So this is my story. My husband has had three emotional affairs. We call them emotional affairs because he swears he did not sleep with either of them. I'm not sure I believe him.
The first emotional affair was after we had been married for 3 years. He started coming home talking about this girl at his work, how he felt so bad for her because he husband treated her so bad and never sexually satisfied her. I think it was pretty innocent at first on his end and she knew exactly what she was doing. Mainly I believe this because he was telling me these things. He told me about how he told her that sexually satisfying his partner was important to him and such. Red flags immediately went off in my head. I didn't want to be that crazy person immediately jumps on any friends that are girls. I did ask him to be careful, that talking about sex with someone of the opposite sex, who is not your partner, might not be the best idea. He pretty much ignored me and later I found out that they were calling each other every night when I was at work. She brought her boys over to my house for Halloween, while I was at work. And she lived no where near us.
Obviously this caused conflict and after a lot of heart ache, he finally quit talking to her altogether
About three years later we moved and the same things started happening with another woman. This time she supposedly had been sexually assaulted as a child and she needed him to help her get over it. I found out because he left his Facebook up by accident and I saw an email to her that said I love you over and over, probably about 100+ times and was signed your secret bf. I asked him about it. She was a really good friend of the family so that is how he explained away the I love yous but then told me bf meant best friend instead of boyfriend. He apparently got worried he was caught, he couldn't not talk to this person because like I said she was a friend of the family but he did a really good job of backing off and didn't talk to her much at all for several years.
That leads us up to the big one. Same girl as the second affair. I knew something was going on. He started acting terrible to me. Said he wanted to not be married anymore, but his entire family is very religious so he didn't believe he could ask for a divorce, especially not if his cheating was found out. So he tried to get me to divorce him. He said the worst things anyone has ever said to me. The very worst being that I should just do the world a favor and kill myself.
I was trying to figure out what to do. I was 3000 miles away from my family and I was too embarrassed to talk to them about it. So I was all alone. He did agree to therapy, in which he swore over and over there was no affair, he just didn't like me anymore.
Then he accidentally sent me a text meant for this girl. So obviously it was all out in the open. He started acting like he might hurt himself. I called our friends over but he left before they arrived. I called his parents. They were 3 hours from us but were coming up. He stayed gone all night, and then early in the morning he sent me a text saying he thought he was dying because he had swallowed a whole bottle of asprin. I called 911. At the hospital he begged and begged me to stay with him. He took the asprin because he didn't want to lose me. He told his girlfriend to leave right in front of me and that he didn't want to talk to her ever again. And he hasnt.
It took me a long time to wrap my head around everything, eventually I told him I was moving back to be near my family. I have a huge family, they all made it very clear they didn't want to see him again. I told him I was going and it was his choice if he came or not. He did come. He got a lot of slack from my family but rode it out, now he has a good relationship with them. He tries to be as open and honest as possible with me. He put mobile watchdog on his phone so I could see all his email and texts. We are still in therapy, everything I suggested he has done. He was offered a work phone and turned it down and let's me look at his phone and tablet whenever I want. He calls or texts me when he is out, where he is, etc
He really seems to be trying. It has been 4 years since the last affair. I don't discuss it, other than in therapy, because I don't want to make him feel like I can't get over it. We connect well now, have a really good sex life. We don't fight often but when we do we talk it out, why we feel the way we feel. I actually feel pretty good about us.
But I still feel very lonely. It's not that he hasn't changed, I think he has, it is about me having to go through that, three times plus his hate texts he sent me during the last affair. My self esteem is still low, I am on wellbutrin to help that. But I feel like my emotions isolate me. Sometimes I still worry about other women. I feel like sometimes I build a wall between is, don't get too close in case it happens again. In therapy we have been working on bringing that wall down, but I worry a lot about getting too close to him to the point I will be heartbroken again if it happens again. He is really one of my best friends. We have been married 17 years. We have alot of fun together, laugh together, share adventures together and I don't want to give that up, but I still do feel like my fear isolates me and makes me feel very lonely.
