About 6 months ago I found out that my partner of 2 years had a series of infidelity encounters with a couple of women - slept with an x colleague, had been messaging women to keep in contact ‘maintain friendships’, chat to them and grew a close relationship with his cleaner which turned into a couple of compromising sexual encounters and conversations.
When all was revealed, he took accountability and we seeked help from councellors and a life coach etc, to dig down and do some work on what was going on. Since then he has done absolutely everything possible to work on our relationship and keep me and ensure that trust is being earned back in the smallest steps. Eg. Transperancy with his phone, cleaning up his social media accounts,deeper conversations, holding space for my anxious meltdowns and communicating so much more. In some ways our relationship is much better now than it was before. He says he love me and wants a life with me.
It was identified that he has an unmet need of seeking validation from women… largely attributed to his childhood relationship with his own mum.
He’s now aware and doing the work around self validation etc and not needing external validation.
I’m a believer that people aren’t bad, but they do make bad decisions.
It’s all still relatively fresh and I’m wondering what the long term future really looks like .
Are there any positive examples where couples have recovered from infidelity and been able to fully trust their partner again and live a long happy healthy life with them ?
Looking for feedback with kindness and love .. no judgment please or unkind comments
15 Replies
I stayed with my ex after I caught him cheating when I was pregnant with our first child but i shouldn't have. So much time wasted, trust is gone and I had no respect for him. It got so mentally draining that in the end I didn't care what he was doing, he cheated again and I didn't even care I felt relief that it was a reason to end the miserable life we had. Having an excuse doesn't make it better, you can seek validation without having sex with someone. There are people who like to look good for exactly that reason, they like being validated and appreciated by opposite sex but they aren't fucking everyone either.
Hmmm my ex was transparent too after he was caught .... until I found out he had a second phone and was still fucking two other girls via it.
You just have to make sure you’re not trying too hard to see the good in him past the bad that is hugely damaging to you. Set the bar that you’ll walk next time and make sure you do it, or you’ll have a long life of misery trying to be his fixer of this.
Remember, whatever his reasons are for cheating, he's still a grown adult man that has control over his behaviour and knows right from wrong.
Be careful of justifying/excusing his behaviour away, make him accountable.
If he does this during the honeymoon phase, imagine at 7 or 10 years when it really gets mudane/stale....
18 months in, I honestly would have ended it, but I'm in my 40s and don't have time for that crap.
Same. Once is enough. If he wanted help, he would have got it, had it, been getting it etc. been upfront with you about it from the start. This one is a cheater doing what all cheaters do once they’re caught. And they put on a good show to make you think they really want the relationship. It makes you feel good. But what you do know about him is that once he’s got you in, he will deceive you while he cheats, to keep you in the relationship. That’s the relationship he has always been offering to you.
The trust comes entirely down to you 🤷♀️
I have friends who have moved past cheating, but do they TRUST their partners? No.
They don't dwell on it every day, because they'd go crazy, but every time their partner is late home, held back at work, out with the boys, or out of contact, or on their phone a lot, they immediately get paranoid and anxious.
You say you "found out" 6 months ago - you don't say how long it went on for before you found out.
Given you'd only been together 18months, I'd suspect it probably went on for almost the length of your relationship 🤷♀️ so he didn't stop acting single just because you came on the scene.
Did he get guilty, decide to change his ways, and confess to you? Or did you "discover" it, confront him and back him into a corner? I think that makes a difference as to accountability.
Of all the guys I've met who admit to cheating (not my boyfriends, by the way, I mean acquaintences and also in a professional sense so there's more than a few) I've never met one who only ever cheated once.
Mostly it's not about the sex. It's about their own ego, about a lack of *whatever* in their relationship so they feel justified, and some just plain get off on the thrill of it, and they learn to lie and hide it better.
I've certainly known men who have said "I've cheated on every woman I've ever had except for my wife" - so there's that. And they openly admit it's because the previous girlfriends lacked something in the connection or the relationship, so the man wasn't that attached to them, so didn't feel guilty about cheating.
Whereas they all also said "I knew my wife was perfect from the first minute, so cheating never crossed my mind".
I honestly think that getting past it comes down to you. Are you prepared to take the risk of having your entire world pulled down around you again?
One woman I know "moved past" her boyfriend cheating. They worked on it for a few years, counselling, all of it. Then he started acting secretive again, hiding his phone etc. She became a raving mess. Turns out he was actually buying a ring & planning his proposal to her.
