Here’s my story.
Part 2
Where my story last left off, Claire had just admitted to me that she had, in fact, kissed our friend Paul, but that it was only after I had confronted her at his apartment.
As I mentioned in that post, I was just so thrilled about having my family back together, I was largely willing to look past it. Even more, I sort of accepted that it was my fault — that my insufficiencies had driven her into the arms of someone else. We went to Disney World and had a great time.
When we got back, things seemed somewhat better, but they weren’t the same. Intimacy still lacked, but I was just so thrilled to be with her. Again, this was ultimately my fault, and I accepted she would get back into it. Our 10th wedding anniversary was coming up and I thought I would buy her a beautiful new anniversary ring and plan a night out on the town for our anniversary in hopes of rekindling everything.
In July, we got back from her parents for the Fourth of July and had had a great weekend, I was really looking forward to our anniversary later that month. The weekend after we returned, I planned to go have some beers at my buddy’s house that I hadn’t seen in a while. Because we were drinking, I planned to spend the night there just so I didn’t have to drive home intoxicated. We had a great time that night, just drinking and sharing stories.
The next morning, I woke up with a tinge of a hangover with a text from Claire. “Hey, are you awake yet?”
“Just woke up, why?”
“Because I need to tell you something. I want to be with you like I said, but I feel like I can’t really move forward until you know the entire truth. I wasn’t honest about Paul. While it was true we kissed, it had been gone on a lot longer. And while it was mostly kissing, it was a few other things too.”
My heart, my stomach, just dropped into oblivion. For some reason the only thing I could say was, “What other things?”
“Well, I guess everything but actual intercourse.”
I switched from sadness, from disappointment, from hurt, to just actual anger. Just an absolute furiousness.
I actually don’t even remember what I said. I just said I didn’t want to talk to her right now. That I wanted to hang out with my friends and I would contact her later.
Throughout the day she sent me messages, begging me to come home, to talk to her about this.
Eventually, I conceded I had children, and I would go home to see them, and I guess “talk about this”, whatever that was. Interestingly, my kids were going to spend the night at my parents’ that night so we would have the house to ourselves.
After they had left, I wanted to know how long it had been going on. Since January or February. How many times did it happen? She didn’t really know, but more than 10.
Eventually, I just blew up. How could she just go to someone’s house while I was at work, on the regular, and give oral sex or receive it, or whatever else in god’s name they did? How could she gaslight me like that? How could she put me through hell to cover this up and let me question my entire reality? How could she say she loved me?
She assured me, she was wrong. She was guilty. She fucked up. That she wanted to work on us and that it was truly over and she wanted to move on. I told her to go to hell and went to bed in a different room.
The next few days are a bit of a blur. Looking back now, I was displaying the surefire signs of shock. It was all a bit of an out of body experience. I would yell at no one in particular, I would sob myself to sleep, I felt so much guilt at myself, but so much anger at her. I felt worthless, I felt unloved, I felt gross, I felt ugly.
And yet, there was part of me that didn’t want my marriage to end.
My parents are divorced and while their divorce was amicable and they raised a well-adjusted man, I just was always very anti-divorce. We had two young children. How could I possibly just…not see my kids as much? Over the coming days and weeks, I could tell how much Claire was trying to reassure me. For once in a very long time, I felt like she was choosing me.
But I was still hurting, painfully hurting. It was hard to get out of bed, knowing what she had done to me. It was a constant source of pain in my life.
But I also looked every day at my beautiful children. I owed it to them to try and make this work, right? I made a vow, a commitment to this other person, and it was for good times and in bad, and even if they dishonored their commitment to me, I still needed to uphold my end of the bargain.
She was, however, cagey about the details. I felt like I needed to know more about what happened. I wanted the intimate details. I wanted to know exactly how long it had gone on and why it had ended. But she didn’t want to live in the past. To an extent, I understood, why would you want to constantly revisit the pain you caused another person? But I felt like I was unable to move forward without.
Several months had passed and we were somewhat coming out of the rut. But there was still something missing. We couldn’t talk about my pain. It was like we were just “moving forward” without any sort of plan.
One day, I was sitting at my kitchen counter and her phone was on the corner. It pinged, and I saw it was an Instagram message notification for a an account that wasn’t hers. Or at least, not her public one. I pressed on the notification and read it.
She was still talking to him. They were talking explicitly. They were calling each other “my love”. She hadn’t cut it off with this guy, it was still happening!
I immediately walked up to her, handed her phone to her and said “I want a fucking divorce.” I texted the affair partner’s wife (who he had reconciled with) and told her what was happening.
Claire broke down. She begged me not to leave. Sobbing, she told me she would do anything she needed to do for me to stay. That it was over with him. That she was done.
I ignored her and went to bed.
I woke up the next morning, finally feeling like I had taken control of my life again. That I finally was able to face the world without hurt anymore. I checked my phone and saw an email from Claire, written around 4 am.
It was a long email, coming clean about what had happened and why it happened. Why she was wrong and why it was not my fault. That she had fucked up everything and that I deserved to know the entire truth. She didn’t want to just move forward, she wanted to grow together. She thanked me for being a wonderful husband and father and that I didn’t deserve anything that had happened. If I wanted, I could ask her any question I needed to know. She just wanted me to stay with her.
I went upstairs and asked as many questions as I could. I finally felt like I wasn’t in the dark anymore. I finally felt like I was capable of moving on. I just had to decide whether I wanted to do it alone or with her.
Come back to 2023 with me
Looking back on this moment, I realize how naïve I was. I realize that what I was about to embark upon was hysterical bonding. Where a shared trauma brings people together. It’s very, very typical and even normal post-affair. The person who did the cheating wants to reconcile so bad with the person they wronged, and the person who was cheated on wants to win back the affections of their wayward partner.
At the time, I didn’t know any of this. I just knew that the person I loved more than anyone in the world was finally choosing me. That maybe I was going to get the opportunity to be the married couple I always wanted us to be. That I would get to keep my family and have a happy, healthy marriage, and we could embark on a dream life together. We’ll come back and address all of this a little later, but back to the story.
Back to 2017
I decided I wanted to stay. She was telling me how much our relationship would change and that she was ready to grow how I wanted us to grow. We could do counseling together and we could be affectionate and we could regain the spark again.
Again, I wanted so badly to be loved. By this woman who had rejected me.
It felt different. It felt real. We felt like a married couple that we’d never been before. It was truly bliss. And for once, I was happy. And we would just now be happy forever.
Or so I thought.
End of Part 2
