My husband is in love with someone else and wants to leave me for her

[C1234]

I am completely broken inside and have nobody to talk to as I don’t want family or friends knowing what’s going on but losing my mind. I just recently discovered my husband is having an affair as he left his phone open on messages & fell asleep. I approached him about it and he admitted it’s been going on for almost 4 years. 4 years ago we were separated due to Covid and while he was trapped in our original home country and us in Australia his dad passed away. Whilst this happened I had fallen into a rut and was drinking a lot and got drunk and wasn’t there for him when his dad passed away and I fought with him in my drunken state. I also worked so hard that I lived past him when after 10 months of being apart from us he was finally able to come back to Australia. I then continued to drink and hurt him pushing him away from me by my actions and fighting all the time. About 18 months ago I stopped drinking and changed my ways as he was ready to divorce me then. I also have a son who was a nightmare step son to him. This woman met him while he was in a very dark place and became friends with him supporting him through all the tough times. He is in love with her as they became friends and then fell in love. He has claimed that he is physically attracted to me way more than her and it’s an emotional bond they share which he can’t give to me as I hurt him so much. About a year and 3 months ago I fell pregnant and his reaction was not good. We since had our baby and I have just found out about this going on and I don’t know who to turn to. We are still intimate sexually in a big way but he is shut off to me emotionally and I’m afraid he leaves. I have completely changed, stopped drinking etc and want to work on our marriage. I used to be very stubborn, defensive and very disrespectful however I have worked hard to change all those traits and I have been showering him with affection the past 15 months. Just need to get this off my chest and see if anyone can offer any good advice 

[therising]

Hi C1234

While I have absolutely zero interest in meeting anyone else, I can offer the perspective of how it feels to emotionally switch off in a marriage. I still live with my husband of 22 years but it's more so a marriage of convenience in some ways. While I see it as convenient, my husband's disappointed I'm not more emotionally connected to him. I mention all this just to set the scene and perhaps lead things to be relatable in some ways. How the switching off began was through an ongoing process of disappointment. I appointed my husband a lot of roles in our relationship, only for him to disappoint himself from many of those roles in a number of ways. Some of the ways he'd disappoint himself from the roles of 'my partner in problem solving', 'my partner in emotional support', 'my partner in constructively guiding our kids', 'my partner in adventure' and so on would be

• through drinking
• through saying 'That's just not me' (in other words, not being willing to develop parts of himself)
• through saying 'I don't want to talk about it'
• through saying 'I'm not interested'

and so on. Over time I eventually learned or taught myself to stop giving him the roles I wanted him to fill, as it was better for my mental health. Pretty much the only key ones left are 'my partner in generating a joint income' and 'my partner in intimacy'. Of course, there a handful of smaller roles that he accepts from time to time. When I mention a marriage of convenience, the 2 key roles I mention are convenient for the both of us. We both relate to them, we both can fill them and we both reap the benefits of them. They're not inconvenient for either of us.

How would I become more emotionally switched on after facing years of disappointments? I'd say the only real way would involve my husband being willing to bring out or connect with the best in me. I have a wonderer in me that loves leading me to wonder and research, an adventurer in me that leads me to dream of adventures, an emotional eater in me that leads me to long for trying amazing foods and places to eat out at and there are so many other parts of me that lead me to thrive. If my husband helped fuel them to life, I would feel alive with him and more connected to him through sensing what it feels like to be well and truly alive. I could not help but embrace him while feeling loved by him, which leads me to...

Something my daughter woke me up to a year ago or so was the idea of the 5 love languages. While my husband is a 'words of affirmation' and 'physical touch' kind of person (with I love yous, kisses and hugs), I'm no longer that person in our relationship, based on emotional disconnection. These days, I'm more so an 'acts of service' gal. I bring people to life through how I actively serve them. If someone I know needs to feel more alive, I'll give them what they need in order to experience that feeling. While it's not a criticism, just an observation, my husband remains largely all talk (of love) while believing more hugs and kisses will make a difference in our relationship. If you were to research 'the 5 love languages', what would you say is your husband's love language? In other words, how does he feel love?

I hope your husband has taken into account how your mental health was impacted during the months you were separated and how challenging things were for you too, especially when it comes to raising a child without him there. The added challenge of an affair and the challenging emotions that come with being a reformed drinker (such as the guilt and regret) means you need to be served in many ways that are going to make a positive difference to you too.❤️

[C1234]

Thank you so much for your reply. I have had nobody but him to talk to. My husbands biggest complaint was that I didn’t spend enough time with him and he wanted us to be closer. I also fought with him a lot and had a very stubborn, defensive nature. He always told me he needed closeness but I worked too much and left him feeling as if he didn’t matter. He did ask me to go back to South Africa in 2020 but I being the main visa holder was adamant that we needed to make a sacrifice to get our permanent residency first. Looking back now, I know he was struggling mentally and emotionally and I should have gone back. He almost took his life and he dealt with his father’s death on his own as I was drinking… I have overwhelming guilt and shame over that. I think I drank a lot as I had a delinquent teenager who was driving me insane and I was single parenting (granted it’s his step son) so therefore he was my problem but this also added extra pressure to our marriage. Not to mention my family caused a lot of trauma in my husband’s life by their actions too. I have not drank now for almost 18 months and have really changed my attitude, stubbornness ect and been really humble… my husband has acknowledged the changes in me but keeps saying it’s too late, he needed the change before the door opened to this friendship which turned into an affair and now he doesn’t want to hurt anyone. I have poured out my heart about how sorry I am for everything and have literally been serving him, showering him with love and affection. He always said sexually there was nothing lacking as we are great in that department but we lacked connection. I am trying so hard to connect with him and have been for the past 2 years but he is emotionally shut off to me and is investing that side of him into her. She lives in South Africa and he works there so now every time he goes back there I will now know he is spending time with her… this plagues my mind constantly. He has even been sharing pictures of our kids including our new born baby with her and I feel that’s hurtful… it’s our kids, she was only just born a few months ago. This woman is willing to wait for him and what baffles me most is that she calls herself a Christian but is having an affair with a married man. I don’t know how to deal with all this pain trapped inside of me. I have been so nice to him even after I found out about the affair via his phone, I have blamed myself for everything, treated him lovingly still, give him so much affection, still intimate with him at night but I feel like outside of the bed I don’t get any affection back and it’s killing me, I don’t get referred to as angel or baby anymore or anything affectionate… all the affection is coming from me. Wondering if I keep showing up and putting more of me in and if it will eventually cause him to fall back in love with me. He says he still loves me and is still deeply attracted to me but he is no longer in love with me and emotionally invested.