She turned him down and broke up with him because she realised that every single time he held back, she would immediately assume he was cheating, and it broke her head and her heart, and she was never, ever going to 100% trust him again.
You say "people make bad decisions" - yep; but change that to word to CHOICES.
He CHOSE to message other women, he CHOSE to have sex with other women; he CHOSE to do this with multiple women; he CHOSE to continue doing this, lying to you and hiding it from you until you caught him.
Only you can make the decision here. And if you're the sort of soft-hearted person that genuinely sees the best in people, and blindly believes what people tell you, then think again. And again. And again.
First 2 years is still honeymoon period. How will he cope when you're married long term and life takes over/some boredom presents? Sorry, he might be a wonderful person, but I don't think he won't do this again in the future, no matter how committed he is to fixing things now
I couldn’t get past it and left and never looked back. I also didn’t accept any of his piss poor excuses about growing up. The tears, the sorry’s. The only sorry was that he got caught. Good for you, for trying everything that it takes but unfortunately it doesn’t last long and it’s something that scars you for life.it works for some but the majority of people I know, it hasn’t, including myself. I’m sorry you are going through this and I hope you can heal in time, what ever decision you make. It’s a shit thing to go through.
In my case, I feel it made our relationship stronger, and no I'm not condoning his cheating.
It made me look at our relationship, and the things I ignored, the signs he was displaying that felt felt unhappy and unwanted, I too delayed these things. Our lack of communication between us led to a relationship breakdown.
Both of you need to want to fix this, you both need to looks deep into wants and needs, find compromise, and truly fight to save this relationship
Thank you. I feel that it has the potential to as well. Our conversations are so much better than before.
My fear of it happening again is pushing him away though and he’s exhausted by putting in work when I’m so anxious.
Can I ask what steps you took to rebuild trust?
How did you know that he was remorseful?
Any insight would be greatly appreciated? 🙏🏻
Different poster... "your fear is pushing him away" - then he needs to lean in! Let him be exhausted. This is all up to him now. You don't build trust - he builds trust. Every action, every day. Look past the words. They mean diddly squat. What is he doing? How is he treating you? I don't mean love bombing. Consistent, transparent, caring, respectful, wife-centric behaviour. You've told him what you need and he needs to do it. It can take years to rebuild trust and be lost again so easily. It's like a staircase with landings. It's up to him 100%
Such a new relationship you still should of been In honeymoon stage , so the fact other women had his attention would worry me. And what happens when he thinks he’s all better, can’t do counselling forever. Get bored, have a fight, feeling down, he may turn to that life again.
2 years you’re still learning about each other, but you should be the only woman he wants validation from and attention etc. and it’s not like it was with just one person, one off. I couldn’t do it. I’d always wonder and always be sus.
But good luck and it’s good to at least try and give him a chance
Yes it can! It takes a lot of work but can be done! I found out after I miscarried our second child that my husband had cheated on me. It absolutely broke my heart and me! It’s been 2 years since I found out. My husband was fully transparent with me. Answered questions when I needed to ask them and worked with ME through it in whatever way I needed. I still to this day will ask questions if I need to but my trust in him has grown a lot. Is it back to we’re it was NO but it slowly will day by day. Do I get worried sometimes yes but I’m only human and will tell my husband when I’m feeling insecure about something he is doing or am worried. We have since had our second born child and I feel like we are so much better now then we were before as we are both more open and honest about things. At the end of the day only you can decide if you want to work through it just don’t let other people get into your head! I can honestly say we are much more happy together as a couple then we were before
Only 2 years in and he has already cheated on you with multiple women and needs other women's attention to feel validated.
How is he going to feel when you have children and all your attention is on the new baby that needs you?
Is he going to go outside the relationship again because he isn't your main focus?
You are better women than I as he would be out the door. The trust for me would never be able to be regained
I stayed with my partner. He cheated multiple times, one was a “friend” of mine. We’ve got kids together and it was a hard decision, but I stayed. He showed genuine remorse and made significant changes and I do believe that he still regrets it. In some ways our relationship is better in terms of communication but the trust is never fully rebuilt if I’m honest. For myself, I do love him and he’s good dad but I’ve already been through the worst, if that makes sense. I’ve accepted that I can’t control his actions, if he chooses to do that again that’s on him and I can’t do anything about it. I do know that it probably wouldn’t hurt me as much and I would be out the door if it happened again. But I would be fine.