Am I wrong? Should I still be feeling this way?
The first emotional affair was after we had been married for 3 years. He started coming home talking about this girl at his work, how he felt so bad for her because he husband treated her so bad and never sexually satisfied her. I think it was pretty innocent at first on his end and she knew exactly what she was doing. Mainly I believe this because he was telling me these things. He told me about how he told her that sexually satisfying his partner was important to him and such. Red flags immediately went off in my head. I didn't want to be that crazy person immediately jumps on any friends that are girls. I did ask him to be careful, that talking about sex with someone of the opposite sex, who is not your partner, might not be the best idea. He pretty much ignored me and later I found out that they were calling each other every night when I was at work. She brought her boys over to my house for Halloween, while I was at work. And she lived no where near us.
Obviously this caused conflict and after a lot of heart ache, he finally quit talking to her altogether
About three years later we moved and the same things started happening with another woman. This time she supposedly had been sexually assaulted as a child and she needed him to help her get over it. I found out because he left his Facebook up by accident and I saw an email to her that said I love you over and over, probably about 100+ times and was signed your secret bf. I asked him about it. She was a really good friend of the family so that is how he explained away the I love yous but then told me bf meant best friend instead of boyfriend. He apparently got worried he was caught, he couldn't not talk to this person because like I said she was a friend of the family but he did a really good job of backing off and didn't talk to her much at all for several years.
That leads us up to the big one. Same girl as the second affair. I knew something was going on. He started acting terrible to me. Said he wanted to not be married anymore, but his entire family is very religious so he didn't believe he could ask for a divorce, especially not if his cheating was found out. So he tried to get me to divorce him. He said the worst things anyone has ever said to me. The very worst being that I should just do the world a favor and kill myself.
I was trying to figure out what to do. I was 3000 miles away from my family and I was too embarrassed to talk to them about it. So I was all alone. He did agree to therapy, in which he swore over and over there was no affair, he just didn't like me anymore.
Then he accidentally sent me a text meant for this girl. So obviously it was all out in the open. He started acting like he might hurt himself. I called our friends over but he left before they arrived. I called his parents. They were 3 hours from us but were coming up. He stayed gone all night, and then early in the morning he sent me a text saying he thought he was dying because he had swallowed a whole bottle of asprin. I called 911. At the hospital he begged and begged me to stay with him. He took the asprin because he didn't want to lose me. He told his girlfriend to leave right in front of me and that he didn't want to talk to her ever again. And he hasnt.
It took me a long time to wrap my head around everything, eventually I told him I was moving back to be near my family. I have a huge family, they all made it very clear they didn't want to see him again. I told him I was going and it was his choice if he came or not. He did come. He got a lot of slack from my family but rode it out, now he has a good relationship with them. He tries to be as open and honest as possible with me. He put mobile watchdog on his phone so I could see all his email and texts. We are still in therapy, everything I suggested he has done. He was offered a work phone and turned it down and let's me look at his phone and tablet whenever I want. He calls or texts me when he is out, where he is, etc
He really seems to be trying. It has been 4 years since the last affair. I don't discuss it, other than in therapy, because I don't want to make him feel like I can't get over it. We connect well now, have a really good sex life. We don't fight often but when we do we talk it out, why we feel the way we feel. I actually feel pretty good about us.
But I still feel very lonely. It's not that he hasn't changed, I think he has, it is about me having to go through that, three times plus his hate texts he sent me during the last affair. My self esteem is still low, I am on wellbutrin to help that. But I feel like my emotions isolate me. Sometimes I still worry about other women. I feel like sometimes I build a wall between is, don't get too close in case it happens again. In therapy we have been working on bringing that wall down, but I worry a lot about getting too close to him to the point I will be heartbroken again if it happens again. He is really one of my best friends. We have been married 17 years. We have alot of fun together, laugh together, share adventures together and I don't want to give that up, but I still do feel like my fear isolates me and makes me feel very lonely.
Am I wrong? Should I still be feeling this way?