(The following is a contributed article obtained through an interview.)

Even now I just don’t understand how selfish and inwardly focused my wife became during her affair. We didn’t have a perfect marriage but I would have never imagined her ever sleeping around and neglecting our children but she did. It still seems like a nightmare that someday I may wake up from.

Shortly after I learned of my wife’s affair and that she had been sleeping with another man from our church, I hired a divorce attorney and private investigator. My wife had threatened to take our kids away and to take everything away from me. I was shocked and confused. Before COVID-19, we seemed to have a “normal” marriage but in wake of learning of her ongoing affair, I realized I didn’t know her anymore. She was mean and vicious. It wasn’t pretty.

One particular winter night, in the middle of a blizzard-like storm, my wife left when we were all asleep and headed over to her affair partner’s apartment for a sleepover. She braved extreme conditions to travel to his apartment. She returned just after our kids were ready to go to school the next morning. They asked where she had been and she told them she got up early and left for the club to exercise.

At the time, I was aware of her deceit since we had home security cameras situated around our home and my private investigator had tracked her down at her affair partner’s apartment. I didn’t say anything to my children since such news would hurt them and their relationship with their mother.

My private investigator had already documented several of my wife’s sleepovers with her adultery partner but this one had a particular impact on me. My wife had left me and our children to go sleep with another married man. She had braved a severe snowstorm for her night of sex with another married man.

My children’s mother chose to risk her well-being to travel through a severe storm to have sex with her affair partner — a man who valued her for sex and showed total disregard for me, our children, and my wife’s life and reputation. What type of a man would ask or even allow his mistress to leave her children home alone to travel through a severe snowstorm so he could have sex? A selfish and self-absorbed man. An unfaithful married man who had been cheating on his wife as well.

I realized then that my wife deserved such a man. She deserved a man who was as selfish, lost, and broken as she was. She deserved an unfaithful and uncommitted married man who betrayed his wife and children. She deserved a man who valued the ‘free’ sex he got from her more than her, her family, her life, and her reputation. The problem was, that our children deserved a better mom who wouldn’t risk her life or abandon them for infidelity and lies.

Recovering from Infidelity

If you have experienced infidelity-induced trauma caused by the emotional and sexual betrayal of your spouse, there is hope! If you are a child affected by parental infidelity, there is hope! If you are a spouse who has betrayed the trust, love, and fidelity of your marriage, there is hope! We recommend that you seek support through professional counseling and therapy as well as through groups dedicated to supporting you through this traumatic journey to recovery. You are not alone and recovery and healing are possible!

Share Your Story

The CHADIE Foundation shares personal stories of spouses and children impacted by infidelity and affairs. If you have a story you would like to share and have published, please use the contact information below to share your story with The CHADIE Foundation. Our mission is to help educate everyone about the damage infidelity, affairs, and adultery cause families and how to minimize the impact.

About the CHADIE Foundation

The CHADIE Foundation (Children are Harmed by Adultery, Divorce, Infidelity, and related Emotional trauma), helps spouses, partners, and children who adultery, affairs, and infidelity have negatively impacted. To learn more about CHADIE and how you can help, please email us at support@chadie.org or visit us at CHADIE.org.