Dear Eva,
My husband cheated on me five years ago, but I only just found out about it last summer when I saw his old email account. He says the relationship was short, online-only, and “meaningless”, and he’s apologised. He says I shouldn’t dwell on it because we are happy now. We hardly ever fight; when I try and discuss it, I can see it irritates him, so I try not to. But I can’t stop thinking about it. It is making me question everything I thought I knew about our relationship.
Cat
Ugh, Cat, I’m sorry. A revelation like that can feel like a bad piece being pulled from your Jenga pile, something that not only threatens the very integrity of your tower but illuminates how wobbly the structure was to begin with. A handful of small wooden bricks! Hastily layered in a moment of glee! No glue, no cement, just the blind insistence that something tall must be built on the beer-puddled table, and now!
You say you hardly ever fight: perhaps you need to. Not fight, that’s the wrong word – perhaps you need to “communicate”, passionately, regularly, and occasionally with an element of ferocity, discussing what might be lacking in your relationship, or telling each other what you want, what you need.
I’m assuming you want to stay with him. But regardless of whether you do or not, in order for you to emerge from this whole and sane and without many small dry patches on your arm that you can’t stop scratching, he’ll need to help you trust him again.
It’s unhelpful, isn’t it, for him to try and brush off the affair, however “meaningless” he believes it was for him. Because it has meaning for you, and his inability to talk about it turns you into the irritating aggressor, poking him for information. He says you’re happy now; he’s not listening. For you to be happy, he needs to answer your questions. Which is not to say he needs to tell you every detail of the affair, describe every emoji shared or WhatsApp deleted, but instead be clear about such specifics as how it began and when it ended, and (more painful) what lies he told you to keep it hidden.
From there it should be easier for the two of you to lay the facts out across the coffee table and work out why it happened, and, if you do want to stay together, what might need to change in order to regain trust, and of course, to avoid it happening again. I type “happened” and “happening” with pursed lips, ever so careful not to lay every ounce of blame on him, despite really, really wanting to. But I am a grown up now, and see that life can be complicated and chaotic, with blame often an unhelpful ending. A small scream to a good friend however, might help clarify your internal position, and rinse out any residual bad feelings, leaving you better equipped to move forward in a way that will not leave you itchy. Good luck.
