The pandemic, job loss, quarantine, teens schooling at home, travel plans canceled, and the divisive culture put a huge strain on an already rocky marriage.
The “perfect couple” as everyone saw was struggling on a daily basis.
Last year, a small quarrel broke out, as I did not remember a conversation about a dog GPS tracking collar. This led to a mild exchange of “you never listen to” accusations that abruptly ended with my husband moving out and in with a woman “friend” who only the week prior I had accused him of having an affair.
I had grown suspicious of the relationship of 8 years (I have only met her briefly twice) when his visits with her got more secretive. My travel revealed more, with the GPS locating him at her house each time.
For the next 6 months, he lived with her while wanting to fix our relationship. He refused to acknowledge that I believed he was having an affair and that I would not be able to focus on our marriage with him living there. This situation also threw one of our teens into an emotional downward (scary) spiral.
After a scary incident, the “friend” reached out to me, opening the door for me to tell her how I felt. She swore she was not having an affair, saying, “I don’t do messy.”
Through emails and texts over the next few months, I told her that I did not believe her (she was not his first affair) and that it was inappropriate for him to be living there, and our teens too were uncomfortable with it. I told her that their living situation was crushing our marriage and our one teen’s mental health. I begged this woman to be a REAL friend to my husband, stop being an enabler and kick him out of her house.
She ignored me, even knowing that he had many options to live elsewhere – he makes a 6 figure salary; he could have gotten an apartment near us!
I am crushed. I reduced our relationship to transactional only and made my house limited to him. I told our teens they could choose their relationship with him but also to know that I believed the woman he chose is a terrible role model, and weak and that they need to be cautious of her intentions.
He is blaming me for corrupting his teens against him! And, he now thinks he made a mistake and wants to fix things. He is claiming innocence on the part of the woman and that she has no culpability for breaking up our marriage.