Husband is openly unfaithful

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MinnesotaMom said:
My husband and I have been married for 4 years. We have 3 children. 3 months into our marriage, with me expecting our son, he tells me he loves me but isn’t in love with me, that the love of his life is his old girlfriend (10 year relationship, she was married, he asked her to leave her husband and marry him and she said no, she is a few years older). I was devastated. We are Catholic, marriage is forever. I told hime I had enough love for both of us, and he said he would come to love me more over time. Every 6 months or so he hints at divorce. They have been in communication via phone and email and text the whole time. He lies to me about this, I confront him with proof (gathered from snooping), he says he can’t trust me and therefore can’t love me, and says he won’t stop communicating with her because he loves her and she is a true friend. The have seen each other a few times. Today I fould emails from this week where he said she “still takes his breath away” and that he loves her. My husband said to me this morning on his way to work that he loves me. We make love 3+ times a week. We are not young people- I am in my late 30’s and he is in his early 40’s. What on earth do I do? I love him, I love my children, and I do not want a divorce. I want him to stop.
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Well if wishes to be open about it take out a newspaper ad and tell the community exactly what type of person he is. Unfortunately being catholic you can’t divorce him.
 
Rascalking said:
No, you can’t, but goodness knows that If I ever did anything like that to my future wife, my dad would kill me.
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I have four sons (and six daughters) and I tell my sons that if one of them strays, he’ll find the other four of us on his doorstep for a “talking”. We’re in this a family. I also let my daughters know they are not alone and have lots of siblings as well as their parents to back them up.
 
ChosenAndCalled said:
I have four sons (and six daughters) and I tell my sons that if one of them strays, he’ll find the other four of us on his doorstep for a “talking”. We’re in this a family. I also let my daughters know they are not alone and have lots of siblings as well as their parents to back them up.
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That’s awesome…more families should be like this. :)*
 
I wonder if his still being in love with this other woman when he married you and intentionally holding back information from you would give cause for an annulment … It might be something to look into if he refuses to go to counseling and meet with your priest.
 
CAmeliaD said:
I wonder if his still being in love with this other woman when he married you and intentionally holding back information from you would give cause for an annulment … It might be something to look into if he refuses to go to counseling and meet with your priest.
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The key words here are could and might. The truth is that if this husband could get it through his head that love is a decision and not just something that happens to you, he could be having the real thing with his wife.

Love takes work, and right now he is putting all of his work into something that isn’t even real and isn’t even his.

He has a decision to make. I would ask him to make that decision, so that his wife knows where to put her efforts – saving her marriage or putting an end to the fraud.
 
The love of his life is another woman? You need to talk to your priest about how likely it is that this “marriage” will be annulled. It just doesn’t seem that a marriage under these conditions could be valid since he deceived you from the start.

You owe it to yourself to try to get out of this situation, and possibly meet a man who will not maintain a relationship with another woman. Even being single would be better than being with a man who loves someone else.
 
PeterMuz said:
First off, I am very sorry you are going through this. I will definitely pray for you, your kids and your marriage. You deserve to be respected and he is not respecting you. How can he tell you he loves this other woman, tell her “she still takes his breath away” and tell you he loves you when he goes to work?

I agree, he probably has some emotional issues in the past that he never worked out. Did his parents get a divorce?
I also agree that he probably feels like you will not leave him and he is taking advantage of that. I know you love him and you love your kids, but this has to stop.

When you make love, you are renewing your wedding vows. I’m not marriage counselor or Church authority, but if he is not willing to make that vow to you, then I would not make love any more. He promised to love and cherish you in those vows, something it sounds like he is not really doing now. He cannot have it both ways. He needs counseling and I would recommend that the two of you together get some marriage counseling. I would also find a good solid priest and talk to him.

I have heard so many good things about Marriage Encounter and I would recommend it. I would say that if you husband loves you, he will go on one of these weekends with you. That being said, it may be hard to get him to go even if he does love you, because he probably feel like he will be told HE needs to change all these thing. Lets face it, nobody likes to be told they are wrong.
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Marriage Encounter is for good marriages that need “tweaking” not for a marriages such
as this one. (LOTS of problems) There is Retrouville which is for marriages with
problems. I know a bit about both, but even with the latter, I think they need some one
on one counseling BEFORE. (Or two on one???)
 
