I knew something was wrong in 2022. I even have a note in my phone that says ‘I feel like he’s cheating’. There was no concrete proof, nothing I remember now, but something triggered me to feel like that and I wanted to make a record of it in the moment. Time went on and we continued on our daily lives, but that feeling was stuck in the back of my head. It just felt weird between us.
Then, about 5 months later, I was updating our financial records (something I always managed) and I saw a hotel charge on his bank statement. I was shocked to say the least. I confronted him of course and he lied. He claimed he got the hotel for a friend because the friend was having issues with his girlfriend. It was a terrible lie, but I was caught off guard. I was panicking, this was my marriage. I went into a full spiral.
Instead of reacting outward, yelling at him and just holding him accountable. I think I went inward. Anxiety and fear of abandonment took over. I started to wonder what I did (of course, I know now it had nothing to do with me). I just lost it.
He also panicked. I think he thought I believed his lie – I didn’t. He planned a trip for us to go out of town. It was the first time he planned a trip like this in a while. I knew then that this was a cover-up kind of trip. He was doing exactly what I thought he was doing but I was too scared to believe it. I wanted to believe that what he was telling me was the truth. That he loved me and wanted us to be together and blah blah blah.
But it was all a lie…I just wasn’t ready to accept it just yet, even when she contacted me after our anniversary 3 months later.
We finished watching a show that evening. I normally stayed up later than him because he had to go to work earlier than me. He decided to head to bed, we said our goodnights and I started to watching something on YouTube. Then I got a text:
“I just wanted to get some clarification because I have been talking to [him] since March [2022] and we have been intimate also and I just wanted to get some clarity because he told me that he had been divorced for 7 yrs.“
Imagine my shock and surprise. Divorced for 7 years? We just celebrated 13 years married two days earlier. Since March? Wow..my intuition from months earlier was spot on.
Now, without going into details of what transpired exactly, just know that none if it was good, productive nor redemptive. Of course I confronted him; he admitted to it but he lied at first. I then saw what was in his phone, and it was worse.
But this is where I think my panic really set in. I was overwhelmed and heartbroken by what I just learned. By the layers of the lies he was living and I couldn’t look at anything rationally. I started making excuses for his behavior. I believed the lies he was telling me. I wanted to believe that this was just a terrible lapse in judgement or something. But, what I know now is this is a personality trait of his. This double (and triple) life he lives is who he is as a person.
This is where I started to take real inventory of my marriage, my finances, my kids, our assets, liabilities, etc. In the middle of my pain, I was wondering what life would look like if I left him. And in that moment, I wasn’t ready logistically. My finances weren’t there. We had 2 kids in college and 1 who just moved to their own place. I couldn’t afford to let my kids not have the financial support to finish school.
I was in grief but slowly formulating a plan to leave – if he did it again.
Yes, I know I should have left then. But I was hopeful that he would not do it again and that he would change. I thought that if he saw how badly this impacted me, he would surely not try to harm me again. Silly me. I believed in my husband.
So yes, we moved abroad after that. I think for me – hoping a change of scenery would help ups reconnect. Maybe for him, a different place didn’t bring those problems. I don’t know really. But the only thing that did happen is those problems (he created) followed us into a new country.
