SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Hey everyone,

I'm not the best writer so I apologize if this is rambly or hard to read. I honestly don't even know where to start.

My partner and I have been together for almost 6 years. We have an 18 month old baby. I'm a man in his mid 30's shes in her early 30's. This is our first child. We were eachothers "first loves", we had dated for ~3 years previously in our teens.

Anyways... I found out on August 6th that she was in the midst of an affair with her best friends husband for 2 months. I discovered this by going through her texts one night after two months of excruciating intuition alarm bells ringing. I could feel her disconnecting and was very motivated to fix our issues and find out what was wrong.

Her best friend graciously opened up her home to us and would babysit our child while me and the spouse worked. because of this arrangement she spent a lot of time over at this friends house and obviously started to develop feelings for her friends husband.

Our relationship wasn't going great for the past couple years to be honest. In hindsight she started to be distant about a year prior to us having a baby. Nothing alarming but definitely noticeable after the NRE stage passed. Our sex life slowly diminished and prior to having the baby we were being intimate maybe 3 times a month on avg, sometimes more.

After she got pregnant we didnt have sex at all through her pregnancy. She had a few complications so we couldn't do anything post pregnancy for a while either.

This eventually became the "norm" and it was almost awkward and uncomfortable to approach the subject and come up with a resolution.

in the back of my mind I was blaming stuff on the COVID quarantine, change in hormones' due to pregnancy etc.

We ended up having a very deep heart to heart conversation about all of our relationship issues in June (in hindsight a week or two into her affair). I had renewed hope and was working EXTREMELY hard to mend our issues. Like I was being super man, working my ass off, providing for the family, doing the chores, being attenuative, always taking her out on dates, just generally being a better husband and partner. Obviously this was too late as she was already involved with this other man.

After the affair was discovered she admitted to being tortured by the lack of intimacy (so was I!!!!). But neither of us had a serious conversation about it somehow. I know, it sounds ridiculous. I think it is too.

I've always been so in love with her and basically was willing to "accept things as they are" and not rock the boat to upset her or make her feel down. I wasn't totally satisfied obviously, but getting to spend my life with the woman I've always desired, who gave be the GREATEST gift in life (a son). In my mind there were a lot of variables that could cause some of the issues we were facing (covid quarantine, pregnancy horomones, PPD for both of us etc)

Anyways, I exposed her affair right away to her best friend, the same night I found out. This other family is destroyed, they also have a very young child (a few months older than ours) they are divorcing. He's going to lose his house and everything. I feel a great amount of satisfaction when i think about his suffering but I still want to strangle him to be honest. He knew me personally and knew we had a young son.

So ever since the affair was exposed we've had tons of heart to heart talks. She appears to be extremely remorseful, she went NC with the AP, admitted what happened to her mom and sisters.Shes in IC, and starts with a new therapist in Jan.

Me on the other hand, I can't talk to anyone about this. I brought it up to the other betrayed spouse because I considered her a friend and she deserved to know what a piece of garbage her husband and my spouse are. But besides that I cannot tell anyone.

I can't even bare the thought of telling my father and mother who love my spouse very much, as if shes their own daughter. They are so proud we started a family and they have a grandchild. I am also horifically embarrassed by this situation so I dont want to tell anyone. I know this isnt good for my mental health or recovery but I can't seem to get over this hump. Nor do I really want to.

Now, since we've been having all these talks, she has committed to honesty and recovery. She has answered all of my questions adequately, admitted to things I wouldn't have found out otherwise etc. Then she came to me in October with a confession.... there was also another man..

According to her, just a week or two before starting this affair with her best friends husband she had a ONS with an old fling.

Now here's the thing, this other man is a guy she met through work when she was 19, he was 40!

Now shes in her early 30's and this guy is in his mid 50's. I'm honestly completely destroyed by this.

I could kind of understand how the other affair could happen, spending all this time with her friend and developing these feelings over time.