First of all my prayers for you and your children. An absolutely disgusting situation you’re in.

Things to consider: If he is going behind your back and having contact with another woman, you have to realize his word on anything is absolute zero. It might seem to you that there are reasons to keep him around, income, security etc. but consider what this man is going to do to his own children by acting like that. His word to them - can that be trusted? Will this behavior lead to further arguments and fighting in front of the kids? You do know kids aren’t equipped to understand those things, right? They react with fear and then guilt because lacking any better explanation they believe they caused it. Then in their teens and twenties with the freedom to act the way they want, all this garbage comes rushing to the surface of their behavior.

I wouldn’t put my kids through that for some one who promised to honor and cherish and love you except when his “other love” is answering his emails.

Give him a choice; go with you to the Priest and try to work it out or get out before he causes more damage in everyone’s lives. Let him know you have copies of his communications with his former GF and he can be absolutely certain those will be in front of the family court judge while you are asking for him to be denied any visitation rights whatsoever in view of his conflict with your deeply held religious faith.

You both see the Priest or you see a lawyer. His call.
 
Rascalking said:
No, you can’t, but goodness knows that If I ever did anything like that to my future wife, my dad would kill me.
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.

Heh, my ex FIL just looked the other way and didn’t say anything. Their whole family is like that and really has no respect for marriage at all.

To the original poster: So long as you let him get away with this, he will get away with it.
I was married to a man who decided that he wanted an open marriage, and was in fact practicing an open marriage with another couple for years before I found out. I thought I could fix our marriage by myself. But I couldn’t. He was the finest of cake eaters. I finally worked up the courage and told him he had to choose: our marriage or no marriage. He walked.

I am in a much better place three years later. It was a soul-destroying marriage, especially during that time when I thought I could make things better. He didn’t care a wit about me or his family.

After my divorce, I went to seek a declaration of nullity. A church psychologist analyzed us both, and said the ex exhibits narcissistic traits (a fancy word for selfishness, if you ask me). I have just received the first affirmation for a decree of nullity. It sounds like you would have good grounds for nullity too, especially since he never gave up this relationship with this other woman, and has always been putting her before you and your children.

I now facilitate a group of separated and divorcing Catholics. There are way too many who stuck around in a dead marriage for much too long. Don’t waste the time you have left.

Marriage Encounter and Retrouvaille, both programs for married people, only work if BOTH are dedicated to saving their marriages.
 
I am so sorry - and my heart goes out for you. Personally I would give him some space outside the house living on his own without his kids to figure out what he wants. Speak to your priest and see if you have grounds for annullment. The other thing…If you know - so probably do your children regardless of what you think. Do you want your children growing up thinking this kind of relationship is OK and making his mistakes.
 
First thing I would do is cut him off… You make love to him 3 times a week and he treats you that way? There are faithful loving husbands who would die to have a wife who would make that much time for them.

The issue is that he obviously isn’t truly loving you, spiritually and physically, as he should.

I’m never one for divorce or separation however I would suggest he get some counseling to get over this person and focus on me or he should go to her because you are worth more than being his second choice.

I’m with WG… I was just stunned to read your post. As a guy please let me promise you most guys aren’t like this, it sounds like you are a wonderful wife and mother who deserves better.
 
jwashu said:
First thing I would do is cut him off… You make love to him 3 times a week and he treats you that way? There are faithful loving husbands who would die to have a wife who would make that much time for them.

The issue is that he obviously isn’t truly loving you, spiritually and physically, as he should.

I’m never one for divorce or separation however I would suggest he get some counseling to get over this person and focus on me or he should go to her because you are worth more than being his second choice.

I’m with WG… I was just stunned to read your post. As a guy please let me promise you most guys aren’t like this, it sounds like you are a wonderful wife and mother who deserves better.
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Sex should NEVER be used as a weapon in marriage.
 
jwashu is not suggesting using sex as a weapon.

