Topic: Empty inside

Hi everyone this is the first time I’ve spoken about this with anyone other than my therapist. About 4 years ago just after we got married my husband and I went through a very rough patch in which we were hardly talking, my husband was always playing games on his computer and always angry coming home from work. I would try to talk it out and get him to open up to me but he would never. Shortly after this I became friends with a work colleague this eventually led to an emotional affair which lasted about 5 months. Before it ended sexual text messages were exchanged (never photos) it was never physical but I ended it with him after feeling so disgusted with my actions and behaviour. I couldn’t believe how I acted looking back on it now I don’t recognise the selfish disgusting person I was but it happened. Because nothing physical ever happened I thought if I just turned all my guilt and shame into becoming an amazing wife and person it would be okay, I never told my husband. Few months later we got pregnant and I was so terrified he would leave me I never told him. Again I told myself work on yourself be a better person, go to therapy fix yourself be an amazing wife and mother. We now have two children and everyone is so happy i work so hard making my husband feel like a king and being an amazing mother. Except I feel like an empty shell of a human, I feel like inside I am broken and don’t deserve anything good in this life. I can’t believe how badly I hurt my husband and my family I’m so ashamed in myself. Every time I look at my beautiful children I just cry because their mother failed them so badly before they were even born. I’m am so scared if he finds out he will leave me and my children, my son is only 2 years old and loves him so much only wants him. I feel like I cannot tell him because I know he will leave me and it will tear my family apart, my therapist believes I shouldn’t tell him. My husband thinks I’m some amazing wife but really I’m just terrible person. I cry every single day, I can’t even look at myself in the mirror, I’ve lost my appetite to eat and I hate myself so much. Some days I thought if I wasn’t here everyone would be better off, the damage I’ve caused and the hurt I’ve caused is enormous and I don’t deserve my husband or this life I have. I think that If I wasn’t here anymore my husband could just remarry someone else and my children could have someone else worthy of their mother.

Hi Struggling 93

For what it is worth I would not mention it. I don’t think there is anything to be gained.

We all do things we regret. It doesn’t make us bad people. It just make us human.

We all deserve love and happiness in or lives. Don’t judge yourself negatively for trying to find it.

I believe that we all do the best we can with what we know at the time. If we are lucky we learn from our experiences.

Be kind, forgive yourself and move on with you new life. You deserve to be happy.

Hi Struggling 93

Maybe reaching out to someone gave you the perspective to look at your marriage in a different way.

In the end you chose your marriage. You could have chosen to leave but you didn’t.

It looks like you found what you needed to help repair your marriage. I don’t think you need to feel guilty about that.

Hi Struggling93,

Sorry to hear you are feeling so broken up about this time in your past.

I was on the other end of a similar situation a few years ago and I wanted to tell you that I don’t see my partner as a bad person for her behaviour and neither do I think you are a bad person.

At the time this happened I had been dealing with my own issues unrelated to the relationship. I had been bottling things up and consequently been quite neglectful of my partner and our relationship (as it sounds like your husband was). I started to see a therapist and worked on communicating some of the things I had been struggling with which helped me overcome a lot of guilt I myself had been carrying. This honesty prompted my partner to tell me about the emotional affair she had had with a work colleague while I had been acting distant in the relationship.

At first I was shocked and angry but I also came to realise what I had contributed to this situation. I hold no anger towards her and I love her more completely than at the time this all happened. We have a 1 year old daughter now which has changed both of us in many positive ways.

This is not to say whether you should mention anything to your husband. What is appropriate and how this will be received in the context of your relationship is only for you to decide.

It seems that your relationship is in a better place now and perhaps there is no need to dredge up the past. I do hope though that he has found a way to communicate more openly with you.

What I am certain of is that you are not defined by something you regret which happened 4 years and 2 children ago. As an above poster suggests, we are all just humans who sometimes do things we regret. None of us is perfect but we can all learn, forgive ourselves our inevitable mistakes and grow with them.

Hello Struggling, no matter how your contact with this person was, nothing actually happened, except for a couple of texts, but that's when you decided to pull back, you knew if it had continued then you would be in much worse state than now, and who's not to say that your husband could have done exactly the same, but 'bygones be bygones' is well in the past.