But this other guy? This totally threw a wrench in everything. How could she start this affair with her husbands friend, using the excuse that it was just sex and she just needed to have sex when she already hooked up with this guy?

I can't get the thoughts of my extremely beautiful wife having sex with this ugly old man. Its revolting and shocking. He's the same age as her Mom...

She tells me they have casually stayed in contact over the years, they have had sex a few times when she was in between relationships. Then she went to visit him to "catch up" and get advice on our relationship issues and he came onto her and she gave in. I cant even believe im typing this.

She is very embarrased by this relationship wtih this old man. While she was willing to speak to her mom and sisters about her friends husband, she cannot bring up this old man due to sheer embarrassment.

My spouse definitely has a slew of issues (myself too) we both come from messed up families and we bonded originally because we were the "normal" ones in our families who somehow made it through a rough upbringing and made a decent life for ourselves.

So here I am... The one woman I have loved since I was a teenage boy has completely destroyed me and shattered my heart into pieces. Only a year after having our first son.

I have cried every day since August. It is not mid december.

Prior to discovering this affair the only tears I shed in YEARS prior was happy tears the day I got to see my Mom and Dad hold my newborn son.

The complete 180 that has happened since that day has left me reeling.

I feel like this old man she initially cheated with has been around for longer then she admits. But maybe not, I have no evidence, I have to take her word for it somehow. in the back of my mind this could explain why we started to drift apart before the pregnancy, maybe he's been around the entire time who knows?

I did find msg's between them on Facebook and a Text. One was just wishing Happy Birthday and the other was him congratulating her on the baby saying "hes so happy for her and her little family!" then he goes and destroys it. Looking at the dates and timings of those text and the verbiage it did seem like they hadn't been in contact for a long time but who knows.

I feel suicidal. There is no good end for me here.

I am forever tied to this woman because of our child, I want to just disappear and never be seen again.

Help me please

I am very sorry for what you are going through. I am fairly new here so I am not sure how much help I can be but I wanted to write and offer you my support . What you are going through is traumatic and devastating. Your world has been turned upside down and you probably don’t know what’s real any more.
My DDay was around the same time as yours but I opened up to many friends and family. I regret having talked to certain people but for me talking helped me a lot. Since you are keeping it to yourself, I can only imagine how much turmoil you are in. There are some great resources online that might give you some insight. I am not sure i am allowed to share websites here on SI but it’s called affairrecovery
You will hear this a lot and it is true. Your wife’s cheating was not about you. She didn’t cheat because you lacked anything. She cheated because she’s lacking something. But I know this doesn’t diminish your pain. But I want you know know that you are not to blame.
Right now your emotions are going to be all over the place so give yourself permission to just feel whatever you feel. Be kind to yourself and allow yourself to grieve this tremendous loss of innocent and pure love. This is all so raw and fresh. You need time and space to think.
I would guess there will be more truth that comes out in the next few weeks/months but the fact she confessed to the ONS is encouraging. It shows me that she feels remorseful, guilty, and wants to be honest with you.
Good luck to you. I will be thinking of you.

Tiro, first, welcome. You're in the right place on the interwebz....

I hate to give you one more thing to be taking up mental bandwidth in the meanwhile, but reading this my first question was, are you sure you are the biological father.

[This message edited by WontBeFooledAgai at 9:37 PM, Wednesday, December 15th]

@dailygratitude

I hope your journey is going well. Thanks for the kind words. I'm pretty farmiliar with the resources available out there. I have been doing nothing but thinking about this since I discovered it in August. I'm probably focusing too much on these different programs / websites / subreddits etc and not giving myself time away from thinking about this crap, but its really hard not to obviously

@wontbefooledagain

That is my worst nightmare forsure. He does look like me, but I obviously want to make sure given what has happened.

I have sent out for some quotations on a paternity test which i will do by January.

The fact that I'm doubting my sons paternity is obviously very hard for my spouse to hear.

