I’ve been with this woman for over 15 years. We’ve been married for 2+. 2 kids, one teenager and one toddler.
In April ’22, I went to the hospital, which eventually led to me being hospitalized for a rare form of blood cancer. I was hospitalized for three weeks. Those three weeks sucked being away from my 2 kids and my wife.
Especially hard on her since I took care of mostly everything around the house and now she was being forced to be a single parent while I was being treated.
On the day of my discharge, my wife admitted to me that she had been talking to her ex-fiance for support. She claimed I stopped talking to her and he’s the only one she can easily open up to. If this was as far as it went, I would have been fine with it..
Past
For some history, we had some fights six or seven years ago, where for a few weeks, we ‘took a break’ (this was prior to marriage). She told me she was leaving to go see him. For those few weeks, I didn’t really care. I was kind of done. So to my surprise a few weeks later, we have ‘the talk’ and asks what I want. I told her that I figured we were over and that’s what she wanted. Turns out that she decided to stop seeing him and said that we need to work on our relationship.
This felt like a complete 180 from what I was expecting. So when she didn’t expect it, I snooped.
This is the man of her dreams, soulmates, whatever. Even at this point where I’m at now, these two are made for each other. So why did she suddenly want to fix our relationship?
Through my snooping, I found out they were hooking up on the regular. Also read that she would choose him over me any day of the week without question. (I only found out within the last few months that she stopped seeing him because he was getting married)
I naively thought things would be better, so I stayed. I had my son to worry about at the time too….
After hospital release
Once I was home, it just didn’t sit right with me. During the night, I snooped again. I didn’t trust her this time. Especially when it involved him.
It started off innocently enough, with talking about my condition and how hard life was for her doing single parent duties while I was in the hospital.
Then it broke into how she missed him and their relationship, and he went all in on all the things that he missed about her. She sent him dirty messages. Talked about how much they missed f-ing each other. After reading for a while, I just couldn’t anymore. But the thing that hurt the most was reading… that she didn’t even miss me, just the fact that I wasn’t around to help in the house.
This broke me. For the next few nights, I made excuses to not sleep in the same bed as her. Told her I was too used to sleeping alone or the rigidness of the hospital bed.
After the first week home, she asked if she could go see him. She reassured me that it was all friendly. To not look like the possessive husband, I agreed. She could tell I was growing resentment.
So the next night, after some arguing, I finally told her that I knew and she was cheating. Of course she denied any wrongdoing. Until I told her I knew that she was sending him nudes.
Now
Here I am almost a year to the anniversary of my diagnosis. She leaves every other night after our youngest is asleep to see this man (who is going through a divorce now). I stay home and spend time with my eldest son and game.
I don’t love her anymore, but I care about her wellbeing. She has a chronic illness where if she doesn’t get her meds, she’ll die. So I can’t just get rid of her.
Truth is, I know I’ve just been a doormat the last year. But I know that going through a divorce is going to fuck me in the court system.
I seriously don’t know what to do. I have no one to talk to, as she essentially didn’t let me have many friends in the years we’ve been together because it was always ‘what about me while you’re out?’
There’s definite gaps I didn’t fill in here, and I apologize for that.