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This story is an anonymous submission about a husband whose wife’s unexpected confession of an affair from 15 years ago shattered his peace and left him questioning their entire marriage.
Dear In Real Life Editor,
Over the past couple of months, my wife has become more active in her church group, prompting her to face her “inner demons” or so she says. Although I’m not a Christian, I have no problem with this, as long as it doesn’t affect the way I live my life.
But last week, she came to me with a grave look on her face, saying she needed to talk about something important. That day, our teenage kids were out with their friends and I was having a peaceful Sunday afternoon. All that changed when she dropped a bomb on me and ruined our happy family forever.
She started off by telling me that recently, she had been trying to lead a more devout life as a better Christian. In helping her do this, her Ladies Bible Study group and her pastor had encouraged her to ask everyone she knew for forgiveness over all her past mistakes – and she had one she needed to tell me.
Now, let me tell you about this earth-shattering mistake.
20 years ago, I married my ‘lovely’ wife.
Twenty years ago, when we first met and got married, my lovely wife was working at a local construction company as a secretary to one of the management heads. In that time, we had tied the knot, moved into a new house, and had our first kid.
Our first 5 years of marriage was pretty hard, I will admit. We were struggling financially, with a young kid on top of paying for a new house and car. We were working a lot of overtime hours, and I didn’t have the time nor luxury to put extra care into my relationship, like date nights or taking her on holidays.
However, I was positive that making these sacrifices were worth it for our family’s future.And it had – after I got a new job, our situation improved substantially.
I got better pay, which meant an easier life, and I could spend more attention on my wife. Our kids grew older and more independent, so I could take her out any night of the week. For the last 5 years, we have been blessed enough to take our family on overseas holidays. Life was good.
My wife had taken up training sessions over the weekend.
For the same reasons, or so I thought, my wife had started taking up training sessions over the weekend at her job. Little did I know that while I was slaving away at work, it turned out that those weekend training sessions weren’t of the corporate kind.
Yes, like a cliche from a bad blue movie, my wife confessed to me that almost 15 years ago – over a span of SIX months – she had been having an affair with her boss.
As I sat in silence, barely able to grasp what was happening, she started to share all the disgusting details of when and where it happened. In the officer, in his luxury car – the more she told me, the worse it got. I wish she had kept those details to herself.
My entire world came collapsing down. I kept getting flashbacks of the past 15 years – the good memories, the shared laughter, the romantic moments – they were all a big f***g lie.
When I asked her why, after all these years, she decided to share all of this, she said that apparently, her new circle had insisted that for her to be absolved from her sins, I needed to know the Truth with a capital ‘T’. Through some selfish desire of hers, she decided that telling me now would absolve her from her sins.
Then, and this is the real kicker – she said she hoped that this mistake was so long ago, and that I would “remember all the good times” we’ve had since then. I was about ready to throw out our marriage photos when I heard that.
I wish I had never found out.
At this point, I’m not even angry that she had an affair. I’m angry that she told me.
My life has been going well the past couple years – stable job, family and we live a comfortable life. And now, for her benefit of her guilty conscience, she messed with my peace.
I cannot get out of my mind, once the affair ended, how could she just go back to being in love with me. I felt like an idiot that was played and used for her own benefit.
I do not want to start over by getting a divorce, having to find new companionship and mess with the family dynamics since we have 3 beautiful children and it will ruin them.
At the same time, I can’t look at her the same anymore, and I don’t think anything will change that. Even looking at her face makes my blood boil.
If anyone has been through something remotely similar, your thoughts and opinion will help tremendously as I decide how to proceed.
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