I have some unique physical features which my son also has so i'm pretty confident, but I feel like I can never be too sure given what has transpired. Thanks for your messages guys

[This message edited by Tiro91 at 9:46 PM, Wednesday, December 15th]

The paternity test serves two purposes. The first is obviously to determine paternity, which in this case seems might not be an issue. The second is to hit home the destruction of trust that you have for her now, which btw is totally justified.

I will say it’s a good sign she came to you with the details of the second affair you might never have discovered. The other issue is it sounds like this might have been more than a one time thing. I like you get the attraction to her best friends husband, but this seems like a long time arrangement.They quite possibly have been getting together to just fuck for years. What is she saying that would have caused her to cheat at this time with him. The reason I ask is it probably started long ago when he was younger and possibly more attractive, and this was a a walk down memory lane for her. I would tell her she has one chance of coming totally clean and you intend to do a deep dive into this.

You need to put her on a very short leash. For her to have had this affair under both your spouses noses takes a lot of work. Where was this all going on? How does she justify or even come to terms with screwing over the two people closest to her. I can’t imagine what the other BS is going through she was an amazing friend and your WW shit all over her.

I hope she realizes the damage she did. You may want to reconcile, but you need to make sure she knows how many lives she screwed up.

[This message edited by waitedwaytoolong at 10:58 PM, Wednesday, December 15th]

@waitedwaytoolong

Thanks for your comments. I agree with you about the paternity test, when I first told her she was pretty sad to hear that I doubted our sons paternity but she understood why I would think that.

I don't think she can justify or come to terms with her betraying the two of us. Especially her friend... she did nothing but help us and make our sons life better. It really is some sociopathic stuff which seems so alien to me, I've known this Woman for almost 20 years... She's always seemed empathetic.

As for where this was all going on... I got a full confession from the wife

It started at her friends house.. she had confided in her friends about our intimacy issues, the husband found out. My spouse says her friend told her husband but I wouldn't be surprised if she went to him directly, she did with this older fellow.

Towards the end of May he had made a comment along the lines of "too bad you cant find someone to have fun with that wouldnt say anything. I would but im married"

Then a week or so later she was over at that friends house. Her best friend (the OW) went to the store and left them behind. They had sex in his dirty garage while she was gone for 15 minutes... like wtf

Besides that it was a mix between our house, their house and even in his car. She would spend the night over there sometimes. I work from home but would go to work on Saturdays and she had him over a couple times.

They had sex in our bed and everything. I'm so destroyed by this it really is unbelievable I'm still here

[This message edited by Tiro91 at 11:14 PM, Wednesday, December 15th]

Sorry for the situation you are in.

You said you dated her when you were in your teens. So you were separated for about 10 years, why did your relationship with her end? And do you know what's going on in her life in the intervening time? Has she had another marriage or relationship, has she cheated on other partners too? How did you get back together, was she with someone else?

I'm asking these to make it easier to find an answer to the question in the title. Because everyone thinks they are special, like, the person we are in love may have cheated on someone else but will not cheat on us etc. Not true, of course.

The fact that she didn't just cheat on you but did it with her best friend's husband shows how lack of morals she is. She and her POS AP destroyed two families with little babies.

You did very good job by exposing them to OBS.

It's good that she confessed some things before you found out, but still she's a cheater and cheaters lie a lot. Your suspicions may be correct, her cheating on you may date back before her pregnancy, when you felt the distance.

By the way, having sex after a long break with someone you've had many times before is not ONS. Also, it wasn't spontaneous, it was pre-planned. That was her intention when she went there. It's bullshit that she said she went there to talk about your marital problems. Generally women don't go to another men's house to do that.

It's good to have a paternity test, it not only shows you the truth, but also shows her how your trust in her has destroyed.

Also, ask her to prepare a detailed timeline of her affaires during your relationship, to be verified by the polygraph test.

[This message edited by guvensiz at 11:33 PM, Wednesday, December 15th]

@guvensiz

We were seperated for 10 years yea. We were just young kids, it would be naïve to think it would last forever. We had a nice relationship but grew apart / were heading different directions in life. But years later found our way back to eachother.