Not giving yourself to a husband who is unfaithful is a logical consequence. It’s a reasonable behavior. It’s not the same thing as cutting him off because he doesn’t do enough around the house.

Her husband needs to pick. She’s got to stop letting him have his cake and eat it too. He needs to remember that SHE is the one that is his wife, not the fantasy from the past.
 
Wow…I am floored by this and I feel ill as well. I can’t believe any human being could be so terrible to another. I am not one to jump to conclusions, but I can’t help myself in this case. He is using you. This is emotional abuse at best. I would give him an ultimatum that he either be your husband and cut off communication with this other woman, or leave.

I also am no canon lawyer, but I think you have very good grounds for an annulment here. You shouldn’t be forced to stay in this, you MATTER and you DESERVE to be loved passionatly by a man who thinks the sun rises and sets with YOU. Your husband’s behaviour is completely unacceptable, no matter how you slice it.

I can’t believe he is acting this way. I am still completely shocked at all of it. Wow.
 
*It is sad enough, when you read a thread like this, about a woman who is doing everything she can to love her husband and be a good wife, and her husband is most likely cheating, and mistreating her every which way he can…and she still is trying to make things better.

But what’s sadder, is when someone tells a woman in such a situation, that she is at fault somehow and that she should keep sleeping with such a guy.

I have tears in my eyes when I read things like that. *

:bighanky:
 
estesbob said:
Sex should NEVER be used as a weapon in marriage.
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It’s called self-preservation about any possible diseases Dear Hubby might be bringing home to Faithful Wifey. Believe me, husbands like this don’t care if they infect their wives and are actually very good at blaming their spouses.

Unless this guy is truly willing to give up the other woman, there is no real marriage. It appears that there were three in this marriage all along, maybe more. Such husbands are not known for telling the truth.
 
You have given this man 3 babies in 4 years of marriage. Rather than be grateful to YOU for giving him children and the promise of future grandchildren and a family in his old age, he’s pining over another man’s wife who has given him a fantasy.

He loved someone else but he married you. How special.

:mad:

Go sleep in the kids’ rooms. Seriously.

Because you don’t have a marriage from what you’ve written. He’s not a man who respects the exclusivity of marriage. For a marriage to be valid, someone going into it must go into it with the the intent to have children, the intent for it to be permanent, and the intent for it to be exclusive. You don’t get a pass on two out of three ain’t bad.

He was a man who pined after someone else’s wife before he married you. He married you and as soon as you were married he informed you his real love was the woman he was going to pine over the rest of his life. And every 6 months whether you are pregnant or not, he lets you know divorce is his option.

Narcissist indeed! (It goes beyond selfish. We’re all selfish. Narcissists are like selfish taken to the nuclear level. A narcissist makes selfish people look like Mother Teresa. A narcissist lives like everyone around him or her is a bug to be squashed. A narcissist isn’t content just to be selfish, they have to destroy everyone else.)

This man has a wife and three babies and that isn’t enough.

Please go see a priest. While there is anything left of you to preserve. Before your children grow up watching daddy treat mommy like garbage.

Don’t keep giving him your body when he doesn’t want the most important parts of you… your mind and heart. 😦

Divorce is horrible for children. I would never suggest it except in the worst situations. But you need to find a way to reclaim your own dignity here. You deserve to be something besides some man’s second choice that he reminds you of every other day.

I"m so sad reading this. Seeing someone else’s hopes and dreams be crushed. You have children who need you to be whole and strong. Do what it takes to make that happen. Their father’s attention really is elsewhere. Take care of their mother. They need her.
 
Not much advice anyone can offer. Just try to work through the hurt of it all and keep up communication and try to work it out. Hopefully he will meet the issue half way and to working things out and protect yourself as best you can. An instance that if he’s out and about, don’t be afraid of using protection for yourself.
 
Still praying! I will offer up my suffering for you today. Have you talked to a priest or a family counselor?

I know everyone reading this can see how hard this is for MinnesotaMom and feels sorry for her. But instead us every arguing over what she should be doing or not doing, lets pray for her. Lets pray for her family and give her positive encouragement. Maybe you can suggest something, but after that MinnesotaMom needs to take all these ideas and process them herself.
 
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