's a start. Go with it. Things can be turned around if the will is there.

Good to see how many people on here view relationships and family as a disposable commodity…

it could be a huge kick up the bum.but it could keep hurting

I think she has already ufcked you up that one. Sorry.

Will you ever be able to make love to her again knowing that she's done what she's done?

If it was just a passionate fumble, I'd say that could be forgiven, but it sounds like she's fallen in love with this guy, or at least she thinks she has…

Telling ya mate, you're storing up a whole heap of anger that will manifest itself at some point in the future.

You don't want to be the next Michael Ryan/Derreck Bird do you?

Coyote – Member
Good to see how many people on here view relationships and family as a disposable commodity…

Pretty stupid thing to say. Plenty of people know that a relationship founded on fear of being alone/poor can be worse for all (inc kids) than a clean split.

Coyote – Member

Good to see how many people on here view relationships and family as a disposable commodity…

I think she's the one that did this…

^^^Agrees with Clubber

she was acting so weird.was suddenly really into me and sex with me.she was crazy and i was over the moon.i questioned it but she just bull shitted me etc.she says she wanted me becuse she felt so good as i said when upset that when we were shagging she was thinking of him.but she swears blind it wasnt so and he just made her feel alive and special etc and so she wanted me.
then loads of text messages etc etc.then suddenly she is all depressed and crying all the time.i kept pushing for an answer and being really supportive which made her crack and she fessed up.

To put it in a slightly odd way. If I were your doctor and I said to you:

"Your hand is ****, its never going to get better, its only ever going to be 60% useful and its always going to cause you pain for the rest of your life. However we can cut it off, its really going to hurt and continue to hurt for a year or so, but you'll grow another one eventually and that will be better."

Which option would you choose.