She had a few LTRs in between, she has a pattern of being in longer committed relationships.

I asked her if she had cheated in other relationships and she claims that she hasn't. I say it doesn't feel too good to be bestowed such an honour but hey...

She has moved rather quickly into new relationships though, I think she's conflict avoidant and would rather just monkey branch then deal with whatever issues she is having in her relationships.

When her and I got back together she had just ended a relationship. She wanted to get involved but I actually tried to talk some sense into her, told her it's probably in her best interest to wait and find out what she really wants. She hasn't been single for more than a few months at a time since she was a teenager.

I told her returning to me is probably not the best idea, and it may just feel comfortable because of our history and how close our families are. I really did try to steer her in the right direction but she was adamant that she wanted to give us another try. Honestly I probably could've hooked up with her right away, but I wanted to do things right, and make sure she was making the right decision. As much as I wanted her, I legitimately care about her making the right life decisions and doing the best for herself. I want her life to be good and fulfilling

Over those 10 years I have always felt love for her. Definitely to an unhealthy degree. I suffered from One-itis, I didnt even care to try with other women, but I was resigned to the fact that her and I would never get back together again, then it happened.. funny how that works.

I agree that it is BS that she went there to talk about her issues. I have told her that straight up, and she admits in hindsight it was for the wrong reasons. ONS might be the wrong terminology my bad, but according to her it had been almost 10 years since they were last together.

I did find messages where they said stuff like "so hows work going? You still with x company? Hows the family? etc"

one in 2019 and one in 2020, so I dont think they have really been in close contact but you never know.

Hi OP, sorry you're here man.

You've stated several times in your post your deep feelings for your wife. And then she behaves like this towards you.

It seems you have an unbalanced relationship here... you worship her, she cheats on you.

You're in your mid 30s, prime of your life, decades of good life ahead of you. Think very carefully if you want to grow old with this woman, if you want to raise a family with this woman, if you want this woman to be the mother of more of your children.

Look you're reeling, but think about what kind of a role model she will be for your children.

Think carefully about what kind of woman would screw her best friend's husband, and break up their family. I'd have to say it was a woman who was very selfish, and the best word I can think of is someone who can be quite cruel.

I would tell your parents about this, bluntly that your wife has screwed at least two other men. Secrets like this can fester away... let them know who you're dealing with, what you're dealing with. Let them know her friend with a young child herself is now divorcing, that your wife is a homewrecker.

I think you're facing quite a difficult reconciliation of your marriage, if that's your goal. Your wife has behaved monstrously, for her to move back into the role of a dutiful wife and mother after all the excitement and drama of a serial cheater... oy, tall order there.

Be kind to yourself, you've been hit by an avalanche.

You did well informing the other spouse, that was kind of you and took courage.

[This message edited by SnowToArmPits at 12:28 AM, Thursday, December 16th]

@SnowToArmPits

thanks for your kind words bud, i really do appreciate it.

I agree its unbalanced. I obviously have deep, true, innocent, unshakable love for this woman, hell I still love her even though she did this to me and my son. Where on the other hand I don't see how she could possibly love me. I don't know what is wrong with me.

Its such a contradiction, how can you commit to someone and decide to have their baby if you dont care about them? It's not like she has monetary reasons to be here, its not like she couldn't find a more successful partner. She is GORGEOUS, she would have zero issues finding someone else.

But I don't want to give off the impression that I was a flawless partner, I mean we weren't intimate with eachother for almost 2 years.. thats not just her fault. I definitely just kind of accepted things for the way they were. But I also didn't spend enough quality time with her and was happy to dive into my hobbies.

I haven't been the best partner, I definitely neglected her in ways. But the love I had for her is still so deep. When I look back at the prior two years I am in shock with how I let things get.

when she approached me about having a baby, and then us going through with it and her giving me my son.. I can't even tell you how on top of the world I felt. The women who i've always loved, chose me of all people to father her first child.