If you and a girlfriend are out having a coffee and someone walks past you, don't you both comment on them, and remember at that this stage you and your husband were going through a rough patch, which can happen in all marriages.

There is no need to tell him nor is there anyway you should feel guilty, you stopped it and now you have a loving family.

We all do things we aren't proud of, but that's how we learn to be a better person, so please don't let this spoil your marriage, you and your husband are the best parents your kids could have, so let this slide away.

Best wishes.

Geoff.

Hi HeapsFunguy

Thank you so much for you reply, I am so sorry if my post brought up any sad memories for you. I’m so glad you were able to forgive your wife, I’m struggling so hard to forgive myself. I’ve never done anything to hurt someone before I’ve always prided on being a good person. I guess I’m just struggling to comprehend how I let these events take place and not snap myself out of it at the time. I find it so hard to be happy every day knowing what an ugly person I am/was. I just keep replaying it all in my head wishing things were different and how my children and husband deserve better. I just keep praying for forgiveness and hoping for better days

Hi Geoff

Thank you so much for your reply, I appreciate you kind words even though I don’t deserve them. I can only imagine the state I would have been in now if anything physical ever happened I feel sick in my stomach to even think of that. I used to be happy within myself before this happened and now I just hate myself. I just want to move on and be happy again it’s so hard

Hello Strugggling, thanks for your reply.

We understand all the protocols, but you have realised your mishap and pulled yourself back, probably at the most difficult time, especially after texting sex messages, because if you wanted to continue on and take this further, would have been quite easy, but no, that's when you stopped it and this takes great strength and deserve credit in doing this.

Can I put you in another situation, if a child desperately wants a toy and when you tell them no, how does this make you feel, and would you relay this to your husband, may be or just let it ride it's way out and just disappear, and what would happen if your husband said to a female that she looks great in that dress, occasions like this happen all the time.

You are bright enough to understand that perhaps it may have gone a little too far, but you pulled away at the most opportune time, and please take credit for this, and by doing this has made you a much stronger person totally aware of any other situations you don't want to be involved.

Sometimes it needs us to establish these boundaries to understand exactly where we stand.

Take some pride and please let it drift away, your a good mum.

Geoff.

Thank you Geoff

I’ve been struggling a bit this week I feel like every thought I have is about this. I’m so worried my husband is going to find out and leave me. I feel so trapped and as if there’s no way out, he either finds out and leaves me or I stay feeling like this for the rest of my life depressed and full of shame for hurting the one I love. I’ve thought about leaving even not living anymore these thoughts are unbearable how could I have been so self absorbed to not see the damage I was causing with this “friendship”. I just want the pain to stop

Hello Struggling, you can't blame yourself here, because all of this started out by your husband coming home angry and then avoiding you while playing video games so you weren't getting the attention you required so it just happened by accident, you need to forget about what was said in the texts, surely this happens when a spouse is denied communication with her other half.

If you are with a girlfriend, do you make comments to each other about a certain male figure, I wonder whether this is any different than talking with the opposite gender, may be or may be not, and who's not to know whether your husband has been doing this with someone else, and that's why he has been ignoring you.

Can I ask you what would happen if one of your children had been doing exactly the same, because as a parent this may well happen.

During life we learn from making our mistakes and this will never change and once this happens when never think about what we did wrong, but try and increase our knowledge in what we do.

OK this did happen, but it's over, but you can't move forward if you have this chain locked onto you, it's an experience that will give you wisdom for the future.

There are many mistakes we all do during our life, that's how we learn.

Take care of yourself.

Geoff.

Hi Struggling,

Wow, it really sounds as though you are beating yourself. Yes you had an emotional connection with someone that you recognize you shouldn’t have, but your partner was also angry all the time and largely absent and neglecting your needs in favor of computer games. I’m not saying that one justifies the other but just pointing out that we are all human and make mistakes. And the fact remains that you never had a physical relationship with this person, which is most people’s definition of cheating. Usually I would say not to bother telling your partner as it was such a minor thing that nothing can be gained from it. But if this happened 4 years ago and it is still eating you up inside then I do wonder if you need to get this off your chest to your partner. I honestly think that he will most likely see the degree that this has affected you and forgive you, which is what you seem to need - forgiveness.