I'm not super successful or rich or anything, I'm just an average Joe. She is stunningly beautiful and prior to these discoveries I would say she is a very warm, caring person. I seriously dont even recognize her anymore.

I've known her for ~20 years. I thought I knew who she was.. It is so very unsettling

The worst part is, even if we do split, she is still the mother of my son, and will still have 50% custody.

So she will still be a rolemodel to him, but then she will have some other man who will raise my son.

And I know how I will react. I will never get into another relationship again, so my sons entire experience of how a relationship / family should work would be through the lens of my wife and whatever relationship she ends up in next.

Over the past 4 months since discovery I've had some blow ups and told her we're done, started to arrange splitting assets and custody. She was completely devastated. I've never seen her in so much pain. I'm so confused by what she really wants and what these men truly mean / meant to her

I hate this

Tiro, this story is heartbreaking. The devastation that she has caused will be forever. She broke up another marriage (it might have ended anyway as he sounds like a real asshole) and now one family is blown apart, while yours is broken and will be for a long time, if not forever.

Read my profile. My EX also carried on her affair in our house and in our bed. Frankly it wasn't something I could ever get over. the sheer depravity of it. She screwed him right next to the pictures of us and our family. Who does this? get a room for gods sake. My hope is that they just did it near pictures, and not while your child was in the house. They may have been sleeping, or too young to notice if this is the case, but if this happened the the empathetic wife needs to really examine who she is. Really hope I'm not jumping to conclusions.

As for the house and bed, I hope you made her do the dirty work of getting rid of everything they defiled. If possible, I would move. What they did in the house will haunt you. I didn't move, and I had the means, and a wife who was begging me to. She knew me and knew that as long as I was there the place, and her, would be tainted. I wish I could say I stayed because of the happy memories as we raised the kids in the house, but I didn't. I stayed because I was stubborn and refused to be evicted by her and him. In hindsight, stupid, stupid, stupid. When we separated and I moved into another home we had it was like a weight was lifted off my shoulders. She hated the house too and couldn't wait to sell the second I gave the nod.

I also get not being able to reconcile what she did, and who she was. Im not in the mindset that all cheaters are serial killers in disguise. My wife for all of our dating, and marriage was great. She was in the local papers all the time for the work she did. Ands I know she did it for the deeds, and not the accolades. She couldn't have been the worlds greatest actress and fooled me for 25 years before her affair.

As for telling your parents, do it. It will hurt, and probably devastate them, but that will still be less hurtful than watching you as a changed man dealing with her and your family mortally wounded. People close to us know when something isn't right. Again, I did the exact opposite. I too told no one. My daughters who are smart knew something was drastically wrong and they suspected an affair. They just suspected the wrong person. I was the one more likely to have had one as I traveled, held an important job, and had young women vying for my attention. She was as described in the above paragraph the least likely one ever.

If she is humiliated and brought down a few pegs, so be it. Its called consequences. Your parents will love you, probably more as they will respond to your pain. If you decide you want to reconcile, they hopefully will be supportive. This is all of course a judgement call. You know the situation better.

What are you doing to make sure neither of these things ever happen again?

So sorry you find yourself here. This is absolutely devastating.

First off, please take care of YOURSELF first. Focus on staying hydrated, eating healthy, and getting in a little exercise. Taking care of your body will help you start a cycle that will allow you to take care of your mind.

You are getting the right advice in terms of how to move forward for a potential reconciliation which is usually re-establishing trust. Timeline w/ polygraph, paternity, digital transparency, no contact letter sent in your presence, etc.

In your case, she has essentially been lying to you for your entire (second/adult/current) relationship.

You wouldn't be re-establishing trust. You would be establishing trust for the first time ever, but with a massive caveat that this person has betrayed you and lied to you for 6 years. You are beginning a marathon behind the starting line. R will be a monumental task for you that I honestly wouldn't recommend in your case (but it's your decision).

You are already in a world of hurt, and I hope I haven't piled on here, but hopium kills.

@waitedwaytoolong

I just finished reading your story. I'm so sorry man... that is horrible. I can't even imagine, especially with older children who would be able to see what is going on.

I am deeply sorry for what you have gone through friend. You are very strong for how you've handled yourself, I admire your courage.

But yes, it happened in our bed once and on our couch once according to my WW. My son was home both times, but put down for a nap. They also had sex multiple times at his house, and as mentioned my son was being babysat there, so he was also present during those times.

She told me it only happened if he was asleep, he apparently came to my house once and my son wouldn't go down for a nap so nothing happened.

The depravity is disgusting and really hard to think about and accept. This is one of my biggest struggles.

We are unfortunately locked into a lease for another ~4 months but I will 100% be moving after this. Wether she comes with me is still uncertain, I don't know what I want to do yet. As mentioned she is in IC and I'm on a waiting list, so i'd like to explore this option first before making any final decisions.

Some days it feels like things are improving mentally for me, then suddenly i'll wake up one day and for seemingly no reason be right back at square 1. Today almost feels like DDay again, and I have no logical explanation for why

I know I should tell my parents. Here's the thing, they're actually divorced. Guess why?

INFIDELTIY.

My Mom cheated on my Dad, and my Dad had a revenge affair with the AP's wife. I was actually only made aware of this a few years ago by my Father after some digging. I still love them both very much and they were both very good parents to me, but yea..

My WW is also an affair baby. Her Mom cheated on her dad, got pregnant, tricked dad into thinking WW was his for a long time. What an absolute mess. These scars appear to be multi-generational. I can see how my WW views men through an unhealthy lens based off the way her mother and sisters have treated men in their life.

My WW has been utterly humilated. the OBS actually contacted all their mutual friends and spilled the beans, they were previous coworkers so she even reached out to all of my WW cowoworkers and told them what happened. It some ways it made me feel guilty for telling OBS but she deserved to know.

For some messed up reason I still feel a great deal of empathy for the hearthach my WW has had to go through due to her own selfish decisions

@This0is0Fine

yes that is what i'm struggling with.

How long has this stuff been going on? How long has she been deceiving me?

I'm a smart guy and pretty technologically competent. I have old iphone backups and have done some data recovery, went through old messages and all that stuff.

I do believe her version of the timeline with the affair with her best friends husband based off evidence i have found and OBS have found. My intuition also started going absolutely bananas during that 2 month span. Amazing how powerful intuition is, it was almost a sigh of relief when i found out, that I wasnt crazy and my intuition wasn't completely wrong.

This older fellow she has a history with tough i'm more unsure. But I did mention I saw msg's from 2020 and 2019 that made it sound like they hadn't been in contact for quite some time. But who knows.

I don't think she's been lying the entire time, but at minimum for that 2-3 month span. I've spent the last 4 months deep diving this story, even contacted both APs directly. I haven't been able to come up with any evidence that would prove her claims as false, but obviously based off her previous actions we all know she is a convincing liar.

Your world is spinning. I'm sure that is an understatement. But here's what you have to do. You now have a son. You have templates of what multigenerational infidelity can do to a person. Here's what I suggest. Give yourself one more day to grieve for the marriage that your wife unilaterally ended. Really bad things happen to all of us. After that one day live with your pain but wake up, put your pants on and start methodically checking off "fixing this" items off of the checklist.

There is nothing that you can do to fix her. So obviously do not start there. If you are in a waiting like for IC then get into another line. If your lease is up in 4 months then, on your own, start looking for places. You cannot get caught waiting there. Drink an ounce of water per pound of bodyweight every day. If you do not work out then walk three miles. By yourself pick up the couch that she had sex on and put it by the side of the road. Do not ask her permission or tell her that you are doing it, just do it. Speak with a lawyer to understand what things would look like if you ended your marriage. You are not in a position to be guessing outcomes, and there is a nonzero chance that this is the outcome.

Tiro, thanks for the kind words. It was rough. Especially being betrayed and blindsided.

I must say I can't have much sympathy for your WW. The need for sex trumping pure decency in respecting a family by screwing while you son and the other infant was napping is disgraceful. Im sorry, but in my book this is unforgivable. the only good thing (and it isn't good) is that you now have a huge trump card if you do get divorced and custody becomes and issue. No judge is going to see a fit mother in one that fucks her best friends husband while the kids are napping.

I know she probably thinks she did the right thing and deserves credit for not having sex while he was up, but it leads to a more disturbing thought. WTF was she doing letting him come over for sex while your son was still up? That is almost worse than than sex. Having him come to your house while you are away and having your son interact with him. Do you think before things blew up they were contemplating leaving the both of you and merging families? There are countless stories of other WS who had those plans. Most got blown up on DDay when one, mostly the men, runs like hell.

I also have no sympathy for her as she has seen first hand the destruction of infidelity in hers, and more importantly your life. She knew what she was playing with and the destruction she would cause, and she did it anyway. If she has lost respect in the community, so be it. She deserves to be shamed. Maybe not forever, but for now. You were 100% right to tell the other BS. Crap, she might still be seeing him on the sly if you didn't blow it up. Even more likely, she would have convinced you that for sake of propriety she needs to still be best friends with her. Imagine her best friend not knowing and having your WW shower her with affection. You did the right thing.

Lastly, your feeling of repeating D day today is natural. You are on this site dredging up this mess. It would be un natural if this didn't bring up emotions.

...we both come from messed up families and we bonded originally because we were the "normal" ones in our families who somehow made it through a rough upbringing and made a decent life for ourselves.

My Mom cheated on my Dad, and my Dad had a revenge affair with the AP's wife. I was actually only made aware of this a few years ago by my Father after some digging. I still love them both very much and they were both very good parents to me, but yea..

My WW is also an affair baby. Her Mom cheated on her dad, got pregnant, tricked dad into thinking WW was his for a long time. What an absolute mess. These scars appear to be multi-generational. I can see how my WW views men through an unhealthy lens based off the way her mother and sisters have treated men in their life.

I'm not sure anyone gets out of messed up FOO without some damage. The good news is that if you both want to reconcile this relationship there's no reason why you can't. You've expressed some reluctance to share with the parents and that's up to you really. You'll still need IC (individual counseling) though because it's just too damned hard to get through something like this on your own. You're going to need to talk, and of course, you can do that pretty freely here, but it's good to have some IRL people to talk to as well. There's also something to be said for being forthcoming in your key relationships. I chose NOT to share my infidelity experience with my mother and unfortunately, that decision cost us the closeness we once had. She died before I could repair that. So, there is a down side to NOT being open in your closest relationships. Give it some thought. I think you might do well with an all-hands on deck approach considering the florid nature of the family histories. I mean, seriously.. who among them is likely to be shocked or willing to throw the first rock? Sometimes, this experience can harden people, but often it can result in greater wisdom. It's your call. Yours are the boots on the ground.

It does sound like your WW is willing to work. I would recommend that you both start off in IC... her to work on her broken character and you to work through your trauma and grief. I would put off MC altogther and instead (and only when you're ready), go for sex therapy. Don't get me wrong... your WW didn't cheat because of anything you did (or didn't do), and that includes sex. The reason I'm thinking start with IC followed by sex therapy is that it can be very healing as a bonding tool in reconciliation. Most couples will fall into hysterical bonding as soon as they're comfortable enough to resume sex. But you guys have an established history of NOT TALKING about sex which led to not being sexual together, and while I think you could muddle through and be okay, I also think you could get a therapist on the job and be better than okay, like fantastic for the rest of your marriage. Think it over. Marriage counseling too early is typically a mistake because MC's tend to try and find fault on both sides. They like to be impartial and all that jazz. But marriages don't cheat. People do. People who have defects in their character.

Cheating is about the cheater. It's about their relationship with their own stated values, or lack thereof. We vow fidelity when we marry, but many of us don't really THINK about what that means as a core value. For those of us who are true believers, you can't make us cheat. It's not a choice in our decision tree. For the cheater though, those core values like fidelity/honesty are weak and permeable. Hence the lack of boundaries around them. They might have thought they were true believers, but when they were challenged, those values weren't strong enough to hold. So, part of a WS's work, as you might imagine, is reevaluating just what it is that they stand for and figuring out why they weren't the person they thought they were. There are so many factors that come into play, things like external validation, lack of empathy, selfishness, sometimes personality disorders. So, it takes WORK on the WS's part to make corrections. But the good news is that when a person really wants to change, when they want it more than anything else.. it's possible.

I know it hurts like a bitch and it seems like the pain won't ever end. But we're all here, and we've been where you are. It sucks and it takes TIME, like 2 to 5 years worth. But the pain is temporary and finite. You'll be okay. Believe it.

They had sex in our bed and everything.

I think unfortunately you are dealing with either a serial cheater, or at the very least certainly a long term cheater who seems to have been this way for the entirety of your marriage.

Or both.

On top of this, adulterous sex in the marital home is a special kind of hell. It compounds, complexifies and ramifies the damage. In the marital bed has to be the 10th circle of that hell.

You are only at the beginning of a long process.

I don't want to be discouraging but you should know right now that the triggering from sex in the home is going to be intense and long lasting. You're going to think of it every time you look at her for a good long while. Every time you stand in your bedroom. At the threshold of the door. When you are trying to sleep in that bed next to her.

I don't want to speak doom about reconciling but also to be realistic here.

Serial cheaters are not good prospects for reconciliation. We see tendencies for narcissistic traits, a sense of entitlement, a lack of self awareness, absent authenticity and general lack of empathy among most unfaithful spouses. Some unfaithful spouses can address these deficiencies. Some.

But these tendencies are magnified to chronic levels among serial cheaters -- and I would dare say among long-term cheaters.

And any cheater dumb enough to shit in their own nest has no idea how this devastates a faithful spouse.

Speaking as someone with some similarities to your experience, sex in the martial home is well nigh unforgivable. And this most certainly is, which also happened to me:

Having him come to your house while you are away and having your son interact with him.

Be careful going forward. Extricating yourself as a young man may be your best bet.

[This message edited by Thumos at 6:07 AM, Thursday, December 16th]

Stop blaming yourself for her infidelity.

Yes, definitely there were things you could have done better in your marriage. But you couldn't do anything worse than she did. And you didn't either.

You were in the same marriage with same problem. When the problems started to bother you too much, what you preferred was to talk to her about it and look for a solution, which was the right way. And look how she choose to cope with the same problem. Without sharing anything with you she directly did the worst thing with the worst people possible she could do. Moreover, after your supposedly candid conversation about your problems, although she could put an end to it, she didn't.

You should see her as she is, rather than putting her on a pedestal. I don't mean not to see her good features. But be realistic and objective. Beside this, the more you see her as a prize and unattainable, the less her respect for you becomes.

[This message edited by guvensiz at 8:39 AM, Thursday, December 16th]

OP, here's an observation from your posts.

You've written several times about how she's devastated, and you're feeling sorry for how devastated she is.

... careful here again with the imbalance in your relationship. 1) she should be bloody devastated, she's acted like a selfish shit to you, her son, and her friend. 2) You haven't written about how empathetic she is about YOU being devastated. Seems to me that you're the one who needs some TLC from their spouse now, not her.

Screwing your friend's husband, screwing him in your home, in your marital bed. For someone to do that, they're capable of very hurtful, selfish things. The disrespect to you here is very, very high. You want to hitch your wagon to this horse for the rest of your life?

You're also worried about divorce, another man raising your son. That's divorce, lots of couples and kids go thru it. In any event, seems to me your WIFE should be worried about another woman raising her son. Being miserable married to a serial cheater won't be a good environment for your son either.

If you reconcile, are you going to be her jailer, monitoring her? Not fun. On the other hand, trusting her at this point - why would you? She's shown you who she is.